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A COLLECTION

OP

HISTORICAL AND OTHER PAPERS
BY
REV. GRINDALL REYNOLDS, D.D.
TO WHICH ARE ADDED
SEVEN OF HIS SERMONS.

^uiltgJjeb ig tfie lElJttot.
CONCOED, MASSACHUSETTS. 1895.. ¦

University Press:
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, C. S. A.

Cat J^

EDITORIAL NOTE.
TT was my Father's desire and intention, had
the leisure ever come to him in his busy life,
to collect in more permanent form his historical
papers, some of whicb had already appeared as
magazine articles.
Wishing to carry out this plan of his, aud en
couraged to do so by the iilterest expressed by
many of his friends after his death, I have col
lected and had printed the following papers.
Several of his sermons have been added, with
the feeling that they might be valued by those
who had listened to his preaching.
Eev. Edward C. Guild has very kindly ren
dered valuable assistance in preparing these
papers for the printer. ALICE EEYNOLDS KEYES.
Concord, Massachusetts,
September 15, 1895.

GRINDALL REYIS^OLDS,
BoEN December 22, -1822; Died September 30, 1894;
Was descended from the family of the Puritan Archbishop of
Canterbury, Gkindai,, whose name he bore. He was kin
to those stalwart divines and first ministers of two of
the oldest Churches of New England, — John Wilson, of
Boston, and Thomas Weld, of Kpxbury.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Portrait of Eev. Grindall Reynolds, D.D. . Frontispiece
Editorial Note  "i
Introduction by Hon. George F. Hoae  ix
Autobiographical Sketch of
Rev. Grindall Reynolds, D.D. xiii
Printed in the Harvard Graduates' Magazine, September, 1894.

King Philip's War; with Special Reference to the
Attack on Brookfield in August, 1675  1
Read before the American Antiquarian Society, October 21, 1887.
Siege and Evacuation of Boston  23
Printed In the Unitarian Eeview, March, 1876.
From Ticonderoga to Saratoga  54
Printed in the Unitarian Eeview, November, 1877.
Three Episodes of the Northern Campaigns of the
Revolution  80
Lecture delivered before the Concord Lyceum, January 23, 1878.

vi CONTENTS. ConcorD, FAQE
The Planting of the Church in Concord .... 104
Paper read in the Meeting-house of the First Parish in Concord,
March 1, 1891.
The Church in Concord: its Period of Personal and
Theological Dissension  125
Paper read iu the Meeting-house of the First Parish in Concord,
March 8, 1891.
The Story of a Concord Farm and its Owners . . 147
Lecture delivered before the Concord. Lyceum, February 1, 1883.
Concord Fight  174
Printed in the Unitarian Review, April, 1875.
Concord during the Shays Rebellion  195
Written during the year 1877.
My Memories op Concord in the Great Civil War . 245
Paper read betore the Old Concord Post, Grand Army of the Eepublic,
March 17, 1886.
A Fortnight with the Sanitary  268
Printed in the Atlantic Monthly, February, 1865.
S0isttllmtou& |0aper0.
Chevalier Bayard : A Saint and Hero of the Mid
dle Ages  282
Lecture delivered before the Concord Lj'cenm, January 10, 1894.
Francis Drake and his Times  305
Lecture delivered before the Concord Lyceum, January 26, 1870.
John Calvin  327
Printed In the Christian Examiner, July, 1860.
Saints who have had Bodies  3g4
Printed in the Atlantic Monthly, October, 1865.
Our Bedouins : What can we do with them ? ... 394
Printed In the Unitarian Review, August, 1877.
Memoir of Grindall Reynolds, Senior  422
Printed In an Account of the Seventy-first Anniversary of the Providence
Association of Mechanics and Manufacturers, February 27, 1860.

CONTENTS. vii
FAOB
The Plague of the Heart. October 4, 1868 .... 428
Wells of Baca. September 28, 1879  . 437
But. April 4, 1880  440
Beauty for Ashes. .June 3, 1883  454
Tongs of Pure Gold. September 17, 1893  46^
Sermon at Baltimore. October 29, 1893  474
The Power of Jesus' Life. January 7, 1894 .... 490

Among Dr. Reynolds's other printed papers were the
following : —
Disco0ese preached at Jamaica Plain, July 21, 1850, on the
death op Zachart Taylor, President op the United States.
Discourse preached on leaving the old Meeting-House at Ja
maica Plain, West Roxbury, Massachusetts, March 20, 1853.
The Moral Oppice op the Teacher. American Institute of In
struction, Angust 21, 1855.
The Kationale op Prayer. Monthly Religious Magazine, July, 1858.
English Naval Power and English Colonies. Atlantic Montlily,
July, 1863.
The French Struggle for Naval and Colonial Power. At
lantic Monthly, November, 1863.
Mexico. Atlantic Monthly, July, 1864.
Colonel George L. Prescott. July 18, 1864.
The Laib Insurrection in Jamaica. Atlantic Monthly, April, 1866.
Borneo and Rajah Srooke. Atlantic Monthly, December, 1866.
Parish Organization. Monthly Rehgious Magazine, July, 1867.
Abyssinia and King Theodore. Atlantic Monthly, June, 1868.
Sermon in Commemoration of April 19, 1775. April 18, 1875.
The New Religion. Unitarian Review, Angust, 1879.
Concord: Drake's History op Middlesex County, 1880.
Ecclesiastical and Denominational Tendencies. Unitarian Ee
view, May, 1889.

INTEODUCTION.
THIS book contains a few examples of the work of
a faithful, busy, and useful life. Dr. Keynolds
was first of all, and above all, a Christian minister.
He was a man to whose intellectual and moral nature
faith, and not scepticism, was congenial. He accepted
without misgiving the religious belief known as Unita-
rianism, substantially as it was held and preached by
William Bllery Channing and his contemporaries. But
he respected the understanding and liberty of thought
of other men. He had a large tolerance. He had also
a genial and affectionate nature, which led him to form
hearty friendships with men whom he accounted worthy,
according to his somewhat severe standard of personal
excellence, without regard to differences of belief. So
he had the kindliest personal relations with the rep
resentatives of other denominations. He cared little for
discussing questions about which Christians differ, al
though he was fully equipped for such discussions when
his duty seemed to him to require them. But he stated
with great power and with, great beauty the arguments
which lie at the foundation of the Christian faith, and at
the foundation of good morals and purity and upright
ness in personal conduct. It is hoped the sermons

X INTEODUCTION.
here printed are worth preserving, and will be valued
not only for their literary excellence and high order
of eloquence, but as exhibiting fairly the spirit of
Dr. Eeynolds's faith.
Dr. Reynolds's work as a Christian minister had, of
course, the largest part of his heart. Next to that was
his affection for the town of Concord. From the time
of his settlement as Minister of the First Parish, in July,
1858, until his death, he entered into the life of the
people of the town almost as if every family in it had
been his near kindred. He had an enthusiasm for its
history and antiquities. He soon became the trusted
and confidential friend of nearly every family in the
town, and in that way became acquainted with its history
and traditions, so that he probably knew more about the
town than any other person, although there are many
families there who have dwelt on the lands where they
now live since the town was settled by Bulkeley, Wil
lard, Hosmer, and their companions, in 1635. So his
mind became a storehouse of its local and family tradi
tions. Indeed, if the best example of the character,
faith, and practice of New England Unitarianism of the
close of the nineteenth century, or if the best example
of the character and citizenship of the town of Concord
for that period were to be sought, it is believed that
those who knew him will agree that there can be none
better found of either than Dr. Eeynolds. He was a
man of great business capacity. He managed the con
cerns of the American Unitarian Association with singu-

INTEODUCTION. xi
lar wisdom, discretion, and success. He was a pillar in
the town and a pillar in the Church. When he died it
seemed as if something substantial and essential had
been subtracted from both.
He had also a taste and capacity for historical inves
tigation which, with his charming English style, would
have enabled him to gain great distinction in that de
partment of literature if he could have devoted his life
to it. The papers upon that class of subjects inserted
here are the work of hours spared from the engrossing
employments of his profession. But they will amply
vindicate this statement. GEOEGE F. HOAE.
Worcester, Massachusetts,
September 30, 1895.

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.^

GRINDALL REYNOLDS was born in Franconia,
New Hampshire, December 22nd, 1822. His
father, Grindall Reynolds, was a Revolutionary soldier,
serving as was the custom for periods of three or six
months as private, ensign, lieutenant, and captain. At
the time of his son's birth he was in charge of some
large iron works, which four years later burned down
and were never rebuilt. Late in life he married Cynthia
Kendall, the daughter of a Revolutionary soldier. The
second child and oldest son of this marriage was the
subject of this sketch. At four years of age the boy
1 At the request of the editor of the " Harvard Graduates' Mag- ¦
azine," Dr. Eeynolds wrote for the September number this brief
sketch of his life. It was written in July, 1894, at FitzwiUiam,
New Hampshire, where he was spending his vacation according to
his custom. It was the last bit of work from his pen except a
few letters, as he died September 30th. He sent with it to the
editor the foUowing letter : — Fitzwilliam, N. H., July 2, 1894.
My dear Mr. Thayer, — Enclosed find the facts of my life ; more
of them I suspect than you wUl care to use. So I cheerfuUy hand
my manuscript over to the tender mercy of your critical eye and
your wise scissors. Do what you wiU with it, or nothing. I am
ready .to give you what you can justly ask ; but I have no desire
to spread abroad my exceedingly feeble glories.
Very sincerely, Grindall Eeynolds.

xiv AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.
was sent to the district school, having however learned
his letters aud to read the Bible at his mother's knee.
The schoolhouse, as he recalls it, was as rude in con
struction, its desks as primitive and hacked, its seats as
hard, and the discipline within it as harsh and unrea
sonable as any that historians have described or roman
cers painted. When he was five years old the family
moved to Boston, living first on Essex Street and then
on Fort Hill. He attended the primary school at the
corner of Federal and High Streets until, at seven years
of age, he was promoted to the Washington Grammar
School. At twelve years he graduated, receiving a Franklin
medal. Having passed an examination, he became a
pupil in the English High School. Here from various
reasons he had the good fortune to be tot two and a
half of his three years' course under the immediate in
struction of Thomas Sherwin, than whom no nobler man
and no better teacher ever stood in a school-room. At
the age of fifteen and one half years he graduated, again
receiving a Franklin medal.
Long vacations were not in those days the fashion,
either in schools or anywhere else. So in less than
three weeks the boy found himself in the store of
Thomas Tarbell & Co., wholesale dry-goods merchants.
There he remained, passing through all the grades from
errand-boy to book-keeper, four years and a half, leav
ing in March, 1843, to fit himself to enter Cambridge
Divinity School. He studied one year and a half under

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xv
the direction of Rev. Chandler Robbins, and upon exam
ination became a member of the Cambridge Divinity
School, September, 1844, from which he graduated in
June, 184T.
The first Sunday after he left the School he preached
in the Unitarian church at Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts,
and in January, 1848, was ordained as its pastor. Feb
ruary 7th, he married Lucy Maria Dodge, born Septem
ber 15th, 1827, died February 18th, 1887. Here he
remained something more than ten years, until he ac
cepted a call to be the minister of the First Parish in
Concord, Massachusetts. Of this parish he was installed
as minister July, 1858, and has remained there ever
since, twenty-three years as active pastor, and after
wards as honorary pastor. In May, 1881, Mr. Reynolds
vas elected Secretary of the American Unitarian Asso
ciation, which post he still holds. The position of min
ister of a large parish, or of the chief executive officer
of a religious body, affords scanty leisure for literary
pursuits and especially for writing not strictly in the
line of ofiicial duty. Still, he has furnished eight or
ten articles for denominational magazines, such as the
Christian Examiner and the Unitarian Review, as many
more for the Atlantic Monthly, while perhaps an equal
number have appeared in pamphlet form or otherwise.
In 1860 Harvard conferred on him the honorary de
gree of Master of Arts, and in 1894 that of Doctor of
Divinity.

President Eliot used these words in conferring the
degree of Doctor of Divinity : —
" In rebus divinis oratorem eloquentem, administra-
torem prudentem, ah Unitariis rationibus suis optime
praepositum."

KING PHILIP'S WAE;
WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE ATTACK
ON BROOKFIELD IN AUGUST, 1675.
Read before the American Antiquarian Society, October 21, 1887.
THIS paper does not propose to give an account
of King Philip's War, as a whole. To do
that with any thoroughness would require a volume.
It would rather confine itself to a statement of the
reasons why the war happened to take place, and to
a somewhat full sketch of a single event of that
war. The subject has for me what I may call a traditional
attraction. My ancestor, Captain Nathaniel Reynolds,
was one of the original settlers, who after the war took
possession of Mount Hope, the home of the Wampa-
noags, and named it Bristol. My great-grandfather,
Benjamin Reynolds, was the first boy christened in the
new town ; while my grandfather, John Reynolds, and
my father, Grindall Reynolds, first saw the light and
were reared to manhood amid the associations of the
ancient hamlet.
No historian, as it seems to me, has pointed out
with sufficient clearness the causes which made this
war, not only probable, but inevitable. A little sketch
of the First Church, Bristol, Rhode Island, appeared
in 1872. In that sketch .you find this statement. It
1

2 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
refers to the grant of the township in 1681.^ "The
whole of Plymouth County was then settled, except this
territory, which was the only spot left uncovered in the
western march of English population. " This is literally
true. When the ' ' Mayflower " dropped anchor off Ply
mouth the Wampanoags held the whole region as their
hunting ground. Of this great tract all they retained
in 1675 was a little strip, called then Mount Hope,
scarcely sis miles long and two miles wide. The
southern line of English possession had been drawn
right across Bristol Neck, enclosing, and almost im
prisoning, the tribe in a little peninsula, washed on all
sides, except the north, by the waters of Narragan
sett and Mount Hope bays. As if to emphasize this
fact, their neighbors, the people of Swanzey, "set
up a very substantial fence quite across the great
neck. "2
That some freedom to fish and hunt in the old terri
tory was granted is probable. But in the nature of the
case each year narrowed its scope. Governor Winslow
says, " Before these troubles broke out the English did
not possess a single foot of land in the Colony but was
fairly obtained from the Indians. "^ No doubt this
may have been true. No less true was it that the
owners of the soil hardly comprehended the meaning of
transactions by which they sold their birthright for a
mess of pottage. Even what remained was coveted.
To protect them in it, in 1668 it was necessary to
order,* "that noe person shall ... on any pretence
whatsoever buy or receive any of those lands that
1 Historical Sketch of the Fii-st Church, Bristol, E. I., by J. P.
Lane, p. 8.
2 Hubbard's Indian Wars. » Plymouth Eecords, x. 363.
* Plymouth Laws, 221.

KING PHILIP'S "WAR. 3
appertaine unto Mount Hope. " Yet one year later the
Court granted^ one John Gorham a hundred acres
within the bounds of Bristol, provided it could be
purchased of the Indians.
Another change had come just as hard to bear. To
the men who landed at Plymouth Rock the Wampanoags
seemed to be, and no doubt were, a dirty, half-naked,
and half -starved lot of barbarians. ^ But these barba
rians were independent, and exercised a controlling
influence over the tribes of central Massachusetts.
" Massasoit, " says Drake, " was for an Indian a great
king." As an equal he made a treaty with the whites ;
and was assured that ^ " King James would esteem him
his friend and ally. " Fifty years pass. The son of
Massasoit, according to the Puritan annalist, had
divested himself of all independence.* He had meekly
acknowledged himself and his people to be subjects of
the King of England and New Plymouth and under
their laws. Nor was this subjection a dead letter.
The chiefs were summoned to appear and answer accu
sations often ill founded. Restrictive laws were applied
to trade, and even to personal habits. Sachems were
arrested, tried, and executed for acts committed by
order of their chief. Of King Philip the Plymouth
Commissioners write that he was in arnis,^ "from a
guilty feare that we should send for him and bring
him to tryall with the other murderers." All this
may have been the necessary result of the contact of
the strong with the weak. It may indeed, as Palfrey
argues, have benefited the Indian himself. But it sub-
1 See History of First Church, Bristol.
2 See PaKrey, i. 183.
* Drake's Indian Wars. * See Hubbaxd's Indian Wars.
5 Plymouth Eecords, x. 364.

4 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
jected him to restraints which to a savage were well-
nigh intolerable.
Add, now, that the colonists, having obtained the
land and tethered the owners, had no faith in him;
that they were haunted with the feeling that he was
" plotting mischiefe " ; that repeatedly Philip and his
brother were summoned as suspected criminals and
forced to submit to humiliating conditions; that the
brother actually died of a fever, occasioned in part by
the hardship endured on one of these arrests, and in
part also by the rage and shame engendered by this
very humiliation. This is the way matters stood in
1675 according to the conquerors' own statement.
Read Philip's pathetic story recorded in Arnold's his
tory and you will know how it looked to the conquered.
Said he to John Borden of Rhode Island ^ : —
" The English who came to this country were but a
handful of people, forlorn, poor, and distressed. My
father was then Sachem. He relieved their distresses.
He gave them land to build and plant upon. He did
all in his power to serve them. Their numbers rapidly
increased. My father's counsellors became uneasy and
alarmed. They advised him to destroy them before
they should become too strong. But my father was
also the father of the English. His advice prevailed.
It was concluded to give victuals to the English.
Experience has taught that the fears of my father's
counsellors were right. By various means they got
possessed of a great part of his territory. My elder
brother became Sachem. They pretended to suspect
him of evil designs. He was seized and confined,
and thrown into sickness and died. After I became
Sachem they disarmed all my people. They tried them
1 Arnold's Ehode Island, i. 394.

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 5
by their own laws, assessed damages which they could
not pay, and their land was taken. Thus tract a,fter
tract is gone. But a small part of the dominion of my
ancestors remains. I am determined not to live till I
have no co'kntry."
So it is evident that life and death gra.pple, called
King Philip's War, had to come. I am with those
who doubt the accepted theory about it. Our fathers
excited by natural, and for the most part well founded
fears, exaggerated both the capacity and plans of Philip.
They believed that he had formed a gigantic Indian
Confederacy. This theory rests on slender foundations.
The King Philip of the annals is certainly a creature
of the imagination. The real Philip had not head
enough to plan such a confederacy, nor courage enough
to carry it into effect. , His commanding influence, if
he ever had any, began with the attack on Swanzey and
closed with his flight to the Nipmucks. From that
moment as a great figure he disappears. Indeed, if we
suppose the affair at Swanzey to be the culmination of
years of plotting, what further proof of Philip's weak
ness is needed ? There was no preparation whatever
for defence. A few hundred hasty levies in forty-eight
hours swept his tribe out of existence. There is very
slight evidence that he was in command at any of the
later undertakings. He certainly fled for a time to the
Mohawks. Had not a certain Nemesis brought him
back to die on his own hearthstone, and so lent pathos
to life's close, he might almost have been forgotten.
Philip foresaw,^ as we have already seen, that soon he
must be landless, and a slave instead of a king, if he
did not fight. Of that we have absolute evidence. We
may readily admit that he did what he could, with his
^ See Arnold's Ehode Island, 395.

6 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
own tribe, and with the Nipmucks, who were allied or
united to his tribe by peculiarly close ties, to prepare
for the emergency. But confederacy is a large term
to apply to such despairing struggles. In fact there
was no simultaneousness in the outbreak. It began in
June with the raid on Swanzey. The Nipmucks rose
in July; the tribes along the Connecticut River in
August; those of New Hampshire and Maine in Sep
tember and October. The Narragansetts never rose
at all ; but were attacked and destroyed in mid-winter,
because they did not deliver up fugitives ; and because
their loyalty was suspected ; — and, as it would seem
from the testimony of the Indian spy ^ employed by the
English, unjustly.
The simplest explanation is probably the truest
Already the Indian chief had been repeatedly summoned
to appear to answer to the charge of plotting against
the colonists. Once he obtained deliverance by promis
ing to deliver up the arms of his tribe ; again by signing
articles acknowledging himself a subject of the King
of England; and the third time, as Increase Mather
states it, by giving "a sum of money to defray the
charges which his insolent clamors had put the Colony
into," or, as Philip puts it, "he was seized and confined
till he sold another tract of country." All this was
sufficiently exasperating. But the cup of his indigna
tion was full, when Sausamon, a Natick Indian, who
had in times past taken refuge at Mount Hope, and
been a subject and friend of Philip, in 1675 went to
Plymouth with charges against his benefactor, and
those charges were accepted as true. The death of
Sausamon — slain as it was believed by Philip's order
— naturally followed. The arrest of three Wampanoag
1 See James Quanopokit's Eelations in Mass. Archives.

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 7
sachems for this supposed murder, their condemnation
and execution under English law, precipitated hostili
ties. The young warriors, already dissatisfied with
Philip's timidity, sprang to arms. The rest was like
the spread of a prairie fire, where all the herbage is
ready for conflagration. Tribe after tribe, by a sort of
warlike contagion, rose. The habits of the race made
bloodshed natural, while jealousy and fear, and often
sense of injury, made it certain.
The first act of the war closed with Philip's flight
from Mount Hope. At this seat of what, we are asked
to believe, was a long conceived, subtle, and powerful
confederacy, almost literally no resistance was made.
In forty-eight hours after the appearance of the hastily
gathered English soldiery, the chief was a fugitive,
ahd his tribe, as such, swept out of existence.
The second act could open only in just one place.
Where could Philip flee ? North were the solid settle
ments of Plymouth and Massachusetts, whose first
levies had crushed his tribe at a blow. West was
Narragansett Bay, and beyond the Rhode Island and
Connecticut towns. But northwest, in central Massa
chusetts, was a tract more than fifty miles square
where the Indian had sway. It was the Nipmuck
country. It included nearly all of Worcester County
and a large part of Hampshire County. In the centre
of this region was Brookfield, with possibly one hundred
and fifty people ; at Worcester seven deserted houses.
Now the Nipmucks were Philip's natural allies. Be
tween them and the Wampanoags there had been a
close bond, either of frieridship or subjection. It has
been conjectured, and latterly asserted,^ that Massasoit
closed his life at Brookfield as chief of the Quabaugs.
1 See History of North Brookfield, 46, 47.

8 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
It was therefore inevitable that the defeated chief
should take refuge among them, and that his coming
should kindle afresh the flame.
The assault of Brookfield was no accident. Brook
field was the half-way station between the established
life on the seaboard, and the hopeful beginnings of life
up and down the Connecticut River. In round terms
it was thirty miles from the outposts of Eastern Massa
chusetts, and as many miles from the first hamlets of
Western Massachusetts. Its maintenance, if the Con
necticut River towns were to be saved, was of vital
importance. So vital did it appear, that, though under
stress of great difficulty it was twice abandoned, the
authorities at once ordered its reoccupation ; and to
the close of the war it remained a place of refuge and
arms. We may -well believe that the Indians under
stood, quite as clearly as the whites, the importance of
the post and its weakness. Their purpose to attack it
must have been coincident with their resolution to go
to war.
Apparently the colonists were equally aware of the
importance of the post and its danger. For in the
latter part of June the Governor and Council of Mas
sachusetts sent messengers to the Western Indians
to keep them, if possible, from uniting with Philip.
Satisfactory assurances were received from the sachems.
These assurances were very likely made in good faith.
But with the actual breaking out of hostility the younger
warriors' lust for battle swept away every principle of
prudence. Early in July the a.uthorities, still distrust
ful, sent that hardy frontiersman and scout, Ephraim
Curtis, to Brookfield, nominally to confirm the peace,
really, to use their racy language, "to make a perfect
discovery of the motions of the Nipmug or Western

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 9
Indians. " His report could not have been reassuring.
He found the Indians, about two hundred strong,
encamped on a sort of little island, partly surrounded
by a river, and wholly surrounded by miry swamps,
called Wenamessit, — and about ten miles from the
feeble English settlement. They were in a state of
great excitement. Some cried out that he and his
company should be killed. Others dissuaded from
such a course. Guns loaded and cocked were placed
at his breast. The air was filled with uproar. Finally
he had an interview with the sachems, and "left
them," as he says, "well apeased."^ At any rate he
got away with a whole skin, which under the circum
stances was hardly to have been expected. Curtis
made a second visit to the same place ten days later.
He found the savages outwardly more quiet but really
more dangerous, as they were then committed to hostile
measures. They promised to send sachems to Boston
to speak to the great white sachem ; a promise which
they did not mean to keep. ^ Then it was, on the 27th
of July, that the authorities ordered Captain Edward
Hutchinson, who had just returned from a similar
mission to the Narragansetts, to take Captain Thomas
Wheeler of Concord and his little squad of twenty-five
Middlesex troops and go to Quaboag. These men
were, with a solitary exception, from Concord or the
towns adjoining it. Captain Wheeler was a Concord
man; so was his son. Lieutenant Thomas;, so was
Simon Davis who succeeded him in command ; and of
the remaining eighteen, — though it is not possible to
decide with absolute certainty, — probably ten came
from the same town. The rest, with the probable
exception of one, Zachariah Phillips of Boston, came
1 Massachusetts Archives, Isvii. ^ Ibid.

10 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
from the adjoining towns of Chelmsford, Billerica, and
Sudbury. So the whole stress of danger and difficulty
rested upon people of that immediate neighborhood.
The object of this visit was threefold: to confirm
the Indians, if it might be, in peaceful counsels; to
call them to account for their failure to send according
to promise an embassy to Boston ; and it was added, —
we now quote the language of the instructions, ^ — "in
prosecution of this affayre, if you should meet with any
Indians that stand in opposition to you, or that declare
themselves to be your enemies, then you are ordered to
ingage them, if you see reason for it, and endeavor to
reduce them by force of armes. " Nothing could have
been more foolhardy than this expedition. When we
consider the nature of Ephraim Curtis's report, and
remember that it was known that the Nipmucks had
already attacked Mendon, the only explanation of this
sending of twenty-five chosen men to seemingly sure
death, is the utter contempt in which the Puritan
held his foe. Was peace sought? Then Ephraim
Curtis and his two or three Natick Indians were more
likely to achieve it. Was war to be waged ? What
were twenty-five men to cope with two hundred or five
hundred savages on their own soil ?
Upon the incidents of Brookfield fight we need not
dwell. They are simple and well known. The little
force 1 "came on the Lord's day about noon (being
August 1), to Brookfield, understanding that the
Indians were about ten miles to the northwest." Four
messengers were sent to tell the Indians that the
troops were there, not to make war, but to confirm
peace. They found "the young men . . . stout in
^ Massachusetts Archives, Ixvii.
2 Captain Thomas Wheeler's Narrative.

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 11
their speeches and surly in their carriage. " The chiefs,
however, agreed to meet the English the next morning
at a plain three miles from Brookfield. Accompanied
by three of the principal inhabitants, the little force
marched thither, but found no one. Captain Hutchinson
and his colleague. Captain Wheeler, were then in
great doubt; but, persuaded by the Brookfield men,
who had entire confidence in the good intentions of the
savages, concluded to march to the " swamp where the
Indians then were. " Between a long rocky hill and a
miry swamp, where there was room to ride only in
single file, they were surprised by two hundred or more
of the enemy. Five soldiers and the three inhabitants
were killed. Captain Hutchinson was mortally wound
ed, and died seventeen days after at Marlborough. Cap
tain Thomas Wheeler and his son Thomas and two others
were wounded, but recovered ; though it is believed that
the lives both of the Captain and his son were mate
rially shortened on account of their injuries. Among
those killed was Samuel Smedley, son of Baptiste
Smedley, one of the early settlers of Concord, of
Huguenot extraction the name would suggest, who
owned and occupied a farm near where to-day Mr.
Franklin Daken lives. Mr. Waleott, in his valuable
work, "Concord in the Colonial Period," states that a
son-in-law had already been killed at Nashoba, and
adds that " the death of his son was too heavy a blow
for the already severely taxed powers of the aged father,
and the tragedy was made complete by the death of
Baptiste Smedley only a fortnight after." I cannot
refrain from quoting Captain Wheeler's account of his
own escape, as found in that narrative which has been
justly termed "the epic of Colonial times." The
Indians, he says, "fired violently out of the swamp and

12 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
from behind the bushes on the hillside, wounded me
sorely, and shot my horse under me, so that he faulter-
Ing and falling, I was forced to leave him, divers of
the Indians being then but a few rods distant from me.
My son Thomas Wheeler flying with the rest of the
company missed me amongst them, and fearing that I
was either slain or much endangered returned towards
the swamp again, though he had then received a dan
gerous wound in the reins, where he saw me in the
danger aforesaid. Whereupon he endeavored to rescue
me, shewing himself therein a loving and dutiful son,
he adventuring himself into great peril of his life to
help me in that distress, there being many of the
enemies about me, my son set me on his own horse
and so escaped awhile on foot himself, until he caught
a horse whose rider was slain, on which he mounted
and so through God's great mercy we both escaped."
" But for this attempt for my deliverance he received
another dangerous wound. " It is worth while to recall
occasionally this simple old story of filial fidelity and
filial heroism. The remnant of the troop, leaving
their dead where they fell, rode as they could up the
steep and rocky hill, and were conducted by the
Christian Indian guides, through paths known to them,
back to Brookfield, and took refuge in the largest and
strongest house in the town. There were gathered, as
the historian of North Brookfield believes, eighty-two
persons, thirteen soldiers, thirteen citizens, six wounded
men, and about fifty women and children. And there
for nearly three days they endured a siege in a fortress
whose sole bulwarks were the single boards of an
ordinary dwelling-house, through which the bullets of
the enemy constantly passed, killing, wonderful to
relate! only one person, Henry Young of Concord.

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 13
The savages, to use Hubbard's words, "for two days
assaulted that poor handful of helpless people; both
night and day pouring in shot incessantly with guns ;
also thrusting poles with firebrands, and rags dipt in
brimstone tyedto the ends of them to fire the house;
at last they used this devilish stratagem, to fill a cart
with hemp, flax and other combustible matter, and so
thrusting it backward with poles spliced together a
great length, after they had kindled it ; but as soon as
it had begun to take fire, a storm of rain unexpectedly
falling, put out the fire, else all the poor people would
either have been consumed by merciless flames, or else
have fallen into the hands of their cruel eUemies, like
wolves continually yelling and gaping for their prey. "
Twice that brave scout, Ephraim Curtis, strove to steal
through their lines, and was driven back. The third
time he succeeded, creeping a long way on his hands
and knees, and bore tidings of their peril to Marl
borough. On the evening of the third day their hearts
were gladdened by the appearance of Major Simon
Willard and Captain James Parker of Groton, with
fifty-one men, including five Christian Indians. The
siege was at an end; and, as a home of men, for ten
years Brookfield ceased to be.
Just where did Brookfield fight take place ? Upon
this point there has been earnest and long-continued
discussion. Nor is there to-day any perfect agreement.
Many hold that the scene of conflict is to be sought at
some point in the defile from the head of Wicaboag
Pond, crossing the present town line into New
Braintree. Others maintain that it is to be sought on,
the easterly side of the Winimisset Valley in New
Braintree, anciently embraced in Hardwick. Mr.
Temple in his History of North Brookfield has admi-

14 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
rably stated the evidence for the first theory ; while the
arguments for the other are clearly put by Dr. Paige in
his article in the thirty-eighth volume of the Genea
logical Register, entitled " Wicaboag or Winimisset ? "
Several members of this Society passed a delightful
day in last June, under the auspices of its President,
surveying the whole region. One would wish to visit
the spot many times before committing himself thor
oughly to either theory. What I should say would be
that the valley beyond Wicaboag answers well to
Captain Wheeler's description : " A very rocky hill is
on the right hand, " under which one could march sixty
or seventy rods. " A thick swamp is on the left hand. "
Between the two is a narrow defile, to-day in places
" so bad that we could march only in single file. " At
a little distance an Indian trail is said to lead cir-
cuitously back to Brookfield. The objections to this
theory are twofold: first, the defile is not in direct
line ten miles, as Captain Wheeler is thought to state,
but only five and a half from the house in which the
fugitives took refuge ; and second, if the swamp where
the fight occurred was the same as that which Ephraim
Curtis visited when the Quaboags were encamped on
their four-acre island, then the little brook, flowing
near the rocky hill, does not answer very well to the
muddy river described by bim.
If you turn now to the second theory, you can say,
that the Winimisset swamp is nearly ten miles from
Brookfield ; that it is unquestionably a spot w;here the
Indians had a somewhat permanent encampment, and
that a muddy river still exists. On the other hand, no
such clearly marked defile as the narrative seems to
call for is found. The determination of this question
depends upon the decision made on just two points:

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 15
first, was the swamp where, as Wheeler states it, " the
Indians then were " the one where Curtis found them,
and where Captain Hutchinson's messengers sought
them ? That is, did the Indians fight near their home
or away from it ? Second, does Captain Wheeler's ten
miles mean in direct line, or by the way which he says
"none of us knew," as they rode, to avoid danger of
ambuscade, " in open places " ? The best judges will
differ. As for myself, I lean with moderation to
" Wicaboag. "
We cannot close, without some allusion to the English
actors in this tragedy. For I question whether, in any
human transaction, out of such a little body of men you
could pick so many who were in themselves so worthy
of remembrance, and from whom have come so many
descendants of mark.
Let us be^in with Captain Edward Hutchinson, a
notable member of a notable family. ' Son of William
and the celebrated Ann Hutchinson, he was born in
England in 1613. His father owned and occupied an
estate, on a part of which the famous Corner Book
store in Boston now stands, and the son's early man
hood was probably spent there. ^ In 1637 he was
included in the list of such as had been seduced and
led into dangerous error by Mr. Wheelwright and Mrs.
Hutchinson, and who were ordered to deliver up " all
such guns, pistols, shot, and matches as they shall be
owner of." He lived however to recover the entire
confidence of the authorities, and to obtain positions of
honor both in military and civil life. He was a ser
geant in 1642,2 ensign in 1645, and in 1664 was elected
captain of the celebrated "Three County Troope,"
so called because its members came from Suffolk,
^ Mass. Eecords, 1. 211. ^ Mass. Eecords.

16 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
Essex, and Middlesex Counties. In 1642 he was sent
to the great tribe of Narragansetts, " with certaine in
structions to demand satisfaction for certain injuries."
Thirty -three years later, two weeks after the opening
of King Philip's- War, two weeks before his fatal
errand to Brookfield, he was one of those who dictated
terms of peace to the same tribe. His opposition, in
which he stood almost alone, to the cruel laws against
the Quakers better entitles him to remembrance than
all his civic or martial honors. He was fortunate in
his descendants. His son Elisha was twenty-five years
a member of the Council, Chief Justice of the Court of
Common Pleas, and Commander in Chief of an expedi
tion to Maine against the French and Indians. His
grandson Thomas was also for many years a member
of the Council; and the Eliot Schoolhouse in North
Bennet Street, Boston, stands a monument to his
liberality and to the fierce prejudice generated by the
Revolution, which refused to perpetuate his memory in
the name of the schoolhouse he gave: The second
grandson, Edward, was Selectman, Representative,
Judge of Probate, Judge of the Court of Common Pleas,
and Treasurer of Harvard College thirty years. In
Thomas Hutchinson the second, great-grandson of
Captain Edward, the honors of the family culminated.
We think of him as Tory and refugee ; but for many
years he was the most distinguished and most popular
of the sons of Massachusetts. Simply enumerate the
positions he held ! He was ten years a Representative,
two years Speaker of the House, sixteen years member
of the Council, six years Judge of Probate, Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court many years. Lieu
tenant Governor thirteen years, and Governor three
years. In 1760, while Governor Pownal was absent,

KING PHILIP'S WAR. , 17
he actually held and exercised the offices of Judge of
Probate, Chief Justice, Councillor, Lieutenant Governor
and acting Governor, an accumulation of offices perhaps
never before, or since held by one person; and held
apparently by him to the entire satisfaction of the
community, until in the great controversy he sided
with the King.
Of Captain Thomas Wheeler and his descendants
we know less. The name was too common a one to
permit the most accomplished antiquarian to unravel
the various genealogies. But his " narrative " alone
ought to make his name immortal; it is so clear, so
full and so charged with the thought and feeling of
the time. Our first notice of him is found in the
Massachusetts Records; wherein it appears that cer
tain " inhabitants of Concord, Chelmsford, Billerikey,
Lancaster and Groten," having petitioned, "the Court
judgeth it meet that such persons living in the frontier
towns " be " leg,ally capacitated to lyst themselves
troopers "under Thomas Wheeler Sen', whom the
Court appoints to be their Leiftenant. " Two years
after he was made Captain, and so remained till his
death. This occurred one year and four months after
the fight. His son, the Ensign, followed him the next
month, leaving as a townsman records only a horse,
pistols, cutlash, and guuj valued at £6 12s., the sole
reward, it would seem, of his most valiant service.
Captain Wheeler's descendants appear to have been
chiefly plain yeomen, whose vocation has not brought
them into public notice; but in this generation few'
men have had a career more honorable than the late
Vice President Wheeler, in whose veins flowed the
blood of the old Puritan Captain.
Lieutenant Simon Davis, who succeeded to the com-
2

18 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
mand after his superior officers were disabled, was a
Concord man, whose home was near what is now the
Abel Clark place. According to Wheeler's narrative
it was " his lively spirit " which kept up the courage of
the survivors. He was one of the two sous of Dolor
Davis, who was himself first probably of his name in
the new country. Lieutenant Simon became Captain
Simon, and in King William's War, from 1689 to
1697, with forty troopers and thirty foot soldiers, was
appointed to defend the frontier from Dunstable to
Marlborough. Of few men can it be said that three
Massachusetts Governors have sprung from their loins.
Yet John Davis, John Davis Long, and George Dexter
Robinson are all descendants of Dolor Davis. Whether
all come from Lieutenant Simon or from his brother
and townsman, Samuel Davis, is not quite clear.
Simon Willard, uncle of Lieutenant Simon Davis,
who rescued the Brookfield garrison when it was in
extremity, was one of the noted persons in early
Massachusetts history. Coming from County Kent, as
so many of our best did, with Peter Bulkeley he shared
the honor of planting Concor(|. Twenty -four years
later he was called to take the helm at Lancaster, and
steered that frontier settlement through all the obstacles
and dangers of its early life. He had held almost
every post of duty, civic or military, and now at the
allotted threescore years and ten he was giving his last
moments to perilous public service. He left his stamp
on his descendants. The period from 1689 to 1763
was almost one long war between the colonists and the
French and Indians. And during that time there was
hardly a day in which one of Simon Willard's blood
and name was not standing guard on the frontier,
while two Presidents of Harvard attest the interest
of the family in sound learning.

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 19
This account would be incomplete, and unjust in its
incompleteness, without some allusion to Captain
James Parker of Groton, who, as second in command,
accompanied Major Willard and the rescuing party.
He was, says Dr. Green in his "Groton during the
Indian Wars," "in the early. history of Groton without
question its most influential . inhabitant. " This is
easily seen to be true. . There is hardly an important
public paper relating to the infant town but has his
signature. Was a meeting-house to be built he must
be at the head of the committee to further it. Was a
road to be laid out; who so fit to have part in doing it as
" Sergeant Parker " ? He was Chairman of the first
Board of Selectmen in 1662, and he appears in that
capacity as late as 1694. He was Town Clerk for
several years. With the first fear of an Indian war,
on May 6, 1673, it was ordered that, " James Parker of
Groaten, having had the care of the military company
there for several yeares is appointed and ordered to be
their leiftennant, ahd Wm. Larkin to be ensigne to the
said Company there." •- Sixteen years after, when the
conflict entitled ."King. William's War" was impend
ing,' it was still the :veteran James Parker who was
called to lead the soldiers of the town, being appointed
Captain in' 1689. Judge Joel Parker was one of his
descendants, and the Lawrence family, which has filled
so large a space. in the commercial, manufacturing, and
philanthropic life of Massachusetts, is descended on one
side from the Parkers, — whether of the Captain James
branch, the genealogy of the family has not been suffi
ciently put in order to permit a definite statement.
I reserve the most picturesque figure for the last:
Ephraim Curtis, scout and interpreter. One wonders
that so little has been made of this person; for you

20 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
have to come down to the days of Robert Rogers, and
Israel Putnam, and John Stark, before you find an indi
vidual who stands out so clearly on the background of
our frontier history. He was the son of Henry Curtis,
one of the first settlers of Sudbury, born in 1642, and
so only thirty-three years old at Brookfield. He was
evidently a man of courage and iron firmness, both in
peace and war. No chapter in Lincoln's History of
Worcester is more entertaining than the first, in which
he gives an account of the contest between the Com
mittee of Settlements and one Ephraim Curtis, a young
man from Sudbury. This young man had bought a
grant of Ensign Thomas Noyes of two hundred and
fifty acres, and had located it just where the Committee
wanted to lay out town lots, especially one for the minis
ter, one for the meeting-house, and one for a mill. This
was in 1669. A petition to the Great and General Court
signed by four men of name and substance did not terrify
the " young man. " Four years after he had added to the
difficulty by taking possession of his ground and build
ing thereon a house, becoming, as I judge, the first
settler of Worcester. Things began to look serious,
whereupon another petition, signed not only by the
aforesaid four men of name and substance, but by
twenty-nine persons proposing to settle, was sent to
the General Court. They stated that they had made
all proper offers to the young man, which he had
declined. They intimate that if they cannot get the
coveted two hundred and fifty acres they shall have to
give up the plantation. The affair was finally compro
mised by giving Curtis fifty acres in the village, on
which a descendant still lives, and two hundred and
fifty acres outside the village. When we consider that
Daniel Henchman, Daniel Gookin, Richard Beers, and

KING PHILIP'S WAR. 21
Thomas Prentice constituted that Committee, — men
of experience, men of high position and influence in
the Colony, — we can understand of what metal the
young man from Sudbury was made. In this frontier
life Curtis had somehow become a sagacious scout, and
had learned to speak with fluency the Indian tongue.
These qualities, together with his known firmness and
courage, made him the very man to send on the mission
to the Nipmucks. In his narration of that expedition
his coolness and undaunted bravery are hardly more
evident than his power to picture vividly the exact
condition of affairs. In the siege which followed, it
was necessary that some one should carry to Marl
borough news of the peril of the beleaguered garrison.
Twice Curtis failed. But the third time he succeeded,
creeping on his hands and knees through the enemies'
lines. Thrice afterwards he appears on the Massachu
setts Records: once as a witness against an Indian
chief ; once as clothed with power to raise a company,
"to march under his comands into the wood, and
endeavor to " surprise, kill, or destroy any of the In
dians our enemies ; finally, liberty was given Ephraim
Curtis "with such other Englishmen as he shall
procure, provided they be not less than thirty men well
armed, ... to gather and improve for their own use all
the Indian Corn of the Indian plantations belonging to
our enemies the Indians that are fled." With these
records my knowledge of this heroic character ends.
Whether he went back to his trade as a carpenter, or
peaceably tilled his acres, or remained to the end a
daring scout and Indian fighter, I know not. It may
be assumed, perhaps, that in 1718 he was dead, as his
farm was then improved by his son. George William
Curtis, the silver-tongued orator, traces back his origin

22 KING PHILIP'S WAR.
to this stalwart Puritan; and I think it may be
admitted, that, in addition to persuasive speech, of
which his ancestor does not seem to have been desti
tute, he inherits the capacity to have views of his own
and to stand by them.
With these personal sketches ends my account of the
affair at Brookfield and of its actors. I do not propose
to follow farther the desperate conflict. The war pur
sued its devious, cruel course till it closed, so far as
our State was concerned, with the death, twelve months
later, of Philip, wlio like a wounded wild beast sought
his own lair to die. When it closed, the Wampanoags,
who had welcomed the Pilgrim and given him food and
kindness, as a tribe had ceased to exist. It was the
first and the last independent Indian war on Massachu
setts soil. All later wars may properly.be termed
French and Indian wars. And the savage allies of
the most Christian monarchs, the Kings of France,
came largely from outside the Bay State.

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
Printed in the Unitarian Review, March, 1876.
CAN we easily ascribe too much historical impor
tance to the siege of Boston ? It is true that,
measured by the number of men employed and the
munitions of war expended, it was not a great event.
It is equally true that no brilliant military movements
marked its course, unless, indeed, we except from
this statement the occupation of Dorchester Heights.
Neither did anything tragic lend to its closing hours
pathetic interest. It was its real significance, the con
sequences which hung on victory or defeat, which have
kept it fresh in the world's memory. When the army
under Washington settled down on the hills which
girt Boston, the question was not. Shall a petty provin
cial town be cleared of military intruders, or shall the
little colony of which it is a part be permitted hence
forth to govern itself according to its chartered rights ?
The problem was weightier : Should the foundations of
this Western republic be laid in that generation, or
wait a more favorable hour?
The assertion is a strong one, but it has in it at least
the elements of probability. New England was then,
for various reasons, the heart of the Revolution. Mer
cantile in grain, a system of mediaeval monopolies —
called on the English statute-book Navigation Laws —
had pressed like lead upon the neck of her commerce.
Long before 1775 there was a great and wide discontent

24 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
within her borders. But the people who endured this
wrong were of the stock of those Puritans who, from
religious faith and political convictions alike, held that
there were limitations both to royal and legislative
power. They were of the same race as the men who
drew the sword at Naseby and Marston Moor to defend
legal rights, — who sent Charles I. to the scaffold, and
drove his son James across the narrow channel, to be
the object of the cold compassion and half-concealed
scorn of all Europe. Besides, perhaps on this earth
never was there so homogeneous a people as that which
tilled the rough farms of New England, or clung to her
rock -bound shores. As a result of all this, when new
and intolerable burdens were laid on the Colonists, and
the hour for action had come. New England was ready,
and she presented a united front. The Tories, who
southward almost neutralized the power of the patriots,
here were so insignificant in numbers and influence
that they were swept from the path of the Revolution
without an effort. Add, now, that in the town of
Boston was a knot of men whose boldness, prophetic
insight, and political decision were wellnigh miracu
lous, and whose faculty of arousing masses to resistance
was only equalled by their gift of imparting to that
resistance order and irresistible method, and you can
readily understand that New England was ripe for
revolution, as the rest of the confederacy was not ripe ;
that Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill, and
the long suspense around beleaguered Boston, were all
needed to weld the widely scattered Colonies into one
people. It seems probable, sometimes it seems certain,
that had Great Britain, at the outset, appreciated the
nature of the crisis, and put forth the whole of her
mighty strength, and annihilated or led into captivity

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 25
that first American army, she would have brought a
pause to the Reyolution which might have lasted a life
time. It is therefore impossible to award the siege of
Boston too high a place in the list of those events
which have exercised a permanent influence in human
history. The men of 1775, from Maine to Georgia, under
stood this. The unconscious recognition of the provi
dential position of the little Puritan town is one of the
most striking features of the history of the period.
Here was a handful of fourteen or fifteen thousand
people — not more than enough to make a respectable
shire town — crowded into a narrow peninsula, whose
surface was scarcely larger than a good farm; the
inhabitants of a town around whose history no venerable
traditions had gathered ; a town not known as a central
mart of commerce, or as a great seat of learning or art ;
beautiful for situation, but not beautiful from rich
private mansions, or stately public edifices; marked
"only by one proud distinction, — the heroic devotion
of her sons and daughters to the principles of true
freedom. Yet towards this little town all eyes and
hearts were turned. And when the British Ministry,
by the Boston Port Bill, shut up her harbor, destroyed
her commerce, brought her rich men to poverty, and
her poor men to the verge of starvation, they only
crystallized sentiments of sympathy into deeds of
brotherly kindness. Private purses were opened for
her relief. Neighboring towns offered to her distressed
citizens the shelter of rural homes. Every town and
village in the Province, and every Colony outside it,
strained their resources for her support. It takes a
volume to record the offerings. Marblehead, rival sea
port, scorns to profit by her neighbor's misfortune.

26 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
She asks Boston merchants to use her wharves and
storehouses as though they were their own. Maine
sends her coasters laden with hundreds of cords of
wood. Connecticut drives thither great droves of thou-
- sands of sheep. The Middle and Southern Colonies
pour frbm their granaries corn and rye and wheat and
flour by thousands of barrels and tens of thousands of
bushels. South Carolina from her swamps gathers
up a great, generous donation of rice, and with sympa
thy and patriotism, richer yet, sends it • as her offering
of good will. Some special instances are peculiarly in
teresting. Wethersfield, Connecticut, taxes her people
one penny in a pound to support the poor of Boston.
Temple, a little village, not ten years old, of a dozen or
two families, nestling among the hills of New Hamp
shire, gladly gives fifty bushels of rye, the product of
farms just won by hard labor from the primeval forest.
Even the Indians of Martha's Vineyard feel the common
pulsation, and proffer their gift. While from the
adjoining hamlets the most varied supplies — fresh
vegetables, potatoes, turnips and cabbages, pork, salt
fish, butter and cheese, clothing and shoes, and even
tobacco to cheer the weary heart — were carted over
Boston Neck. Never, perhaps, in the world's history
was there a more remarkable uprising of sympathy and
generosity. And it is not to be forgotten that at the bottom of
this generosity, was the feeling that Boston was the
vanguard, if not the forlorn hope, of liberty; that in
her peril and in her utter desolation she was fighting
the battle for all the rest, — a feeling how well expressed
in a letter from a town in Connecticut to her select
men ! " As Boston has been the first to explain, assert,
and vindicate the rights of America, and detect and

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 27
hold up to. public view, stripped of every color and
disguise, the wicked plans devised against her, her
glory would have been incomplete had she not been the
first to suffer in the common cause. We presume not
to advise. We admire and applaud your constancy."
Any review, therefore, of the siege of Boston would be
incomplete which did not recognize the fundamental
fact that this was one of the decisive events of history.
The siege of Sebastopol may be forgotten. For,
although hundreds of thousands were gathered to that
feast of blood, and courage and skill were lavished
without stint, nothing final was achieved. But the
leaguer of New England's capital will not be forgotten ;
for the half-armed, half-disciplined militia who starved
out, or intrenched out, the royal army, then and there
settled that there was to be an America.
But when did the siege of Boston really commence ?
Was it in those days succeeding the nineteenth of
April, when the farmers from all the New England
States came hurrying seaward, and with no real com
mander-in-chief, and with little or no plan of action,
seated themselves upon the hills, and with military
instinct began to intrench themselves ? Or was it on
that third day in July, when under the historic elm at
Cambridge there stood a man of grand face and form,
who took command of these irregular levies, and where
disorder had been introduced method, and reinforced
rude courage and patriotism with military skill and
foresight ? It would be far nearer the truth to say that
the siege began the hour that General Gage landed
with despotic instructions and almost vice-royal powers.
For never was he governor in Massachusetts one foot
beyond the girdle of the flashing bayonets of his

28 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
soldiers, and within that girdle his subjects were bold
and defiant, chafing under their yoke, and meeting the
insults of the soldiery with open resistance. It would
be far truer to say that the siege began on that first day
of June, 1774, when the Boston Port Bill closed to
honest commerce the highways of the sea. For then,
with the sounds of labor stilled, and the wharves, so
lately thronged, solitary, the patriots bitterly resolved
that though the royal navy might rule in Massachusetts
waters, the royal army should not traverse Massachu
setts soil. No visible lines of intrenchment were on
the low hills which commanded the peninsula; no dark
bulk of breastwork or bastion frowned down upon it.
All the same, the beleaguerment was there, unseen but
latent, ready at the first hostile movement to become
manifest and impregnable. Like the fabled net of the
magician, its meshes were so fine that the keenest eye
could not see them ; so strong that a giant's struggles
could not break them.
That extraordinary episode in the early days of
September ! In what clear light it puts this subject !
How evident not only the dauntless determination of
the patriots, but their instant readiness! Towards
evening on the first day of that month. General Gage
sent by water a small detachment of soldiers to Quarry
Hill, in what is now Somerville, who brought away
from the arsenal ^ of the Province two hundred and fifty
1 The quaint old mill which stands to-day, looking in the dis
tance like a gigantic minie-baU, which was buUt early in the
eighteenth century, which in 1747 was bought by the Colony for a
powder-house, and in which the ammunition of Washington's army
was stored dming the siege, is the most genuine and most inter
esting Eevolutionary reUo now in existence near Boston. We can
only echo the wish of Drake that SomerviUe may see to it that this
ancient memorial of the fathers be preserved.

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 29
half-barrels of powder. Not a large military incident
surely! Not a wonderful stretch of authority in one
who was sent out with the express purpose of taming
rebels ! Yet so inflamed was the public mind, that all
New England was in a blaze. In twenty-four hours,
three thousand men were in Cambridge ; in forty-eight,
the farmers of Hampshire and Berkshire, and the
forces of Connecticut under "Old Put," were on the
march ; and, had there been need, in less than a week
more men would have gathered around Boston than
General Washington commanded. And while this was
going on, and while this threatening array was collect
ing, all that Gage could do was to cower with his
soldiers under the shadow of the Province House, to
build fortifications across the Neck, not to help him
out of Boston, but to protect him in Boston, and to
despatch piteous letters to the Ministry, begging them
to send out more regiments. If this was not practically
a siege, what was it ?
On the eleventh day of October, 1774, the govern
ment of Massachusetts passed forever from British
hands, for on that day the Provincial Congress met in
Concord and organized. That which for months, and
perhaps years, had been a fact, became now a visible
and palpable finality. With a calm steadiness which
awakened the admiration of all parties, the new
authority diveste"d the royal governor, one by one, of
all his powers and functions. Appointing a receiver-
general, it took possession of the purse ; organizing a
committee of safety, it seized the sword; through its
committee . of supplies it became master of all the
Province and town arsenals and munitions of war ; by
its minute inquiries it may almost be said to have
counted up every musket and fowling-piece, and

30 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
weighed every ounce of powder, in the Province. Not
content with the old militia, it called into existence
companies and regiments of minute-men who should be
ready at briefest notice to hurry, armed and equipped,
to the point of danger. It elected generals and com
missaries ; it established military laws and regulations.
It collected in depots provisions, clothing, tents, and
military supplies of all sorts; it purchased powder,
muskets, and cannon, — and all to one end : to keep
General Gage in Boston, and Massachusetts free of his
unlawful authority. And so he was fettered and held
back from action by chains whose strength nobody
better knew than he.
The steady courage and preparation of those without,
producing nearly all the results of an actual siege, is
noteworthy. The unspeakable audacity of those who,
in the days of uncertainty and danger which preceded
formal warfare remained within, is still more remark
able. At no time during its occupation could Boston
have had three thousand able-bodied men in it; and
these without any organization, and half armed or
unarmed. And side by side with them was a garrison
numbering at different periods from five to ten thou
sand men, — the best of England's soldiers. Yet the
citizens yielded nothing. They walked among the red-
coated gentry with proud step, as men and equals.
Still, in the Old South Meeting-house, within earshot
of the Governor's home, they held great gatherings to
denounce the oppressive measures of King and Parlia
ment. They refused to give aid or comfort to the
intruders. Insults they met with resistance; blows
with blows; and to such purpose, that Sam Adams
writes, " In private rencontres I have yet to hear of a

SUEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 31
single instance of the officers coming off other than
second best."
What a scene was that which occurred on the anni
versary in 1775 of the Boston Massacre! The time
was March sixth, nearly midway between Colonel Les
lie's ignominious return from North Bridge, Salem, and
Colonel Smith's bloody retreat from North Bridge,
Concord; the place, that Old South Meeting-house,
which we, children of the fathers, would make a place
of merchandise ; the audience, a town meeting, called
in defiance of an act of Parliament, and in scorn of
Parliament's tools. Samuel Adams was there, at heart
firm as granite, in aspect balmy as a June morning,
graciously motioning to British officers to occupy the
best seats. Every pew, every aisle, • every niche, was
crammed with listeners. To such a place, to such an
audience, at such a time, came Joseph Warren, borne,
as tradition has it, on account of the dense crowd,
through a window, and delivered an oration whose pur
pose was to denounce the laws of the Parliament and
the presence of soldiery in the town as inconsistent
with the rights and liberties of the subject. Could
bold resolve further go ?
One other scene ! Massachusetts had appointed dele
gates to the Continental Congress. That Congress met
to weld into a compact unity those scattered elements
of disaffection and revolt which General Gage had
come to disperse and destroy. Did these men, bound
on such an errand, steal quietly away from the presence
of the British Governor ? The farthest thing from
that ! Says John Andrews, merchant, selectman, and,
best of all, trusty annalist, " I am told that the com
mittee for Congress made a respectable parade in sight
of the five regiments encamped on the Common ; being

32 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
in a coach and four, preceded by two white servants
well mounted and armed, with four blacks in livery,
two on horseback and two on foot. "
This same spirit of defiance and self-assertion ran
through all classes. " The mulish workmen, " as an
enraged British officer terms them, though themselves
half starved, refused to lift a hand to build barracks to
shelter the soldiers from the inclemency of a New
England winter ; and Gage had to send to New York
and Nova Scotia for the needed carpenters, brick
layers, and smiths. At one time private encounters
between the military and civilians seem to have been
of daily occurrence. Mr. Andrews reports, " It would
puzzle any one to purchase a pair of p — Is, as they are
bought up with a full determination to repel force by
force." Before us is the record of nigh a score of
sharp encounters provoked.by the military, but met in
no craven spirit by the people. What a scene is this
to happen in what had been once the most peaceable
and orderly of towns ! Fifteen British officers dined at
a disorderly house, not it is to be presumed to the
improvement of their sobriety or decency. They broke
up in squads. The last five coming out met one Alva
Hunt, a cooper, walking with his wife, and insulted
her. " Whereat," we are told, "he aimed a blow at an
officer's head and laid it open." They then laid about
with their swords and drove all before them, excepting
Samuel Jarvis, Samuel Pitts, one FuUerton, and a
negro fellow, name not given, who got the better of
them, and took their swords away from them. It is to
the credit of General Gage that he made these shame
less debauchees wait on the selectmen and publicly ask
the pardon of the town. Here is a midnight — we had
almost said, comedy ! Young Mr. Molineaux — both

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 33
he and his father seem to have been Sons of Liberty —
at eleven o'clock at night was seized by two Welsh
fusileers in the street leading to his father's house.
He shook them off, ran a few steps, threw off his coat
and waistcoat, and, turning, assumed an attitude of
defence, knocking one down, and then the other. He
continued this lively amusement fifteen minutes, keep
ing them in play and all the time crying, " Murther. "
A lad now appeared on the arena ; shortly after, Major
Small, a British officer who was greatly respected, and
in Trumbull's picture of the battle of Bunker Hill is
represented trying to save Warren's life, put an end
to the assault by arresting one of the soldiers. A
third fracas appears to have taken place on a main
street: a band of British officers, as usual crazy with
liquor, with swords drawn, rush about, cutting, thrust
ing, with entire recklessness. Seeing the Providence
stage passing, they attack it, break the windows, and
insult the passengers. But the driver, a bold, active
fellow, jumped from the seat, seized and beat one of
them, and apparently put the rest to flight. These
skirmishes are, perhaps, a littld more lively than most
which are recorded. Still they fairly enough represent
the stiff resolution with which high and low alike
refused to submit supinely to any form or act of injus
tice and violence. They needed it all; for while the
officers of higher rank were disposed to protect the
citizens, many of the subalterns acted like " a parcel
of children " ; and the soldiers, who, if we are to
believe Timothy Newell, "were a set of men whose
unparalleled wickedness, profanity, debauchery, and
cruelty were inexpressible," taking their cue from
them and improving upon their masters, were ready for
any act of insolence or brutality.

34 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
On the twentieth of April, 1775, for the first time,
an army began to gather about Boston. Made up of
the troops of four Colonies, there was no legitimate
commander-in-chief, and only by courtesy was General
Ward received as such. On the seventeenth of June
the battle of Bunker Hill was fought, and with so little
military order that nobody to-day can say with cer
tainty who commanded, if, indeed, any one man did
command. On the second of July, General Washington
arrived. Even at the news of his coming the Provin
cial Congress " voted that the proclamation for a fast
be suspended"; just as in 1630, when a ship-load of
provisions arrived in the starving colony, straightway
the day of fasting was made a day of thanksgiving.
And so the siege pursued its slow course, until that
bright morn of the seventeenth of March, 1776, when
the British embarked in their fleet, and dropped
silently down the bay.
The siege of Boston was to both the contending
parties a true school of arms. Nothing is so surprising
as the number of persons destined to play important
parts in the war who were present. Not many of the
great names are missing. Of all the general officers
employed in the American ranks from 1775 to 1783,
nearly two thirds were there serving in some capacity.
Count off the roll of great names. General Washington
himself had probably never commanded so many as a
full regiment of soldiers. Perhaps he had never seen
any other fortifications than the rude log breastworks
and blockhouses of the Indian frontier. It was not
because he had exhibited capacity on great fields of
action that men had faith in him, but because on small
fields his prudent foresight, his modest decision, and

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 35
his intrepid valor had shone resplendently amid the
pretentious dulness and haughty incompetency of other
men. With him, as second in command, came from his
vagrant wanderings over half the earth General Charles
Lee. Lean and wellnigh grotesque in figure, harsh
and repulsive of countenance, his eccentricity exceeded
his genius. Heralded as a military prodigy and the
protecting angel of freedom, he ended a career begun
in vainglorious boastings in imprisonment for open
insubordination and treason at Monmouth. The Adju
tant Greneral was that other British soldier, Horatio
Gates. His powers fitted him for a moderate place.
His vanity led him in the crisis of the Revolution to
seek to push Washington from his seat, and himself to
seize the reins. But the laurels worn, not won, at Sara
toga, faded forever on his brow at Camden, and a weak
but probably honest career ended in sad retirement.
Nathanael Greene led to Roxbury the Rhode Island
contingent. He was Quaker born and bred, — the son
of a father who was eminent as a preacher, and equally
eminent for his shrewd management of a great farm,
and of a combined grist-mill, saw-mill, and forge. As
a stripling and young man he earned his livelihood
toiling at his father's forge. But in his hours of
leisure he satisfied the cravings of an active and power
ful mind with the study of Euclid, Locke on the
Understanding, and Blackstone's Commentaries. His
only practical knowledge of war was a brief service as
private in the Kentish Guards in piping times of peace ;
and it is no small evidence of the impression which he
had even then made on his contemporaries, that, in
preference to so many others who had a larger military
experience, he was chosen to command the soldiers of
his native Province. But, sober, thoughtful, sound in

36 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
judgment, and full of resources, he soon became the
trusted friend of Washington, and, if any man was, on
tented field or in council chamber, his peer. To the
scene of action hurried Israel Putnam, — name dear
to schoolboys ! Better wolf-hunter and Indian fighter
than strategist or tactician! But his bold, bluff,
honest ways have appealed to the imagination, and will
long keep him a place in memory. Henry Knox was
there as a volunteer. His studies had been all war
like, but his business, that of a bookseller, peaceful
enough. With prodigious energy he dragged to Cam
bridge, in the depth of a New England winter, through
thinly settled and almost pathless forests, the cannon
captured at Ticonderoga, and his arrival made Dor
chester Heights and the evacuation a possibility. In
a few months he became the first artillery general of
America, if not of his times. Who can forget John
Stark, gaunt, strong, descendant of the tough Scotch-
Irish race ? At Bunker Hill, by the shore of the
Mystic, he played his part bravely, and at Bennington
he won the most brilliant victory of the war, and
secured Burgoyne's surrender. Benedict Arnold ! No
one can write that name without sadness. He was a
man without feeling and without principle, but of such
resolution and of such desperate valor that he seemed
made for great achievements. Had he been happy
enough to have died in the hour of victory at Stillwater,
he would have left his name in the roll of pure patriots.
Put in contrast to this brilliant wickedness the solid
goodness and sound judgment of Benjamin Lincoln,
who achieved that hardest work, the preservation amid
misfortune and defeat of the respect and confidence of
all good men.
Many of the lesser actors on this narrow arena proved

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 37
to be men of note. Daniel Morgan, stalwart Virginia
wagoner, marched a company of riflemen and sharp- ,
shooters all the way from his distant home, and startled
the staid Northern farmers by the unaccustomed uni
form of fringed hunting shirts. It was his fortune,.
standing at bay at Cowpens, to put to rout Tarleton's
famous troopers, and to throw the first gleam of light
across the darkness and sadness of the Southern cam
paign. Major Knowlton, of Connecticut, at Bunker
Hill, for conduct and valor deserves a place beside
Prescott. When he died, a few months after, in a
successful skirmish on Harlem Heights, he won from
Washington's chary lips the eulogy, " He was one who
would have done honor to any country. " Recently the
statue of General John Glover, of Marblehead, has been
brought to grace the city he helped to save. He was a
man of diminutive size, but of fiery energy and effi
ciency. His amphibious regiment of Essex fishermen
and sailors was one of the first in the field, and one of
the best. After the disastrous battle of Long Island,
they ferried the American army across the East River,
and saved it from destruction. Five months later they
only were able to pilot through the swift current and
broken ice of the Delaware that chosen troop which
electrified a desponding country by the battle of
Trenton. Gladly would we run through that long list.
Heath and Sullivan, Thomas and Spencer, Artemas
Ward the incorruptible judge, Otho Williams, Rufus
Putnam the engineer, and John Brooks, one of Massa
chusetts' best Governors, — these and more than two-
score others known and followed on many a battle-field.
Nor was the British army unrepresented at Boston.
All three of the commanders in chief, Gage, Howe,
and Clinton, were there. The versatile Burgoyne,

38 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
historian, dramatist, member of Parliament, spoiled
_ darling of fashion, brave and unfortunate soldier, came
thither, by his sprightliness and wit to enliven the
dreary hours of a monotonous siege. Sir Robert Pigot
was said to have been the first man who mounted
Prescott's redoubt in the third and final charge at
Bunker Hill. He was a good soldier, and in 1778
successfully defended Rhode Island against General
Sullivan. Lord Rawdon, who on Hobkirk Hill baffled
Greene, and who nearly half a century later, as Gover
nor General of India, achieved a pure renown, brought
his skill and steady courage to this trial of arms. In
the list you must include the name of General Alexander
Leslie, who by his expedition to Salem appeared in the
first scene of the first act of the mighty drama of the
Revolution ; and who, as he surrendered Charleston in
1782, stood almost the last actor before the curtain
finally fell. With him was Nisbet Balfour, who in
1781 at the same Charleston brought a deep stain upon
an honorable name by the cruel and needless execution
of Colonel Hayne.
By far the most striking feature of the siege was the
presence of these great men in both ranks. At that
siege especially were the untrained courage and enthu
siasm of the patriot soldiers tempered by the discipline,
by the great privations, and by the constant disappoint
ments of a weary leaguer, to a finer skill and endur
ance. Could you have annihilated the army around
Boston and in Boston in the winter of 1775, you would
have blotted out most of the prominent military names
of the Revolution, and the larger part of its history.
Among the events of the siege of Boston let us place
then, first in time, first in importance, the presence of
the men who themselves wrought out the Revolution,
who in a certain very true sense were the Revolution.

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 39
When we come to consider the special features and
characteristics of.the siege of Boston we shall be sur
prised to notice how largely these were predetermined
by other causes than the courage of the soldiers or the
skill of the opposing generals. In brief, it may be
said that the British commander did not dare make the
campaign one of active hostilities, and that General
Washington could not. Concord, and Lexington, and
Bunker Hill stood like so many spectres in the path of
the royal officers, and took all heroism out of them.
From unreasonable contempt of their foe, they had
passed to as unreasonable a respect for him. They
seemed, indeed, to have cherished something like a
superstitious dread of this part of the country, and of
the people who occupied it. General Howe, on assum
ing command early in October, writes in this doubtful
strain to the Earl of Dartmouth: "The opening of a
campaign from this quarter would be attended with
great hazard, as well from the strength of the country
as from the intrenched position which the rebels have
taken, and from which they could not be forced with
out considerable loss on our part; and from the diffi
culty of access farther into the country they would have
every advantage in the defence of it on their side, being
indefatigable in raising field-works, which they judi
ciously suppose must wear us down by repeated onsets,
whereas they are so numerous in this part of the
country that they would not feel the loss they might sus
tain. " And General Gage, in his last despatch, a few
weeks earlier, exhibits the same discouragement: "I
am of an opinion, that no offensive operations can be
carried on to advantage from Boston. On a supposi
tion of a certainty of driving the rebels from their
intrenchments, no advantage would be gained but repu-

40 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
tation. Victory could not be improved. The loss of
men would probably be great, and the rebels be as
numerous in a few days as before their defeat. Besides,
the country is remarkably strong, and adapted to their
way of fighting." Compare these views with those
expressed in a letter written by a British officer eight
months before, and you will comprehend the change of
feeling. " What you hear about the rebels taking up
arms is mere bullying. Whenever it comes to blows,
he that can run fastest will think himself best off.
Believe me, any two regiments here ought to be
decimated if they did not beat the whole force of
Massachusetts Province. " So at last the British com
manders, coming down from their high expectations,
had settled into the conviction that offensive operations
in Massachusetts were hopeless. This alone accounts
for the fact that ten thousand soldiers, the flower of the
British army, who had confronted with honor the best
French troops, permitted fifteen thousand raw militia,
under country captains and colonels, to draw a net of
intrenchments around them without making an effort
to break through these toils, — and to do so, when we
know by American testimony that had they made an
attack all the American artillery must have been
silent, and the infantry for want of ammunition could
not have fought an hour.
On the other hand, it was impossible for Washington
to engage in active warfare. He was hampered in
every way. He had, indeed, an army of green troops,
full of courage and faith in their cause ; but they were
not so much soldiers as the material out of which
soldiers should be made. Gathered from all quarters ;
often poorly armed; always imperfectly drilled, and
unaccustomed to act together in a body larger than a

SUEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 41
company; averse to strict discipline; disposed to feel
that they had a right to come and go at their own
pleasure; containing, too, in their ranks, if we are to
trust Dr. Belknap, some lewd fellows of the baser sort,
— they made up a body of men of such natural valor
and intelligence that they could be depended upon to
do good service in simple skirmishes, or in defence of
a stronghold, but were not equal to the complicated
and simultaneous movements by which alone a town
like Boston could be assaulted with any hope of suc
cess. Stringent discipline might and did remedy these
defects ; but the term of enlistment was so brief that
the army was perpetually changing, and the work was
never done. As Washington declared, never • before
had a siege like this been maintained, when one army
had been disbanded and another recruited within mus
ket-shot of two and twenty regiments, the flower of
the British army. This was the first obstacle. There
were others still more serious. One month after
Washington took command he writes that the existence
of the army depends upon its situation being kept a
profound secret, for they have only nine rounds of
powder to a man. For seven long months, far into the
new year, there was not a day when the Americans
could hope to make a successful advance, and scarcely
to defend their lines against a resolute attack, for want
of that very breath of war, — powder. Not only had
they no powder to put into their muskets, sometimes
they had no muskets to put their powder in, so be they
had it. Once two thousand men stood utterly unarmed.
As for cannon, not until Knox with incredible labor
had dragged them from the shores of Lake George, and
Captain Manly had captured the transport "Nancy,"
filled with every munition which the Americans needed.

42 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
could there be said to be any proper train of artillery.
As the bitter winter came on, — and it was bitter, —
Washington had almost literally to apply to the neigh
boring towns, and as it were to beg from house to
house, for blankets to keep his soldiers from freezing.
" Most houses can spare one, some of them many, " he
pleads. As early as November second there was a
great scarcity of wood. " The soldiers of different regi
ments are almost on the point of cutting each other's
throats for a few standing locusts to dress their victuals
with." General Greene writes, December thirty-
first : " We have suffered prodigiously for want of wood ;
many regiments have been obliged to eat their pro
visions raw for want of fuel to cook it. " In view of
this destitution of all things needful for comfort or
warfare, Washington speaks wellnigh with contempt
of the complaints that he does not seize commanding
points. " What signifies Long Island, Point Alderton,
or Dorchester, while we are in a manner destitute of
cannon, and compelled to keep what little powder we
have for the use of musketry ? " He could as well have
seized Dorchester Heights in August and September
as in March; he had as many men; he could have
intrenched himself more easily; the enemy were no
stronger; but he dared not, lest he should bring on
that general battle which none so well as he knew that
he was not ready to fight. Despite his daring passage
of the Delaware at Trenton, amid the ice and tempest
of a winter's night; despite that resolute attack of
Howe at Germantown, within less than a month after
his defeat at Brandywine ; despite his flaming wrath at
the misconduct and retreat of Lee at Monmouth, — it
has been the fashion to emphasize the title of Ameri
can Fabius, as though that described the inmost temper

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 43
and genius of the man. If we study his first command
at Boston, we shall comprehend how much of this pru
dence was of nature, and how much was taught by the
stern lessons of necessity. Twice during the siege he
proposed to a council of generals, what nothing but the
most fearless and enterprising valor could contemplate,
to attempt to take the town by assault, — once in
September by boats, and once in February over the ice.
It could not be. His own better wisdom must have
agreed with his officers that it must not be undertaken.
But the bare proposal shows the natural temper of his
mind. So, with the whole country flushed with recent
victory, and full of great expectations, with his own
impetuous nature chafing at the obstacles, Washington
had to sit down and patiently plan how to expel the
enemy by the slowest and least heroic of methods.
Thus it was predetermined by the conditions of the
case, that the taking of Boston should have little of the
pomp and circumstance of war. No tremendous bom
bardment, seeming to rend earth and sky ! No des
perate assault ! No frequent sallies ! None of these
things ! The coil should simply be drawn tighter until
the enemy yielded or escaped. Very early, strenuous
efforts were made to prevent supplies of fresh pro
visions, fuel, forage, or munitions of war from going
into the city. The only lively skirmishes which broke
the dull monotony of the siege were occasioned by the
expeditions of the Provincials to the islands in the
harbor, to destroy the hay and drive off the stock,
which might be of value to the enemy. That on Hog
and Noddle's Island rose wellnigh to the dignity of a
battle, for on that occasion the Americans not only
defeated the troops opposed to them, with heavy loss,

44 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
but took and burned a schooner, carrying sixteen guns,
which was aiding the attack, and all this without the
loss on their part of a single life. " The Lord mani
festly appears on our side," exclaims a pious Bostonian,
exultingly. Wherever on the coast the English sought
supplies they met resistance. At Weymouth the whole
neighborhood rose in a body to drive off the invaders.
Six transports, looking into Casco Bay for hay and
provisions, were attacked by whale-boats, and five of
them taken. The sailors of Machias captured two
sloops which were sent thither for lumber, and, man
ning the prizes, pursued the armed tender which came
to protect them, and took her also. A ship loaded with
two thousand barrels of provisions was tolled into the
Piscataqua River, and became the prize of the fisher
men. This was what was going on all along the coast.
Not content with simple resistance to invasion, soon
armed ships and schooners — some public, some private
— push out from every bay and inlet. Howe writes
that he fears for his provision transports, — with
reason. Four prizes taken into Boston Bay, two into
Salem, two into Plymouth Harbor, one to Beverly, one
to Marblehead, — such are the items of news eagerly
recorded in diaries, or printed in the little dingy news
papers of the period. Even the elements fought against
the besieged. A great storm in the British Channel
wrecked as many vessels probably, and destroyed as
many supplies, as the Americans succeeded in taking.
These perpetual losses began to tell. As early as
September fifth Earl Dartmouth writes to Howe : " The
situation of the troops, cooped up in a town, deprived
of the comforts and necessaries of life, wasting away
by disease and desertion faster than we can recruit,
and no longer objects of terror to the rebels, is truly

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 45
distressing, " No fresh provisions in Boston ; most of
the wounded from Bunker Hill fight dead for want of
them ; two thousand sick ; twenty to thirty dying daily ;
the bells not allowed to toll at funerals; soldiers
deserting by hundreds, — such were the tales brought
by citizens who escaped, or by deserters who stole into
camp, or briefly recorded in journals. In December an
officer writes: "The distress of the inhabitants and
troops is beyond all possible power of description. No
fuel, no vegetables, pulse, or flour ; only salt meat, and
that fifteen pence a pound. " Plainly, war was taking
on the aspect of privation.
The sufferings of the inhabitants must have been
still more severe. But with a kind of grim humor one
of them records that the flesh of an old bull sold for
one shilling a pound ; and Selectman Newell enters in
his journal, "Very trying scenes! This day was
invited by two gentlemen to dine on rats." One would
think so, especially if the invitation was accepted.
But underneath the grim humor, what grimmer sorrows
and privations ! What a spectacle, when, just before
the siege closed in upon the city, thousands of men,
women, and children, without food, without resources,
leaving behind their homes, some in wagons, some on
foot, wended their weary way over Boston Neck, like
the patriarch, not knowing whither they went! Who
shall paint the hardships of those who remained, where
the poor could find no work, where the rich could
collect none of their dues, where all were exposed to
the open scorn of the refugee Tories, and to the brutal
insults of a licentious soldiery ? What a piteous sight,
when, with the coming of winter, seven hundred poor
souls, many of them aged, thinly clad, pale with past
endurance, were thrust out upon the bleak exposure of

46 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
Point Shirley ! Nobody would compare for extremity
of suffering the siege of Boston with many another
leaguer. For, after all. Generals Gage and Howe were
simply kindly gentlemen sent on an unkindly errand.
But what with the hated yoke of martial law galling
free necks, and the cruel separation of families caused
by the sudden closing up of the town, and the real
destitution and disease, there was enough to blanch
ruddy cheeks, and bow to an untimely grave vigorous
forms. ' The winter wore on, with less and less priva
tion, perhaps, to the soldiers, as one and another trans
port succeeded in reaching port; with more privation
to the inhabitants, who had no part in the good fortune,
and whose resources were steadily decreasing. Some
times, however, stern war smoothed its wrinkled front;
notably, when old Putnam appeared on the scene in the
new character of a lady's man, and regretting to learn
that Mrs. Gage's board is furnished only with salt
beef, politely sends her a quarter of veal to vary her
diet. A very acceptable gift, we are told, for which a
polite card of thanks was sent back.
Meanwhile in the American camp the most pressing
wants had been supplied by the zeal of the neighboring
towns. Officers were slowly learning their duty ; disci
pline was growing more firm and steady, and the whole
army was settling down into the habits of military life.
Every hill and projecting point from the Mystic River
to Dorchester Neck had been made impregnable,
stretching around Boston in a vast semicircle of
redoubts and breastworks of fifteen or twenty miles
in length, until at last — Knox's precious convoy of
cannon and mortar arrived, the almost priceless stores
of Manly's fortunate capture transported to camp, and

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 47
a moderate supply of powder gathered up — the decisive
step was taken. One moonlight, hazy night, while all
along the line the artillery thundered to drown the
noise of the movement, three thousand men, and three
hundred ox-carts laden with bales of pressed hay,
quietly stole across Dorchester Neck, and climbed the
steep heights. All night, while the enemy slept, they
labored. Howe woke to find the town, the harbor, the
fleet commanded by his adversary's guns. A few futile
plans of attack, a few days of uncertainty, and then a
hurried embarkation, and the siege which had made so
little noise and accomplished so much was over.
The occupation of Dorchester Heights came to Howe
like a thunderbolt out of a clear sky. Evidently he
had no fears about this vital point, either because long
immunity had lulled him to false security, or because
he felt that he could at will sweep Dorchester Neck
with his artillery and prevent its passage. He assured
the Ministry that he could hold Boston against all
comers. To the British officers it was a disagreeable
surprise. They were now comfortably settled in bar
racks or deserted houses. Eight store-ships from
England had reached port in December, and many
others from the coast. Fuel, fresh provisions, and
other comforts were plenty. They had turned the
Cradle of Liberty into a theatre. Plays, balls, mas
querades, and grand dinners at the hospitable board of
General Howe, were all down in the bill of fare. It
was hard to give it up, and at such short notice. Only
the day before a lively officer writes : " For the last six
weeks or two months we have been better amused than
could possibly be expected." On the morning of the
fifth, he rubs his eyes, and takes in the full meaning of

48 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
those low hillocks, and exclaims, "Adieu, balls and
masquerades!" Twelve days more, on board a ship
riding at anchor in Nantasket Roads, he lugubriously
records: "Sail to-morrow to Halifax, a cursdd cold,
wintry place, — nothing to eat, less to drink. " To the
Tories it was the knell of doom. One cannot but pity
them. Often they were gentlemen of high culture,
thoroughly honest, with loyalty to their king almost a
religious sentiment. They left behind stately mansions
and pleasant farms, to linger, perhaps, in loneliness
and poverty in strange lands.
It did not take Howe long to decide, that bright
March morning, that the new works must be stormed,
or he leave. He accepted the first alternative. Lord
Percy, with twenty-four hundred men, dropped down
the harbor to Castle Island, with orders to make the
attack at evening. The British soldiers, remembering
that bloody June day, muttered, "It will be another
Bunker Hill, or worse.'' Washington reminded his
soldiers that it was the anniversary of the Boston
Massacre. But it was to be a war not of man, but of
the elements. That afternoon a storm lashed to fury
the waters of the bay, and when it ceased the Americans
had made their works too strong to be assaulted. But
to go was as difficult as to stay. The transports were
too few, and every one of them was at the mercy of the
enemy. But through the intervention of the selectmen
there was an unacknowledged but real truce. Washing
ton was glad to save the city from flames, and to spare
his soldiers' blood. Howe was ready to escape on any
terms. All was now hurry and confusion. What to take,
what to leave, was the question. The ships were
loaded with little order or method. Cannon were

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 49
spiked, or their trunnions broken; carriages, pack-
saddles, and every imaginable article, dropped into the
docks. On the tenth of March Howe ordered all linen
, and woollen goods — articles in great request among
the rebels — to be conveyed on board the JUxnerva at
Hubbard's Wharf, and delivered to Crean Bush, Esq.
This was in obedience to the direct command of Lord
Germain. But it introduced a new element of disorder,
for Crean Bush, a miserable New York Tory, magnified
his office, and went from store to store, breaking them
open, and searching for the required articles. Now
all restraint was thrown off. Sailors, soldiers, and
especially the imported carpenters, on the thirteenth
ranged the streets, axes in hand, insulting peaceable
folks, breaking into warehouses, and throwing into the
river and docks vast quantities of sugar, salt, flour,
and the like, and making the town the scene of tumult
and riot.
Howe still lingered. It is said that the wind was
unfavorable; but Washington sunmiarily ended the
delay. On the night of the sixteenth, he took posses
sion of Nooks Hill, a little rise of land which must
have heen near the South Boston end of the present
Dover Street bridge. From thence the Neck and the
intrenchments could be swept and searched. Howe
embarked with precipitation, and by ten o'clock on the
morning of the seventeenth he and all his troops, and
more than a thousand refugees, were on the way down
the harbor. There were watchers on the hills, and
almost before the British left the wharves. Colonel
Ebenezer Learned threw open the gates of the forts on
the Neck, and entered with five hundred men. Nearly
simultaneously Israel Putnam, with a detachment,
crossed the water from Cambridge, and landed at the

50 SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
foot of the Common. The evacuation was complete.
The enemy in his hurry left behind a vast amount of
stores. Twenty-one vessels, mostly scuttled, two hun
dred and fifty cannon, five or six thousand blankets,
many thousands of bushels of grain, and some thou
sands of tons of coal, are among the things enumerated.
He scattered the Neck with crow's-feet to retard the
progress of troops. This recalls a fact, to which allu
sion has not often, if ever, been made : that these two
thousand crow's-feet were ordered by Gage very early
in the siege, as though he anticipated the catastrophe
from the beginning.
Washington quietly visited the city on the next day,
and, returning to Cambridge, wrote to Hancock and
several others an account of the final hours of the siege.
The same day he despatched a large force, under
Heath, to New York. On the twentieth, the city
having been thoroughly cleansed, he marched in with
the troops. The doors and windows were thrown open,
and the liberated people expressed their lively joy and
gratitude. But one observer notes that a melancholy
gloom hung on their faces. Another, that " by means
of the hard and savage treatment of the British
soldiery," and the want of comforts and many necessa
ries, "they were become thin, and their flesh wasted."
There is a pleasant tradition that Mrs. Washington
rode in a carriage, and that at one point of the route a
babe born on Evacuation Day was brought out and
placed in her lap. Washington remained a fortnight
longer. We have no full account of his doings. He re
ceived the thanks of town, State, and Congress. Much
of his time must have been given to strengthening the
city against any return of the enemy, who still remained
in the bay. On the twenty-eighth, with citizens and

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 51
officers, he attended a solemn service of thanksgiving.
One recalls involuntarily that other siege, when liber
ated Leyden — burghers, women, children, soldiers,
sailors, with stout Admiral Boisot at the head — went
up to the great church to lift to high Heaven their
offering of gratitude. It is agreeable to recall that
John Andrews, to whom we owe such a clear and lively
account of Boston in 1774-75, had the pleasure, at
an hour's notice, of entertaining General Washington
and lady, together with General Gates and others, at
his mansion in School Street. On the fourth of April,
Washington, after an early dinner, started for New
York. One more incident, with a genuine New Eng
land flavor: on the twenty -ninth of March, the whole
British fleet still in the bay, the crow's-feet hardly
collected out of the streets, a town meeting was held in
the Old Brick Meeting-house, and town officers chosen.
So soon had all come back into the old ways again.
We have the testimony of Washington, that, though
the town was much damaged, and many houses despoiled
of furniture, it was much less injured than he expected.
Even the home of that arch-rebel John Hancock was in
tolerable order, and all the family pictures left un
touched. Other witnesses say that the town was in
dreadful condition: houses laid waste and filthy;
some only heaps of ruins; fences and trees alike
destroyed "by these sons of Belial." The accounts
are perfectly reconcilable. Now that the lapse of a
century has softened bitterness, we can afford to
acknowledge that Gage aud Howe had no disposition
to increase the necessary horrors of war. That they
permitted the Old South Church to be used for a riding
school, and the Old North and a hundred dwellings to

52 SUEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON.
'be torn down for fuel, does not prove any special hard
ness. They could hardly be expected to cherish any
great reverence for that house of worship where Adams
and Warren had thundered in the ears of the people
their denunciations of the King and his creatures; and
it was too much to ask of human nature, when troops
were "starving from cold," to keep hands off from
empty wooden buildings, of whateyer name. But the
commanders were poorly seconded by their officers.
These, for his supposed tenderness to citizens, called
Gage " the old woman. " As a result of this contra
riety of feeling, there was a general preservation of the
town, accompanied by much special and disgraceful
mutilation of it.
You may ask, now. What did the siege of Boston
accomplish ? When the British sailed out of Massa
chusetts Bay they admitted at any rate that the crush
ing of the revolt in the four Puritan States was
impracticable. A ghastly admission one would think.
The siege of Boston took the American struggle out of
the range of local warfare up to the level of a national
revolution. The nineteenth of April told the unwel
come truth that our fathers could fight after the fashion
the forest and the Indian had taught them. The seven
teenth of June proved that on occasions behind breast
works they would face boldly the determined assaults
of veterans. To discerning minds, these conflicts had
revealed far more, — that whatever the peril in the
coming days, the Colonies would stand shoulder to
shoulder. Still, eyes which did not wish to see saw
in these preliminary encounters only the rashness of
an angry neighborhood. At most, they believed that
only the bordering States would join in the daring

SIEGE AND EVACUATION OF BOSTON. 63
treason. The siege of Boston swept away such illu
sions. That was a great act of war, achieved in the
face of vast obstacles by the combined efforts of all.
Long before its close all doubts had passed away.
Henceforth the Colonies, from Canada to the Gulf,
would present one united front, and throb with one
common feeling. The world saw that a new nation
was born. As Howe embarked on the morning of
Evacuation Day, that glorious success in the first great
and prolonged trial of arms had made the Declaration
of Independence, and our recognition as a people by
the nations, near and certain events.

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
Printed in the Unitarian Review, November, 1877.
NO part of the war for American independence has
in it more elements of real or of visible interest
than what may be termed the flux and reflux of the Rev
olutionary invasion of Canada. From that gray dawn in
May, 1775, when Ethan Allen, in the name of the great
Jehovah and the Continental Congress, compelled the
British colonel to surrender the strong fortress of
Northern New York, to that bright October day in
1777, when Burgoyne closed a campaign, begun with
proud expectations and brilliant successes, with a pain
ful surrender, — from Ticonderoga to Saratoga, — the
American colonists and the British government were
engaged in a continuous struggle for mastery in the
then almost uninhabited border land between Canada
and .Northern New York and New England. The hope
of the Bostonians, as the Canadian peasants styled
the rebels, was to add to the thirteen Colonies all the
recent conquests from France, and so to leave King
George, on the whole North American continent, no
foothold and no base for hostile operations. The pur
pose of the English was to obtain full control of that
remarkable chain of waters which stretches from the
St. Lawrence to New York harbor, and thus to cut off
from the confederacy the head and heart of the rebel
lion, — Puritan New England.
It is simply impossible to narrate here, even in tho
most concise manner, the events of three campaigns.

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 65
crowded with striking incidents, in which successes
and reverses succeeded each other with wonderful
rapidity, and at the end of which the war died almost
within a day's march of the spot of its audacious birth.
As the surveyor, planting at intervals a stake or flag,
marks to an observing eye his course, so we, recalling
here and there a few governing facts, can dimly outline
the great story. March 29, 1775, John Brown, of
Pittsfield, secret agent at Montreal of the Provincial
Congress of Massachusetts, writes to Samuel Adams
and Joseph Warren : " One thing I must mention as a
profound secret. The fort at Ticonderoga must be
seized as soon as possible. Should hostilities be com
menced by the King's troops, the people of the New
Hampshire Grants have engaged to do the business,
and, in my opinion, are the most proper persons for
the job. " This agreement of the people of the New
Hampshire Grants could hardly have been made much
later than the middle or last of February. Two months
before the British had committed open violence, two
months before the blood of Lexington or the fight at
Concord, these stalwart farmers of a sparsely settled
Province, which was even then struggling for its own
political existence, pledged themselves to a great act
of war. With this bold, may we not say mad agree
ment, the annals of the invasion of Canada commence.
May 10 and 12, 1775, as all the world knows, Ethan
Allen, with eighty-three men, and Seth Warner, with
a still smaller following, surprised Ticonderoga and
Crown Point, — those keys of Canada, as Allen called
them. Eight days after, Benedict Arnold, in a small
armed schooner, swept before the south wind up to the
gates of St. John, took one vessel, burnt many more,
and obtained full control of the waters of Lake Cham-

56 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
plain. September 4, after what proved to be, on the
part of the Continental Congress, a fatal period of two
and a half months of timidity and irresolution, Mont
gomery, with a small army, was at the mouth of the
Sorel. Six weeks later he had taken Chambly. An
other fortnight, and St. John, with two thirds of all
the regular soldiers in Canada, was in his possession.
And on the 12th of November, by his unopposed
entrance into Montreal, he became real master of the
whole Province, with the notable exception of the one
stronghold, Quebec. So swiftly had the first wave
rolled on and up.
But this was the climax of the invasion. A sharp
struggle, a slow decadence, and total and disastrous
failure followed. For, on the 31st day of December,
in the last fading hours of the year, amid a driving
snow-storm, Montgomery, with a few hundred soldiers,
joined Arnold, fresh from his amphibious march through
the wildernesses of the Kennebec and the Chaudi^re,
and made a desperate, and, as it now looks, what might
have been, had fortune granted one smile, a successful
attack upon Quebec. Bloodily repulsed, for full four
weary, bitter months the American army kept up the
appearance of resolution and military strength. But
behind the appearance was utter exhaustion and dis
couragement. Montgomery dead, Arnold wounded,
the small-pox depleting faster than whole new regi
ments could recruit, this shadow of an army held
little more than the ground on which it encamped.
Then General Carleton, the British commander, heavily
reinforced, assumed the offensive ; and on the 6th day
of May, 1776, — the very day which completed the year
since the Green Mountain boys gathered at Castleton
to fulfil their agreement with Major Brown, — the

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 57
hazardous retreat began. Back first to Three Rivers ;
then to the mouth of the Sorel; and, hastened by
defeat, still more swiftly to St. John; until, in the
early days of July, five thousand wretched men, ragged,
half starved, poorly sheltered, three thousand of them
sick, scores of them every day dropping into their '
graves, the remnant of more than ten thousand who
had joined in this bold venture were huddled around
Crown Point. Not an American soldier remained in
arms in Canada.
The stroke had been given, and failed. What luck
should attend the counterstroke was now to be deter
mined. Carleton, with his fresh, disciplined bands,
had easily swept from before him what was but the
semblance of an army. But when -he came to the
shores of the lake, so aptly called by the Indians
"the gate of the country," he found that gate shut and
barred. " Confronting him was General Arnold, with
a fleet of sixteen or seventeen vessels. That those
vessels were hastily built and ill adapted to the pur
poses of war, — that they were armed with cannon of
light calibre, and manned chiefly by landsmen, — all
this is true ; but for the time being they made Arnold
master of the situation. The American army, all
along the line of its retreat, had seized and carried
away, or else burned, every ship, every bateau, and
every canoe even, which it could find; and when the
British commander reached the lake, he had neither
naval force to meet his adversary, nor fleet of boats to
transport his troops. That he displayed foresight and
energy must be admitted. Four ships of war which
had been sent from England, were taken apart at
Chambly, carried around the rapids of the Sorel, and
put together again at St. John. Ten gunboats from

68 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
the same source were added; ten more were built or
gathered on the spot ; and, to complete theirequipment,
seven hundred veteran sailors were collected. Mean
while, to utilize this naval superiority, five or six
hundred boats had been constructed, and ten thousand
soldiers stood ready to embark and follow in the wake
of the victorious fleet.
But during these preparations the summer had slipped
away, and there was no time to reap the harvest. On
the 11th of October, indeed, Carleton defeated the
American fleet off Valcour Island, in an engagement
in which the vanquished, fighting against odds, won
more glory than the victor, and then in proud array
sailed down the lake and took possession of the deserted
fortress' and the little peninsula of Crown Point. All
that remained to the Americans of the wide conquests
of the last seventeen months was the solitary stronghold
of Ticonderoga. But the campaign was over. Prepa
rations were too incomplete and winter too near for
the victorious army to plunge into new and unknown
dangers. Amid the dark memories of his selfish greed
and base treachery let this bright record remain : that
Arnold's presence in Lake Champlain alone saved New
York and saved the confederacy, stunned by the great
and unexpected reverse of Long Island, from a peril
which they were not prepared to meet.
Early in June, 1777, Burgoyne, who had superseded
Carleton, was on the way southward as he supposed
to easy victory. He had a compact little army of eight
thousand men, made up of German and English veterans.
Its equipments were perfect, and it had a park of artil
lery of an excellence and strength before unknown in
this hemisphere. Many of its officers, for valor and skill,
had already achieved a European reputation. Burgoyne

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 59
found the road open before him, as his predecessor had
left it. On the 20th he was at the mouth of the river
Bouquet, endeavoring to teach his wild Iroquois allies
how to fight after a kindly and civilized fashion. On
the 23d his advance was at Crown Point. The night
of the 4th of July, — ominous celebration of the first
anniversary of Independence Day ! — General Phillips
was pressing his troops and cannon up Sugar Hill with
that same vehemence, as another says, with which he
broke fifteen canes urging forward his artillery at the
battle of Minden. The next morning, a British subal
tern, looking six hundred feet down the rugged slope,
saw through his glass the countenances of the Ameri
cans, no doubt with fear and perplexity stamped upon
them. Burgoyne had only confirmed what Trumbull
had long before proved : that if Ticonderoga locked the
entrances of Lake George and South Bay, that little
abrupt cone, less than a third of a mile southward, was
a sure key to unlock them. Two days later General
Frazer and Baron Riedesel pursued, and, after an ob
stinate resistance, defeated the American rear-guard at
Hubbardton. No language can describe the consterna
tion which seized the humble homes which were thinly
scattered along the Northern Hudson. The presence
of British soldiers was sufficiently alarming; but to
the imagination of that day the Hessian was the type
of diabolical cruelty; while the dread of the painted
Indian added the last element of terror. Everybody fled.
Ox-carts, wagons, men on horseback, women on pillions,
mothers dragging themselves along under the burden of
one or two children, were familiar sights in the narrow
wood-paths which were the only roads of that day.
To the British it had been not so much a campaign
as a pleasure trip, so smoothly all things had moved.

60 FROM -nCONDEEOGA TO SARATOGA
Their noble host sailing peacefully in long lines
down Champlain, a grand pageant ; strong forts open
ing their gates at the terror of their name; beauti
ful Lake George, set in New York's dark and bloody
ground, every foot of whose shores had its tale of
bold foray, of fierce skirmish, or of desperate battle,
lying unresisting at their feet, and seeming to in
vite them to embark upon its waters, — what was all
this but to play war ? No wonder Burgoyne dreamed
that in a few brief weeks, victorious, he should
meet Howe midway on the Hudson, and with him
exchange congratulations. But, in truth, his troubles
had just begun. No supplies to be had short of the St.
Lawrence; the dark wildemess before him cut and
slashed by the provident order of Schuyler, until its
few paths were a maze of locking and interlocking
trunks, such as a tornado, crashing through the forest,
leaves along its track, — he was brought to a fatal
pause of six weeks. Each moment of it was like a
^ft of pure gold to his adversaries, enabling them to
recover courage and to collect resources. Besides,
acting by detachments which, as Washingon with clear
sagacity foresaw, could not amid those dense forests be
properly supported, Burgoyne risked terrible disasters.
In a single week in August, Jolin Stark, at Bennington,
lopped off the left arm of his strength; while Arnold,
at Fort Stanwix, putting idle panic into the minds of
St. Leger and his forces, paralyzed the right arm. The
maimed body groped blindly on to receive, four weeks
later at Bemus's Heights, a mortal blow. Such, in
brie^ is the outline of three momentous campaigns
which, on the one hand, secured the independence of
the Colonies, and, on the other hand, for one hundred
years at least, bound the Canadian Provinces to Great

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 61
Britain in willing fealty; and if daring partisan
exploits, striking military achievements, perpetual
change of scene as perpetual change of fortunes, and
the presence of great and noble men on the field of
action, furnish materials for interest, then no part of
the Revolutionary struggle is more attractive, or better
repays study.
One of the attractions of this series of operations is,
that it is possible to view them as making up a living
and varied monograph, complete in itself, and, in
fancy at any rate, separated from every other chapter
of our history. Of course it is not really so. Deeply
considered, these events are bound to all contemporary
ones by ties which cannot be severed. You read
Washington's letters, and you see how, with his own
great load to carry, every hour he bore in his heart the
needs of this Northern struggle, and, to insure its
success, contributed from his enfeebled army his best
soldiers. You study the records of the Contihental
Congress, and how evident it is that, when its members
had, with reluctance, accepted the hostile movemeht,
they gave for its furtherance their counsels, their
labors, and, alas! too often their personal piques and
sectional jealousies. And when the crowning mercy
came, it was not alone New York or New England
which received the blessing, but the farthest State of
the confederacy just as much, which from that hour
felt its shackles grow loose and brittle. So, in truth,
these campaigns were but part and parcel of all the
rest of the uncertain struggle.
But it is not natural to feel acutely this connection.
The field of action was so distant in space and so
different in character, and the strategy so independent

62 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
of other movements, that, as you read, you hardly
recall parallel events. Following Montgomery in his
victorious advance to Montreal, or watching Arnold
struggling around the rapids and over the portages and
through the shallow and choked lakes which lie between
Norridgewock and Quebec, who remembers that at that^
very time Washington, lacking ammunition, lacking
guns, lacking food, lacking fuel, lacking men, lacking
everything, strong only in the ignorance of the enemy
and in the fears which Concord and Bunker Hill had
created, was overlooking beleaguered Boston ? Or, as
we hold our breath that we may catch every one of the
features of the heroic struggle on that 31st of December
upon the heights of Quebec, do we recall that in those
very hours our great commander at Cambridge was
wearily watching, with fears in his heart, more than
half his army, at the close of their time of enlistment,
march away from camp, leaving it almost naked and
defenceless against its foes ? To how large a portion
of intelligent readers is it perfectly clear that the
retreat of the American army from Canada and Howe's
advance on New York were contemporary movements ?
That, when one British fleet was driving along the
waters of Lake Champlain the shattered remnant of
Arnold's ships, another British fleet, having broken
through the obstructions at Fort Washington, was
dominating all the broad reaches of the Hudson ?
That in the same months, and almost in the same
weeks, when Gates was jauntily reaping at Stillwater
and Saratoga the fruits of Schuyler's foresight, his
great chief, whose place he dared hope to fill, was
wrestling against odds at Brandywine and German-
town? These events do run parallel; and doubtless
they cast light and shade upon each other, and mutually

FEOM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 63
act and react. But few carry in memory the connec
tion. This apparent isolation of the Northern cam
paigns has its advantages. It certainly gives dramatic
unity to the narrative; and it enables the mind, less
burdened by multiplicity of interests and events, better
to comprehend the field of action, the men, the move
ments, and the results.
And, first of all, we need to fix our attention upon
the field of action; for this, perhaps, more than the
foresight of administrators, and more than the skill of
generals and the valor of soldiers, determined the
fortunes of these Northern campaigns. It is almost
impossible to appreciate the physical conditions of
this region of country barely one hundred years ago.
Draw a straight line, nearly east and west, from the
boundary of New York and Vermont, through Saratoga,
till it touches Lake Ontario at Oswego. Here is a
tract larger than Vermont. More than six hundred
thousand people live on it, and still it is not crowded.
In 1777 there were scarcely twice as many hundreds.
The map of the period writes across this tract, " Unsur-
veyed. " You travel up and down the shores of Lake
Champlain on either side ; you find at every step pros
perous towns arid villages. But when Burgoyne sailed
up that lake there were not fifty people on the west
shore from Crown Point to Canada ; and on the eastern
sliore, barely a half dozen or so of hamlets of a few log
huts each. Lake George was a gem in an absolute
wilderness, — an unbroken wood clothing its surround
ing hills and touching its waters on all sides, except at
a little fifty-acre clearing at Sabba' Day Point. In
short, from the Connecticut to Lake Ontario there was
one boundless forest, with scarcely the smoke of a
white man's cabin rising from it, made rugged by steep

64 FROM HCONDEEOGA TO SARATOGA.
mountains and innumerable hills, and cut through on
every side by swift-rushing streams. For a brief
period, while the French held Crown Point and Ticon
deroga, near to them one or two little villages, of
perhaps fifteen hundred people, had sprung up. But at
the close of the last French war they were deserted;
and to-day the curious inquirer finds the old cellar
holes, some of them amidst dense woods, which have
grown up where life and joy once were. These vast
solitudes had been the neutral ground and the battle
field for unknown periods; first, between the Six
Nations and their savage foes in Canada; afterwards,
between the British and French. In this ocean of
verdure there were no roads, only narrow trails passable
but to the feet of Indian scouts. So terrible was this
wilderness, that Sir John Johnson, when in 1775 he
fled from his baronial hall on the Mohawk to Canada,
though his steps were directed by the best of Indian
guides, was nineteen suffering days traversing perhaps
two hundred miles, and reached Montreal in what is
recorded as "a pitiable condition." Even the country
south of this wildemess is spoken of as dark and fear
ful, full of dangerous defiles, and broken by morasses
and easily made impenetrable. A journey of Mrs.
Schuyler, from Albany to Ticonderoga, to see her sick
husband, is described as fatiguing and exposing to the
last degree ; and Dr. Franklin, proposing to ride over
the best road in the Province, from Albany to New
York, with the most careful of drivers, and in the
softest coach good Madam Schuyler could furnish,
jocosely su^ested the propriety of making his will
before he started.
If now you tumed your eye eastward, toward Maine,
you would find similar conditions, or worse. After

FEOM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 65
you passed the narrow strip of civilization which
hugged the mouths of the rivers and the Atlantic, you
were face to face with primeval solitudes. Woods,
slippery with fallen trunks, and dense with moss and
undergrowth; rivers, continually broken by rapids;
ponds choked with the decay and fall of vegetation for
untold ages, —were everywhere. Even in Canada it
was hardly better. Montreal was a little town of five
thousand people; St. John; hardly more than a mili
tary post ; Three Rivers, a village of perhaps a thou
sand. .General Riedesel, passing . through, says the
country around the St. Lawrence and the Sorel was
pretty, but utterly incapable , of ; sustaining the army.
These are not simply interesting reminiscences. Nature
dominated in military affairs, and largely determined
results. We recall a few instances. For six weeks
Arnold struggled with incredible perseverance through
the Maine forests. Had he been able to reach Quebec
only three days earlier, he would certainly have taken
it, and perhaps made Canada the fourteenth State in
the Union. When Carleton reached Champlain with a
noble army, a little fleet, not half so powerful as any
petty fishing town on our coast could equip with a
month's notice, was amply strong to bar his progress
and ruin his campaign. And when on that same lake
Burgoyne had undisputed command, a little strip of
wilderness before him, and a long thin line of commu
nication behind him, made advance to the Hudson for
six weeks dangerous, if not impossible. Even then he
did not sufficiently respect the perils of the wilderness.
His instructions to Baum, when one thinks what the
ways over the Green Hills must have been, ordering
him to cross and recross Vermont, and bring back
hundreds of cattle for food, and hundreds of horses to

66 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
mount his cavalry, read like the ravings of a madman
rather than the instructions of a prudent general. And
when he himself had reached the Hudson, and for
whole weeks was so near the enemy's camp that he
could hear his reveille, and had fought on the interven
ing ground two pitched battles, he was ignorant both of
the position and strength of Gates's army; and it was
not until after his surrender that he learned anything
worth knowing. Stranger yet, when, September 18th,
Major Brown attacked his communications and burned
hundreds of boats and took hundreds of prisoners, it
was not from his rear-guard and it was not from his
scouts that he learned of this fresh disaster, but, ten
days after, from a German cornet whom Gates released,
and who brought to the British commander news which
in the rebel camp was three or four days old. So
clearly and vividly do all the circumstances of these
campaigns prove that the Americans had no allies so
sure as the strength of the hills and the wide solitudes
of the forests.
The material of the opposing armies furnishes another
interesting subject of inquiry. Of the American force,
the bulk must have been New Englanders. Of them
we have graphic sketches, drawn not always by friendly
hands. They were the farthest possible remove from
the traditional soldier. Coming out of the heart of
society and life thoroughly democratic, they had no
respect for titles. To them a captain or colonel was a
fellow townsman with an epaulet added. The officers
often shared their opinion, and preserved too littie
dignity. Thacher relates an amusing instance. A
certain Massachusetts colonel, "a serious and good
man," permitted his son to set up a cobbler's bench,
and, in intervals of military duty, to pursue his trade

FEOM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 67
at his quarters. The officers of Wayne's regiment were
disgusted. At first they only sneered ; but one day
one of their number, warmed with wine, entered the
colonel's room, threw the bench out of the window,
assaulted the colonel himself, and set the camp in an
uproar. If we can trust Southern reporters, the New
England military apparel was not, at its best, impres
sive. Here a dingy suit of old French war regimentals
contrasted oddly with the homespun at its side. A
battered cocked hat was sometimes added, while a
motley array of rifles, fowling-pieces, and carbines com
pleted the un-uniform uniforms. At Saratoga, even
so much as this was not attempted, the rank and file
appearing in ordinary farmer's garb, and the officers
having little tp distinguish them but different colored
cockades. Their ideas of camp duty were the crudest.
Schuyler reports that, when he came to Ticonderoga,
the first sentinel he met left his post and went back
to wake the guard; that the second suffered him to
approach without opposition, and that with a penknife
he could have overcome both and set fire to the block
house. They carried into war the traditions of the
town meeting, and seemed to believe that there too
the majority should rule ; so that poor Montgomery was
actually forced by the clamor of his soldiers to encamp
on that side of St. John which his own judgment held
to be both less safe and less healthy. Add now that
they were civilians more than soldiers, liable to fits of
homesickness, a disease for which, as an officer said,
there was no remedy but a discharge, and one begins to
see why strange reverses so often followed as strange
successes, and why the defeats of the Canadian army
were not half so bad as its dissensions and divisions
and utter lack of sound discipline. Yet it was out of

68 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
just such material that a few months' real campaigning
made splendid regiments, like that which, under General
John Brooks, threw itself with headlong fury against
Brayman's redoubt, and killed or drove out its de
fenders, and turned the 7th of October's fight into a
ruinous disaster for Burgoyne. It was just such as
they — men almost without discipline — who performed
at Bennington the unheard of achievement of raw
militia storming intrenchments held by veterans and
defended by artillery.
It was in these campaigns that the New England
farmers, so democratic in their feelings and so homely
in their ways, first came into contact with the soldiers
from other sections. The contrasts were sometimes
sharp and wide. New York, with its few vast land
holders and its many tenants, was distinctly aristo
cratic. Slavery had given the same tendency to the
more southern States. In the troops from these sections
there was more care for appearance, and the grades of
rank were more distinctly marked. Graydon observes,
" There were none by whom an unofficer-like appear
ance and deportment would be tolerated less than by a
city-bred Marylander, who at the same time was dis
tinguished by the most fashionably cut coat, the most
macaroni cocked hat, and the hottest blood of the
Union." Between such contrasted troops there could
not but be some friction, — enough to exercise no very
beneficial influence upon the campaign. Indeed, a
clear observer testifies that " since the troops from the
Southern States have been associated with those from
New England, a- strong prejudice has assumed its
unhappy influence, and drawn a line of distinction
between them. "
Especially unfortunate it was, that, in addition to

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 69
all this, there grew up in the minds of Eastern soldiers
a bitter hostility toward their New York commander.
Everybody sees now that Schuyler was a man of stain
less integrity, a true patriot, and that to his foresight
and energy the country owed a great debt. But he was
a punctilious man, who could not abide want of disci
pline, and in whose nostrils the very qualities which
belong to raw militia were au offence. And so, while
his earnest support of his native State in her strife
with the Green Mountain boys had already alienated
Western New England from him, his anger and rebukes,
well enough merited, completed the breach, and half
hearted obedience was the direct result. That it should
ever have been believed by any considerable body of
men that General Schuyler was a traitor, and that he
received the pay of treason by collecting silver bullets
which had been fired into the American camp from
Burgoyne's guns, looks almost too ridiculous for cre
dence. It simply shows how deep was the distrust,
and what a baneful effect it must have had on the con
duct of affairs. So however superior Schuyler might
be to his competitor in character, patriotism, and mili
tary ability, and however cruel it might be to rob him
of the fruit of his labors, when things had come to such
a pass that New England men would not enlist under
him,, or obey him with cheerfulness when enlisted, his
removal became a cruel necessity. The, story of the
blind injustice of many noble men towards one as
noble, is not a pleasant chapter in Revolutionary
history. Of the composition of the British army less needs to
be said. Its veterans had, no doubt, the virtues and
vices of mercenary soldiers. But little or nothing dis
creditable to them has been handed down. Possibly,

70 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
at this late day, in respect to the employment of
Indians, we may abate a little the severity of our criti
cisms of the mother country. On the one hand, it is
evident that the British generals looked with profound
dislike upon their .employment. Riedesel records his
painful emotions; and Burgoyne undoubtedly drove
them from his service by his humane efforts to keep
them within bounds. Onthe other hand, the American
record is not quite clean. It is certain that Stock-
bridge Indians were in Gates's army. Herkimer at
Oriskany was helped by friendly Oneidas. More or
less, St. Francis and Caughnawaga Indians followed
Arnold and Montgomery. Even Washington questions
whether, seeing that they will not be neutral, it would
not be better to enlist Indians ; and, in 1776, Congress
actually voted that it was ex;pedient to take two thou
sand of these savages into the service. It was perhaps
therefore more owing to inability than to virtue that
our escutcheon was not thus early smirched by bar
barian alliances. Then, as now, we were glad to use
the Indian, and reprobated his cruelty chiefly when it
was turned against ourselves.
One would not willingly dismiss this branch of our
subject without recalling a few men, who played their
part in these campaigns with rare vigor and fidelity,
and who did perhaps as much as others of wider renown
to make them finally successful, but whose names,
through early death or removal from service, have
almost faded out of sight. And first let us mention
with honor the name of John Brown, of Pittsfield,
earliest of all the patriots to project the invasion of
Canada, and through the long strife a good soldier, in
counsel wise, in action prompt and daring. Yet how
many Massachusetts men know who or what he was ?

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA 71
Two years before the breaking out of the Revolution
there came to Pittsfield, then a little town of eight
hundred people, a young lawyer of good family. So
quickly he made his mark, that a year later he was
chosen to represent the town in the first Provincial
Congress at Concord. Less than two months after he
took his seat he was selected, as the fittest man of
them all, to go to Montreal to ascertain the sentiments
of the Canadians, and to build up there a revolutionary
party. That young lawyer, member of Congress and
secret agent, was John Brown, then just thirty years
old. His journey to Canada proved his hardihood. It
was winter. For fourteen days he pressed forward, —
now in a boat amid the broken and drifting ice of Lake
Champlain, now plodding through the deep snows of
the forest, and now wading in the freezing overflow of
creeks and watercourses, Retumed, he was with Allen
at Ticonderoga, The following July he made another
yet more perilous visit to Canada, and was four days
within the enemy's lines, using his eyes well, and
escaped capture only by leaping from the back window
of the house in which he was concealed, and fleeing,
pursued by many soldiers. He accompanied Mont
gomery in his advance, and by a daring movement
captured the little fort at Chambly, and with it the
very munitions of war with which his chief forced the
surrender of St. John. Brown had always distrusted
Benedict Arnold. That able, bad man reciprocated by
withholding from him his merited promotion and load
ing him with foul charges, and then by his great
influence preventing a fair court of inquiry. Justice
denied. Brown resigned his commission, and pub
lished a card in which occurred these prophetic words :
" Money is this man's God, and to get enough of it he

72 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
would sacrifice his country. " Then followed a remark
able scene. Arnold said that he would kick Brown
whenever he met him. The next day Brown strode
into the dining-room where Arnold stood amid a group
of gentlemen. " I understand, sir, that you have said
that you would kick me. I now present myself to
give you an opportunity. " A pause. No answer. No
movement. Brown turned on his heel, saying, "You
are a dirty scoundrel," and left the room. But no
private grievance could sour his patriotism. In the
closing days of the campaign he joined General Lincoln,
and by him was despatched with five hundred men to
cut the British communications. Prompt as ever,
September 18, 1777, he surprised the lines at Ticon
deroga, released one himdred American prisoners, took
three hundred British, and burned four armed ships and
two hundred bateaux. After Burgoyne's surrender he
lived three years quietly at Pittsfield. Then from the
Mohawk Valley came a cry of distress. Sir John
Johnson and his savage allies were on the war-path and
near. In that valley, studying his profession. Brown
had passed some of the pleasant years of early life, and
he could not be deaf to the cry. At the head of the
Berkshire militia he hastened forward; and on his
thirty-fifth birthday, on the 19th of October, 1780, fell
into an ambuscade at Stony Arabia, and early on the
disastrous day dropped dead from a shot which his
manly person had attracted. He died honorably, fight
ing for a country which he felt had not been just to
him, while his traducer and oppressor, not two months
before, had skulked down the Hudson to take refuge in
the " Vulture, " thenceforward to find his place among
the living dead. So perished in early manhood the man
who, more than any other, originated, and who bravely

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 73'
sustained and helped prosperously to close the Northern
campaigns of the Revolution.
The name of Seth Warner has not passed into so
deep an oblivion as that of his contemporary, but it has
been obscured by the reputation of men who have
merited less and achieved less. To the popular mind
Ethan Allen stands as the hero of the Green Mountains ;
and there is much to warrant it. His strong figure,
his boldness, his frankness, his humanity, his partisan
exploits, his power of putting his thoughts into lan
guage which you cannot forget, all tended to make him
the popular idol. But he was rash and eccentric, with
a high temper, incapable of obedience, and pursuing
his own plans with obstinacy. His lieutenant, his
equal in courage and patriotism, was a firmer, steadier,
and more trustworthy man. On several occasions
Warner did vital service. At Hubbardton he saved
St. Clair's army, charging and driving the best British
soldiers ; and had not Riedesel reinforced Frazer with
overwhelming numbers, he would have forestalled John
Stark's glory, and made Hubbardton an earlier Ben
nington. At Bennington, when Brayman came up, the
Americans • had been thrown into confusion by their
own victory, and it was the cry, " Reinforcements close
by ! " which arrested a panic. " Then, " says an eye
witness, " in five minutes we saw Warner's men hurry
ing to help us. They opened right and left, and half
of them attacked each flank of the enemy, and beat
back those who were just closing around us, " — and the
most brilliant victory of the Northern war was won.
How hardy a soldier Warner was is shown by that
march, with two hundred men on snow-shoes in the
winter of 1775-76, across the trackless region between
Vermont and the St. Lawrence, to join the American

74 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
army, then so enfeebled by sickness and defeats. But
hard service and exposure wore him out, and he retired
to die, old in body, at forty-one years.
One name we might gladly pass in silence. Had
Arnold died in that mad charge oi October 7, his name
would have gone down to posterity, all his faults for
gotten, as a pure patriot and a great hero, — so bril
liant had been his career and so splendid his services.
You can draw a line the day of Burgoyne's surrender.
On the surface, all before it is glorious; all after it,
shameful. Read the journals of Judge Henry and
James Melvin of that dreadful march through the
Maine forests. You feel as if the annals of ancient
and modern warfare could furnish no story of endurance
to surpass it. At Quebec he divided the honors with
Montgomery, and wellnigh shared his martyrdom. In
the naval battle off Valcour Island, so magnificent was
his courage that he snatched more glory from the jaws
of defeat than most win from victory. To his energy
and reckless courage, more than to any other cause,
Burgoyne owed his crushing defeat ; and the verdict of
time crowns not Gates, but Arnold, hero of Saratc^a.
To these add his minor achievements : his swift reso
lution giving the Americans the control of Lake
Champlain in 1775 ; his cool audacity holding in check,
almost without an army, the enemy after the repulse at
Quebec ; his skilful retreat from Montreal, himself the
last man to leave the Canadian shore. What other
general of the Revolution had twined for himself such
a wreath of glories ? Yet, to a discerning eye, beneath
the fair surface were all his later faults. Popular with
the private soldier, to his fellow officers he was tyran
nous and overbearing and irascible to the last degree.
Squibs and caricatures rarely fail to seize the salient

FEOM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 75
foibles of their victims. A bit of doggerel, written on
th'e occasion of a sharp quarrel between Arnold and a
subordinate officer, embalms his irritability : —
" Wynkoop is a plucky lad,
And Arnold is another ;
Both can easily get mad.
And raise a tarnal pother.
" Old Gates, I guess, wiU set 'em straight,
Without appeal to Schuyler ;
I only hope good Colonel ' Koop '
Won't bust his angry bUer."
The doggerel is worth quoting, if only to show how
fast and far slang could travel a century ago ; for it
was only two years before that the first boiler explosion
took place at Soho, and originated the derisive advice
to angry men "not to burst their boilers." But a
fierce and arbitrary temper was not his worst quality.
From the beginning he was destitute of integrity. The
soldiers whom he enlisted to go to Ticonderoga he
cheated out of their wages. Taking advantage of his
power as military commander, at Montreal, he put
sentinels at the shop doors of merchants, and took
goods which were afterwards sold for his private emolu
ment at Albany. So, from first to last, he was the
same manner of man, — with skill and courage equal
to all emergencies ; with a despotic temper few could
abide; with no rectitude to make him worthy of trust,
and too self-centred to be a real patriot.
How refreshing it is to turn from these painful recol
lections to the memory of one whose presence gave
even to the horrors of war a tender grace. No book on
war experience is so attractive as the journal of Baron
ess Riedesel. The passionate love of her husband,

76 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
which gave her courage to cross the ocean and to follow
him into the dangers and wild solitodes of a hosfile
land; her worship- of him and her deep faith in his
superior skill, so innocently expressed; her patient
endurance of hardships and terrors to which she was
all unused ; her warm sympathy with the sufferings of
soldiers, tending them with her own hands, and feeding
them from her own stores ; her tearful account of the
death of brave men amid the roar of artillery, where
shot pierced their last place of refuge, — all these
details, so simply yet so touchingly narrated, give to
her book perpetual interest. That story, told so often,
and yet never once too much, of her ride with trem
bling heart with her little ones through the American
camp; of the respectful, pitying looks of the rough
soldiers; of that manly man stooping to kiss her
children, and, with thoughtful kindness, providing
food, shelter, and hospitality, — no nobler testimony
has ever been given to the real worth of the plain men
who won American freedom, or to the noble bearing of
the men who commanded them.
The results of these three shifting campaigns ! We
have intimated them, — threefold. They substantially
closed the conflict in New England. Tryon and Arnold,
with cruel spite, might arrange forays which had but
little use or meaning except to alarm the defenceless
people of Connecticut. An English force might linger
for two years more at Newport and conduct expeditions
against neighboring towns which brought no credit to
their authors. There might be a brief campaign on
the little island itself; but the war, to all intents, had
passed southward to new fields, — to New York, to
Philadelphia, to South Carolina, to Virginia, there to

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 77
die. Again, these campaigns secured the independence
of the American Colonies. Not merely, as some would
intimate, because they made certain the French alliance,
with all its vast aid to us and its vast strain upon
British strength and resources, but because, as Professor
Smyth so well states it, " the general conclusion from
the campaign of 1777 was, that the country presented
difficulties that were insurmountable, and that the
enemy could not be brought to engage without his con
sent, — that the subjugation of the continent, therefore,
was impossible." The patriot of that day might not
have stated it in just such language ; but he saw none
the less clearly that if thirty thousand men on New
York soil, beginning the campaign with the prestige of
victory, could not ward off a capital disaster, and could
hold nothing outside the range of the guns of their
fleet, then this game of conquest was over. Not
Valley Forge, not the reverses in South Carolina, not
months or years of weary waiting, could remove him
from this steadfast conviction. All the more the pity,
he thought, that it should take the good King over the
water five more years to reach the same conclusion.
But one result of the Northern campaigns is not
perhaps in our day so clearly appreciated: that they
bound the Canadian Provinces for one hundred years at
least in willing loyalty to Great Britain. There can
be but little doubt of the favorable feeling, of the
Canadians at the opening of the Revolution. The first
action of Congress assumes it: "Voted, that General
Schuyler, if it be not disagreeable to the Canadians,
do immediately take St. John and Montreal." Well
informed observers thought that nine tenths of the
people favored the Bostonians. Even the Indians,
especially those of the St. Francis and Caughnawaga

78 FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA.
tribes, assured Major Brown that they had refused to
take up arms against the Americans, and added, that,
if they were obliged to fight at all, they should take
part with their friends in New England. These state
ments were substantially correct. Brown himself owed
his safety during his hazardous visits to Canada in no
small measure to the friendship of the people, who kept
him informed of the motions of the military. When
Arnold's half -starved followers came straggling through
the wilderness, they were received with open arms into
the villages around the Chaudi^re, and fed, sheltered,
and comforted. Some two or three battalions actually
enlisted in the rebel service; perhaps a thousand in
all. Moses Hazen, one of their officers, became a
Brigadier General, and served with credit. These
troops were called Congress's Own, and some two or
three ^hundred of them followed the fortunes of their
new allies and received grants of land, after the Revo
lution, from the State of New York. Such was the
condition of things in 1775. And if, immediately upon
the breaking out of the war. Congress could and would
have followed Ethan Allen's advice, and sent forward
at once a strong body of troops, there seems to be but
little question that for the time being, and perhaps
forever, Canada would have been annexed to the thir
teen Colonies. At most, there were but a few hundred
regulars in the Province, and no others came, or could
come, for the space of a year. The bands of Loyalists
who, under Colonel McLean, afterwards did such royal
service, were not then organized. It is difficult to
understand from what quarter strenuous resistance
could have come. But the golden moment passed;
and, as the aspect of affairs changed, the love of many
waxed cold, and then turned into actual dislike. If

FROM TICONDEROGA TO SARATOGA. 79
the cause of this change of Canadian feeling is asked,
the first reply would be that Governor Carleton's wise
and conciliatory policy had had its natural effect. His
military skill some may question, but few that he was
a sagacious, large-hearted administrator of government.
He was firm yet mild, vigorous and at the same time
lenient, and while he repressed the disaffected he also
won them to his side. Then, as the campaign wore on,
and the affairs of the Americans seemed to look more
and more desperate, people began to doubt the wisdom
of rebellion, and to hesitate about embarking in this
sinking ship. Besides, the American soldiers played
into Carleton's hands. What Arnold did by wholesale
at Montreal, many of them did all over the country by
retail. Peasants were threatened, and even branded,
for asking payment of debts. Horses were taken by
force or by threats, even by the privates. Certificates,
unsigned and worthless, were given in pay for goods.
To this was added the stupid folly of awakening the
anger of the French peasants by insulting and robbing
their priests. In short, in the American army, as
indeed in all armies, there were men without reason,
without integrity, and without respect for others'
rights. So a change of feeling came, and, as such
changes are likely to be, was thorough. And in 1777
the Province, with little exception, was entirely and
earnestly loyal. So it was settled for then, — for a
century. Whether it will ever be different, or whether
for us or them it would be better if it should be
different, it is not the business of an article which
seeks to deal with facts accomplished to inquire.
Enough that the campaigns of 1775, '76, and '77 found
the Canadas disposed to be rebel, and left them glad
to be loyal.

THREE EPISODES OF THE NORTHERN CAM
PAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.!
LeCTUKE delivered BBFCiEB THE CONCOBD LtCEDM, JaNUAET 23, 1878.
ON the 19th of April, 1775, three hundred Massa
chusetts militia-men — mostly farmers — stood
on the banks of, Concord River, opposite Old North
Bridge, and exchanged volleys with a detachment of
British soldiers, and compelled them to retreat. By
this act the Colony took up the gauntlet which King
George had thrown down, and the American Revolution
began. The second audacious movement in that momentous
struggle was made two days after, when ten thousand
of the best British soldiers were shut up in Boston by
twenty thousand half-armed militia, commanded by
generals who had graduated from the lawyer's desk,
the farmer's plough, the blacksmith's forge, the book
seller's shop, and the doctor's office.
A third, and if possible yet more audacious enter
prise, was crowned with success just three weeks after
Concord fight. On the 10th of May, as the first beams
of morning were flushing the eastern horizon, Ethan
Allen with eighty-three men surprised the strong
fortress of Ticonderoga, — which within the memory
of the assailants had rolled back in bloody defeat a
1 This Lecture covers some of the same ground as the preceding
article, but in many respects it is quite different, and so both have
been printed. — Editor.

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION. 81
great army, and, as every schoolboy knows, they com
pelled the British commander by the authority " of the
great Jehovah and the Continental Congress " to sur
render. With this achievement began that invasion of
Canada, which promised one hundred years ago to
make real what is said to have been the dream of
Charles Sumner, "that all American soil should be
under American government."
Who shall worthily delineate the great plans, the
heroic deeds, and the fluctuating fortunes which filled
with incessant activity thirty long months ? The skill
of generals, the courage and endurance of soldiers, the
patriotism of the people, made that whole region
stretching along the banks of the Upper Hudson, by the
shores of beautiful Lakes George and Champlain, down
the Sorel and St. Lawrence to Quebec, and thence
through the Maine woods to the Atlantic, true classic
ground in American history. To tell the whole story
would require volumes. All I can hope to do is to call
attention to a few of its episodes. Or rather I would
select and depict two or three striking incidents in the
Northern campaigns of the Revolution. That you may
the better grasp the true meaning of such incidents,
and place them in right relations, let me attempt a
concise statement of the causes which led to these
campaigns, and, if I may, clearly outline the campaigns
themselves. In 1775 the colonists of New England and New York
had come into a state of open rebellion against the
apparently overwhelming power of Great Britain.
North of them were a people whose history and tradi
tions were altogether different from their own. They
were the French Canadians, whose settlements, hugging
the shores of the St. Lawrence and Sorel Rivers, made
G

82 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
up a spai-se population of perhaps one or two hundred
thousand people. By the fall of Quebec in 1759 these
people had come under British rule, and their country
was garrisoned by British troops. But at first sight
this would not seem to imperil the Colonists. For
between Canada and the towns on the Hudson and on
the Atlantic coast there was then a broad strip of
primeval forest, varying in width from one hundred
and fifty to two hundred miles. A vast region ! desti
tute of culture! without population! without roads!
made rugged by steep mountains and hills! cut and
slashed by swift running streams full of dangerous
rapids and choked and made incapable of navigation by
fallen trees ! The Indian, with instincts sure as those
of the wild beasts which roamed it, could thread its
recesses with certain and steady step. The white
scouts and rangers, taught in the rough school of their
barbarous foes, had learned to imitate them. But to a
disciplined army, with horse and artillery and stores,
those pathless solitudes furnished an insurmountable
barrier. But in this barrier there was one weak spot. Take
down your map. You find the great river St. Lawrence,
navigable through its whole length, and flowing in a
northeasterly direction at an average distance of one
hundred and fifty miles from the English settlements
of that day. Midway in its course, directly north of
the boundary line between New York and Vermont, it
receives the waters of a river, then known as the Sorel,
now as the Richelieu or St. John. You ascend that
river. Soon you are on the broad surface of Lake
Champlain, of which indeed it is the outlet. But Lake
Champlain by its connected waters of Lake George and
South Bay reaches to within ten miles of the Hudson

NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEYOLUTION. 83
River. Here then was an opening into the very heart
of the country. The Indian named Lake Champlain
"the gate of the country." It was. Over those placid
waters, long before the foot of white man had trodden
its shores, fleet after fleet of canoes had glided, bearing
to and fro savage armies in the unceasing warfare
which was waged between the Canadian Indians and
the famous Six Nations of New York. Across those
same waters had come Montcalm and Dieskau, and the
other French captains, during that seventy-five years'
struggle between England and Prance for supremacy in
the New World.
Two strongholds, originally built by France and then
held by England, dominated these waters, — Crown
Point, which commanded the narrow neck of water
between Champlain and South Bay, and Ticonderoga,
built on the little river which connects Lake George
with its larger neighbor. Whoever held the strong
holds of Quebec and Three Rivers on the St. Lawrence,
and St. John and Chambly on the Sorel, had a firm
base for hostile operations against the Colonists close
at hand. Whoever controlled the Lakes had an open
door, through which to pour his troops into the heart
of the Colonies, and down the Hudson to New York
City itself, and thus dismember the confederacy.
Behold in this the efficient cause of those three Northern
Campaigns of the llevolution, which terminated in
Burgoyne's surrender. The patriot leaders felt that
they must possess Canada. Not because of any harm
or good the peaceful French peasants might do them.
But because they felt it to be a question of life or
death, of freedom or bondage, whether that military
gateway was open or shut, and whether that secure
base of hostilities was held by the mother country or
themselves.

84 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
Yet, singularly enough, the first steps towards the
solution of this question were taken by individuals,
and not by congresses or authorities of any sort. The
Provincial Congress of Massachusetts did indeed appoint
a Committee of Correspondence, — Samuel Adams and
Joseph Warren as usual at the head, — to inquire what
was the feeling of the Canadian people. And this
committee appointed that gallant soldier, Major John
Brown of Pittsfield, — whose very name is forgotten in
the State whose annals he adorned, — a secret agent
to go to Canada and ascertain the temper of its peo
ple. This he did, encountering on his winter's journey,
through snow and ice and flood, incredible hardships
and no little peril. He reported that our neighbors
were friendly, but so few in numbers, and so watched,
that they would not dare to make a movement until an
American army was on their soil. These remarkable
words closed his report: "One thing I mention as a
profound secret. The fort at Ticonderoga must be
seized as soon as possible, should hostilities be com
menced. The people of the New Hampshire Grants
have engaged to do the business, and in my opinion are
the most proper persons to do the job." This was
three weeks before Concord fight.
When the 19th of April called America to arms, it
was still private enterprise which struck the first blow.
For on the last day of April two private gentlemen of
Connecticut, Captains Mott and Parsons, started from
New Haven with fourteen followers. At Pittsfield,
Massachusetts, they were joined by Colonel Eaton and
Major Brown with forty more. While at Castleton,
Vermont, they found Ethan Allen and Seth Warner
with ninety Green Mountain boys. So before one
hundred and forty men, mostly plain farmers, Ticon-

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION, 85
deroga and Crown Point fell; and the keys both of
New York and' Canada were snatched from British
hands. All this on private responsibility. Out of this
bold act grew the " Three Northern Campaigns of the
Revolution." Congress still hesitated, — hesitated so
long that the conquest of Canada, a certainty in May,
became a problem in September, and an impossibility
in December.
The first campaign began thus. Early in September,
1775, General Montgomery left Crown Point with a
force which should have been 5,000, and was 1,500, and
sailed down Champlain. A fortnight later Benedict
Arnold with 1,100 picked men started to reach Quebec
through the Maine forests. By the middle of November,
Montgomery had taken St. John, Chambly, Three
Rivers, and Montreal, and was master of the St.
Lawrence up to the walls of Quebec. By the middle
of November, too, Arnold with a few hundred followers
had struggled through those Eastern^ wilds, and from
the other side was threatening the same stronghold.
So far all had gone well. But on the 31st of December,
in a desperate assault upon the town, Montgomery was
slain and Arnold wounded, and the remnant of their
forces hurled back in bloody defeat. That was the
first campaign. Three months of victorious advance
till success seemed sure. Then overwhelming failure
in the last and heaviest stroke.
The second Northern Campaign of the Revolution
began May 6, 1776. Then General Carleton, the
English commander in Canada, heavily reinforced from
England, assumed the offensive, and attacked the
American army, reduced to a shadow of itself by hard
ships and the ravages of the small-pox. His forces,
threefold in number, more than threefold in that ful-

86 NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLmON.
ness and perfection of equipments which as much as
aught else make military strength, easily pushed back
the foe, and in quick succession recovered the Cana
dian towns: until, on the first of July, Atc thousand
American soldiers, half of them sick, many dying, all
hungry and in tatters, were back at Crown Point, so
utterly miserable that the physician who visited them
records that the sight brought tears to his eyes. October
11th, Carleton removed from his path the last obstacle
to his advance by the defeat and destruction of the
American fleet off Valcoor Island, and a few days later
he entered Crown Point. That was the second cam
paign. It was substantially a treading back by the
British over the same ground from which the year
before they had been driven.
The third campaign opened early in Jane, 1777;
when, on the one hand, Burgoyne with a compact little
army of 8,000, better furnished than any which had be
fore stood on American soil, started down Lake Cham
plain bound, via Albany, to New York ; and when, on the
other hand, Barry St Leger, wifli 1,750 men, regulars,
New York Loyalists, and Indians, set out from Oswego
to reach the same destination through the rich Mohawk
valley. It ended with the disastrous retreat of St.
Leger, August 22d, and Burgoyne's surrender, the 17th
of the following October. Its incidents were the
capture by Burgoyne of Ticonderoga, July oth: the
battle of Hubbardton, July 7th; that of Oriskany,
August 6th ; Bennington. August 16th ; and Burgoyne's
two fatal battles of Stillwater and Freeman's Farms in
September and October. So closed the third and last
of the great Nortibem Campaigns. A drawn game in
some respects. But the advantage was with the
Americans. They retained the kevs of the Lakes.

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 87
They captured a great army. But they did not add
Canada to the Confederacy. Far from it. In 1775
they found Canada friendly. They left her in 1777
indisputably averse to further intimacy, and the annex
ation of that Province was indefinitely postponed.
From each of these memorable campaigns I select
one episode, — or rather I choose a single enterprise
or encounter, — so complete in itself, that I may hope
to make its purpose and real quality clear to your
minds. From the campaign of 1775 I choose Arnold's expe
dition through the Maine forests to Quebec. And this
for two reasons: first, because of the astonishing
nature of the achievement itself; and second, because
the fortunes of the campaign hung on the success or
failure of this expedition. If you recall the outline
which I have just given, you will remember that -in
September General Montgomery with a very inadequate
force started from Crown Point to invade Canada. He
had to march or sail hundreds of miles, far away from
supplies, far away from reinforcements, finding many
strong posts to capture and an ever increasing foe to
oppose, while at the end he would come face to face
with the frowning citadel of Quebec. On such a
venture did not success seem impossible ? If now,
while he engaged the attention of his opponents, a
select force, secretly threading the forests of Maine
and silently floating over its waters, should all unfore
seen and from an unexpected quarter burst upon Quebec
wellnigh stripped of its defenders, the fate of the
Province would be sealed. This was the plan. We
know now that it was a good one. It failed, riot
because of the stupendous natural or artificial obstacles.

88 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
but because a trusted messenger betrayed everything to
the British commander weeks before Arnold could
appear on the scene of action.
The story of this march has been told by Arnold
himself, by Judge Henry of Pennsylvania, by James
Melvin, private, and by several others. The com
mander was Benedict Arnold, standing then in the first
rank both as patriot and soldier. He was about forty
years old, short of stature, florid in complexion, physi
cally a combination of activity, energy, and endurance.
He was brave, not simply to temerity, but almost to
madness; yet in the quickest rush of his passion he
had that clear perception of every error of a foe which
makes a true soldier. Insolent to superiors, overbear
ing to equals, by the private soldier he was beloved
and trusted. His evil qualities, his dishonesty, his
rapacity, his readiness to sacrifice even his country to
revenge, had not at that time revealed themselves.
Such was the chief. His officers were picked men.
Daniel Morgan, the Virginia wagoner, at Saratoga was
second in valor and conduct, — if second at all, — to
Arnold. A few years later, by his defeat of Tarleton
at Cowpens, he turned the tide of Southern war.
Christopher Greene won glory by his stout defence of
Red Bank against the Hessians. Henry Dearborn was
first General and then Secretary of War. There was one
volunteer whose brilliant talents and evil career have
given him almost a world wide notoriety, if not fame.
I speak with sorrow the name of Aaron Burr. The
soldiers were worthy of their leaders. Washington
with his usual magnanimity had spared from his scanty
forces around Boston eleven hundred of his best troops,
"rude and hardy, unused to the discipline of camps,
but utterly fearless," is the report of one who was with

NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 89
them. They were more than that, — patient of hardship
beyond the capacity of ordinary men.
The expedition sailed from Newburyport September
13th. Five days after it was at Gardiner, near the
mouth of the Kennebec, where the soldiers' disem
barked. ' Here were two hundred bateaux which had
been built — so the story runs — in. the preceding
fortnight. Naturally enough, under hard usage they
showed signs of weakness in almost as brief a time.
However, as they were never paid for, though Colonel
Colburn and his sons petitioned for generations to be
reimbursed, perhaps they were good enough for the
price. Five days more and they had pushed on to Fort
Western, near the present city of Augusta. Another
week brought them to the outmost verge of civilization
at Norridgewock. Here their troubles began. Before
them was a journey through an absolutely uninhabited
wilderness, and upon the bosom of rivers whose course
and character were imperfectly understood, but known
to be impeded by many and dangerous falls and rapids,
and broken by long and difficult carrying places. The
second week in October they reached the head waters
of the Kennebec. This was the easiest part of their
advance. Yet Arnold, writes, that the soldiers might
well be taken for amphibious creatures, that of the
hundred miles passed over they had waded half the
distance, pushing the boats up the rapid stream by
main force, and giving variety to their toil by bearing
the boats and all their contents around rapids, and
along paths narrow, often rough and steep, and some
times choked by undergrowth.
Arrived at this point, they found this piece of work
cut out for them. All they had — boats, provisions,
ammunition, clothing — was to be borne on the

90 NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION.
shoulders of nine hundred weary men to Dead River.
This was the character of the portage. First four
miles of carrying up a precipitous path to a pond, three
quarters of a mile across. Then a second carrying
place of a mile, to a second pond half a mile wide. A
third carrying place of a mile and a half to a pond one
and a half miles in breadth, succeeded. Finally, a
fourth carrying place of four miles and a half ^ a con
siderable portion of this last through a mossy bog in
which the men sank knee-deep and sometimes to their
arm-pits — brought them to Dead River. Much of the
way a path had to be cut through the primeval woods ;
and to-day a narrow strip of evergreen running in a
thin line through an older growth of hard wood is said
to mark the course and to be a monument to the
industry of Arnold's soldiers.
Arrived at Dead River, the boats were paddled,
poled, and pushed eighty-seven miles, having been
taken out and borne around dangerous places no less
than seventeen times. Many of the boats having been
destroyed, the rest were so overloaded that a large
portion of the troops marched on land following the
course of the river. But what with tangled thickets to
be cut through, rough pathless hills to climb, and miry
swamps to ford, they found the way no easier on land
than by water. No wonder that the soldiers by this \|
time were ragged, their shoes worn out, and replaced
by every kind of makeshift, and that even their skin,
from bearing many burdens and encountering many
thorns, was about as worn as their clothing.
The close of October brought them to the place called
"the height of land," where on one side the waters
, flow toward the Atlantic and on the other to the St.
Lawrence. Before them was the Chaudi^re River, most

NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 91
aptly named " the Caldron. " For, as one diary states,
" every foot of its head waters was like a boiling pot. "
Here they resolved to leave most of their boats, and
dare a march through an unknown forest. They might
as well have left them all, for erelong the tumultuous
water wrecked most of them. The biting wind which
swept these highlands pierced through their thin and
tattered garments ; snow and sleet drenched them ; and
to put a climax to their sufferings they found that they
had no meat remaining and only five pints of flour to a
man. Two women, wives of petty officers, accompanied
them in this tremendous journey. Their cheerfulness,
their patient endurance, "wading," as is recorded,
"without a murmur through the overflow of the
Chaudidre, where the thin ice had to be broken, and
where they sometimes sank to their arm-pits," shamed
the men in their lesser fortitude.
On November 4th, not having for thirty-two days
seen the face of a strange white man, they came to the
first Canadian villages. Absolute starvation had stared
them in the face. Some had eaten nothing for two
days ; and then only a broth made from the flesh of two
gaunt dogs, and a few worn-out moccasons. So closed
this terrific struggle with Nature in her sternest aspects.
The struggle with man was now to begin.
A week more and they were on the banks of the
St. Lawrence, opposite Quebec. Two hundred under
Colonel Enos had deserted. Two hundred had been
sent back, worn out or sick. Seven hundred gaunt,
ragged, and almost spectral men stood in arms. A
sorry crew, one would think, to threaten the Gibraltar
of America. Yet despite all, the treachery of their
messenger, their own weakness, the strength of the
place, so great was the alarm, and so few the men to

92 NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
defend, that it is admitted by British writers that, had
Arnold struggled through a day earlier, or had he
found boats in which to cross the day he did .arrive,
Quebec must have fallen. But the golden moment
passed. So but for chance, which plays such part in
all warfare, this most adventurous of expeditions might
have ended, not in defeat, but in success. But for
this, Canada in all probability would have been the
Northern State or States of the Union; and questions
of fisheries and duties would never have arisen to
plague our rulers, and to strain the relations of friend
ship between us and our nearest neighbors.
From the campaign of 1776 I select the naval battle
on Lake Champlain, off Valcour Island. You recall
the course of that campaign. Carleton with his fresh
army had swept before him the enfeebled American
force as easily as a brisk Octobfer breeze does the fallen
leaves. By the 1st of July he was at St. John. By
the 1st of August he had within call a veteran army of
ten thousand men. A few weeks later he had boats
enough to float them over Lake Champlain. Could he
have advanced then, what was there to prevent his
occupying Albany in ten days ? Of the five thousand
Sullivan had brought back from Canada twenty-eight
hundred were in the hospitals. To the dispirited
remnant few recruits had been sent, and those not of
the best quality. Plainly this wreck of an army could
hardly have retarded the enemy's march a single day.
What assistance could have come from the Southern
army? None. On the 20th of August, Washington
with scant ten thousand men was awaiting in his lines
on Long Island the attack of Lord Howe with twice
that number. On the night of the 29th, after a disas-

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION. 93
trous defeat, he was stealthily withdrawing his forces
in that wonderful retreat across East River to New
York. Had Carleton landed at Crown Point the last
week in August, in all human probability he would
have been in Albany in ten days, and for the time
being at any rate severed New England from the other
Colonies. What hindered him ? Arnold's little fleet. Judged
by any ordinary naval ideas that fleet was simply
contemptible. 'All told, it was not a match for one
stout sloop of war. Its largest vessel was not bigger
than a fishing smack, and its smaller ones were mere
cockle shells. Its cannon were mostly little popguns,
of three or four pounds or less I Its crew landsmen,
and its commodore with no more experience than could
be gained in a couple of voyages to the West Indies.
But so long as it was the only fleet it did its work just
as surely as if every gunboat, sloop, or schooner had
been a stanch ironclad. Two precious months were
gained. When Carleton was ready to advance, Wash
ington had stayed Howe's victorious progress at White
Plains; confidence was in part restored; recruits had
poured in; with winter so near, a hostile invasion
looked too perilous to the British commander. So,
without firing a shot, the American fleet had won all
the fruits of victory. It was yet to win out of utter
defeat much of the glory of victory.
Valcour Island was in the time of the Revolution a
little wooded islet, perhaps two miles in length, and
situated about midway in Lake Champlain. Between
it and the New York shore was a deep channel, possibly
a mile or so in width. In this channel Arnold placed
his little fleet. He had sixteen vessels small and
great, — if indeed the word " great " can be used, —

94 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION.
manned by four hundred and eighty-five men. The
character of this fleet can readily be surmised, when
we say that fourteen of its, number were constructed
from timber which three months before was standing
in the forest ; that the sides of several of them were so
low that barricades of fascines had to be built to make
them tenable. Not one man in five of the crew had
seen salt water. The majority were not even fresh
water sailors. The artillery was pig metal in July.
So ignorant of the use of guns were the men that
Arnold had to point with his own hand his cannon.
Arnold was put in command simply because in his
somewhat varied career he had had a few months'
experience at sea; just as he was held to be a fit
person to go to Quebec, because his excursions as a
horse trader had given him some knowledge of the
country, which old employment led the garrison of
Quebec to salute hira from the walls with the not
flattering cries of " Horse jockey, old horse jockey ! "
Arnold in later days has been severely criticised for
his choice of situation. It is a sufficient answer to say,
that never, until his own base treason set all hearts
against him, was a lisp of complaint made. Besides,
if in this narrow strait, where the enemy could not
deploy his full force, he could not win victory, what
was his chance out on the open lake ? It has been
suggested that Arnold, whose audacious mind, fertile
in expedients never travelled in the ruts of other men's
thoughts, hoped to conceal himself behind the thick
shelter of Valcour Island; and then, when the enemy's
fleet had passed, to pounce upon the flotilla of unarmed
transport boats, lying forty miles north at the entrance
of the Sorel, and destroy them, thus making Carleton's
advance impossible. Nothing is more probable.

NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 95
At any rate, on the 11th of October the British fleet
passed Valcour Island on the Vermont side, and was
rapidly sailing up the lake when the American flotilla
was discovered, probably by the masts rising above the
trees. At once the English ships turned, entered the
channel from the south and put itself in the line of
the American retreat. A conflict was now unavoid
able. Very different was the quality of this fleet from
that of the one which we have already described. It
numbered thirty vessels. Three of them were well
made war ships, built in England, taken apart at
Chambly, carried round the rapids, and reconstructed
at St. John. The tonnage and the armament of this
fleet were three times that of the Americans. Seven
hundred picked sailors manned it. The guns were
worked by a detachment from the corps of artillery.
The officers were of the best. Edward Pellew, after
ward Lord Exmouth, rose to highest rank and a
European fame.
But one result could come from a collision. Yet
against this vast disparity the Americans struggled for
hours until darkness closed around the combatants.
The British commodore stationed his ships in a line
across the narrow channel, and awaited the coming of
morning. The largest American vessel had acciden
tally run aground and been burned. A smaller one had
sunk. On the part of the British there had been a loss
of two and perhaps three small gunboats. Night settled
down upon the lake dark with cloud and mist. At its
coming Arnold with his shattered fleet silently rounded
the northern end of the island. Unperceived he sailed
southward, and by morning was out of sight. Unfor
tunately, he had to sink two of his vessels, too far gone
for repair, and to wait some hours to put the rest into

96 NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
better trim. For on the 13th the enemy were descried
coming on swiftly before a north wind. Arnold's own
ship, that of Captain Waterbury, and four gunboats,
having been seriously injured in the previous encounter,
were overtaken. Waterbury at once surrendered. Not
so Arnold. He fought for five long hours a retreating
fight nearly surrounded by the enemy. Finally he ran
his vessels ashore, set them on fire, and by a swift
march brought his crew safe to Crown Point. Of
sixteen vessels six were burned, three sunk, one was
captured, and the rest took refuge under the guns of
the fort.
One doubts whether ever before in the history of na
val warfare a total defeat was received with the exulta
tion proper to a great victory. Bnt it is certain that
the gallantry displayed on this occasion awakened the
pride, heightened the courage, and increased the deter
mination of the very side which had played a losing
game. I have often heard an old friend tell the story
of the battle, as he heard it from the lips of his father,
who was a petty officer in Arnold's own ship. He nsed
to say, that no language could describe the audacity,
the desperation, the frenzy, with which Arnold fought,
nor the coolness which he preserved in his maddest
moments to take advantage of every error of a foe, or
of any opportunity of time or position. It is melan
choly to reflect that this man, standing on the pinnacle
of fame, — trusted by Washington, admired by the
whole country, capable of the best service, — was even
then entering upon a course of personal dishonesty, of
public peculation, and of injustice to fellow officers,
which was surely leading him to that gulf of treason in
whose black depths both fortune and good name should
be buried.  - -

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 97
I select from the campaign of 1777 St, Leger's
advance and the battle of Oriskany, And first let me
recall again the course of events. In 1775 Montgomery
from Lake Champlain on the west and Arnold from the
Kennebec River on the east met under the walls of
Quebec, there in a crucial trial of arms to lose the day
and the campaign. In 1776 General Carleton recovered
all that he had lost in the previous year, and by the
destruction of the American fleet removed the last bar
rier, and, victorious, closed the year at Crown Point,
returning with the coming of winter to his headquarters
at St. John.
You see then that the campaign of 1777 commenced
under very different auspices from those' which pre
ceded it. There was no obstacle whatever between the
British and American frontiers. In eighteen days
after Burgoyne started from Canada to invade New
York, he was within ten miles of the Hudson, and
was only two days' march from Albany, having in the
mean time defeated the best soldiers of his enemy, and
captured his last strong fort, Ticonderoga. Nothing
was in his way but the wreck of a defeated army, and
roads, bad at their best, and now made by Schuyler
their worst, and wellnigh impassable. Just at this
moment, when the American general could not spare
a man for side operations, when he knew that at any
moment the best equipped army which ever trod our
soil might assail him, when therefore every nerve was
at its utmost strain to resist the attack from the front,
tidings came of a fresh invasion from the west. What
did this mean ? Much or little ? It meant everything
that was perilous. It meant that the British authori
ties had learned the lesson of Arnold's forest march,
and proposed to return a Rowland for our Oliver,
7

98 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
In imagination take down your map of New York
again, and study the situation a little. Draw, if you
please, a line directly north and south, twenty miles
west of the Hudson and parallel with it Outside that
line is three quarters of the Empire State. And out
side that line in 1777 there were not five thousand
white people, all told. A few villages of the Six Na
tions and the aboriginal forests filled that whole vast
space. Trace now the great artery of communication
at this period with the Northwest You started at Fort
Oswego. on the shore of Lake Ontario, paddled up the
Oswego in your canoe, through Lake Oneida, then up
Wood Creek. Here was a carrying place of several
miles, across which you bore your canoe and goods to
the head waters of the Mohawk. Floating down this
stream you reached Albany, and were in the rear of
Schuyler's army. To any one coming on this track
with hostile purpose there was but a single obstacle.
In the time of the French and Indian wars a work
called Fort Stanwix was built on the carrying place
between Wood Creek and Mohawk River, where the
town of Rome now stands. Its object was to protect
the primitive line of communication to which allusion
has been made. Once it was a strong fort ; but it had
fallen into a ruinous condition. Such as it was, with
crumbling bastions, a slender garrison, and deficient
stores, it was the only barrier westward against
invasion. And now its value was to be tested. For on August
1, 1777, Barry St. Leger with a motley force of 600
regulars and 1,150 Loyalists and Indians started from
Fort Oswego for Albany. In two days he was before
Fort Stanwix, and had summoned it to surrender.
The consternation of the people in those sparse and

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION. 99
feeble frontier settlements, at whose doors were seven
hundred wild savages with scalping knife and toma
hawk, and four or five hundred Tories with hate and
revenge in their hearts, can only be imagined, not
described. Had the execution answered to the plan,
in other words, had twenty-five hundred regulars been
given St Leger, as the importance of the movement
demanded, nothing could have saved the Colony. He
would have reached Albany about as quickly as his
men could have covered the intervening space. That
was the opinion of Burgoyne; that was the opinion
of Schuyler; and General Greene, no mean judge, coin
cided in their views. Even with what he had, he was a
formidable peril. What saved New York was the bat
tle of Oriskany.
The chief military authority of that region was
Nicholas Herkimer, an old man of German extraction,
already more than sixty-five, but still strong and vigor
ous, and skilled more in Indian warfare than in regular
tactics. At the rumor of an invasion he issued an
order commanding every well man between sixteen and
sixty to appear, gun in hand, ready to march against
the enemy, while all other male persons were to hold
themselves armed to defend their homesteads. To this
call a most remarkable gathering answered. Four
hundred were from the militia of the county. Four
hundred were volunteers from every grade of society,
who came without any previous organization, simply
with their trusty guns and brave hearts to use them,
and fought as steadily and stoutly as veterans of a
hundred fields. Eight hundred men from a community
which could not have numbered half eight thousand
souls. In that number were included doctors, lawyers,
and members of the legislature. It was haying time ;

100 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION.
but the farmers left their crops to their fate and came.
To swell the ranks almost the cradle and the grave
were robbed. Frequently from one household hurried
grandfather, father, and sons. One family named
Snell sent out nine, and left seven dead on the field.
Many other families, whose names are preserved,
furnished five and four.
When this little body had advanced to within ten
miles of the fort. General Herkimer proposed to wait
for reinforcements. He feared an ambuscade from
superior forces, and, as the result proved, justly. But
this did not comport with the adventurous spirit of his
following. His officers, fairly raged. They called him
"coward," "traitor." The sting of all this was, that
he had a brother, a nephew, and a brother in law who
were Tories, and that he knew that his own loyalty
was suspected. For a time he kept calm, saying that
he was placed over them as a father, and would not
lead them where he ought not. Then at last he gave
the order, " March on ! "
At the distance of a couple of miles the somewhat
disordered troops plunged into a marshy ravine through
which ran a narrow causeway of logs. Just as the
nature of the ground produced some confusion from all
sides came a deadly volley. Herkimer fell wounded
by a shot which killed his horse and shattered his own
leg. Careless of the suffering, he seated himself on
his saddle, leaning against a tree. All through the
struggle his clear tones were heard cheering and
directing his men. Any other troops would have been
seized with a panic and been lost. But these were
men who had been accustomed to cultivating their
fields with a loaded gun by their side, and to mowing
their hay-fields in companies, with a sentinel and guard

NOETHEEN CAMPAIGNS OF THE EEVOLUTION. 101
to meet the Indian. So, with stobbom resolution,
behind trees they stood their ground. Fortunately a
heavy shower brought a pause to the conflict. The
Americans took advantage of it to arrange two by two
in a circle, and henceforth fought with a more equal
chance. Five hours the combat raged. Then the
Indians raised the cry " Oonah ! " and retired, and the
battle was over.
One element of terribleness cannot be omitted. The
Loyalists who fought them were their own neighbors,
who had gone to the same school, sat side by side with
them in the same church, and tilled adjoining farms.
An awful bittemess had grown up. It is the universal
testimony, that these men fought each other with the
ferocity of tigers. Even brothers who had been nour
ished at the same breast sought each other's lives.
The field was won ; but out of the eight hundred who
marched on to it two hundred lay dead where they fell.
Two hundred out of a community of a few thousands.
Who shall doubt the tale, that there was mourning
that day in all the loyal households along the Mo
hawk ? Herkimer died a few days after, — tradition
says, calmly smoking his pipe and listening to the 38th
Psalm, " Make haste to help me, 0 Lord my salvation."
Two hundred of so little a company died. But they
saved the state. The Indians had been told that these
were "pudding-faced Dutehmen," who would not fight.
But when twelve chiefs and nearly a hundred warriors
fell, they lost courage. The Loyalists were in hardly
better case. So when Arnold, advancing to the relief
of Fort Stanwix, sent before him wild rumors, enlar
ging his scanty forces into many thousands, a panic
easily seized the dispirited forces ; and regulars. Loyal
ists, and savages left their encampment^n headlong

102 NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION.
retreat, — the Indians, it is said, recompensing them
selves for their losses by tomahawking and scalping
such of their white friends as straggled from the main
body. I am a New Englander in birth and sympathies,
and am not likely to belittle Bennington or John
Stark. But I question whether Bennington was more
remarkable in its features, or in its results more
important, than the field of Oriskany ; or whether John
Stark is more worthy of remembrance than that patriot,
hero, and martyr, Nicholas Herkimer, whose very name
and the battle he won are omitted from the " Encyclo
psedia" published in the State for whose deliverance
he died.
I have spoken of three striking events out of many
just as striking, and my hour is exhausted. But it
needs but these to show what a remarkable body of
men it was which inaugurated and carried to a success
ful issue the American Revolution, — what courage
they had, what endurance, what self-sacrifice, what
force and skill to rise to the height of unforeseen
emergencies. The more you examine, the more clear
it appears that our independence was not an accident ;
but the work of those who were full grown men, strong
in body, clear of mind, large of heart, devoted with
no uncertain attachment to the principles of freedom.
They were not either from one locality. The love of
freedom, the courage to defend it, the fortitude to die
for it, were sentiments widely diffused. Men of New
Hampshire, men of Rhode Island, men from the banks
of the Schuylkill and from far off Virginia, joined
the men of Massachusetts and Maine in that dreadful
march to Quebec. The heroes of Valcour Island were
mostly from Vermont and Connecticut. And all the

NORTHERN CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION. 103
sorrow and all the glory of Oriskany belonged to New
York Germans. And if men of all nationalities and
sections could unite then to make this a great country,
ought we not to have faith that, however it may look
to-day or to-morrow, men of all sections and nationali
ties will continue to unite to make it a greater and
better country.

THE PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN
CONCORD.
Paper read in the Meeting-hodse of the First Parish in
Concord, March 1, 1891.
CONCORD was the first venture of the Puritan
inland. The little hamlets scattered along our
rocky coast were indeed far away from civilized life ;
but they faced the open sea. This advance into the
unknown aroused the imagination. Men said, "right
up in the woods, " as though the wilderness had swal
lowed up the settlement. The twelve miles' tramp
from Watertown through the primeval forest, with its
tangled thickets and wet swamps (weary and painful
business enough, no doubt) is set down in the old
chronicle as something "heroicall."
And clearly this experience did do its part to shape
the character of the people, and of the church they
gathered. An enterprise which landed a little band of
men, women, and children on a bleak plain, a New
England winter at hand, shelter to be built, fuel to be
collected, provisions to be stored — while a broad strip
of wilderness, in which there were no roads, nor even
wood-paths, separated them from the rest of the
world, — must have found or made brave hearts and
resolute wills. Then consider the isolation, not to be
measured by length of miles to be gone over, but by
destitution of means of communication. In 1635 all
Massachusetts Bay had but four thousand people. A
pretty small centre of life, one would say. Yet from

PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 105
that centre the new town was practically severed.
This seclusion was a real condition. Writes Peter
Bulkeley to the minister of Cambridge, "I would
gladly hear how the common affairs of the church stand
with you. I am here shut up, and do neither see nor
hear. " And to John Cotton he says, " I lose much in
this retired wilderness in which I live. Help us with
some of that which God hath imparted to you. " Even
thirty years later, when in every way the town had
enlarged, it was said of his successor. Rev. Joseph
Estabrook, " that he was too bright a star to be muffled
up in the woods amongst the Indians. " Can we wonder
that " some faint-hearted souldiers " sought, if they
did not find, fairer fields? That a little later the
stoutest were ready seriously to consider Oliver Crom
well's proposal to emigrate to Ireland ? Or that twenty
years after the settlement Captain John Mason could
write to John Winthrop the younger that "for the
planting of Delaware a great supply was tendered from
Concord per General Willard, Mr. Bulkeley, and, as I
thinke, the most of that towne. " But isolation has its
good side. It forces human beings to depend upon
themselves. Those who stayed through and lived
through became strong and self-reliant men and
women. From the beginning the parish was inde
pendent In 1636, quite as soon as fitting shelter had
been provided for their families, the people made
arrangements to gather a Christian church, and to
mark the occasion by proper religious services at New
town. Three days before, they invited the Governor
and Deputy Governor to grace the occasion by their
presence. Not only Governor Vane, but John Win*
throp, " the wise and prudent, " refused to come. The
reason given was that the church had gone forward and

106 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
" had not come to them before as it should have done,
and as others had done. " But all the same the people
went right on, had their service, gathered their church,
and settled their ministers. The incident is suggest
ive. It reveals in the fathers an independence which
was not disposed to accept dictation even from those
they loved and respected most. So it was not of
chance that a century and a half later the children
rose to the height of a great occasion. To original
vigor, hardship, seclusion, and the habit of personal
decision had added fresh power.
The first minister of this frontier parish — we use
the words advisedly — was Peter Bulkeley. Until
expelled by Archbishop Laud for non-conformity, he
had had charge of the church in Odell, Bedfordshire,
England. The tradition is, that before he left England
he had selected the spot on which to plant his church.
The resemblance in natural features between the new
home and the old gives some probability to the legend.
Odell, like Concord, is situated on the banks of a river
so sluggish and crooked (the Ouse) that Thomas Fuller
says that it is " more meandrous than the Meander. "
The same green meadows, the same upland plains, the
same tranquil stream, meet the gaze in the one case as
in the other. The same with a difference. For here
soil by nature thin, and perhaps wasted by the savage's
thriftless husbandry, and meadows clothed with coarse
water grasses, were there replaced by fields rich with a
thousand years of culture. Peter Bulkeley was fifty-
three years old when he came in 1635 to New England.
Up to the time of his migration his position had been
one of ease, scholarly refinement, and influence. Ten
years of his life, from sixteen to twenty-six, had been

PLANTmG OF THE CHUECH IN CONCORD. 107
spent, as undergraduate and fellow, in quiet study at
St. John's College, Cambridge. Then upon the death
of his father he succeeded to the benefice of Odell. He
was " of an honorable family, " one of whose branches
boasted a viscount and another an Irish archbishop.
" A very plentiful estate " was his, says his biographer.
Even when it was sold, under the necessity of imme
diate removal, it brought him no less than .£6,000; a
sum which for practical purposes was clearly equal to
$100, 000 in our day. Add now to external advantages
that he was himself a man of mark. To use the homely
words of Neal, " he was a thundering preacher and a
judicious divine," So all that heart could wish, in
fortune, in position, and in power to do good, he had.
Arid all he gave up for conscience' sake. With wife
and children he came to Concord; to live the first
winter in a hut half burrowed out of the hillside ; to
spend the rest of his days amid surroundings which, to
one so delicately bred, must have seemed rude and
harsh; to minister to an outpost church which never
numbered in his lifetime more than three hundred
people ; in such work to remain until in 1659 old age
and death overtook him, and his body was laid away to
rest in an unmarked grave. Not in the whole list of
Pilgrim and Puritan worthies was there a more notable
instance of the sacrifice of self to duty.
Can we look through the haze of two centuries and a
" half and discern the real man, and tell why one so
removed by the conditions of his life from observation
could not be hidden ? One thing is clear: he had that
indescribable quality we call personal power. In any
company he would have been a quantity to be con
sidered. That was the impression he made on his con
temporaries. That is the memory which has lingered

108 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
in the traditions of the town. Says the historian
Hubbard, at the great Synod held at Newtown in 1637,
"Mr. Thomas Hooker and Mr. Peter Bulkeley were
chosen moderators, . . . two as able and judicious di
vines as any the country afforded. " " The Church is
bound to bless God for the holy, judicious, and learned
labors of this aged, experienced, and precious servant of
Christ," writes Thomas Shepard of Cambridge. "Mr.
Bulkeley was a masterly reasoner in theology ; I con
sider him one of the greatest divines among the first
ministers of New England," is what President Stiles
records in his diary. "He was esteemed in his day
one of the greatest men in this part of the world,"
adds Dr. Chauncy. His inherent personal force alone
explains this wide-spread impression. A man of
average gifts would have literally been lost in the
woods. It is equally clear that Peter Bulkeley was in temper
and training, and, to the end of his life, in habit, a
student. " His education was answerable unto his ori
ginal. It was leamed, it was genteel, and, which was
the top of all, it was very pious. " " He was a most
excellent scholar, a very well-read person, and one who
gave demonstration that he knew what should go to
make a scholar." Such is Cotton Mather's eulogy.
All that we know about him confirms the verdict. He
must have brought with him across the sea what for
those days was a great library, or else somehow gath
ered it after his arrival, to be solace and companion
ship in his exile. For in his lifetime he had " endowed
Harvard College with no small part of his books,"
Yet at his death he left volumes which were appraised
at seven hundred and fifty dollars. Nor did books or
pen rest idle. At the very time when the fortunes of

PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 109
the new settlement were at their lowest ebb, when to
hardship and isolation were added discouragement and
perhaps dissension, he sent to press his " Gospel Cov
enant. " " One of the first-born of New England," they
called it. This book easily commanded the intellectual
respect of the men of his day. The subject, the line
of argument, the method of Scripture reference, all
belong to a past age. Few persons could summon up
either the interest or the patience to read it through.
Nevertheless the work has many passages which are
weighty and impressive, and some lines which would
be esteemed eloquent, wherever found. Here is a brief
extract: "True holinesse toward God is ever accom
panied by righteousnesse toward men. There is true
holinesse, and there is false, lying, dissembling holi
nesse. How is one to be discerned from the other ?
Holinesse of truth hath righteousnesse going with it.
But false holinesse thinks it enough to seeme holy
toward God, neglecting duties of justice and righteous
nesse toward men. It was not so with the holy apostle,
• who, speaking of his own conversation among the
saints, appeals to their consciences, how holily, how
justly, how unblamably, he had his conversation among
men. " Pretty direct, is it not ? Pretty practical, not
far away from the drift of the best religious teaching
qf to-day ? The closing paragraph has been quoted
more than once, but it is so full of dignity and pathos
that it will bear repetition: "There is no people but
will strive to excell in something. What can we
excell in, if not in holinesse ? If we look to number,
we are the fewest. If to strength, we are the weakest.
If to wealth and riches, we are the poorest of all the
people of God through the whole world. We cannot
excell (nor so much as equal!) other people in these

110 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
things. And if we come short in grace and holinesse
too, we are the most despicable people under heaven;
our worldly dignitie is gone. If we lose the glory of
grace too, then is the glory wholly departed from our
Israel." Such was the strong spiritual meat with
which the Puritan minister fed his flock, as they came
on the Lord's Day from their rude huts on "one
straite street under a sunny banke " to the equally rude
meeting-house, which stood " on the hill near the brook
on the easte of Goodman Judgson's lott"
To the last Mr. Bulkeley preserved his love and
knowledge of the classic tongue. In his old age he
wrote Latin verses, of which art he was pronounced to
be "a competent master." However it may be as to
the Latinity, the sentiments were elevated, as the fol
lowing nearly literal translation of one written in his
seventy-fifth year testifies : —
" Old age with idle days hath come : naught else
But useless weight I seem, yet grant, great God,
While I do Uve, my life may be a praise
Unceasing, and a glory to thy holy name.
May I not live and pay no homage meet ;
But rather death soon end my fruitless years.
Among thy saints on earth I would declare
Thy words of life, or sing thy praise above.
In life, in death, may I be thine, O Christ I
My life is thine alone, and thine my death."
Add now to personal presence and power, and
genuine scholarship, what is yet more important, good
sense and sound judgment Hardly had he reached
his new home when the fierce Antinomian controversy
broke out. It convulsed the whole of the little com
munity. The wisest and the best were involved in it
It divided men one from another, and created great and

PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. HI
sometimes lasting bitterness. In our day it seems
incredible that thoughtful and devout men and women
should have accepted enthusiastically a doctrine whose
essence was boldly stated by its founder in the phrase,
" Good works do not promote salvation" ; or, as its New
England expounders stated it, " Sanctification doth not
prove justification." But so it was. The saintliest
of women, the purest of men, espoused doctrines which
made all good conduct worthless in the sight of God.
" The Church of Concord seems to have been entirely
free from this new species of delusion," remarks Simon
Willard's biographer. If so, it must have been largely
owing to the spiritual sanity of its pastor, Peter
Bulkeley was undoubtedly a Calvinist, and honestly
accepted the views of the religious body to which he
belonged. But he evidently had a sense of proportion,
a wholesome conviction that no Christian character is
either symmetrical or sound in which faith or works
are omitted. Indeed, the closing passage of the Church
Covenant, attributed to him, — which runs thus, " We
do solemnly promise before the Lord that we will care
fully avoid all oppression, griping, and hard dealing,
and walk in peace, love, mercy, and equity with each
other," — does seem to justify the accusation that the
Concord ministers "made much of the Covenant of
Works," though few in our day would say that they
made too much of it, Sound sense was never more
evident than in his treatment of the celebrated John
Cotton. Mr. Cotton and the members of his church
refused to take any part in his ordination, or even to be
present at the services. And apparently for no other
reason than a subtle disagreement as to the relative
place in man's salvation of faith and works. A grosser
affront could hardly have been offered to one who had

112 PLANTESTG OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
given a lifetime of fidelity to Puritan principles. It
might naturally have awakened, even in a forgiving
nature, lasting resentment But he would not suffer
any coldness to grow up. Afterward he corresponded
with his opponent, sought his advice, and apparently
made him friendly visits. This was not because he
had an impassive nature. When he thought the com
mon weal was endangered, he could feel strongly
enough and speak hotly enough ; as when with a great
deal more vigor than politeness, or even justice, he
terms Mrs, Hutchinson "that Jezebell whom the
Devill sent over thither to poison these American
churches. " It is reported of him, that he, — first of
the Puritan ministers, — sought through systematic
catechising to give orderly religious instruction to
the young. This again would indicate the possession
of a well-balanced mind, which no finespun theories
could blind to the influence of Christian nurture in the
formation of character.
Cotton Mather reports that Mr. Bulkeley in his inter
course with others had a manner at once kind and
familiar and marked by dignity. The story of Ambrose
Martin, which Mr. Waleott has preserved in his " Con
cord in the Colonial Period," certainly testifies both to
his real kindness of heart and his wisdom. Ambrose
Martin was a decayed gentleman, apparently in the
evening of his days. He asserted — what with us
would be a truism — that the Covenant was a human
invention, adding some disrespectful words about min
isters. For this petulance he was fined ten pounds, an
enormous sum considering the value of money at that
time. He refused to pay it ; whereupon his cow was
sold, and a levy made on his house and land, from
all of which twenty pounds was obtained. The man's

PLANTING OF THE CHUECH IN CONCORD. 113
obstinacy or sense of injury continued, and he declined
to make any claim for the ten pounds overplus, unless
the whole sum was returned to him. At this stage
Mr. Bulkeley appears in the case. A petition written
by him and signed by himself, his colleague, and
thirteen citizens of the town, was sent to the authori
ties. It represented that Martin's course was to be
imputed "to his infirmitye and weakness," and that
his family were reduced to great extremity, and
respectfully asked that his fine be remitted. Governor
Endicott returned an icy negative. The money re
mained unclaimed for ten years, when probably Martin
and his wife had ended their days in poverty. One
cannot but agree with Mr. Waleott that in this trans
action the minister and his people appear to advantage.
But simple friendliness of demeanor, or readiness to
forgive, does not measure the sweetness and richness
of Mr. Bulkeley's life among men. His wider relations
with his neighbors and the public were equally large
and generous. He brought six thousand pounds from
England. Twenty-four years after, he had thirteen
hundred pounds left. What had become of the rest ?
Had he spent it- upon himself, living in the woods in
a sort of baronial grandeur? Far from it. "Here
he buried a great estate," writes Mather, "while he
raised one still for almost every person he employed, "
bestowing farms on old servants when he dismissed
them, then taking new ones to be in their turn treated
in like manner. His latest biographer suggests that
many of the first settlers of the town had been his
tenants at Odell, and that he naturally felt a special
responsibility for them. However that may be, it is
certain that he did cherish toward all whom he had
led into the wilderness a peculiar sense of responsi-
8

114 PLANTING OP THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
bility. For he buried in that wildemess more than a
great estate, — great powers, great learning, and great
eloquence. A passage in his last will, which 1 have
never seen quoted, shows how profound was his sense
of public duty ; and that this liberality was not the
child of lavishness, or even of sympathy for companions
in a strange land. " It may perhaps be expected " — so
runs the document — " that I should bequeath something
to the publique use of the country ; which practice I wish
were observed more than it is by those that are of
ability. But were my estate better than it now is, I
suppose that I may be therein excused, in regard to
what I have done formerly in the beginning of these
plantations, wherein what I have done some few do
know, but I will be sparing therein. This only I know
and may say that which I did then was an helpe to a
weake beginning." So the old minister of Concord
was one of the first of New England to recognize the
duty of men of wealth to the community, and to enforce
that duty by his practice.
Few details of any life cross the chasm of two hun
dred and fifty years. But such as have reached us of
this life reveal a man of strong and well-cultured mind,
of firm opinions, of warm and occasionally intolerant
feelings, tempered by sound judgment and calm self-
control. It has been the good fortune of the quiet
river town which the minister of Odell helped to found
to have many jewels in its modest diadem. It can
point proudly to names which have adorned the rolls
of literature and the walks of professional life. But
possibly in that bright list not one can take rightful
precedence of this obscure minister of a handful of
exiled men and women. Prom whatever point we
view him, whether in respect to his native power, his

PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 115
scholarship, his solid judgment, his liberality, his
noble public spirit, or his sacrifice for conscience'
sake, we come back from the contemplation with added
respect for his ability, his motives, his character, and
for the impress he left upon the life of the town when
' it was in its formative state. We feel that, if his lot
had been cast in the centre of thC' Puritan Common
wealth instead of one of its struggling frontier villages,
his influence and reputation would have been second to
none of its remarkable body of educated men. As we
close this notice there come to the mind the rude
rhymes of his neighbor, stout Captain Edward Johnson
of Woburn : —
" Eiches and honour BucMy layes aside
To please his Christ, for whom he now doth war.
Why, Buckly, thou hast riches that will bide,
And honom'S that exceede earth's honour far.
Thy bodies worne and days in desart spent.
To f cede a few of Christ's poore scattered sheepe,
Like Christ's bright body, thy poore body rent
With saints and angeUs company shall keepe.
Thy tongue and pen doth to the 'World declare
Christ's covenant with his flock shaU firmly stand,
¦When Heaven and Earth by him dissolved are."
Peter Bulkeley died in 1659. The next year his son
Edward succeeded him; and seven years after Joseph
Estabrook was appointed his colleague. Of these two
men, and of the condition of the church under their
administration, little has been preserved ; nor does tra
dition add much to our knowledge. Probably the pros
perity of the town had increased. The great stress of
hardship was over. With greater population, larger
resources, and many additional comforts, plans of
wholesale emigration were no longer likely to be pop-

116 PLANTING OF THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
ular. Nay, the place, with its broad plain, its softly
rounded hills, and its gently flowing river, had come
to look like home. Men and women enjoy themselves
when their fortunes brighteui Nevertheless times of
prosperity do not leave on the pages of either general or
local history the same record as days of hardship and
struggle. So if the successors of the pioneer preacher had been
in every respect his equals, they would probably have
fallen into comparative obscurity. But they were not
his equals. The elder Bulkeley was by nature a strong
man. And he had been tempered, as they had not, in
the fires of adversity. To leave behind a fair English
home, and all its pleasant surroundings, indicated
strength and cultivated it. Besides, the first minister
of Concord had tbe advantage of the best intellectual
training which England could give to her chosen ones.
His son had only the iristruction which scant libraries
and ministers burdened with many cares could furnish,
while his colleague was the child of the little College
which could muster in all its <dasses only twenty-six
pupils. Edward Bulkeley was born in Odell. One year in
advance of his father, at the early age of twenty, he
came to America, tradition says to prepare for the
coming of the rest Probably he fitted, largely if not
wholly, for the ministry under the direction of his
father. What Rev. Thomas Shepard of Charlestown
wrote on the blank page of his Book of Psalms suggests
queries : " Mr. Edward Bulkeley, pastor of the Church
of Christ in Concord, told me, September 20, 1674, that
when he boarded at Mr. Cotton's house at the first
coming forth of this Book of singing of Psalms Mr.
Cotton told him that my father Shephard had the chief

PLANTING GF THE CHUECH IN CONCOED. 117
hand in the composing of it. " Now when and under
what circumstances did he board at Mr. Cotton's ?
Not on his first arrival. For the Book of Psalms had
not then come forth. Ts it an improbable supposition
that he was residing, as the custom was, with a pious
and learned man, to be, guided in his preparation for
the ministry ? In 1642 Mr. Bulkeley became the first
settled pastor of Marshfield, whence he removed to
Concord in 1658. Of this sixteen years' ministry
literally not one fact is preserved, except that in the
second year of it he was admitted to the freedom of
Plymouth Colony. From 1660 to 1694 he did duty in
whole or in part as pastor of the Concord Church.
Then on account of infirmities he was relieved from all
work, dying two years aftpr, an old man of eighty-two,
at Chelmsford.
What do we really know about this second minis
ter of Concord? Very little. He is spoken of as
<'a learned and pious divine." He is even termed
" famous. " But such eulogy would naturally have been
applied to any one who had continued his office blame
less for half a century. Tradition reports that he was
lame and feeble. The facts seem to confirm the legend.
He had just passed fifty when he had to ask for a col
league. In the whole history of the parish, since Peter
Bulkeley in 1644 took full charge, none other has been
compelled by weakness to do likewise before a great
old age.
The form of his dismission from the First Church of
Boston is peculiar. "Our Brother Edward Bulkeley
was by the Churches silence consented to be dismissed
to the Church at Concord by his and their desire. "
What is the force of those words, "by the Churches
silence " ? ^ that the step was so fitting that not a

118 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
spoken word was needed ? Probably. But one wonders
whether the First Church was quite weaned from Anti-
nomianism, and whether it was not glad to be free of
the son, lest he like his father might " make too much
of the Covenant of Works.,"
In the Massachusetts Historical Collections for 1868
there is a curious paper. The author was Samuel
Willard, Concord born and bred, minister of Groton,
soon to be head of Harvard College ; the date, 1671,
twenty years before the outbreak of the awful delusion
called Salem Witchcraft; the subject "a strange and
unusuall Providence of God, which befell Elizabeth
Knap." This poor creature was clearly sick both in
body and mind. "Shee was in a strange frame," he
writes, "sometimes weeping, sometimes laughing,
making foolish and apish gestures. " She was " violent
in leapings and strainings, scarce to be held by three
or four." She complained of pain in divers parts. In
obedience to the superstition of the times, she attrib
uted her troubles to a neighbor who " had come down
the chimney." Finally she confessed that the Devil
ha,d frequently sought to bargain with her for her soul,
though as yet she had been able to resist him. The
simple faith of this son of Concord, his quandaries
and questionings, show what hold witchcraft had upon
the faith of intelligent and humane people. But the
trouble became too heavy for him to bear alone. So he
summoned in Rev. Mr. Rowlandson of Lancaster, and
Messrs. Joseph Estabrook and Edward Bulkeley, to
labor with the afflicted one. But the woman, or Satan,
was too much for their combined forces. The narra
tive leaves the poor soul where it found her. All we
gain is one little glimpse of our second minister, telling
us that he shared in that delusion which was fated to

PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 119
furnish such a sorrowful chapter for our Massachusetts
history. Mr. Waleott recalls two singular episodes in the
life of the Church. John Hoar, lawyer, in 1668, was
fined ten pounds for saying " that the Blessing which
Master Bulkeley pronounced in dismissing the publique
Assembly in the Meeting house was no better than vane
babling." While Philip Reed, " Physitian, "^ in 1670,
was fined twenty pounds because he said "he could
preach as well as Mr. Bulkeley, who was called by
none except a company of blockheads who followed the
plowtail, and was not worthy to carry Mr. Estabrook's
books after him. " The remarks were not courteous,
and certainly they were not discreet. But were they
true ? One production of Mr. Bulkeley has escaped the
tooth of time, — his sermon delivered after the return
of Captain Thomas Wheeler from Brookfield fight. It
was a time to stir a man's soul. The whole Colony
was convulsed. Every frontier settlement and every
lonely farmhouse was in peril. Two of his parishioners
had been slain. Two more came home so shattered that
they lingered only a few months. The lot of these
might any hour be the lot of his hearers. You read
the sermon through from text to conclusion. There is
not one throb of pathos in it. You cannot find an
eloquent line, hardly an impressive sentence. It is a
maze of Inquisitions and Instructions, of Applications
and Uses, of Doctrines and Reasons, of Motives and
Improvements, wherein the mind wanders and is lost.
How could a tender human heart help breaking through
the meshes of formality ? And how was it possible for
men, of rude speech possibly, but of strong and hot
sympathies, to admire or approve such stiff and
measured utterance ?

120 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCOED.
With SO little to guide it is not possible to speak con
fidently. Still this is certain. The younger Bulkeley
has not left behind the impression of power which his
father did. Apparently he had not his vigorous per-
sonalityj his cultore, or his great heart. Mather calls
him " the worthy son " of a worthy sire. Clearly he
was that. An honest, faithful, and devout man. But
with all his real excellence one who did not rise much
above mediocrity.
The rude and wellnigh brutal language with which
Dr. Reed described the comparative merits of his two
ministers deserved, as it received, condemnation. But
was not his estimate, put in fitting words, substantially
correct ? We have not indeed many details of the life
and character of Mr. Estabrook; hardly as many as
of his colleague; but their testimony tends one way.
He had clearly the advantage of a more systematic
training. He came from his English home fitted for
the University. The next five or six years he must
have spent in general and professional study at the
little College which John Harvard had founded. He
seems to have occupied at Concord an assured position.
Judge Sewall alludes to the part he took in several
important religious services, once certainly with high
commendation. Some thought, as we have seen, that
he would have shone in a city pulpit; that is, if the
Boston of 1700 could be called a city. Even the dis
courteous words of the physician, to the extent they
disparage the elder, praise the younger minister.
Finally, the obituary notice found in an old newspaper
is so specific in its eulogy that we feel that real gifts
and virtues must have been behind it. He was emi
nent, it says, in his skill in the Hebrew tongue ; inde-

PLANTESG QF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 121
fatigably laborious in his ministry; in his preaching
plain, practical, and persuasive; in his intercourse
with his people grave, affectionate, and conciliatory.
He had so much patriarchal dignity that his people
loved him as a friend, and reverenced him as a father.
In his latter days they _ealled him "the Apostle."
Perhaps no one of these scattered allusions makes
singly a great impression. Combined, they create the
feeling that, if . he was not a remarkable man, he was
one of good native power, of well trained mind, faith
ful and laborious, and personallywinning; in short, an
acceptable and useful parish minister.
Little or nothing can be gleaned from the town
records to add to the scanty knowledge we get from
outside sources. One or two items do show with what
difficulties the parish labored, even when the stern
hardships of the actual planting were over. Much as
the Church might respect its minister, it was not easy
to pay him. Only eight months after he took sole
charge of the pulpit, November 23, 1694, by which the
town saved fifty pounds heretofore paid Mr. Bulkeley,
we find this statement : " Mr. Estabrook is unsatisfyed
in respect to ye yearly payment of his sallary, in regard
to many neglecting to do according to that promised
unto him." Whereupon the selectmen called a public
meeting, December 10, when "it was further voted,
whether they would give to Mr. Estabrookes thirty
pounds in money, and fifty -seven in Corne, — at these
rates, — Wheat 5*. pr Bushell, Rye 4s., Indian 3s.,
Barley 4s. This voat was read at least three times
distinctly and voted in the affirmative by the whole
assembly ; and Mr. Estabrook aforesaid Being Present
did declare himself fully satisfied." Five years after
it was significantly added, " that all was to be good and

122 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
marchantable," as though occasionally a parishioner
had brought "lean ears." To the modern clergyman
three hundred bushels of grain, "marchantable" or
otherwise, would be something of a burden. How
ever, in those days the minister tilled the ground no
doubt, and had his granary to fill. In May, 1711,
Mr. Estabrook's health broke, and the selectmen were
empowered " to assist him in. preaching six months. "
But before they could carry out the kindly purpose the
good man's work was over. The final record of him
on the town book strikes with a chill. For in town
meeting, October 9, it was voted "as for Mr. Joseph
Estabrook's funerall charges the Towne did not see
cause to allow anything toward the same." Let us
hope this was because he left a good estate and his
family did not wish an allowance. Otherwise it would
look like cold ingratitude for forty-four years of affec
tionate servioe. But whatever the feeling which dic
tated this course, could the people have appreciated
things as they were and were to be, — could they have
looked back in memory over the seventy-six years of
church life in which there had been unbroken peace,
and forward in vision to nearly as many more years,
disturbed by dissensions, partly personal, partly theo
logical, — they would have thought that no testimonial
to the worth, the fidelity, and the peaceable spirit of
this good man could be too costly.
To fix a precise date when the work of planting and
establishing a town or church may be considered to be
complete is clearly impossible. For in some sense the
process never ceases. But in a broad way we may say
that the turning point in Concord history was at the
close of Mr, Estabrook's ministry. Then it had ceased
to be a frontier town. Beyond it was a whole circle of

PLANTING OF THE CHUECH IN CONCOED. 123
towns, some of which had been nearly destroyed in
King Philip's War, but which now were restored and
prosperous. As one result, fear of the Indian, which
must have darkened the experience of the former gen
erations, had passed away. The means of communica
tion had become more direct and easy ; so that we read
of trips from Boston to Concord and back in one day
made with apparent ease. In short, it had ceased to
be a little hamlet " right up in the woods. " It was a
busy town, interlocked by mutual interests with other
towns. The population had largely increased, and
could have scarcely been less than twelve hundred and
fifty souls. Only one church in the town, none of its
suburbs, Bedford, Acton, Lincoln, Carlisle, having as
yet set up for themselves, in few periods of her history
have so many people fallen to the care of one minister.
The resources had increased in like proportion. Many
things indicate this. Rude huts had been replaced by
comfortable homes. The year 1711 saw the completion
of what may be called the first permanent place of wor
ship. The church of 1635 could hardly have been more
than a rough log house. That of 1667 was either so
hastily built, or of such unseasoned timber, that in 1709
it was going to decay. But the house of 1711 was built to
last. Each generation has tried its hand at improving
it; but the stanch frame abides. One more evidence
of enlarging resources may be noted. That curious
habit of collecting from each family its little portion
of grain, with which to pay in part the minister, ceased
upon the death of Mr. Estabrook. His successor not
only received a larger stipend, but he received it all
in cash. Thus in all outward ways the town and
the church were firmly established. In numbers, in
resources, in means ol communication, in sense of

124 PLANTING OF THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
security, in enjoyment of comfort, there was manifest
growth. It remained for the future to tell how much
growth there had been in grace, how much diffusion of
that divine charity by which they should walk together
in peace and mutual helpfulness.

THE CHURCH IN CONCORD :
ITS PEEIOD OF PEESONAL AND THEOLOGICAL
DISSENSION.
Paper read in the Meeting-house of the First Parish in
Concord, IMahch '8, 1891.
THE turning point in our Massachusetts history
is found in that period between the years 1683
and 1692 when the Puritan Commonwealth lost its old
charter and received a new one. For more than half a
century all power, political, religious, and even social,
had been in the hands of what were styled the freemen
of the Colony. And who were these freemen ? The
Colonial Record of 1631 reads thus : " To the end, that
the body of commons may be preserved of honest and
good men, it is ordered and agreed, that, for the time
to come, no man shall be admitted to the freedom of
the body politic, but such as are members of some of
the churches within the limits of the same. " By this
enactment the Puritan church obtained control over
every department of life, and used it. The power to
vote, to hold office, to naake laws, to execute them, to
decide who should or should not dwell in the land,
was all in the hands of a body of people who were esti
mated in the latter part of the seventeenth century
to number hardly one fifth of the adult males in
the community. Palfrey says, "The freemen of the
Massachusetts Colony had the right to expel from their
territory all persons Tvho should give them trouble. In
their corporate capacity they were owners of Massachu-

126 THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
setts by a title to all intents as good as that by which
any freeholder among them had held his English
farm." The experience of Mrs. Hutchinson, Roger
Williams, and. others, testifies that they had the will
to maintain what they held to be their rights. Men
might think, but they could not speak, contrary to the
ordinances. Religious differences might exist in the
secret of the heart, but all expression of them was
stifled. All amusements contrary to Puritan stand
ards, all criticism of powers in church or state, were
remorselessly punished. Here was a theocracy, pure,
stern, without charity for minds that craved freedom
and dreamed of progress.
Now all changes. The Charter of William and
Mary in many ways curtailed the independence of the
Colonists. But under it the widest differences of reli
gious faith were tolerated. To the chagrin of the elders
right in Boston, the Episcopalian, the Baptist, the
Arminian, was permitted to rear his place of worship
and enjoy it. The seat of authority too had shifted.
The franchise was no longer confined to church mem
bers, but became the privilege of nearly every male
inhabitant. Meanwhile other changes, which could not perhaps
be traced directly to any alteration of the fundamental
law, had more slowly, but just as surely, come. The
years from 1675 to 1725 have been called the dark age
of education in New England. The fathers were many
of them the fruit of England's best culture. The
children, in their rude struggle with nature and the
savage, could not hold on to the refinements. What
was true of education was just as true of religion. The
fervor of the zealot had passed away. Whitefield said
it had sunk " into heartless formality. " Sometimes it

THE CHUECH IN CONCOED. 127
was undermined by scepticism, and was hardly a form.
Even the standards of morality seem to have been
lowered somewhat. The celebrated Jonathan Edwards,
describing the Northampton of his day, says, "The
people, in general, I suppose, are as sober and orderly
and of as good a sort as in any part of New England. "
Then he goes on to paint a picture of the disorderly,
drinking, licentious habits of the young people of both
sexes, which simply shocks you. Hutchinson affirms
that the amount of this deterioration was greatly
exaggerated by the severe ideas of ascetic Calvinists.
Probably he was right Still, the religious divisions
and the moral retrogression were no doubt ag real as
the increasing desire for spiritual freedom and a more
humane religion. The long, peaceful, and moderate
ministry of Mr. Bulkeley and Mr. Estabrook had kept
these things from coming much to the surface of
Concord church life. But the ferment was there, ready
to become active. This sketch of the conditions of life
in the larger community explains the conditions of
life which so soon manifested themselves in smaller
communities. November 19, 1711, John Whiting was called to fill
the vacancy caused by the death of Mr. Estabrook, and
on the 14th of the succeeding May was ordained. His
ministry opened in sunshine; it closed in darkness.
All the more is it needful that we should inquire who
and what the man was. John Whiting was of strong
Puritan stock. For forty years his father had been
honored pastor of Southampton, Long Island. His
mother was daughter of Deputy Governor Thomas Dan
forth of Massachusetts. His grandfather was Rev.
Samuel Wliiting, who for forty-three years was the

128 THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
trusted teacher and guide of Lynn, which indeed
assumed that name in honor of its pastor, who had
been minister of Lynn Regis, England. His grand
mother was daughter of Sarah Bulkeley St John, and
through her John Whiting takes his place in the list
of the five ministers of Concord, who ha^¦e had Bulkeley
blood in their veins. To this clerical roll he could
add of relatives and connections, near and far, at least
a dozen more, while his niarriage with Mary, daughter
of Rev. John Cotton of Hampton, brought him into the
family of the celebrated minister of the First Church,
Boston. Dr. Holmes puts the Puritan clergy in the
Brahmin class; and such lineage gave one standing
in the community. It was not of chance that Judge
Sewall rose at four o'clock that spring moming to ride
" in Austin's calash " to Mr. Whiting's ordination, to
reach home the same day not much before his loved
Old South bell rang its nine o'clock invitation to
welcome sleep. Nor was it of chance that, when Mrs.
Sewall died, the Judge notes in his diary Mr. Whiting's
comforting visit. These are the tokens of a good social
and professional position.
But what sort of a man was behind the position ?
When John Whiting came to Concord he was thirty-
one years old; but he had already achieved, as well
as inherited, an honorable place. Graduating from
Harvard in 1700, he had been its librarian from 1703
to 1706, one of its tutors from 1706 to 1711, and a
member of the Corporation from 1711 to 1712. He
must have had much personal attractiveness; for he
was preferred by the Concord Church to Edward
Holyoke, and Edward Holyoke was for thirty years one
of Harvard's best Presidents, to describe whose virtues
Mr. Quincy can hardly find language strong enough.

THE CHUECH IN CONCOED. 129
William Whiting says that bis aflcestor " as a preacher
was quiet, modest, gentle, arid persuasive." This is
probably trUe. Certainly he was not one of the new
lights ; rather a man of tefiriemerit and learning th&a a
Boanerges. But could we have been with the crowd
which filled the old church on his ordination day, we
should have found nothing but cheer and hope, and
satisfaction that a new ininister had come, of whom
all good things could be said, and for whom all good
things might be prophesied.
And for twenty-two years these expectations seemed
to be fulfilled. In all that period not a line has been
preserved which even hints at any feeling of dissatis
faction. We suspect, however, that the calm was
deceitful. For in all those years, not orily here, but
throughout New England, the clouds of religious differ
ence and of theological bitterness were surely gather
ing, November 19, 1735, the storm burst out of what
seemed a clear sky, Ori that day a council iUet at
Concord, It had been summoned by the church to
hear grievances relating to the misconduct of its
pastor. Rev. John Whiting. The decision was, that
the charges were true; that the Church had been too
hasty in accepting its minister's confession of repent
ance and receiving him at once as a brother. It is
pleased, however, to learn that he hath since behaved
himself soberly and watchfully, and would not recom
mend his dismissal, but that he be put on probation
till May. This misconduct spoken of was undoubtedly
what was held to be, on occasioris at least, too free
use of wine. Sixteen months later the deacons were
requested to see whether Mr. Whiting would join the
town in calling another minister. To this he agreed ;
and, May 16, 1737, the tovvn voted, forty^one to thirty-

130 THE CHUECH IN CONCORD.
three, to settle a colleague. But to this the church
would not agree ; and on the following October called
another ex parte council. Rev. Joseph Sewall of the
Old South Church has left a report so brief and racy that
we cannot do better than reproduce it : " October 17, I
set out for Concord with D. Henchman ; rained, lodged
at Mr. Hancock's. Next day got to Concord; visited
Mr. Whiting. Mr. Hancock was chosen moderator.
Council voted Mr. Whiting unworthy to be a minister
of the Gospel, and advised the church to remove him
from his office. After a public hearing, at which Mr.
Whiting would not be present, as he had before refused
to submit matters to the council. The crime, intem
perance, 21st day. The result was read in the Meeting
House. I prayed. I hope God helped me. The church
then voted agreeable to the advice of the Reverend
Council, eighty-three yeas, eleven nays. My brother
C,ooper was their moderator. October 23 I preached
at Concord a. m. from Eph. 5 : 18, Be not drunk with
wine. Endeavored to bear testimony against the sin
committed. October 24, I returned safe."
No one can doubt that these charges were, to a
degree, true. It is not to be believed that the good
men who constituted the councils bore false witness.
Besides, when the habits of the times are remembered,
nothing appears more probable. Those were days
when everybody drank, and freely. Consider the
things that come down to us. Almost at the very time
the town was dismissing its minister, its selectmen
were paying for rum drunk by people who labored to
save the South Bridge in a freshet. Mr. Sewall's own
church furnished, every time he had a meeting of
ministers at his house, so much wine that, if the
brethren did not go home exhilarated, it was no fault

THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 131
of the church. Even an ordination could not be satis
factorily completed without an ample supply of ardent
spirits, amounting in one case, an antiquarian friend
tells me, to more than two barrels. Many things we
' consider appropriate were omitted at Puritan funerals,
but not, I suspect, intoxicating drinks. Every time
the minister visited a parishioner it was held to be
courteous, as the phrase was, "to take something."
Rev. William Emerson, writing to his wife, then in
feeble health, expresses his gratitude that a friend
sends her a bottle of wine as often as once in two or
three days. Amid this universal use, or abuse, how
could it be otherwise than that now and then the best
intentioned should occasionally pass the limit of pre
scribed sobriety? So I admit the error of the good
man, for good man he undoubtedly was, — an error
perhaps more than once committed.
But I do not feel convinced that he was in any
general sense an intemperate person. You observe
that the Council which condemned him was ex parte,
and that the accused refused to appear before it. This
fact of itself puts some doubt upon the verdict, or at
any rate some limitations. Eighteen months later we
get a glimpse of Mr. Whiting's own view of it. It
was April 9, 1739. Mr. Bliss had been settled just
thirty-three days. " The Church of Christ in Concord "
met, apparently for the first time under his ministry,
" to consider the affair of the late pastor, " — really to
call him to account, because he had made no confession
of his fault, and did not attend communion. A pretty
harsh proceeding, it would appear, for a young man of
twenty-four, only a month in his seat, to press upon
a man of sixty, already sufficiently humiliated. To
the committee sent to labor with him, Mr. Whiting

132 THE CHURCH IN CONCOED.
made this temperate reply; "Friends, if the Church
of Christ in Concord has anything to offer me, I desire
that I may have it in writing and time to consider how
to receive it And I expect some satisfaction for the
wrong which has been done (whether by any particular
member, or the majority of the members present at my
deposition) before I can (with due temper) sit down
with the church at the ordinance of the Lord's Supper. "
The answer to this letter was his immediate deprivation
of the privileges of a member of the church. At this
late day it is impossible to decide what was the nature
of the wrong which Mr. Whiting held had been inflicted
upon him. Perhaps, in the language of the Council
of 1735, he would have said that he had continued
"to behave himself with sobriety and watchfulness,"
and was entitled to the lenity which that Coimcil
granted. Perhaps, with still more forc^ he might
have complained that the church had proposed, and
he had accepted, as the condition of peace, the appoint
ment of a colleague, and then had not kept its agree
ment. At any rate, whatever his reason, he does not
speak as one conscious that he is under just condemna
tion. Nor must we forget that one third of the people
of the town then and ever after stood by him, defended
him, and to his death really continued under his
ministry ; and that in this third were some of the best
people. His after life to all appearance was both
kindly and blameless. Our theory would be, that Mr.
Whiting was a man of means, given to hospitality, no
ascetic, probably fond of the pleasures of the table, and
one who occasionally passed the limit of wisdom in his
indulgence of the customs of tho times.
We are the more inclined to this mild estimate,
because it is clear that the whole story has not been

THE CHURCH IN CONCOED. 133
told; and that there were other influences beside the
personal habits of any man which helped to produce
the result We have already pointed out to what an
extent the freedom granted by the Charter of William
and Mary brought to the surface religious differences,
which heretofore had been compelled to remain un
spoken. In the closing years of the seventeenth cen-
tory these differences led to a struggle for the control
of Harvard College. It ended in the defeat of the
extreme Calvinists, and in the withdrawal from the
Presidency, almost under compulsion, of Increase
Mather, the leader of the extreme party. In 1701,
Samuel Willard, who may be called a liberal orthodox
man of the seventeenth centory, took his place; and
was succeeded in 1707 by John Leverett, who yet more
fully represented the progressive spirit of the time.
These things happened while John Whiting was in
Cambridge, and it is clear on which side were his
sympathies. So when the lines of divergence were
being drawn, as in all those years they were, here and
in every town in the Province, the party which repre
sented the old views could depend upon the opposition
of the minister of Concord, in the pulpit and out of it
Then, in 1734, — the very year in which mutterings
against Mr. Whiting began to be heard, — came Jon
athan Edwards and the great awakening at North
ampton. It was the first and the mightiest of the
revivals. It spread like a conflagration. That awak
ening did much good, and no little harm. Often it
replaced in the religious life scepticism and formality
by faith and enthusiasm, though of a sombre cast. It
fought, frequently with success, the growing vices of
the times. But in every direction it divided ministers
and people almost into hostile camps. In Concord it

134 THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
left bitter feelings, which it took forty years to banish.
But in all its aspects, its high Calvinism, its intense
and often vulgar excitement, its asceticism, and its
tendency to minimize the value of early religious
culture and of practical goodness, that awakening must
have been repulsive to one of the disposition and
training of the man who stood in this pulpit. He must
have stiffly resisted its entrance into his parish. It is
impossible to believe that this immovable opposition
of the minister to the views of one wing of the church,
and that the stronger, was not one of the reasons that
led to his deposition. His habits might have furnished
the occasion, but the cause was deep and fundamental.
After his dismissal Mr. Whiting continued to live in
Concord until his death, fourteen years later. May 4,
1762, preaching much of the time to the minority of
his people, who seceded in 1743. The inscription over
his grave is a sort of post-mortem protest against the
action of his opposers. "A gentleman of singular
hospitality and generosity," it says, "who never
detracted from the character of any man, and was a uni
versal lover of mankind." Wisely or unwisely, over
all this story Shattuck sought to draw the veil of for
getfulness. But that veil has been rent by the publica
tion of the Old South record. So justice to the man,
if not fidelity to the truth of history, demanded that
the story in all its aspects should be retold.
When the town met six days after the removal by
the church of its minister, it did not confirm the action
of that body. It simply assessed fifty pounds to carry
on public worship. But its further vote, "to allow
Mr. John Whiting his salary in full untill the 1st day
of May next, " showed that in fact his work as minister

THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 135
of the town was over; and on March 7th following,
without fruitless opposition from his friends, the vote
of the church was quietly concurred in. The heat
generated by Mr. Whiting's dismissal did not easily
cool. It affected the life of the village for forty years.
Even in respect to the matter of looking for a new
minister there was a hitch. For on May 15, 1738, the
town refused "to joyn with the church committee to
agree with suitable gentlemen to supply the pulpit."
Even when the church selected Daniel Bliss, thirty-two
out of one hundred and two were found ready to vote
against him. Nor did opposition cease with his call.
Accusations were brought against him. The council
originally called for his settlement had to be reinforced
by two churches favorable to the pastor, and three
favorable to the dissatisfied members ; and it was not
until March 7, 1739, that he was finally ordained.
Daniel Bliss, the new minister, was born in Spring
field, Massachusetts, January, 1715, and was therefore
only twenty-four years old when he came to what may
properly be called the storm-tossed church of Concord.
He had been educated at Yale College. His after
course shows that he was in thorough sympathy with
the theological opinions of Jonathan Edwards, and
with the methods of church discipline adopted by that
celebrated divine. In the church of Springfield, in
which he was reared, he must have been a malcontent,
as its minister. Rev. Robert Breck, was Edwards's ablest
opponent in the Connecticut valley; and no doubt
in such an atmosphere of controversy the religious
convictions and feelings of the young man became
fixed. As a church administrator, Mr. Bliss was
clearly a believer in stringent discipline. We have
already seen how stern were the demands which he

J36 THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
made upou his predecessor. This same aggressive
policy was continued by somebody, as appears by the
town record of May 17, 1739 : " It was propounded in
Town Meeting, whether the Town will build a pew in
the Meeting house for Mr. John Whiting and his
fanaily, in case they will accept of it as their seat in
the meeting house (they quitting the pulpit and the
pew built for the ministry)." Four months later,
"the Selectmen were instructed to take care to build
said pew as soon as conveniently they can at the
Town cost" November 27, 1739, "It was voted that
the article relating to Mr. John Whiting's sitting in
the pulpit be dismissed." Finally, January 3, 1740, the
pmch delayed pew is reported built, cost three pounds,
ten shillings. Two years later there was no relenting,
Town meeting. May 13, 1742, Article 2 reads thus:
"To see if the Town will make eome Reasonable
allowance to Mr, John Whiting for his support in his
declining years, considering his former good services
and present Indisposition of Body. Passed in the
negative- "
How much Mr, Bliss had to do with the action of his
adherents in public meeting may be a grave question.
But the strictness of church discipline fell not alone
upon the late minister, whose errors might seem to
justify it, but equally upon such of his friends as
doubted the justice of his sentence, and on that account
withdrew from steady communion with their brethren.
For on August 26, 1742, the church decided that "John
Hosmer, John Wood, Samuel Miles, and Joshua Brooks
are not to be allowed communion with this church
untill they offer satisfaction suitable to their crimes,"
These were good men and true, one of them a deacon
of the church. And what were their crimes ? Appar-

THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. 137
fgntly a steadfast assertion that Mr, Whiting had been
wronged, a protest against the esttreme views which
they heard upon election, and absence from the Lord's
Supper, This discipline may not have been any stricter
or harder than was common in the early days of the
Colony. But it was harder than men were likely to
endure patiently in the time of larger liberty which
had come. And so it proved in Concord. The follow
ing anecdote would indicate that Mr. Bliss's personal
bearing was grave and stern, Said one of the late
Misses Blood' to a descendant of Rev. William Emer
son, " You 're of the old stock. Your grandfather, —
no, your great-grandfather was a minister of this town.
He came after Mr. Bliss, My mother used to say that
when he first came and visited them they were scared,
the children were so afraid of Mr. Bliss; but Mr.
Emerson spoke to them and said, ' What good children
you are!' and my mother said it was like the sun
coming out from a cloud."
Yet beneath the forbidding manner a tender heart
throbbed. In his diary he writes : " Our very dear son
John died on the 16th of December, 1746, just about
three quarters of an hour after nine o'clock in the
evening. Of his age he was very much grown, had a
white and ruddy countenance, a sweet and pleasant
natural temper, of a quick wit and promising genius,
on whom our hopes and affections were too much placed
by raised expectations. " Three years later, of his six
months' old child he records, " a pleasant babe, a calm
and quiet child, now, I hope, in endless rest, "
As a preacher, Mr, Bliss had striking qualities. He
replaced the somewhat formal utterance of the pulpit
of that day by the fiery earnestness of the revivalist.
Accepting to the utmost the stern dogmas of Calvin,

138 THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
his soul was on fire. Woe was laid upon him if he did
not preach the Gospel as he understood it Sometimes
he was moved tq tears. Often he rose to solemn
denunciation. His voice grew louder and louder, his
gestures more extravagant, his calls to repentance more
fearful and commanding. The effect upon his hearers
was equally striking. An intense excitement ran
through his audience, finding expression in groans
and shouts and confusion, which offended and made
hostile those of a calmer temperament. Thus Mr.
Bliss by his faults, and possibly still more by his
virtues, had the quality of character which sharpened
and made permanent divisions already existing in the
parish. Had he been a man of gentler make and
quieter ways, with less enthusiasm and a more fully
rounded judgment, things might have gone differently.
As it was, he did the work he was fitted to do, and with
no slack hand. He built up the church with the great
body of earnest and susceptible persons. He cut off
from the church many just and righteous persons,
who could not find God either in the whirlwind or
the fire.
John Whiting and Daniel Bliss were the antipodes
of each other. They dwelt in different theological
hemispheres with a different climate. John Whiting,
bating his fault, whose reality and extent we cannot
accurately determine, might almost have been the
original of one of those rectors whose portraits George
Eliot has so admirably painted. He was undoubtedly
a cultivated gentleman, calm and refined in his ideas
and manners, fond of the good things of this life, an
optimist, who believed that through a Christian educa
tion we best become children of God, and reflecting his
optimism in his peaceful, cheering, and no doubt some-

THE CHURCH IN CONCOED. 139
what formal utterances. Such at any rate is the
picture of him which rises in my imagination. Daniel
Bliss was like him in none of these things. He was a
man of a thoroughly unblemished character, devoted
to his ministry with a rare fidelity, one who believed
that all his flock were by nature children of wrath,
who had no faith that salvation could be attained by
Christian culture, however faithful, but only by a stroke
of conviction sharp and clear, like a flash of lightnirig
darting out of the heavens. His whole aim, certainly
in the beginning of his preaching, was to produce just
such crises in the lives of his people. Ease, the com
forts of life, the refinements of literature, in his case,
retired into the background. I suspect that, if he
could come back and walk the streets of Concord to
day with the mien he had, we should mark the grave,
stern, sad, almost sour cast of countenance which we
see stamped so often upon the faces of many of those
early God-fearing and God-serving Puritans. When
he died at fifty, just when more peace had come into his
parish than he had known before, no doubt it was the
sharp sword which had worn out the scabbard, — the
fiery soul that had been too much for his poor body.
The divisions which had marked the settlement did
not decrease with the passage of the months. They
were the result of fundamental differences both of taste
and opinion rather than of personal bittemess. The
breach was widened by the coming of George Whitefield,
who preached in Concord, stirred the people greatly,
intensified the earnestness and deepened the convic
tions of the young preacher, with whom he rejoiced,
and whom he pronounced to be "a child of God." At
about this time Whitefield made his attack upon
Harvard College as a seat of ungodliness. The only

140 THE CHURCH IN CONCORD.
ground for it seems to have been, that, in the progress
of events, the College had ceased to be chiefly a semi
nary for the training of ministers, and had become a
place of general intellectual cultore. But whatever
may have been the merits or demerits of this con
troversy, it undoubtedly awakened a great excitement
throughout the Province of Massachusetts. In many
quarters friendship for Mr. Whitefield changed into
open hostility. Scores of ministers signed a protest
against his statements. Rev. John Hancock, of the
neighboring town of Lexington, refused to admit him
to his pulpit. The flames in Concord were fanned
to greater heat. Union, before difficult, now became
impossible. The internal history of the parish, from the time Mr.
Bliss received his call, in 1738, to the time when the
General Court, in 1745, gave his opponents liberty
to establish a second church, has never been clearly
written, and now it cannot be. But they must have
been years of great confusion and strife. Life could
not have been stagnant and dull. The entry made by
Dr. Joseph Lee, who now first appears on the scene, in
its very incoherence is probably the more descriptive
and accurate: "More Prayers and more negatives.
I am weary of writing the Prayers of our friends and
townsmen that are oppressed and distressed in body
and mind as well as estates, and hard speeches and
cruel railings and all the arguments that I could make
use of failed. Yea, my skill failed me, and I had no
more to do for them but to Rite negatives, that I had
no heart nor hand in, until they petitioned the General
Court, who would hear the Prayers, and they could
digest the Banns and Judge impartially in the matter."
By 1742 and 1743 things had come to such a pass that

THE CHURCH IN CONCOED. 141
recourse was had to that great remedy in those days for
parish difficulties, "a venerable Council." Three such
councils were held ; one ex parte council called by the
church; one of the same kind summoned by the
aggrieved brethren; and a mutual council, of whose
members ten were supposed to be favorable to the
minister and four to his opponents. This last clearly
sought to be impartial, and to close up the breach. It
found something to blame on both sides. It held that
Mr. Bliss had been incautious and extravagant in his
language and in his statement of doctrines ; and advised
him " to be humble under a sense of having given so
much ground to many of his Christian brethren to be
grieved and offended at him, and that he make a
suitable acknowledgment of the things wherein he
was blameworthy. . . . And now, as to the aggrieved
brethren, we advise them, that upon his giving Chris
tian satisfaction as above they return and set quietly
and peacefully under the ministry of their Reverend
Pastor. We fear," they add, "that corrupt principles
contrary to the Doctrines have been and are espoused
by some persons in this place, which have occasioned
their stumbling at some truths which have been deliv
ered them. " It is impossible to conceive of a decision
more absolutely fair and impartial. Mr. Bliss's errors
were those of a man both of a dogmatic and an enthu
siastic temper, who gave himself up unguardedly to
extempore speech, while his opponents had certainly
lost faith in some things that had formerly been
accepted. Shattuck, in his history of the town, furnishes most,
if not all, of the materials necessary for a full under
standing of the points of difference between the parties.
But his account is so encumbered by unimportant

142 THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
details, indeed the complaints of the aggrieved are so
encumbered by such details, that the ordinary reader
does not grasp the situation. If, however, you care
fully examine, you will find that all that is really of
weight can be reduced to five heads or divisions. Two
of these are theological, two refer to rules of ecclesias
tical order, and one only has a personal bearing. Con
sider the theological questions. The first concerns the
doctrine of election. Mr. Bliss has left his own view
on record. "The offer of the Covenant of Grace," he
writes on the Church book, "is to all to whom the
Gospel is preached, and all are laid under the obliga
tions of it. Yet I suppose and preach that this Cove
nant is made in Christ for the elect only. Yet those
(who are not elect) for not accepting the Covenant of
Grace, when the Lord enters into it with men, I sup
pose and always hold them to be liable to a double
damnation." That is, Mr. Bliss was a Calvinist, and
one such as we rarely see now, and believed with John
Calvin that God predestined only a few to be saved;
while his opponents were Arminians, and held that
the Covenant of Grace could be accepted by all. The
second point of theological difference was this. Mr.
Bliss maintained that no soul could be saved, or counted
to be truly in the Christian fold, which had not passed
through a process of conversion so sharp and distinct
that it was fully conscious both of its character and
time. Thus he accepted the revival method as essential
at all times and with all persons. On the contrary, his
aggrieved brethren held that the process of Christian
education was the usual and the safe method of salva
tion, and the revival method the exceptional one. You
observe that these divisions hardly touched any ques
tions under discussion by Christian bodies to-day; and

THE CHUECH IN CONCOED. 143
that the members of both parties would be admitted
into any church in our Commonwealth.
If we turn now to the breaches of ecclesiastical order,
we shall find that the first accusation was, that he had
preached in other parishes, not only without invitation
from the pastors, but contrary to their wish. This is
what is meant by the saying, "that he was not in
charity with many neighboring churches. " This seems
a small offence to us. But under the old New England
method it was a great offence. Witness this story of
Dr. Osgood of Medford, which was told me by a father
of the faith, long since passed to his reward. "An
early Methodist had made arrangements to preach in
Medford. As a matter of courtesy, he called on Dr.
Osgood to apprise him of his intention. ' No, you are
not going to preach,' was the surprising salutation.
' I am paid |333. 33 J to do the preaching of Medford,
and I propose to do the whole of it. ' ' But, ' said his
astonished visitor, ' I have engaged k hall for Wednes
day evening. ' ' I shall be there and preach, ' was the
Doctor's reply ; and being a masterful man, he was as
good as his word. " Under this state of feeling, that
Mr. Bliss should have, at the invitation of his own
mother and friends, preached at Springfield, was counted
a serious breach of church order ; and the offence was
repeated elsewhere. The second accusation was that
he had introduced into his pulpit unauthorized and
uneducated exhorters, to the great scandal of the
Gospel. This action had the sanction of Whitefield's
authority, and apparently that of Jonathan Edwards,
but was not in accordance with the New England feel
ing of that period. The personal complaint of hasty
and unbecoming language, and of statements incon
sistent with each other, may be passed over in silence,

144 THE CHUECH IN CONCOED.
as they are natural, if not essential, to extempore ad*
dress delivered under excitement. Mr. Bliss accepted
the decision of the Council without protest, and made
all proper acknowledgment of error, showing how little
his conduct had its source in personal pride, and how
much in deep-seated convictions. And had the ever-
widening gap had its source in individual feeling this
dignity and moral sincerity might have closed it; but
division was inevitable. Two councils had indeed
advised it. Every step toward it was however marked
by difficulty. September 4, 1744, " The Town refused
to free those who had seceded from Mr. Bliss's ministry
from their proportion of tax, or to let them worship in
town hall." May 16, 1745, it "appointed a Committee
to oppose the petition to be freed from the proportion
of Mr. Bliss salary." It also "refused to help the
seceders to biiild a meeting house, or to grant the
Town house, or to pay for their preaching." So these
people appealed from the church and the town, and
venerable councils, to the Great and General Court,
which, January 19, 1745, wisely decreed a separation,
freeing the aggrieved from all ministerial charges, from
June, 1743, since which time they had maintained wor
ship among themselves. Thus a second church was
regularly organized in Concord. Its real name was the
West Church. But in derision it was called, from its
place of meeting, the Black Horse Church. About a
third of the population appear to have belonged to it.
According to Mr. Shattuck this church continued to
live — largely under the charge of Mr. Whiting —
about fourteen years. Then most of its members, who
still belonged to Concord, went back to the old church.
Some of the reasons are obvious. - The death of Mr.
Whiting in 1752 removed the one great personal

THE CHUECH INi CONCOED. 1.4Sr
obstacle to union. The setting off of the precinct, of
Lincoln early in the forties, and its incorporation into
a town in 1764, took: into.' another municipality several
of his strong supporters.. Death no doubt removeds.
others. The copy of the petition; of. Job Brooks, Jr.,,
dated July 17, 1746, clearly paints to the existence of
a church- at Lincoln before, that, date. The list of
members made a year later clearly contains Concord
names; while in May, 1751, the church voted "to
receive any member of the Church of Concord, who
should be dismissed." So, with this haven of safety
near at hand for all discontented souls or tender con
sciences, the expense of the West Church must have
seemed to be needless. Finally, we may venture the
suggestion that Mr. Bliss himself, like Whitefield,
had softened his own methods, even if he did not modify
his opinions. During the separation nothing occurred
in the old parish needing to be noted except the adop
tion in 1749 of a new church covenant. The old one
was undogmatic. The new one became distinctly so,
by stating that an excellent compendium of Faith and
Practice was to be found in the Shorter Catechism of
the Assembly of Divines.
March 10, 1764, Whitefield made a second visit to
Concord. The next morning being Sunday, Mr. Bliss
by his request preached. The sermon made so power
ful an impression upon him that Mr. Whitefield said
"that had he studied a whole lifetime he could not
have preached such a sermon. " Mr. Bliss had reached
the zenith. His intellectual powers and his spiritual
vigor were at their best. Most of his opponents had
been reconciled. At peace now with his neighbors, his
own church seemingly united, the religious life of
his people, if less exalted, perhaps more profound and
10

146 THE CHURCH IN CONCORD. .
trustworthy, might he not look forward to many years
of tranquil and useful life ?' But it was the last bright
flash of the flame before extinction. Consumption
claimed him, and two months later he died. We have
already sketched his character. A man of beliefs dark
and sombre, but genuine to the core, a man of earnest
ness such as is vouchsafed to few of earth's children, a
man gifted with that divine quality we call eloquence,
we may accept the eulogy of his successor and call him
" a flame of fire, " — yes, and kindled by a coal from the
altar.

THE STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS
OWNERS.
Lecture delivered beeoee the Concord Lyceum,
February 1, 1883.
IN a little sketch of Concord, which I wrote for
Drake's History of Middlesex County, I alluded
to a beautifully rounded little eminence filling the
triangle made by the junction of the Sudbury and
Assabet Rivers. One point of this triangle ends in a
miniature promontory, known to children of our gener
ation as Egg Rock. The hill itself was called by the
early settlers plain North Hill. Since their day it
has been variously termed Lee's Hill, Barrett's Hill,
and Hurd's Hill, while in recent times a not very suc
cessful effort has been made to restore the Indian
name, Nawshawtuck.
This little hill, and the woodlands, meadows, and
arable land attached to .it, make a tract of about four
hundred acres, bounded chiefly by the two branches of
the Concord River. It constitutes one of the few farms
in Concord which very nearly retain, their original
character. Pieces of land have been added to it;
pieces of land have been subtracted from it; but, in
the bulk of it, the farm is what it was when, in the
second division of the lands, two hundred and twenty-
eight years ago, it fell to the lot of Major Simon
Willard. I venture to ask attention to the story of
this farm and its owners. The subject must have some

148 STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS O'WNERS.
attractions for Concord men and women. The annals
themselves show iu what a wonderful manner, in the
lapse of time, width and variety of genuine human
interest get attached to one little parcel of ground.
We begin with the first owners, the Indians. A
powerful tribe once occupied the whole region now
known as Middlesex and Essex Counties, and could
boast three thousand warriors. A mysterious plague
in 1612 swept off nine tenths, of these people. "They
died in heaps," says the old chronicler. "The bones
and skulls in their several places of habitation made
such a spectacle that, it, seemed a new-found Golgotha."
Then their chief, Nanepashemit, whom the historian
styles " the renowned, " moved from Lynn to Medford,
probably for greater safety from hereditary foes. There
he built a curious fort, of poles thirty feet long, driven
into the ground in a great circle. But there his enemies
found him and slew Mm; and there he was buried.
His wife. Squaw Sachem, succeeded to his authority,
and first, perhaps in Massachusetts practically asserted
and maintained woman's rights. With a sagacity
worthy of a Christian potentate she confirmed her
power by a second marriage with Webbacowet, whom
the old Puritan, with no surplus of politeness, termed
"the pow-wow, witch, priest, sorcerer, and chirurgeon
of the tribe." What further we know about this
woman is told by the Massachusetts Colonial Records,
where it appears that for a mere pittance she sold land
to the settlers of Concord, Cambridge, and Charles*
town, and gave to one Jotham Gibbons the tract of
land near the Mystic ponds, which she had reserved for
her own use, to acknowledge (as she expressed it in
her deed) " the many kindnesses she had received from
his father, and. for the tender love and respect which

BTOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES. 149
she bore to the son, and desired tbat these be recorded
in perpetual remembrance lof this thing." Across the
centuries no more touching eulogium lias come to us
than this simple testimony of the rude forest queen to
the Christian charity and jus.tice of Captain Edward
Gibbons, of Boston, and of plain Jotham Gibbons, his
son. In 1641 appears .also a vote by which Cambridge
is enjoined to give Squaw Sachem one coat every
Tvinter : and the next year another vote by which she
was to receive from tke same source, as a sort of primi
tive back pay, four coats .and thirty-five bushels of
jBorn. In 1644 she and four other chiefs put them-
iselves, their subjects .and property, under the jurisdic
tion of the Colony. On this occasion sundry grave
questions and simple answers -are duly entered on the
public records. For entire honesty of statement we
commend to your attention the reply made to require-
jnent No. 3, which ran thus : " Not to do any unne
cessary worke on the Sabath day." To which the
iBtraightforward savages said, "It is easy to them.
They have not much to do any day. And they can well
take their ease that day." :She died in 1662, old and
.blind. Of this broken tribe a feeble remnant under a sub-
chief, Tahattawan, lived in Concord. Probably in all
they did not number a hundred. For Higginson tells
us, that "after the plague few Sagamores had three
hundred subjects, some but fifteen, some only two."
Their home was on the farther aide of the stream from
Egg Rock to Clamshell Bluffs. Behind was land for
their rude husbandry; before, the river, which, as Mr.
Hale has said of some other poor folks, was all the
pork and beef barrel they had; on tbe hill, possibly a
little fort or stockade. No doubt they were glad to

150 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS O-RTNEES.
exchange land, which they could not occupy, for
knives, hoes, and cloth, of which they were in sore
need. The rest of their story is quickly told. They
became Christians; pathetically asking "not to be
moved far from the English, lest they should forget to
pray." In their new home at Littleton they lived
peaceably and honestly forty years. Then King
Philip's War broke out. No chapter in our town
history so shameful as that which tells of the treatment
of this helpless people. By order of the General Court
they were removed back to Concord. Only one man,
John Hoar, rose above the prejudice and fear of the
hour. (I presume that his place was on Lexington
Street, where Mr. Alcott's house stands.) He per
mitted the poor exiles to put their wigwams on his
grounds, took charge of them, employed them. There
were but fifty-eight of them; only twelve were men,
and these unarmed. "They were living," as Major
Gookin reports, " very soberly and quietly and industri
ously." But neither their weakness nor their good
conduct could save them from persecution.
The exigencies of the time had brought to the surface
one Captain Moseley, a soldier of desperate courage,
and an old West Indian buccaneer. The superstitious
red men viewed him with a peculiar terror, for they
said that he was a man with two heads. The fact was,
he wore — what in New England in those days was not
common — a wig. This wig, when he came into an
engagement, he was wont to hang on a bush, and to
keep, as the Indians affirmed, another head upon his
shoulders, and to fight just as well as if he had the
ordinary stock. Any one familiar with Cooper's novels
will readily recall an incident in one of his Leather-
stocking Tales, which was probably suggested by this

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES. 151
old tradition. This Captain Moseley had under him a
company in which there were no less than twelve
pirates, pardoned to fight Indians. He had signalized
his promotion by an act of cruel injustice to the Chris
tian Indians of Marlboro. To him certain of the
townspeople sent secretly. He came. It was mid
winter. With the active sympathy of many of the citi
zens, it is to be feared, with the passive consent of
most is certain, he snatched these poor people from the
hands of Mr. Hoar, scattering their little properties,
and hurried them to the bleak shores of Deer Island,
there to spend the bitter winter and the inclement
spring with no shelter but their tents, and no food but
a scanty supply of corn, and the clams they dug from
the sea-shore. It seems incredible, that within two
months of this outrage, one of these very Indians,
Thomas Dublit, volunteered to go on a dangerous mis
sion to the hostile tribes to endeavor to secure the
release of Mrs. Rowlandson. For this end he and
another Indian made three expeditions. On the fourth
he was accompanied by Mr. John Hoar, who succeeded,
apparently with no little peril, in redeeming her,
bringing her first to Concord and then to Boston. How
many of these Nashobah Indians ever came back from
their cruel exile, neither history nor tradition tells;
but in 1734 only one was left Thus the story ends of
the first owners of our beautiful hill, girded by the
quiet rivers. Their ample fields we occupy, and at
their hands our fathers received nothing but gifts and
friendly treatment
The first white owner of the farm was Major Simon
Willard. Not unlikely three quarters of Concord-born
people now living do not know who Simon Willard
was. Then it is time they did know. For infant

152 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS 0"\VNEES.
Concord owed more to him, perhaps, than to any other
single person. He it was who selected the spot on
-which the town stands, and by his influence with the
natives promoted its peaceable possession. He was
one of the little band who made that painful march
through thickets, and watery swamps, and unknown
woods, which the old Puritan annalist so graphically
describes. And he it was that in the dark and difficult
days of the first settlement filled every post and per
formed every duty. Probably in all those early years
he was its chief selectman. Certainly for eighteen
years he was its clerk, and for fifteen years its Deputy
at the General Court From the beginning he was the
military commander; and with two others made the
legal tribunal before wliich all cases between man and
man of moderate importance were tried. Last but not
least, to him was intrusted the delicate office of selling
strong water. For, however strange it may look to
us, rum selling was then committed to men in high
standing, and was itself almost a certificate of good
character. Nor was his work and usefulness confined within
this single town. Possibly he was the most influential
man in the county. All through his later years he
held the office of Assistant. Now in Massachusetts in
the seventeenth century an Assistant was a person with
high and varied duties. In the General Court he was a
Senator. To the Govemor he was a Coimcillor. In
the administration of law he was a member of the only
Supreme Judicial Court of the period. To all these
honors and labors Simon Willard was called for twenty-
two successive years, and just as he died received the
largest vote given for any one for his twenty-third
term. Add now that in 1641 to him and two others

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS 0"WNERS. 158
was given the whole charge of trade with the Indians;
that in 1655 he was promoted to the command of all
the military force of Middlesex County,; that in almost
innumerable cases he was appointed to settle bounds
'between individuals and towns, and in one case
fbetween Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and adjust
differences with Indians, whom the fathers, like their
children, were not indisposed to oppress ; — and you
see that he was a notable man and trusted, not simply
ihere, but in all the region about.
The facts of his life are simple. He was bom in
1605, at Horsemonden, Kent, where a descendant found
jthe ancient church in which he was christened, and a
magnificent oak, more than three hundred years old,
under whose shade he must have played. When he
was four years old his mother died, when eleven, his
father, leaving his son a good patrimony. At twenty-
nine years he was married, in comfortable circum
stances, with a promising business. Then, like many
another, for conscience' ,sake, he left all. At Cam-
ibridge, by the Charles River, he bought a farm, built a
house, and began to trade with the natives. A year
passed, when he sold his property, turned liis back
on the comparatively settled life of Cambridge, and
plunged into the wilderness to help plant a new town,
there to live twenty-^four years. His biographer inti-
imates that the warm attachment which had grown up
between him and Rev. Peter Bulkeley led to this
change of plan. July, 1658, the selectmen of Lan
caster, feeling the need of a ruling mind, thought
"meet to order a letter of invitation to be sent to Major
'Simon Willard to come and inhabit among us." A
«imilar invitation in a previous year had been declined.
.But eight months before this last call Mr. -Bulkeley

154 STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNERS.
had clssed his career. Perhaps that weakened the tie
which held him. At any rate he accepted the invita
tion, and sold his farm. Por twelve years he was the
controlling mind in Lancaster. Then he moved to
Groton, where his son was minister. There King
Philip's War found him. At seventy, with all the fire
and vigor of youth, he took command of the Middlesex
soldiers, trying, with a scanty force, alas! to protect
the wide, helpless frontier. When Captain Thomas
Wheeler and Lieutenant Simon Davis with a little
band from Concord and the vicinity were surprised at
Brookfield and besieged, and in the last extremity, it
was their old neighbor who rode up with his troopers
and friendly Indians and rescued them. March 14,
1676, while he was absent on service, his own house at
Groton and sixty-five others were burned. One month
later he lay dead in his new home at Charlestown,
worn out, I doubt not, by the burden and grief of that
dreadful war, too heavy for shoulders that had already
laid on them the weight of seventy-one years. The
first European who occupied the farm on the hill was a
noble specimen of a noble race. Weighty in judgment,
versatile, trusty, of kindly temper, of indomitable
industry, he filled well almost every conceivable post
His successor was a very different pattern of a man,
— much more entertaining, I suspect, much less useful.
The first glimpse we have of him is in the journal of
one John Dunton, an Englishman, who made a trip
through New England in the latter half of the seven
teenth centory, visiting Lynn on his way to Salem.
In that journal he records: "About 2 of the Clock I
reached Capt. Marshall's house, which is half way
between Boston and Salem. I staid to refresh nature
with a pint of sack and a good fowl. Capt. Marshall

STORY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS 0"WNEES. 156
was a hearty old gentleman, formerly one of Oliver's
soldiers, upon which he very much valued himself.
He had all the history of the Civil War at his fin-
¦ ger's ends, and if we may believe him, Oliver did hardly
anything that was considerable without his assistance ;
and if I 'd have staid as long as he 'd have talked, he 'd
spoiled my ramble to Salem." This Captain Thomas
Marshall came to Lynn in 1635. But when the civil
war between the Parliament and the King broke out,
he returned to England, entered Cromwell's army,
became a captain, and came back to New England
covered with glory, a fact of which he was apparently
quite sensible. A little before, Joseph Armitage built
on the Saugus River one of the first taverns erected
in the Colony. By a curious freak, the sign of this
tavern, an anchor, was painted a bright blue, and the
place was familiairly known as "The Blew Anchor."
This Blew Anchor Captain Marshall bought and kept
many years. He must have been a person of some
respectability, as the town of Lynn elected him no less
than six times its Deputy to the General Court, and in
the Indian wars put its soldiers under his command.
He must, however, have had some weak spots, if we
are to judge from his experience as a magistrate,
entitled to perform the marriage ceremony. The
Massachusetts Records . state that on the 18th day of
October, 1669, "Captain Marshall, of Lynn, was
empowered to join in marriage such persons in Lynn
as might desire his services, they being published
according to lawe." But fifteen years after quite a
different record appears. It says : " The Court being
informed that Captain Thomas Marshall hath of late
married some persons not legally published, on exami
nation of the case, finds that he was abused by misin-

156 STOEY OF A CONCOED FARM AND ITS OWNEES.
formation of some, and by his own overmuch credulity,
and that he hath exceeded the commission by marrying
people not living in the town, which might be occa
sioned by some mistake as to the extent of the commis
sion, which the Court hath now more clearly explicated
to prevent the like inconvenience ; and judge meete to
discharge the said Captain Marshall from officiating in
that employment." What induced Captain Marshall
to come to Concord, it is impossible to say. But come
he did, and on the 29th of November, 1659, purchased
Major Willard's farm for ^210. But as nine days after
the date of this deed he received authority "to sell
strong water to travellers and other meet provisions,"
we exercise the Yankee privilege of guessing that he
hoped to turn an honest penny by selling strong water
at the place which Major Willard had established.
Whether he was disappointed in his expectations, or
was overcome by the temptation to make JE30, we
.cannot guess. But for some reason in sixteen months
he sold the place to Henry Woodis, or Woodhouse, for
£240, and so passes out from Concord life. The last
appearance of this veteran of which we have any
account was as a witness in a trial about an old mill
privilege in 1683. Six years after, he died, aged
seventy-three. This third owner of the farm was
evidently a gqod deal of a character. The title, which
clung to him, of the jolly landlord of the Blew Anchor,
was significant. The traveller describes him as a
hearty old gentleman, full of innocent vanity. The
town historian calls him a fine old Englishman, who
kept open doors to all comers. Even the Committee of
the General Court softens a little, and attributes his
shortcomings to nothing worse than innocent credulity.
One cannot but think that this easy-going and probably

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES. 157
rosy-cheeked publican found the grave Puritans of
Concord uncongenial companions, and gladly got back
to the Blew Anchor and to its cheery customers, who
would listen to his long yarns about half fabulous
exploits. Henry Woodis was the first owner of Lee's Hill
whom Shattuck records. Yet he is the very one of
whom, we know the least He came to New England
in 1650, so Savage affirms. He was in Concord in
1654, for in March of that year he voted in a minority
of five against a plan to divide the town into quarters.
Where he lived then, and what land he occupied, is not
clear. But of the three hundred and one acres which
he bought in 1661 of Thomas Marshall probably only
two hundred and forty-three are in the present farm.
Yet in 1699 he owned three hundred and fifty acres,
and no new purchase of land is recorded. May we
not fairly infer that before 1661 he already had a
hundred acres of his own, and in the same region?
Five years after his purchase, his house was burned,
and his only son, an infant of a few weeks,, perished in
the flames ; and so it was fated that he should be at once
the first and the last of his name in the town.^
During his fifty years'' life here he filled some honors
able positions. In King Philip's War he was first
Quartermaster, then Lieutenant. Fbr three years, from
1690 to 1692, he was Representative; In 1684 he was
one of a committee appointed to extinguish the Indian
title to the new grant, — now Acton. In 1699, an old
1 Tradition adds that he, lost in the great London fire the pre
ceding September two houses more. I do not think that the build
ing he lost in Concord was the one erected by Simon WiUard, but
one he himself had buUt and occupied before he purchased the
great farm of Thomas Marshall.

158 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES.
man, he sold his farm to his son-in-law, Joseph Lee,
reserving, however, one fifth for his own use. Two
years later he died. Mr. Woodis was evidently a
person of respectable ability and character. But he
left no such impress on our history as did his prede
cessors. Yet he was more essentially a Concord man.
Few, if any, of their descendants remain in the town,
while many, if not most of the old families, have a few
drops of Henry Woodis's blood in their veins. Lee,
Cheney, Estabrook, Dakin, Davis, Wood, and Hey wood
are the names of some of the families into which his
daughters and granddaughters entered by marriage.
The tragical death of his only son left Mr. Woodis
without an heir to his name ; and his estate, partly by
purchase and partly as the dowry of his daughter, fell
into the hands of the Lees, by whom it was held one
hundred and thirteen years. Of this family we have
now to speak.
Joseph Lee, the first, was the son of a settler of
Ipswich, whose true name, tradition says, was Leigh,
and not Lee, as we have it. How, in those days, —
when practically Ipswich was as far from Concord as
Chicago is now, — Joseph Lee and Mary Woodis met
at all, and especially met frequently enough to con
template matrimony, is the problem. But they did,
and in 1678 were married. The Ipswich records say
that Mr. Lee did not move to Concord till -1696, and
then probably to relieve his father-in-law of the burden
of his great farm. After Mr. Woodis's death he occu
pied the portion of the farm he had obtained, apparently
making no effort to reclaim the fifth which had been
bequeathed to the fourth daughter, Mrs. Dakin. Old
age stole upon him, and in 1716 he gave his son
Joseph one hundred and fifty acres, and his other

STOEY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNERS. 169
children the rest of his estate, and then died. That is
all history or tradition records.
Joseph Lee, the second, was a physician. More
ambitious than his father, he early set to work to unite
the fragments of this grand farm. He purchased of
Elinor Dakin the fifth which his grandfather had
alienated; then his brother's and sister's portions,
finally adding, in 1730, two adjoining strips. So the
two hundred and forty-three acres of Thomas Marshall,
which Mr. Woodis had made three hundred and fifty,
became in his grandson's charge three hundred and
seventy-five. Joseph Lee, third of the name in Concord, physician,
Tory, had by the middle of the century again united
the farm. By what heirship, by what purchases, is not
clear. That he practised his profession steadily is not
probable. On the contrary, the numerous accessions of
land which he made outside his farm, and outside the
town, indicate that he had large business transactions
and achieved wealth. Ever after he was twenty-eight,
until the commencement of the Revolutionary War, his
time and interest must have been a good deal absorbed
by church quarrels. He was one of those who seceded
from the First Parish, and formed what was called, in
derision, the Black Horse Church, because its meetings
were held in the hall of a tavern, near our present
library, which had for a sign a black horse. This
breach having been healed by the death of Rev. Mr.
Bliss, another quarrel, more personal and bitter than
the last, broke out. Dr. Lee sought admission to the
church, and was repeatedly refused. Nine church
members and others not of the church, under the title
of aggrieved brethren, espoused his cause. What with
interminable church meetings and innumerable church

160 STORY OF A CONCORD FAEM AND ITS OWNEES.
committees and councils,, mutual or otherwise, they
kept the church and themselves in a turmoil seven
years. The cause of this division was not, as we might
suppose, doctrinal. A somewhat tattered document
shows that the cause was practical and personaL This
asserts that Dr. Lee had oppressed, widows, and orphans
by undue delays in settling accounts and by exorbitant
charges; that he gave way to his passions, vilely
reflecting on his pastor ; that he theatened and bully
ragged a committee who had done nothing but give him-
sound' advice. All of which, as an ex parte statement,!
may be taken with a grain of salt. In the Revolution,,
the doctor, having much, to losej; shrank from civil war,
upheld the existing powers, in short,, was a Tory. This'
was natural, and perhaps might have been excused:
But that he stole, down to Cambridge and betrayed
secrets to the enemy could not be overlooked. To this
he pleaded guilty. For this he was confined fourteen
months to his farm,, glad,, no doubt,, to escape with so
Ught a penalty. One other trace of him I find in a
letter of condolence to.' Stephen Hosmer, in which he
speaks of himself as confined and deprived of the privi
lege of attending the funeral of a friend. Many curiouff
traditions about Dr. Lee still linger, whose authenticity
is not perhaps perfectly clear. One states that he had
an apartment in which he kept a fire burning thirty
years, thinking that he was on the eve of discovering
the philosopher's stones Another ascribes to him a
violent and unreasonable temper, and tells of a certain
valuable lot of ship timber,, which he refused to sell,.
and suffered to rot upon the ground, because he could
not obtain his price. Despite his troubles, and despite
any faults of temper, he lived to a good old age, dying
at eighty years, in 1797, and over his remains a stone

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES. 161
was reared which ascribed to him pretty much all
of the Christian virtues. Dr. Lee has made a perriia-
nent impression upon the history of the town. He has
made a permanent impression upon its very soil. For
I think that the name Lee's Hill will outlive all its
successors. I have no faith that he .was one who would
have had a tranquil life in any community, or have
been popular. I picture him as somewhat selfish, a
man of set opinions, and not a little resolute and
pugnacious in the assertion of them.
It was while Dr. Lee was confined to his farm that
one of the most interesting episodes in Concord history
took place. I refer to the sojourn of Harvard College.
When we consider how, sooner or later, everything
seems to appear in this ancient town; that it first
sheltered the Provincial Congress ; that in 1786 it ran
a narrow chance of being itself the State capital ; that
for the space of a few months it was, six years later,
actually that;' that in our own day it has been the
home of two such opposites as the State prison and the
School of Philosophy, — it may seem to be in the order
of events that our great institution of learning should
sojourn awhile amid its tranquil scenery. At any
rate, it happened that when, by the siege of Boston,
Cambridge became one armed camp. Harvard College
was transported to Concord. The professors and
students were scattered through the village, — twelve
of the latter finding shelter in the venerable mansion
of Dr. Lee. One wonders what sort of an impression
this advent made upon the town. Here was a quiet
village, quiet then beyond all our capacity in these
days of railroads, telegraphs, and telephones even to
Comprehend, Within a mile of the church there could
not have been more than seventy-five houses. To this
II

162 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNERS.
little hamlet came one hundred and forty-three students,
with the five, six, or ten professors or tutors, with
library and apparatus, with increased social life and
excitement. Five hundred students billeted upon the
modern town for a year would hardly be an equal
burden. It is interesting to see what distinguished
men were the result of this somewhat vagrant course of
instruction. In the little class of forty-two, which
graduated in 1776, I note the names of Christopher
Gore, one of the ablest of the Governors of Massachu
setts ; Samuel Sewall, Chief Justice of the same State ;
Royall Tyler, who combined in himself the somewhat
incongruous distinctions of Chief Justice of Vermont
and author of the first American drama which ever
appeared upon the stage. To these might be added
two or three others scarcely less distinguished. I
question whether in the long and honorable list of
Harvard any class has produced, according to its
numbers, more able men than this very class which
spent its senior year in our town. All the students did
not escape the fascinations of the place, for Dr. Ripley,
for sixty-three years minister of Concord, Dr. Hurd,
for fifty -five years its physician, and Jonathan Fay, for
thirty-three years its lawyer, were all members of the
College in the year of its wandering.
Whether any of the Lee family occupied the home
stead between the death of the doctor, in 1797, and the
time when the property passed into other hands, in
1814, 1 am not sure. But as Tempe Lee, widow of
Silas Lee, did not part with her right of dower until
1814, when William Gray gave her $1,100 for the same,
it seems probable that she is the female member of the
family of whom a faint memory remains in the minds
of those born early in the century. The farm itself

STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNERS. 163
seems to have been owned jointly by his sons, Joseph
and John. Then John became, by purchase, sole
possessor. He conveyed it to his younger brother,
Silas, from whom it passed finally out of the family.
All these sons appear to have been men of more than
usual ability. Joseph was ordained minister in Royal-
ston in 1768, and preached his last sermon fifty years
after his settlement. John was in Castine, Maine, as
early as 1785, and was collector of the port from 1789
till 1801. Afterwards he was largely engaged in the
lumber business, apparently to no profit. For in 1810
he conveyed the farm to Silas, as it would seem to
protect his brother in the indorsement of a note of ten
thousand dollars, which he himself could not pay.
Silas was a lawyer in Wiscasset, Maine, about 1790,
member of Congress in 1800 and 1801, United States
Attorney for the State of Maine in 1802, and then Judge
of Probate. As we have seen, he became owner of the
farm in 1810. But one month later he mortgaged it
for ^10,000, no doubt to enable him to pay the note
for which he was bound, and at his death, in 1814, the
mortgage not having been redeemed, the estate fell
into the hands of the mortgagee. Before dismissing
this portion of my subject, let me note, as an interest
ing case of persistence of the family type, that, while
Dr. Joseph Lee was a Tory in the Revolution, his son
John, in the war of 1812, was a Federalist to the verge
of disloyalty, and his grandson John was in the War of
the Rebellion in sympathy with the South and opposed
to the government.
So William Gray, merchant of Boston, became the
owner of Lee's Farm. One of the notable men of his
day was this same William Gray, better known by the
sobriquet of Billy Gray. Born in Lynn in 1750, he

164 STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS O'VVNEES.
was grandson of one of the three shoemakers of that
town who kept journeymen. The boy himself was
apprenticed to the same trade, and it is not unlikely
that, if he had continued in it, with his vast energy he
would have made Lynn before its time the great boot
and shoe town. But health failing, he was put first
into the employment of a Mr. Gardner, and then of
Richard Derby, one of the great merchant kings of
Salem, in the days of her great prosperity. A story is
preserved of his boyhood, something of the George
Washington and hatchet variety, in which the Salem
lad appears at no disadvantage in comparison with the
father of his country, but tells the tale of the breaking
of a square of glass with such simple truth, that he
receives from his employer as a reward a suit of
clothes. Whether this story is veritable, or one of the
myths which gather around great memories, I know
not. But certain it is that his integrity, joined to a
mind of wonderful capacity, enabled him to build up a
business unparalleled in his time. He owned sixty
square-rigged vessels, and his enthusiastic biographer
exclaims that there was no country where his name
was not known, and no sea not ploughed by his keels.
He was a man of striking qualities. Through a long
life he rose between three and four o'clock, writing all
his letters, planning all his enterprises, before half
the world was out of bed. As an employer he was just
and generous. He never discharged a good servant,
and kept many of his captains in his employ more than
a quarter of a century. He first discerned the fine
quality of Joshua Bates, the American partner of the
Barings and the founder of the Boston Free Library,
— taking him from his father's cart, which he was
driving, into his counting-room, employing him in

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNERS. 165
confidential business, and so launching him on his great
career. One adage, now of pretty wide circulation,
may be credited to him. When asked what " enough "
was, he replied "a little more." Mr. Gray might
never have left Salem — in which case Lee's Hill
might never have known him — had it not been for
the bitter party feeling of the time. In early life he
had been a Federalist. But when the embargo, in Jef-
erson's administration, went into effect, he separa,ted
from his party, opposing and defeating in town meet
ing a resolution of censure of the government. His mo
tive could not have been a selfish one, for on account
of this embargo act he had himself forty vessels rotting
at his wharves. But those were days of savage party
division. There was no measuring of words. He was
called everything that the vocabulary of abuse could
furnish. Salem became distasteful to him. He went
to Boston, carrying with him his business. There the
Democratic party took him up and chose him Lieu
tenant Govemor. During the war of 1812 he lavished
his wealth in support of the government. Mr. Drake
says that it was his gold that fitted out the " Constitu
tion " for that memorable cruise in which she took the
" Guerriere, " and forever dissipated the false ideas of
British naval supremacy. ^ Mr. Gray died in 1825, the
richest man in New England. It was in 1816, possibly
in 1813 or 1814, that he became owner of Lee's Farm.
1 An old merchant of Boston, but who spent his boyhood and
youth in Concord, used to assert that the very timber of which the
" Constitution " was built was cut from Lee's Hill, and that his own
father teamed it to Chaxlestown. 'When we consider what a mag
nificent growth covered the hill, and that we know that Dr. Lee
was in the habit of selling ship timber, the story looks probable
enough, and it certainty adds a new element of interest to the spot.

166 STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNERS.
He never, indeed, lived here, but employed a foreman
to carry on his place. There was a very heavy growth
of old timber. The late Mr. James Wood told me that
he worked one winter lumbering for Mr. Gray, that
fourteen or fifteen teams were occupied drawing to the
river the great pines and oaks, — some of them two
and three and even four feet in diameter, — and that an
enormous raft was made, floated down the river, thence
to Boston, there to be used in the building of his
wharf, and in the construction of his ships. I suspect
that, on the whole, farming without the eye of the
employer did not prove profitable. At any rate, in
1821 he sold the farm for $3,000 less than it cost him;
and so closed the connection with the town of one of
the ' most remarkable merchants which Massachusetts
ever produced.
We have seen that up to 1825 the farm of which we
have been discoursing had had in its varied history
for owners an Indian queen, a fur-trader, an inn
keeper, two farmers, two doctors, two merchants, one
minister, and one lawyer. It was now for a brief
season to be the property of a judge. Samuel Phillips
Prescott Fay was Concord-born, the son of Jonathan
Fay. He graduated with high honor from Harvard
College in 1798. A French war was then threatening,
and a small army was gathered at Oxford in this State.
Thither he went with the commission of captain. But
tbe war never took place,, and he returned to the study
of the law which he had just commenced, was admitted
to the bar, and early obtained a good professional rep
utation. In 1821 he was appointed Judge of Probate,
and retained the place until ill health rendered him
unequal to its duties, thirty-five years after. He was
two years a member of the Governor's Council, and

STORY OF A CONCORD FAEM AND ITS OWNEES. 167
twenty-eight years an Overseer of Harvard College.
As he lived until 1856, he must have been known to
many of the elder portion of Concord people. The
unbroken testimony is that he was a man of good legal
ability, absolute integrity, great urbanity, and much
quiet humor. His ownership of the property was
nominal, as he purchased it in 1821, and held it till
1825, not for himself, but for his sister's husband,
Joseph Barrett. Still no account of the farm and its
owners would be complete which omitted him.
Joseph Barrett, familiarly handed down in Concord
traditions as Squire Joe Barrett, was a striking figure
in the town in the first half of this century. Ou his
father's side he was grandson of Colonel James Barrett,
who commanded at North Bridge. On his mother's
side he was descended from Henry Woodis, one of the
early owners of the farm, and Joseph Estabrook, the
third minister of the town. Through his paternal
grandmother he claimed kindred with Peter Bulkeley.
Indeed, it may be said that in every fibre of his body
and every drop of his blood he was a Concord product,
for I have been unable to find a single ancestor on
either side who was not either of Concord origin or
else a settler of the town. In person he was wellnigh
of gigantic proportions, standing an inch or two over
six feet, and weighing more than two hundred and fifty
pounds. Many feats of strength are told of him, such
as lifting barrels of cider and shouldering and carrying
up stairs a bag containing eight bushels of corn. His
size and weight did not lessen his activity. In the hay
field, cradling grain, or holding the plough, especially
when he took part in full dress and ruffled shirt at
ploughing matches, few men could keep pace with him.
He was a person of great resolution and courage. For

168 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNERS.
years he was a deputy sheriff, and displayed both his
sagacity and fearlessness in the arrest of hard charac
ters, which were by no means few, even in what many
esteem to be the golden age of the republic. In 1825
Mr. Barrett became the owner of the Lee Farm,
though, as we have seen, it was purchased for him and
occupied by him as early as 1821. How successful an
agriculturist he was I know not, but he must have been
a notable one. Everything he did was on a large scale.
His nephew, George M. Barrett, told me that he used
to keep a flock of eight hundred sheep. To these he
gave endless attention, himself caring for them in
health and sickness, so that they knew him and followed
him. At one time he engaged in the manufactore of
cider, often having on hand more than five hundred-
barrels. Cutting and teaming of wood and lumber
grew in his hands to large proportions. A story
which has been preserved shows how great a business
in this line he must have done. A man asked the
Squire if he would be one of several to loan him a yoke
of oxen, as he had a great load to move. " How many
do you want in all ? " was the reply. " Ten yoke. "
" If that is all, " said the Squire, " you need not go
round to the neighbors to gather such a little team, I
will furnish tbe whole." The fact is that Mr. Barrett
had in his barn at that very time twelve yoke of oxen
and six or eight horses. It is not so wonderful that,
in these days of horned scarcity, his son likes to have
a good pair of cattle. As we have intimated, the
squire was a mighty man in the hay field, taking the
lead, and permitting no man to pass him. His confi
dence in his vigor and activity led him into a sort of
dilatoriness, by which lateness to church, and especially
to the stage-coach, was a rule of his life, and which

STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNEES. 169
in a person of his genial ways only added a touch of
humor to people's conception oF him. In 1844 he gave
the charge of the farm up to his son Richard, working
afterwards as suited his fancy. He was driving a load
of stone when the news came to him that he was elected
Treasurer and Receiver General of the State. He
jocosely said he could not possibly accept it, for he
was engaged to work for Dick at ten dollars a month.
However, he must have made a compromise with his
employer, as he took and filled the office until his
death, in 1848. It would be presumptoous for me to
attempt any characterization of one known to so many
by personal acquaintance. But this, I think, may be
said : No one would be likely to attempt to depict the
social and business life of Concord between 1800 and
1850, and omit from his picture the stalwart form and
marked mental physiognomy of the twelfth owner of
Lee's farm. Squire Joe Barrett
Of the later owners of Lee's farm it does not seem
needful to speak at any great length. Prom 1844 to
1852 it belonged to the son of the Squire, our towns
man. Captain Richard Barrett, and was carried on by
him. He sold it in 1852, and has for many years filled
the position of Treasurer of the Middlesex Mutoal Fire
Insurance Company. Samuel G. Wheeler, the pur
chaser, was a native of the State of New York, who in
a long and active life had been by tums a manufac-
torer, a commission merchant, and a dealer in real
e-state. While he occupied the place he thoroughly
renovated the old mansion, built the great bam, laid
the stone walls, planted on the Acton road rows of
elms, and so in many ways added to the value and
increased the comeliness of the estate.
Pour years passed, and the property had a new owner.

170 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNERS.
It would have seemed as if every variety of life and
occupation had already come into contact with the
ancient farm; but not so. The new owner. Captain
David Elwell, was a retired sea captain, who in three-
Score and odd years had ploughed more water than land.
He was a remarkably intelligent, active, and successful
shipmaster, making long voyages, chiefly to the East
Indies and Sumatra. It is remembered of him that he
was the first American captain who ever sailed through
the Straits of Magellan. In 1840 he retired from the
sea, was for years Wharfinger of Union Wharf, and later
Treasurer of the East Boston Dry Dock Company. At
the advanced age of sixty-eight years he came to Con
cord. He filled the house with a great collection of
curiosities gathered from many lands, and settled down
in his new home. But in the winter of 1856-57 his
house with all its contents was burned, and he moved
back to East Boston. Nothing remained but the cellar
and the great chimney. On this last there was, when
I came to town, a half effaced inscription variously
deciphered 1646 or 1656. It was no doubt the date of
the erection of the building. A single Concord anec
dote of Captain Elwell has been preserved, and indi
cates that he was a man who had his own ideas of men
and things, and did not hesitate to express them.
After the fire he stopped a while at the iliddlesex
Hotel. Captain Isaac I. Hayes, of Arctic celebrity,
came to Concord, probably tolectore. Rightfully or
wrongfully, the impression then was that he had in
an unjustifiable manner deserted his superior officer.
Captain Kane. Some one offered to introduce Cap
tain Elwell to Mr. Hayes. "No," was the emphatic
answer, " not to a man who deserted his commander. "
The boy of ten or twelve who heard the reply never

STORY OF A CONCORD FARM AND ITS OWNERS. 171
forgot the kind of wrathful indignation with which it
was spoken.
Two more changes, and the history of the farm is
completed. It passed successively into the hands of
two grandsons of old Dr. Isaac Hurd, who in the last
year of his college life, spent as it was in Concord,
might well have frequented its goodly acres, and
possibly lived in its venerable homestead. Again
fresh vocations furnished fresh owners. Joseph L.
Hurd was a commission grain merchant, having his
headquarters at Joliet, Illinois, a State which only as
far back as tbe time when William Gray owned Lee's
farm must have been a wellnigh untrodden prairie;
for in 1810 Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota together
had only about twelve thousand inhabitants, or one
person to every sixteen square miles. Charles Henry
Hurd, the present owner, ^ came to the farm from an
employment which would have filled our ancestors with
astonishment, if not with affright. He had been a
railroad man, a vocation which came into existence
not half a century ago, and which in that brief time
has wrought marvellous changes and accelerated mate
rial progress.
Nearly a quarter of a millennium has slipped away
since the white man took possession of these acres.
The old mansion, the old barn, all the old things of
man's device, are gone. A modern house and barn of
grand proportions have now replaced them. Perhaps
the farm looks forward to another two hundred and
1 [In 1891 the farm was purchased from the heir's of Charles
Henry Hurd by William 'Wheeler, a member of an old Concord
family, who for many years has been engaged in building water
works in different parts of the country, thus adding still another
profession to the list Mr. Eeynolds has given. — Editor.]

172 STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND ITS OWNEES.
fifty years of yet more varied history, to be rehearsed
by some future chronicler to an audience yet to be.
Who knows ?
This is an ancient story, and I think it not amiss to
add to the chronicle what our Puritan ministers used
to call an improvement. Rightly viewed this farm has
been in itself a little world. All trades, all profes
sions, all human interests, seem sooner or later to
have come to it. The Indian, the fur-trader and
planter of new towns, the Cromwellian soldier and
inn-keeper, merchants, doctors, lawyers, mechanics,
farmers, a judge, a minister, a sailor, a railroad mana
ger, — all these have possessed the land, and for the
most part have departed and left little trace of them
selves behind. I count that nine different stocks or
families have in two hundred and fifty years owned the
farm, and that only two of them are represented in the
town to-day, unless it be by remote side branches. But
on the soil there are nothing but surface changes. The
beautifully rounded little hill, the green meadow, the
winding rivers, — these are just what they were two
hundred years ago.
Instinctively, as I close, I recall Emerson's words,
which seem simply concentrated history : —
" Each of these landlords walked amidst his farm.
Saying, ' 'T is mine, my children's and my name's ;
How sweet the west wind sounds in my own trees I
How graceful cUmb those shadows on my hUl !
I fancy these pure waters and the flags
Know me, as does my dog ; we sympathize ;
And, I affirm, my actions smack of the soU.'
" "WTiere are these men ? Asleep beneath their grounds ;
And strangers, fond as they, theu- fuiTows plough.

STOEY OF A CONCOED FAEM AND IIS OWNEES. 173
" The lawyer's deed
Ean sure,
In tail,
To them and to their heirs
¦Who shall succeed,
Without fail,
Forevermore.
" Here is the land.
Shaggy with wood,
With the old vaUey,
Mound and flood.
But the heritors ?
Fled hke the flood's foam, —
The lawyer and the laws,
And the kingdom,
Clean swept herefrom.
" They called me theirs.
Who so controlled me ;
Tet every one
Wished to stay, and is gone.
How am I theirs.
If they cannot hold me.
But I hold them?"

CONCORD FIGHT.
Fbcitei> in the Uxitaeias Eevibw, Apbil, 1S73.
WHAT was there in the character and position of
the town of Concord a hundred years ago, or in
its relations to the larger interests and transactions of
the times, to .make it the object of the first really
powerful, hostile movement of the British Governor ?
Any one who visits Concord now finds a neat, quiet
town, of moderate size, girdled by low hills, and look
ing out upon broad green meadows, and upon the most
winding and most tranquil of rivers. It is a pleasant
town to see, and restful to the eye. To its own
children it seems as towns are apt to seem, the pleas
antest spot on the earth. To a stranger, no doubt, it
does not differ essentially from scores of villages which
nestle amid our hills, or sun themselves along our
streams. It is very difficult, therefore, in 1875, to appreciate
that in , 1775 this quiet town was one of the great
centres, not only of intellectual life, but also of politi
cal influence and power. Yet so it must have been.
Of all our inland settlements, in population it was
almost the largest, in resources almost tlie wealthiest
As a shire town there came to it necessarily that con
tinual excitement which stimulates in any community
mental activity. Thither, five or six times a year,
came the various courts of law, with their retinue of
judges, jurors, lawyers, and suitors, numbering many

CONCOED FIGHT. 175
scores ; and came, not as now, borne quickly there by
the railroad in the morning, and as quickly away at
night, but to make the town a home for days and weeks.
Here conventions for all manner of objects of county
interest were accustomed to gather. Here, especially,
in Puritan fashion, in the meeting-house, the choice
spirits of the county, or, as Paul Revere termed them,
the High Sons of Liberty, met to discuss grievances, to
deepen the love of freedom, and the purpose to resist
oppression, and, above all, to ripen feelings of patriotism
or indignation into wise action. It was not an unim
portant circumstance either that Concord was the first
settlement in the State off tide-water. For a time our
fathers clung to the rocky and barren shores of that
ocean which divided them from their old home. At
Plymouth, at Salem, at Boston, at Dorchester and
Roxbury, and at many other places on the seaboard,
the germs of flourishing towns and cities were planted.
But inland there was nothing but the wildemess and
the savage. Not until fifteen years after that immortal
voyage of the " Mayflower, " in 1635, did a little band
of Puritans cross the first barrier of hills which shuts
from sight the ocean, and settle by the side of what the
Indian called; from its wide meadows, the "grass-
ground river. " They named the new home Concord, —
title strangely unprophetic of that bitter fight which
ushered in the bitterer struggles of the Revolution!
As a necessary result of this early origin, the town
became one of the few hives from whose redundance
New England was peopled. Everywhere its children
went. In all the towns along the seaboard of Maine,
in the new settlements which were springing up in
Southern New Hampshire and Vermont, in the younger
villages of Middlesex and Worcester Counties, in far

176 CONCOED FIGHT.
off Connecticut, as it was then, there were men and
women whose ancestral home was within the territorial
limits of old Concord. So its name was a household
word on the lips of many who never had seen, and
perhaps never should see it with the bodily eye.
Thus, from various reasons, it happened that, in
1775, among all the inland towns in Eastern Massachu
setts Concord was the most prominent, — the natural,
as it was the political, centre of the great and patriotic
county of Middlesex. It was a small town, as we
estimate towns, never in its best estate before the
Revolution having exceeded two thousand people. But
we must not forget that Massachusetts, according to
modern standards, was itself a small State.
It was no doubt on account of this prominence in
character and position that Concord was, from the
beginning, chosen to be the place for the first meeting
of the First Provincial Congress of Massachusetts. In
making this statement, we do not overlook the just
claims of Salem. It was at Salem that the vote was
passed'which created that Congress. It was at Salem,
too, that the General Court resolved to become a part
of that Congress. But we repeat, in its wholeness, with
all the members which constituted it, the Provincial
Congress first met and transacted business at Concord.
As the creation of a Provincial Congress drew after it
by almost necessary sequence "Lexington Alarm,"
Concord Fight, Bunker Hill, and to no little degree
the national independence, it is well to count the steps
by which it came into existence. In the summer of
1774 thoughtful people saw that a break between the
legislative and executive branches was at hand, — to
be followed, inevitably, by a stern struggle for suprem
acy between the two. When that break took place,

CONCOED FIGHT. 177
where should the representatives of the people find a
legislative home ? Boston was dominated by a great
British army. Salem and all the sea-coast towns
would, in event of trouble, be at the mercy of British
fleets. A town itself thoroughly patriotic, and sur
rounded by a population of the same temper, near
enough to Boston to be in communication with its Sons
of Liberty, far enough from it to be safe from the inter
ference or threats of the royal Governor, seemed to be
the first requisite. All eyes turned to Concord. A
convention of the best men in Middlesex, held in its
meeting-house, "Voted, August 31, 1774, that each
town in the county be recommended to elect one or
more delegates to attend a Provincial meeting, to be
holden at Concord the second Tuesday in October."
Suffolk County, in an equally important convention,
held at Mr. Vose's house, Milton, September 9, recom
mended to its towns the same course. Cumberland
County, in what was then the distant Province of
Maine, added its voice to the same effect, September
22. And Worcester County spake with no uncertain
sound. It advised "its towns to instruct the Repre
sentatives who may be chosen to meet at Salem, in
October next, absolutely to refuse to be sworn by any
officer or officers but such as are or may be appointed
according to the constitution. And should anything
prevent their acting with the Governor and Council, as
is set forth in the Charter, that they immediately repair
to the town of Concord, and there join in a JProvincial
Congress with such other members as are or may be
chosen for that purpose." The General Court met at
Salem, October 5, 1774, waited two days for the Gover
nor to take the proper steps to qualify its members, —
waited, as no doubt it expected to wait, in vain, — and
12

178 CONCOED FIGHT.
then proceeded on the 7th to elect John Hancock its
chairman, and Benjamin Lincoln its clerk, and by
the following votes to merge its own existence into
that of the new and larger body: "Voted, that the
members aforesaid do now resolve themselves into a
Provincial Congress, to be joined hy such other persons
as may have been or shall he chosen for that purpose, to
take into consideration the dangerous and alarming
situation of public affairs in the Province, and to con
sult and determine on such measures as they shall
judge will tend to promote the true interests of his
Majesty in the peace, welfare, and prosperity of the
Province. Voted, that the Congress be adjourned to
the meeting-house in Concord." Arrived at Concord
the second Tuesday in October, the first business was
to reconsider the votes by which John Hancock was
elected chairman, and Benjamin Lincoln clerk, and
then to elect the same persons to similar positions
under the titles of President and Secretary. Such
action was had, no doubt, because the presence of addi
tional members made the form of reorganization both
respectful and proper. It is absolutely certain that in
some cases such additional members were chosen. It
is wellnigh certain that more than one half of those
who were at Concord were not elected to Salem. The
body thus reorganized and its successor for six months
met alternately at Concord and Cambridge. The Sec
ond Provincial Congress was in Concord in March and
April, 1775, and adjourned only four days before the
encounter at North Bridge. By its sessions there it
must have helped largely to make the town an object of
interest to the friends, and an object of enmity to the
foes, of freedom. In that old meeting-house, which,
repaired and remodelled, alas ! stands now on the same

CONCOED FIGHT. 179
church green, what words to fire men's souls were
spoken, what policy to shape the destiny of the State
was enacted! There Joseph Warren, John Hancock,
Samuel and John Adams, Elbridge Gerry, names
memorable in the State and national history for the
next generation, and with them Prescott, Heath, Ward,
Lincoln, the first military leaders of the Revolution,
played their part Scarcely Independence Hall itself
has more venerable associations.
As a natural consequence the committees of safety
and supplies — the most important bodies which ever
existed in tbe Comnaonwealth, to whom the whole work
of arousing the people and preparing for their defence
was intrusted, who were to call into existence soldiery,
to find officers, to procure arms, to gather supplies, to
appoint depots, to be, as it were, eyes and hands to all
the rest — were constantly at Concord. They were
there, John Hancock at their head, on the 17th of
April, not more than thirty-six hours before brave men
were massacred almost before his eyes on Lexington
Green. Very early in the history of these committees, it is
stated that they ordered to be deposited in Worcester
two hundred barrels of pork, four hundred of flour,
and one hundred and fifteen bushels of peas; and in
Concord, one hundred and, thirty -five barrels of pork,
three hundred of flour, one hundred and fifty bushels of
peas, and fifty-five tierces of rice; and "Voted, that
all the cannon, mortars, cannon-balls, and shells be
deposited in the towns of Worcester and Concord in
the same proportions as the provisions are to be
deposited." These votes, so far as Worcester was
concerned, were never carried into effect. But Concord
became one great storehouse. Every farmer's barn,

180 CONCORD FIGHT.
the town-house, the court-house, the tavem shed, the
miller's loft, all became extempore depots for pro
visions and munitions of war. Very likely in other
places there were limited supplies. But gradually, in
comparison with the means of the Province, a vast store
was accumulated at Concord- Eleven hundred tents,
ten tons of cartridges, eighteen tons of rice, eight tons
of fish, many hundred barrels of flour, fifteen thousand
canteens, a thousand iron pots, besides cannon and
mortars, round-shot and grape-shot, canister and shells,
spades, pickaxes, billhooks, shovels, axes, hatchets,
crows, and wheelbarrows, wooden plates and spoons,
cartouch-boxes and holsters, belts and saddles, and
many other articles, made up this astonishing deposit
No doubt Concord was made such a depot because it
was a large town, and had several military companies;
because, too, it was near the probable scene of action,
yet far enough away to be reasonably safe from any
sudden attack. One cannot but think that the thor
oughly trustworthy character of Colonel James Barrett,
who was the sole custodian of these treasures, must
have entered largely into the calculation. The com
mittee were aware how precious was the charge com
mitted to the brave old town. They enjoin Colonel
Barrett to keep watch day and night He must always
have teams ready to transport away the goods at the
first alarm. He "must not so much as mention the
name powder, lest our enemies should take advantage
of it." But such a secret could not be kept Tories
stole to Boston to tell it. British officers came thither
in disguise, noting all the difficulties of the way. and
seeking to find the places of deposit Tradition says
that Major Pitcairn visited the town. Finally, the
committee was alarmed, and the day before the battle,

CONCORD FIGHT. 181
too late fully to accomplish their purpose, ordered that
the munitions and provisions should be distributed
among nine different towns. Meanwhile each patriot in
Boston was a volunteer sentinel, watching every move
ment of General Gage, with eye quick to detect each
change of military position, with ear open to catch the
faintest whisper of danger. So that when the royal
Governor resolved upon action, almost before he gave
his order to Colonel Smith to march to Concord and
destroy there the munitions of war, his counsels were
known; and while the soldiery were embarking to
cross Charles River, Paul Revere was taking that
adventurous ride over which poet and historian alike
delight to linger.
Why did the fight happen at Concord ? It could
happen nowhere else. With Boston for a centre,
within a radius of twenty-five miles there was no other
spot where Gage could strike to such profit. He might,
indeed, in quiet villages find men to whom it was
sweet to die for country ; for brave hearts were plenty
then. He, might burn the humble homes of those who
loved freedom more than safety. But such acts ex
asperate rather than weaken. But, at Concord, had
the four hundred militia gathered on Ponkawtasset
Hill held aloof, and left the Provincial stores to the
mercy of the British troops twenty-four hours, Gage
had struck a deadlier blow than if he had slain five
hundred on the battle-field. The direction of his
march was neither of accident nor of choice, but of
necessity. When Revere knew that Gage was on the
war-path, he did not have to ask whither to ride.
But what happened at Concord ? A body of Ameri
can soldiers, organized under legal authority, at the
command of their officers advanced in military array,

182 CONCORD FIGHT.
received the fire of the enemy, and, when ordered,
attacked and forced a similar body of British troops to
retreat. This is what distinguishes the fight at Old
North Bridge from all previous affairs. Not to speak
of the troubles in North Carolina, there had already
been in New England hostile incidents and meetings
more than one, though they are fast being forgotten.
The boy Snider, who was shot in Boston streets the
22d of February, 1770, was unquestionably the first
Revolutionary martyr. But he was murdered, not by
a British soldier, but by a British sympathizer, who,
resenting the posting of a brother Tory, was driven
home by a band of boys with many hoots and some
stones, and in his fury shot a little fellow of eleven
years who happened to be present. Eleven days after,
the Boston Massacre followed. Here a squad of British
soldiers fired a volley into a crowd of people, killing
three and wounding eight persons, most of whom had
committed no offence whatever. But the affair was so
connected with previous quarrels, and with immediate
threats and insults, that an American jury, rather than
run the risk of injustice, substantially acquitted the
soldiery. The next encounter in order is the burning
of the "Gaspee," — one of the most gallant achieve
ments of the whole period. The " Gaspee " was a
British schooner of eight guns, which haunted the
waters of Narragansett Bay, and, with little cause, and
no evidence of rightful authority, stopped and harassed
the vessels plying thereupon. This sea-wasp, pursuing
a peaceful packet, got aground a few miles below
Providence. John Brown, of that place, with others,
fitted out eight whale-boats, which dropped down the
river on the evening of June 9, 1772, and reached the
stranded vessel a little after midnight. After a brief

CONCORD FIGHT. 183
struggle, the schooner was captured, her crew put
ashore, and she burned. In the affray her commander.
Lieutenant Duddingston, was wounded, and could justly
claim that from his veins had come the first English
blood shed in the contest. Captain Abraham Whipple
led the Americans, and thus was engaged in the
earliest private naval exploit, as three years later he
commanded in the first public naval battle. But gal
lant as the achievement certainly was, it was a private
expedition, and always disallowed by the Rhode Island
authorities. Boston gave its celebrated tea party De
cember 16, 1773. The festivities, though they closed
with a masquerade and a libation to Neptune, need not
be described. They certainly were not presided over
by the authorities. February 26, 1776, Colonel Leslie
stole out of Castle William with two hundred men,
and made a rapid march through Marblehead, hoping to
capture in Salem and Danvers certain military stores.
He found the drawbridge between the two towns up;
A scuffle ensued for the possession of two flat-boats.
And North Bridge, Salem, might have taken its place
in history instead of North Bridge, Concord. For
Colonel Pickering was the best educated military man
in the Province, and the Essex militia afterwards, at the
close of that hot April day, showed of what stuff they
were made. But neither party was anxious to precipi
tate hostilities. And Leslie agreed, that if, for honor's
sake, he was permitted to march thirty rods beyond the
bridge, he would abandon the objects of his expedition.
About this time an affair of great seriousness took place
at Westminster, the shiretown of Windham County,
which then included the whole southern half of
Vermont this side the mountains. Under the direc
tion of some sort of a rude organization, the people of

184 CONCORD FIGHT.
Westminster and the vicinity took possession of the
court-house, March 13, and refused entrance to the
royal judge, sheriff, and their attendants. A parley
ensued. It was agreed that the judge, without an
armed force, should come into the court-house and
discuss matters with the malcontents. This agreement
was broken by the sheriff. For at midnight he appeared
with a considerable party and demanded admittance.
Being refused, he gave orders to fire into the building.
One man was killed and one wounded. This was the
first American blood shed by direct command of a
royal official, when at the time no violence was offered
or threatened. But, as there was then in Vermont no
State authority of any kind, patriotic or otherwise,
this affair too must take its place among volunteer
movements. Five hours before the fight at Concord, the first
hostile meeting between organized American and
organized British soldiers, each party acting under
what it held to be legitimate authority, took place.
Before sunrise on that morning, at the first intimation
of danger forty to seventy minute-men (the exact
number is uncertain) assembled by order of their
captain, John Parker, on the little green in front of
Lexington church. The promptness with which these
men responded to the call, the courage which they dis
played in a hot encounter later in the day, proves them
to be entitled to the place of brave men among the
bravest. As this party was drawn up across the upper
end of the common, the sudden appearance of Major
Pitcairn, his order to the Americans to disperse, and
his quick command to his own soldiers to fire, made
the quiet green the scene of a bloody massacre, and at
the command of their captain the Lexington men dis-

CONCOED FIGHT. 185
persed, leaving one quarter, if not one third of their
number, dead or wounded. There has been a long and
often needlessly warm discussion as to whether any
guns were fired by the minute-men in return for the
fatal volley which they received. Authorities certainly
differ. And it is not possible quite to reconcile the
adverse affidavits. So the question can never be abso
lutely settled. But a candid weighing of all the evi
dence makes it altogether probable that, as the company
dispersed, three or four, and possibly eight or ten, guns
were fired. But, as a military encounter, the contest
was hopeless from the beginning. Such shots as were
fired were discharged, not only without the orders of
Captain Parker, but in direct opposition to them, and
were prompted by the impulse and courage of the
individuals themselves. Beyond inflicting slight flesh
wounds upon a soldier or two, they did no damage to
the enemy, and scarcely delayed his onward movement.
" The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church. "
And it is impossible to exaggerate the importance of
the cruel affair at Lexington, in exciting sympathy, in
arousing indignation, in giving courage to the timid,
and in fusing all different feelings and opinions into
one united sentiment of patriotism. It is with just
reason, therefore, that the sons of Lexington, and the
whole State, hold in solemn remembrance the brave
men who fell tbat day.
The peculiarities of the fight at Old North Bridge,
which divided it from all skirmishes or battles which
had occurred previously, and which entitle it to dis
tinct remembrance as an event of unsurpassed impor
tance, are, that there every movement of the militia was
made in accordance with the orders of those legiti
mately in command; that there, for the first time,

186 CONCOElJ FIGHT.
British soldiers fell before an ATuerican fire; and,
especially, that there the invader was turned back, once
for all, never to make another hostile advance on
Massachusetts soil, unless the few acres enlargement
of his prison house won by the awful slaughter at
Bunker Hill be called an advance. Other places have,
and justly, their sacred memories. But within the
bounds of the original thirteen States there is no spot
more interesting than the two secluded green slopes,
with the quiet river flowing between, where the soldiers
of the King and the soldiers of the people met in
military array and exchanged fatal volleys.
"1775, 19 April. — This morning," writes the patri
otic Concord minister in his diary, "between one
and two o'clock, we were alarmed by the ringing of
the bell, and upon examining found that the troops, to
the number of eight hundred, had stolen their march
from Boston in boats and barges, from the bottom of
the Common over to a point in Cambridge near to
Inman's farm. This intelligence was brought us first
by Dr. Samuel Prescott, who narrowly escaped the
guard that were sent before on horses, purposely to
prevent all posts and messengers from giving us timely
information. He, by the help of a very fleet horse,
crossing several walls and fences, arrived at Concord
at the time aforementioned ; when several posts were
immediately despatched that returning confirmed the
account of the regulars' arrival at Lexington, and that
they were on the way to Concord." Such is the account
of the first tidings of the invasion in the very words of
one who was an eyewitness of the events which suc
ceeded. It was probably about three o'clock before the
town thoroughly comprehended its danger. The hurry,
the confusion, the excitement, the alarm, which must

CONCOEt) MGHT. 187
have filled this little village during the four hours in
which it awaited the coming of eight hundred merce
nary soldiers, can hardly be imagined, far less described.
Every available man and team must be impressed to
carry away or to hide the precious stores. The minute-
men and members of the old military companies were
preparing their arms and equipments for immediate
service. Many of the women and children took to the
woods for safety. Tradition preserves some simple
anecdotes, which have not yet been recorded, and
which reveal the varying hmnors of the time. Thus,
one good lady, hearing that the regulars were coming,
goes straight to the adjoining meeting-house, and takes
the communion plate and buries it in her soap-barrel
in her cellar, in the arch under a great chimney which
is still standing. Another, getting ready to take her
children into the woods, in her confusion went to her
drawer and put on a checked apron, which in those
days was the proper adornment on state occasions.
This she unconsciously did over and over again, until,
when she recovered her wits in her hiding place, she
found she had on seven checked aprons. No doubt
every home had its tale, both pathetic and ludicrous,
to tell.
A little after sunrise two hundred armed men had
come together. Three quarters were from Concord, a
few from Acton, and the rest minute-men and militia
from Lincoln. Their advance was stationed a mile
toward Lexington, at the end of that steep ridge which
skirts the village on the north. The main body occu
pied, "as the most advantageous sitoation," the high
point of that same ridge, directly opposite the meeting
house. A little before seven, the advance came hurry
ing back, saying that the enemy were at hand, and

188 CONCOED FIGHT.
" their numbers were more than treble ours. " A second
position was now taken, " back of the town, on an emi
nence." This was probably somewhere on that high
land which borders Monument Street, though some
think at the extreme northern end of the ridge first
occupied, which many years ago was levelled to give
room for the court-house. " Scarcely had we formed, "
says the same diary, " before we saw the British troops,
at a distance of a quarter of a mile, glittering in arms,
advancing towards us with the greatest celerity. " So
high was the courage of our people, and so unwilling
were they to retreat, that not a few insisted upon meet
ing the enemy then and there, though some estimated
his numbers at twelve hundred, and none at less than
eight hundred. Finally, Colonel James Barrett, who
had been by the Provincial Congress put over all the
forces in the neighborhood, and who about this time
rode up, having been engaged since daybreak in secur
ing the stores, ordered them to fall back over the
bridge to Ponkawtasset Hill, a high eminence which
overlooks the village, and there wait for reinforce
ments. This order was obeyed, as were all righttol
orders given that day. By half-past nine the Acton
minute-men, two small companies from Bedford, and
individuals from Westford, Carlisle, Chelmsford, and
very likely from other places, had joined them. They
numbered, perhaps four hundred and fifty, perhaps
three hundred and fifty, — more likely the last than
the first. Meanwhile a small body of British troops
occupied South Bridge. A hundred, under Captain
Laurie, guarded North Bridge. A hundred marched
by the river road to seek for stores at Colonel Barrett's,
possibly to seek for the Colonel himself. The main
body of five or six hundred remained in the centre,
looking, to very little purpose, for munitions of war.

CONCOED FIGHT. 189
At this time smoke and flame, rising from the burn
ing of cannon wheels, became visible to these anxious
watchers upon the hill. What was it ? Were the
cruel enemy setting fire to their homes ? They could
not longer remain inactive. A hurried debate was
had. And then Colonel Barrett gave orders to Major
John Buttrick to lead the little force down the hill to
the bridge, charging hiin not to fire unless he was fired
upon. There has been a hot discussion as to the rela
tive position of men and companies in this advance.
We shall not enter into it, for it belittles and insults a
great event Whether the Acton men led, or marched
side by side with David Brown's Concord minute-men;
or, if they led, whether it was because they had a more
forward courage, or, as Amos Baker of Lincoln testi
fied, because they alone had bayonets with which to
meet the enemy, if he should trust to steel rather
than lead, — are questions which can never be settled.
Enough that in fact the Acton men did occupy the
post of greatest danger, and like brave men, as they
were, held it firmly. But what swallows up every
other consideration is the thought of the incredible
courage which was in all these men. Was there not
real courage in that Colonel, man of mark and position,
foremost person of his town and neighborhood, with
little to gain and much to lose, who, with his hair
already whitening with age, sat there on his horse, and
issued a command which was nothing less than flat
rebellion, which could never be forgiven him except
at the end of a successful civil war ? Estimate for me,
if you can, the courage of the last man in the last file
of that little battalion ; his physical courage who dared,
with a few hundred militia, to march down to attack
what he believed to be three times their number of the

190 CONCOED FIGHT.
best soldiers in the world ; his moral courage who, a
plain farmer perhaps, averse to quarrels, law-abiding,
in obedience to his political convictions was ready to
^ confront with hostile weapons the servants of him who
' till that hour he had held to be his legitimate sover
eign ! Merely to have contemplated seriously such a
step stamps all these men as heroes.
What followed, everybody knows. The Americans
marched down to within a few rods of the bridge, with
wonderful self-restraint received a few scattering shots,
which wounded Luther Blanchard of Acton and Jonas
Brown of Concord, and afterwards a volley by which
Captain Davis and Abner Hosmer of Acton were
killed. Then rang out the startling order, "Fire,
fellow soldiers, for God's sake, fire ! " And from all
those silent pieces poured forth a volley. It was a
deadly one. Out of a hundred men, according to
Gage's official statement, three were killed, and nine
wounded, and, by the American account, three killed
and eight wounded. Of the killed, one died imme
diately by a shot in the head. One expired before his
comrades reached the village, and was buried in the
old graveyard. One, mortally wounded, was cloven
through the skull with a hatchet by a lad, at whom,
says Chaplain Thaxter, he had made a thrust with his
bayonet. From the window of the house now occupied
by the Hon. John S. Keyes, a little girl of four years
was looking out. She never forgot how pleased she
was to see the two hundred British soldiers march by
in perfect order, with their bright weapons and scarlet
coats and white pantaloons, or how terrified to see the
same men come back, hurried, in disorder, muddy, a
great many as it seemed to her, with limbs tied up and
bloody. In the record of this hot skirmish, five names

CONCOED FIGHT. 191
stand out to receive peculiar honor. First, Captain
Isaac Davis, of Acton, a modest manly soldier of only
thirty years, who could say that he had trained up a
company, not one of whom feared to follow him, who
assumed his position with a full sense of its gravity,
and died first of all in the front rank; Major John
Buttrick, of Concord, who himself, within sight and
sound of his own home, led the advance, and at the
right moment gave the word of command; Colonel
John Robinson, of Westford, who, reaching the field
before his own townsmen, as a volunteer walked side
by side with Davis and Buttrick; Lieutenant Joseph
Hosmer, of Concord, who acted as adjutant on that
day, and by his earnest words, "Will you let them
burn the town down ? " determined that heroic march
down the hill to the river ; Captain William Smith, of
Lincoln, who volunteered with his single company to
attempt to dislodge the enemy from the bridge; —
brave men were these, whose names must ever be con
nected with a memorable event, but possibly not braver
than scores who that day played their part and are
forgotten. Here, perhaps, dramatic unity would close the story.
Por here ends the fight at Old North Bridge. The
Americans pursued the retreating foe a few rods, until
he was strongly reinforced, then, turning to the left,
climbed the hill back of Mr. Keyes's house, from which
they had in all probability descended in the morning.
As it was evident that there was no intention to burn
the town, the insane attempt to dislodge twice their
number from what Emerson terms "the most advan
tageous situation " was not made. But the field of
battle was really won. Irresolution and timidity had
entered the British counsels ; and, after various marches

192 CONCOED FIGHT. '
and countermarches, at twelve o'clock they began their
terrible retreat. Then a strong detachment of Ameri
cans hurried across the great fields, and at Merriam's
Corner, a mile and a quarter below the village, joined
the Billerica and Reading men in a fresh attack. Half
a mile on, the Sudbury company came up, and there
was a new struggle. On the edge of Lincoln, where
then thick woods shut in the road, was the severest
encounter of the day. And so the fight merged into
that persistent attack and pursuit from all quarters of
the British forces, through Lincoln, through Lexing
ton, through West Cambridge, through Charlestown
almost to the water's edge, and to the protection of the
great ships of war. In Lincoln it was that Captain
Jonathan Wilson, of Bedford, who had been on the
field among the earliest, through a too adventurous
courage, died. During this pursuit, too, three out of
the four Concord captains were wounded. So some
where in that long route, if not at North Bridge, these
men sought and found their post of danger.
What were the results of the Concord Fight ? If we
look only at its immediate results, then we say, of
itself it baffled the plans of the royal Governor. Had
nothing occurred after the encounter at North Bridge,
had Colonel Smith gone back peacefully to Boston, as
over a parade ground, none the less he would have gone
back defeated. He did not steal out from Boston,
with, the best soldiers of her garrison, and swiftly
traverse the fields of Middlesex, that he might see the
beauty of the country, — not even to slay, in unequal
conflict, ten rebels. He came to ravage that Provincial
storehouse and magazine which Concord was. And
he failed. Quite likely great efforts had been made in
the preceding weeks, and especially on the day before,

CONCOED FIGHT. 198
to deplete that storehouse. Certainly that moming,
while awaiting his arrival, wonderful energy was dis
played by the whole people in removing stores to places
of safety. Every conceivable expedient was tried.
They were removed to neighboring towns. They were
concealed in thickets. They were hidden under straw
and feathers, and even under manure heaps. Colonel
Barrett took up a bed of sage in his garden, and there
buried cannon and their wheels, and then planted his
sage over them in the old place. One man ploughed
long, deep furrows, and filled them with kegs of
powder, and then turned the next furrows over them.
Still there was an ample supply left, if only time had
been given to find it In one shed, within a hundred
feet of where the light infantry marched, more than
eight tons of provisions were stored. But the stout
skirmish at the bridge, and the increasing gathering
on Jones's Hill, broke the courage of the British com
mander, and his achievements bore about the same
relation to his original purpose that the scratch of a
pin does to the deep wound which lets out the life-
blood from the heart.
In the production of those greater results; of that
mighty wave of indignation, which, like a prairie fire,
swept from before it every obstacle; of that wonder
ful uprising, not only of all Massachusetts, but of all
New England, and, we might add, of all America,
which made Boston, in one week, not a British con
quest, but a British prison ; of that unanimity of patri
otism which was all that was required to make the
Colonies unconquerable, — in the creation of these cer
tainly each of the three great events of the day, the
massacre at Lexington, the fight at Concord, the stab-
born pursuit to Charlestown hills, did its part and had
13

194 CONCOED FIGHT.
its influence, — which most, who can tell ? Enough
that the 19th of April really created the nation. And
each town which helped on that day rightfully claims
its share of the honor.
One word, in closing. Emphatically — far more
emphatically than is usually remembered — was the
encounter at North Bridge a Concord Fight. Not one
of the organized military bodies which shared with the
old town her danger and her glory but were bound to
her by closest ties. They were literally bone of her
bone and flesh of her flesh. Just twenty-one years
before that bright spring morning, the 19th of April,
1764, the whole western half of Lincoln for the last
time was included within her bounds. Forty years
before, Acton, and, forty-six years before, the larger
part of Bedford, by her consent, and out of her broad
fields, had been erected into separate municipalities.
Carlisle, which had once gone out, was now, by its
own request, back in the old relations. So it was
Concord, — not the Concord of the narrow limits of
to-day, but the Concord which the Puritan owned and
planted, — that larger Concord which once found its
religious, yea, and its political home, in the very
meeting-house which, unchanged, saw the invader
advance and retreat, — that original Concord it was
which "fired the shot heard round the world."

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
THE Peace of 1783 was a welcome event. By se
curing independence to the Colonies, it crowned
with success the struggles and sacrifices of eight bitter
years ; and it brought to an end that drain of men and
waste of resources which had become almost too great
to be borne. The tradition is that the news of the
ratification of the treaty was received everywhere with
tumultuous joy. As the tidings spread from town to
town all faces brightened. Neighbors grasped each
other cordially by the hand. The bells rung out from
the steeples. The pulpits resounded with thanksgiving.
In the cities and larger towns there were bonfires and
illuminations, and special gatherings and addresses.
For the moment it seemed as if all troubles had passed
away. But the joy was of brief duration. The great expec
tation was followed by as great disappointment. To
momentary harmony succeeded jealousy and heart-'
burnings and an honest sense of wrongs, which brought
divisions into evefry community ; so that within three
years of the declaration of peace actual rebellion had
appeared, and every Massachusetts man, and especially
every citizen of a shiretown, like Concord, had to ask
the question whether liberty regulated by law was a
possibility.

196 CONCOED DTTEING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
The causes of that condition of things, which culmi
nated in what is called the Shays Rebellion, are not
hard to find. Those wild ideas of freedom and human
rights, which are always generated in some minds
amid the heat of a successful revolution, had, no doubt,
their influence. Ardent and unbalanced natores came
to expect an impossible deliverance from personal
burdens, and an absolute personal liberty which was
inconsistent with the continuance of the social state.
Said Luke Day,^ the ablest of the leaders in the Shays
Rebellion, to the men whom he was leading against
Springfield arsenal : " My boys, you are going to fight
for liberty. If you wish to know what liberty is, I will
tell you. It is for every man to do what he pleases,
and to make other folks do as you please to have
them, and to keep folks from serving the devil. " Job
Shattuck of Groton, ^ the leading spirit in the Middle
sex department of the rebellion, said, in an harangue in
his native town, " it was time to abolish all debts and
begin anew." That there were a very large number
who sympathized with these revolutionary expressions
is certain. General Knox,^ in a letter to Livingston,
estimated that nearly two sevenths of the people of the
State were in favor of annihilation of all debts, both
public and private.
But the chief source of disaffection was real poverty.
The interruption of business, occasioned by the war,
the depreciation of the currency, the difficulty of sell
ing at a fair price any kind of property, made it
impossible for honest and solvent people to pay their
debts. But in those times debt was treated, not as a
1 Holland's History of Western Massachusetts, vol. i. p. 296.
* Boston Centinel, September 16, 1786.
» Debates of Convention of 1788, p. 400.

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 197
misfortune, but as a crime. The records of the old
Concord jail reveal this astounding fact, that in the
year 1786 three times as many were imprisoned for
debt as for all other causes combined. No doubt the
records of other jails and of other years would tell as
painful a story. In many cases the prisoners were
Revolutionary soldiers, whose fidelity to their country
was the direct cause of their poverty. One peculiarly
exasperating circumstance was frequently added. The
prosecutors were disloyal men, who, having fled the
country at the beginning of the war, now returned
under the protection of the treaty to crush in the courts
of law those whom they could not defeat on the battle
field. In one instance it is on record that a Concord
man. Dr. Ezekiel Brown, who had served three years
in the army, was arrested and put in jail for more than
two years by a creditor, Frederick William Geyer, who
was a Tory who had fled to England and there remained
until the declaration of peace, and whose disloyalty
was so notorious that his name appeared in a published
list of absentees, headed by the name of Governor
Barnard, who were declared by the State to be
outlawed. ^
How strongly the town of Concord felt the injustice
of this return of Tory refugees and creditors may be
understood by a perusal of the following extracts from
its instructions to its Representative, Joseph Hosmer,
voted in town meeting. May 26, 1783 : —
" Although with pleasure we anticipate the Blessings of
Peace, yet when we look into the treaty formed and agreed
upon by the Commissioners from the several warring nations
for Peace, in their Fifth Article we flnd that the Congress of
these United States are to recommend to the several States in
1 Continental Journal, June 18, 1781.

198 CONCOED DURKG THE SHAYS REBELLION.
the Union to make Provision for the return of those persons
whom we call Tories, or Refugees, who in the beginmng of
the war chose their side and many of them with our enemies
against us, and whom by our laws, which we call just, are
excluded ever returmng again, or enjoying any estate they
left behind them, which is very alarming to us, and we
would Deprecate their return as one of tlie gi-eatest evils
which could fall upon ns, — We therefore must insti-uct you,
Sir, to use your utmost endeavors that aU these Persons,
whose names are inserted in the laws of this Commonwealth,
who are styled Conspirators and absentees, and all other per
sons that have since gone to our enemies, and have taken an
active part with them in any way or m.TJiner whatevei', might
never return to us again, or enjoy any estate they left behind
them ; and that you use your endeavours that no compensa
tion be made to any Person or Persons of the above descrip
tion for any of theu* estates ah-eady sold, and to have all
that ai-e confiscated sold and applied to Public use."
Any person who carefully studies the internal history
of this period must admit that the mass of honest and
well meaning people had to bear a vast amount of real
hardships, if not actual wrongs. There was a condi
tion of affairs, therefore, which called for the exercise
by all parties of the greatest candor, prudence, and
thoughtfulness. But the misfortune of the times was,
that the war had brought forward men whose courage
and efficiency had given them position and influence,
but who had neither that knowledge of affairs nor that
natural moderation of spirit and clearness of judg
ment which would make them wise leaders in troubled
periods. Such an one was Daniel Shays, tbe ostensible
leader of the insurrection. Such were Luke Day of
West Springfield, and Adam Wheeler of Hubbardston.
Such certainly was Job Shattuck, the first man in the

CONCORD DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 199
Middlesex rising. These were all captains in the Revo
lution, of proved courage. They were probably men of
reasonably honest purposes. But by temperament they
were rash and obstinate, with habits of mind and with
a training which unfitted them to meddle with great
questions of law and statesmanship. With these to
lead, and with a great mass of discontent behind them,
it was hardly possible that the unhappy events of the
succeeding months could have been avoided.
If the town of Concord was not disloyal, it was not
because it had not its share of difficulties and poverty
to endure, or because it did not feel its burden. One
single fact is full of meaning. In the ten years suc
ceeding the time when the town was reduced to its
present limits by the setting off of a part to Carlisle,
the population increased 269, or one fifth. In very
nearly the same period the dwelling-houses were re
duced from 193 to 188, and the barns from 174 to 142,
while the number of acres tilled and the amount of
stock kept were diminished in like ratio. Take another
line of inquiry. From the declaration of peace until
the beginning of the insurrection, a period of about
three years, the suits brought against inhabitants of
Concord in the Court of Common Pleas averaged nearly
fifty each year, or perhaps one to every five families in
the town. For the three years preceding 1770 in the
same court the suits averaged less than seven, and this
too when the population of the town before the setting
off of Carlisle was a quarter part larger than at the
later date. The caution displayed in town meetings
in guarding against unnecessary expenses, the strictly
just but as strictly economical spirit which pervaded
its instructions to its Representatives, give us a clear
indication of what was the real tone of feeling and the

200 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
real condition of affairs. Now the first impression
these records make upon the reader is the evident
poverty of our people. Thus, May 27, 1782, the town
enjoins James Barrett to use his best endeavors that
"no one member of the General Court shall receive pay
as a member and a Committee from the Court at the
same time." Again, "We instruct you in making
grants to those who are servants of government, for a
reward for their services, that you do not grant too
large sums for the same, and thereby gratify an avari
cious disposition in them, and make those places of
trust lucrative." What the town's idea of lucrative
pay might be, and how tight a rein it kept, may be
understood by reading the vote passed just before
Mr. Barrett's election: "Voted, that the person who
should be chosen, should receive six shillings per day
while in actual service, an account of which time he
should bring to the Town, and if it should be that their
pay should be more than six shillings per day, then in
that case the Representative who shall be chosen shall
be hereby directed to bring the overplus to the Town
Treasury." The next year, 1783, Joseph Hosmer,
member elect, is thus instructed : " Sir, in levying
taxes upon the good people of this Commonwealth,
you will be very careful and lay no more upon them
under their present burdened circumstances than is of
absolute necessity. . . . You will oppose all extrava
gant grants of money and salaries to servants of Gov
ernment. . . . You will oppose all new grants of every
kind for past services of soldiers and officers, but see to
it that all old promises are speedily fulfilled. " A year
or two later it is suggested that the fascination of the
town of Boston leads the General Court to hold long
sessions,; in which "there is a small proportion of

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 201
business done, " aiid that, if the General Court should
emigrate into the country, perhaps " business would be
despatched with greater expedition, as the members
would have but little to do other than that for which
their constitoents have chosen them. . . . And while
money is scarce among us, we think that should the
Court be removed the pay of the members might be
reduced. "
The town was as anxious to discover the causes of
the existing poverty, and to remove them, as it was to
prevent the creation of new burdens. Its action on the
whole is creditable to the foresight and good judgment
of those who directed its counsels. It uniformly dis
couraged the emission of any more paper money. It as
uniformly encouraged a speedy return to specie pay
ment. The scarcity of gold and silver was attributed
largely to the extravagance of that portion of the com
munity who, by speculation, or by successful privateer
ing, or by fortunate contracts, had grown rich, while
the mass had grown poor. Discarding the homelier
domestic products, these people sought from abroad
luxuries which could be paid for only in hard money.
A letter from London, published in an August number
of the " Salem Gazette " for 1786, speaks of this vast
importation, not to be paid for without severe exertions
by so young a country. It adds, that an American ship
had come in recently freighted principally with specie.
Very distinct notice is taken of this mischievous ten
dency in the instructions of the town to its old Repre
sentative, Joseph Hosmer, May 25, 1786 : " We lament
that measures have not been more effectually taken by
the General Court to counteract the fatal tendency of
that excessive fondness for foreign manufactures which
has so remarkably prevailed in this State for years

202 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
past, which, while it has drained us of our money, has
put a stop to our improving in useful branches of
manufacture. The daily complaints which are made
for the want of employment lead us to enjoin you to
use your utmost exertions in the General Court, that
such farther duties may be laid on these foreign
articles, especially those which are articles of mere
luxury, or which may be procured within ourselves, as
shall lessen the quantity imported, and that encourage
ment be given, by premiums or otherwise, on articles
of our own manufactures. . . . We are fully convinced
that while the present system of trade is pursued . . .
our distresses must increase and ruin overtake us."
These extracts seem to open to us the very thoughts of
the fathers. They desired to preserve moderation in
counsel. They would use, even for the removal of
heaviest burdens, only legitimate measures. Neverthe
less they felt those burdens acutely.
How could it be otherwise ? Eight years of war had
greatly decreased the producing power of the town, and
tasked in every conceivable way its resources. The
varying value of the currency and stagnation in busi
ness made it uncertain whether what might be produced
would be sold, and if sold, equally uncertain what
would be received in payment. The following notice,
which appeared in a magazine published in a neighbor
ing town, gives a lifelike pictore of the straits to
which people were reduced in business affairs by the
scarcity of good money : " Those who have contracted
with the printer for wood are desired to bring it imme
diately. Indian Corn, Cyder, and Pork are likewise
received from those who engaged or incline to bring
those articles. They are wanted now, and will not
answer if the bringing of them is delayed, as is too

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 203
often the case, until the printer is otherwise Supplied.
If not brought within four weeks, Pork excepted, Cash
only will answer."
Added to all other burdens were heavy taxes. For
1780 and the five succeeding years the taxes averaged
nine thousand dollars in specie. The town had then
about half its present population. Only a generation
ago ^ our valuation was less than one quarter what it is
now; and in 1785 it could not have been over one
twelfth as large. It is probable that a tax of one hun
dred thousand dollars now would be far less onerous
than nine thousand dollars then.
But the time was at hand when no measures through
the ordinary legal channels could satisfy. As early
as 1781 and 1782 outbreaks of great seriousness had
occurred at Northampton, at Hatfield, at Springfield,
at Groton in our own county, and no doubt in many
other places. In the summer of 1786 nearly simulta
neous gatherings of extra-legal, if not illegal bodies,
called Conventions of Towns to consider grievances,
were held in most of the counties. Prudent and loyal
men took part in these assemblies. But on the whole
these conventions exercised a pernicious influence,
increasing instead of allaying the existing disaffection.
An address,^ signed and circulated about this time by a
body of gentlemen in Bristol County, shows to what
lengths people of position and respectability were
prepared to go : —
" "WTiereas the good people of this Commonwealth have
for some time past been very much distressed and embar
rassed by the too vigorous execution of the civU law even to
1 1840, $626,810.
2 Boston Centinel, August 12, 1786.

204 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
the ruin of many honest men and their families ; and whereas
the honorable gentlemen of the Convention of the County of
Bristol have petitioned the Great and General Court for
some relief in that respect, but could obtain none; and
whereas the above calamity is daily increasing and threatens
to involve the great part of the people in beggary and ruin,
unless speedily prevented, — Therefore, in order to prevent
any farther progress of such destructive proceedings, we, the
subscribers, do firmly agree, and engage to nnite, as one
man, and that we will to the utmost of our power oppose
and prevent the sitting of the Inferior Court of Common
Pleas for the County of Bristol, or any other courts which
shall attempt to sit for the purpose of taking property bj-
distress, and all publick vendues of property taken by dis
tress, even at the risk of our lives and fortunes, until a
redress of the present grievances shall be obtained."
Thus encouraged, violent men proceeded to take vio
lent measures. The first step was to stop in all the
shiretowns the sessions of the Court of Common Pleas,
by whose action alone debts could be enforced. But
one wrong generally necessitates another to uphold it
To shield the leaders in these acts of violence from
indictment and punishment, the next step was to forbid
the sitting of the Supreme Judicial Court, which had
cognizance of such acts. Open rebellion naturally
followed, dwindling finally in the Western counties into
mere rapine, and then coming to an ignominious end.
The action of Concord throughout these trying expe
riences was such as can be looked back upon with
pleasure. The scanty details of a town record do not
register the spirit which is in a people. The tradition
is that, while many of the towns were openly inimical
to the government, the sentiment here was thoroughly
loyal. This is confirmed by the testimony of the his-

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 205
torian of the rebellion, who says that Middlesex was
thought to be more ready than most of the counties to
support the laws, and especially that it was believed
"that the local circumstances of Concord made it an
eligible spot for the serious exertions of government. "
There is not on record a single line which openly or
covertly sustains violent measures. Language like the
following,^ written and voted in the heat of the diffi
culty, proves that there were men here who saw to the
very heart of the disease of the body politic: "Many
of the evils complained of we conceive to be erroneously
called grievances, and that they are such as must be
removed, if they are removed at all, by the revival of
private virtue." As the narrative proceeds, it will
plainly appear that, while the course of our people con
tinued to be conciliatory, it became more and more
resolutely loyal.
On the 29th day of June, 1786, the irritation in
Middlesex County first assumed an organized form.
On that day committees from Groton, Shirley, Pep
perell, Townsend, and Ashby met at Groton. These
five towns occupied the whole of that northwest corner,
which, projecting from the main body of Middlesex,
laps Worcester County on the north. Numerically
these towns had then vastly more weight in the county
than now. For they were a full eighth of the popula
tion, while to-day they are but a twenty-eighth. The
soul and the body too of the Middlesex insurrections
were in this little, aud in a comparative sense remote
locality. With one possible exception, all the leaders
in the September riots were from these towns, and nine
tenths if not the whole of their followers. Of those
who in 1787 received pardon upon taking an oath of
1 Instructions to James Barrett, October 12, 1786.

206 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
allegiance, one was from Framingham, fifteen from
Westford, two hundred and ten from the five towns,
and not one from the remaining thirty-three towns of
the county.
At this distance of time it is not possible to ascertain
the reasons for this condition of affairs. Presumably
the nearness of these towns to that portion of Worcester
County which proved to be the stronghold of disloyal
action, and the closer social and political relations
which grew out of such nearness, had something to do
with it. This presumption is greatly strengthened
when we consider that from 1767 to 1785 there was a
persistent effort made by the towns on both sides of the
border to erect a new county out of the fragments taken
from the other two; and that the Middlesex insurgents
in both their attempts to stop the courts had reinforce
ments from Worcester County. The burden of debt
and taxation seemed to press with peculiar heaviness
upon this locality. The principal business of many of
the public meetings of these towns appears to have
been to vote on the question of the abatement of taxes;
twenty, thirty, and even fifty persons having in one of
these towns (Groton) petitioned in a single year for
such abatement. During the five years preceding the
outbreak, the suits brought against the people of these
towns must be numbered by hundreds, and almost by
thousands, and exceed by many times those of any
former period. In Groton one quarter, and probably
one third, of all the adult male population were in that
period subjected to the irritation and expense of a
lawsuit But whatever the' cause, the action of these towns had
from the outset a revolutionary flavor. Early in 1784,
Groton and Shirley appointed delegates to meet at

GONCOBD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 207
Concord with the committees of other towns to consider
grievances. What befcame of this proto-convention,
whether it really met, or whether Concord refused to
entertain it, or whether it was a failure from the begin-
ninar, neither town record nor tradition tells. In the
year of the outbreak all these towns refused to elect
Representatives to the Greneral Court, and were heavily
fined on account of such failure to elect This cut
them off, and no doubt was intended to cut them of^
from the ordinary and peaceful modes of seeking redress
of grievances. Two days before the conamittees of the
five towns came together, Groton, the lai^est of these
towns, at a legal meeting, had a series of violent
articles submitted for its consideration by sixty-eight
of its voters. The following are some of the most
striking of these articles: "5th. To see if the town
will vote not to have any Inferior Court, . . . 7th. To
see if the town will vote not to have more than one
attorney in a county to draw writs, and that he be paid
the same as the State's attorney. 8th. To see if the
town will vote that there be a stop put to all lawsuits
of a civil nature until there is a greater circulation of
money than there is at present . . . 13th. To see if the
town will vote that the first holders of public securities
shall draw their full sum and interest; and all those
that have purchased securities shall give in on oath
what they gave for the same, and shall receive no more
of the public treasury, including interest . . . loth.
To see if the town will vote to choose a Committee of
Safety, to see that there is no more infringement made
on our injured rights and privileges, and act anything
relative to the above articles, or any other things,
which may be necessary for the good of the public at
large. " WTiat is interesting in these articles, as show-

208 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
ing the tendency to political disintegration which
existed, is the obvious conviction on the part of their
framers that one single town of a single county had a
right to veto the laws which had been created by all,
whenever they seemed to it distasteful or oppressive.
After consideration, these articles were referred to a
committee of five, of which Job Shattuck was one, with
discretionary powers to act as they saw fit.
Two days after, the committee of the five towns met,
chose Captain John Nutting of Groton Moderator, voted
to issue a circular inviting the other towns of the
county to send delegates to a convention to be held in
Concord, August 23, " to consult on matters of public
grievance and embarrassment, and also to find out
means of redress. " Twenty-one, possibly a few more,
of the forty towns of the county were represented at the
first meeting of this convention. Action in different
parts of the county greatly varied. The towns in the
northwest, as we have seen, called the gathering into
existence. The central towns for the most part accepted
the invitation, but in many cases limited their repre
sentatives by the most prudent and conservative instruc
tions. The towns of the lower or southern tier either
remained away silently, or, as in the cases of Medford
and Newton, sent back spirited remonstrances and
refusal. Concord appointed Isaac Hubbard, Captain
David Brown, Jonas Lee, Joseph Chandler, and Samuel
Bartlett its delegates, and then by direct vote instructed
them "to oppose every unconstitutional measure that
may be proposed by said convention, and strictly to
adhere to the rules prescribed in the Constitution of
this Commonwealth in all the transactions of the
.same ; to oppose the emission of paper money, and to
take every measure to encourage industry, frugality,

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION 209
and good economy." The convention, having voted as
a sort of preamble that it considered itself fully justi
fied in its present mode of meeting by the Constitution,
and that it would strictly adhere to the Constitution in
all its proceedings, enumerated ten grievances (to
which in October it added seven more), voted to publish
them with an address to the people, and then adjourned
to meet again in the same place, October 3.
But the conduct of affairs had now passed out of the
control of conventions, constitutional or otherwise.
Only six days after the adjournment of the Middlesex
meeting,' a mob, variously estimated from five hundred
to fifteen hundred men and boys, armed with guns,
swords, and clubs, assembled at Northampton. In the
politest of language it informed the Court of Common
Pleas, then about to open, that it would be inconven
ient for the Court to sit for the despatch of business.
A hint thus backed was equal to a command. The
Court adjourned. The mob remained till midnight to
guard against the return of the judges, and then dis
persed. One week later, September 5th, an armed gathering
under Captain Adam Wheeler of Hubbardston sur
rounded the Court House at Worcester. The resolute
Chief Justice, General Artemas Ward of Revolution
ary memory, pressed forward until his clothing was
pierced by the bayonets of the insurgents. Finally,
unwilling to kill or injure him, the leader permitted
him to address the crowd from the Court House steps,
which he did with great power; but in vain, and the
Court was forced to adjourn.
One week more and the Courts were to meet at
Concord, Naturally its people were greatly disturbed,
14

210 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBiELLION.
and ready to use all proper measures to prevent the
recurrence in their quiet town of the scenes of the last
fortnight A meeting was held, September 9, "in
which, after seriously and deliberately conversing on
the matter, it was voted that the late measures taken
in the two counties, viz. Hampshire and Worcester, in
putting a stop to the proceeding of the Courts of Justice
in them, was alarming and to declare our utter abhor
rence of such riotous conduct; and farther voted to
choose a respectable Committee to meet such from the
other towns in this County, who may send such to use
their utmost endeavors to calm the people's minds
that meet on the next week for the stopping the Court
that is to meet here." The committee chosen was
Major Joseph Hosmer, the Rev. Mr. Ripley, Mr.
Samuel Bartlett, Jonas Heywood, Esq., and Captain
David Brown, "which Committee was by the Town
enjoined as soon as may be to prepare a Circular, and
lay the same before the Town for its acceptance. " The
meeting was adjourned half an hour "to give said
Committee an opportunity to set" "At the time
aflixed the Town met and the Committee reported a
Draught they had prepared, which was several times
read and accepted by a full majority. " The closing
lines of the record of this meeting give us a vivid sense
of the scantoess of the time which remained in which
to prepare for an emergency that, in spite of so many
warnings, had evidently come to those people with a
sense of unexpectedness. They run thus: "The Town
then proceeded to choose a Committee to write several
Coppys, as many as they could possibly disperse, and to
send them to as many towns as they could by any
means. "
The following is the address : —

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 211

To THE Town of 
Gentlemen, — Alarmed at the threatening aspect of our
affairs, this town has this day held a meeting, and declared,
unanimously, their utter disapprobation of the disorderly
proceedings of a nuniber of persons in the counties of
Hampshire and Worcester in preventing the sitting of the
Courts there. And apprehending the like may be attempted
in this county and probably attended with very dangerous
consequences, we have thought it advisable to endeavor, in
conjunction witli as many of the neighboring- towns as we
can give seasonable information to, by lenient measures to
dissuade from such rash conduct as may involve the State in
anarchy and confusion, and the deprecated horrors of civil
war. We conceive the present uneasiness of the people to
be not altogether groundless ; and although many designing
men, enemies to the present government, may wish and actu
ally are fomenting uneasiness among the people, yet we are
fully persuaded that the views of by far the greater part are
to obtain redress of what they conceive to be real grievances.
And since the method they have taken cannot fail of meet
ing the disapprobation of every friend of peace and good
order, we cannot but hope, from what we know of the stren
uous exertions which have been made by the towns around
us, and in which those disorders above mentioned now exist,
to purchase at the expense of blood our independence, and
the great unanimity with which they have established our
present government ; and from what we know of the real
grounds of their complaints, were lenient measures used, and
a number of towns united to endeavor, by every rational
argument, to dissuade those who may seem refractory from
measures which tend immediately to destroy the fair fabric
of our government, and to join in legal and constitutional
measures to obtain redress of what may be found to be real
grievances, they would be attended with happy effects. We
have, therefore, chosen a Committee to act in concert with
the neighboring towns, for the purpose of mediating between

212 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
opposing parties, should they meet. And we cannot but
hope our united endeavors to support the dignity of gov
ernment and prevent the effusion of blood will meet with
general approbation, and be attended with happy conse
quences. If the above should meet with your approbation, we I'e-
quest you to choose some persons to meet a Committee of
this town, chosen for that purpose, at the house of Captain
Oliver Brown, innholder in Concord, on Monday evening or
Tuesday morning next, that we may confer together, and
adopt measures which may be thought to be best calcu
lated for the attainment of the ends above proposed. We
are, gentlemen, with great esteem and friendship, your
humble servants, Joseph Hosmer,
in behalf of the Town Committee.
Concord, September 9, 1786.
There can be no doubt that the action of the town
was hailed with satisfaction by all loyal people, and
excited great hopes in the minds of those best fitted to
judge of the situation. A writer in the " Massachusetts
Oazette," on the very day of the riot, refers to the
"measures taken by the town of Concord, calculated
to prevent any disorder which might arise in the
county this day by enlightening and composing the
minds of such honest and generally well affected citi
zens as may have been misled by artful insinuation."
The course of the town was warmly approved by the
State authorities. Governor Bowdoin, moved by the
critical condition of affairs, had, September 8, called
together such of the Council, Senate, and members of
the Supreme Court as could be reached. The decision
of tbat meeting was that force was the only resort.
" After hearing, " runs the report, " General Brooks and
Mr. Hall, it was unanimously voted that aid exterior

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 213
to the County of Middlesex would be required to protect
the Courts at their session in Concord Tuesday next.
Also voted that the artillery companies of Dorchester
and Roxbury be called to march under General Brooks
to support the Courts, and that his Excellency order
such companies from Suffolk as may be necessary."
Still disturbed, the Governor called the same gentlemen
together Sunday, September 10, at half past two p. m.
Justice Savage of the Court of Common Pleas for
Middlesex was stating "that the minds of the people
were greatly irritated, and that they had expressed a
determination to oppose the sitting of the Courts, and
he apprehended serious consequences from measures
that have been taken, and expressed a wish that lenient
measures may be adopted. " Says the clerk, " Captain
Ingraham of Concord arrived this moment, and pre
sented a copy of an address which the town of Concord
at their meeting yesterday agreed upon. " At once the
whole feeling changed. It was the opinion of all that
the marching of the troops should be stopped. Gover
nor Bowdoin issued the following command : —
Boston, September 10, 1786.
Whereas the town of Concord have transmitted to me
an attested copy of their proceedings at the meeting yester
day, whicb appeared to me well calculated to remove any
expected disturbances at the opening of the Courts of Com
mon Pleas, &c., in Concord on Tuesday next in an effectual
and pacific manner, and consequently there will be no neces
sity for the aid of the militia. It is therefore, upon con
sultation, my order to you to suspend executing the orders
you have already received from me, the whole of which I
have thought fit to countermand.
I am, sir, with great respect,
Your humble servant,
To Major Gen. J. Bbooks. James Bowdoin.

214 CONCOED DURING THE SHA^S REBELLION.
Trouble was expected in Bristol County. A copy of
the Concord address was despatched to General Cobb,
with the suggestion that it might be wise to take
similar measures in that county, for " it is considered
of the utmost importance that no blood be shed. " The
warm and friendly letter of the Secretary of State to
Major Hosmer lets us down into the real feelings of
those in authority. Boston, September 10, 1786.
Deab Sir, — The address of the town of Concord to the
several towns in the county of Middlesex does the town
great honor ; and I cannot but think that the measures you
have adopted will have a happy tendency to conciliate the
minds of the people, and be productive of great good. Your
address came in a critical moment, which his Excellency
communicated to the Judges of the Supreme Judicial Court,
and several gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of
Representatives, who were assembled by the desire of the
Governor to consult on measures necessary to be adopted at
this very alarming crisis of our affairs, who expressed their
approbation, in warmest terms, respecting the proceeding of
your town. And be assured that the measures that were
taken in consequence thei'eof gave me the highest satisfac
tion ; and as a convincing proof, I have set myself down
this evening to express it to my good friend Major Hosmer,
whose goodness of heart I have long been acquainted with
through very perilous times. . . .
It is the greatest grief to see people, who might be the
happiest in the world, adopt measures to sap the very foun
dations of our excellent Constitution. - I am sensible that
we are under great embarrassments, and there are griev
ances, but in my humble opinion they are most of them really
imaginary. If a little more industry and economy were
practised by the community at large, they would be very
happy. But there are some idle people, going from county

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 215
to county, inflaming the minds of many, filling their heads
with stories of the most improbable nature, sowing sedition,
and making every attempt to overthrow our excellent Con
stitution. Tbe stopping of the Courts of Common Pleas, in
the several counties, is but a small part of their infernal
plan, which many good people, who join these persons, are
little aware of, but sooner or later they will be acquainted
with it. I have not time to add farther, except wishing that
the gentlemen who shall meet at Concord Tuesday next,
upon the subject matter of your address, may have divine
direction in their deliberations.
I am, sir, with respect.
Your friend and humble servant, John Avert.
Hon. Joseph Hosueb, Esq.
Notwithstanding this official approval, after events
proved that such a course, as a matter of policy, was a
mistake. Wherever the mob was boldly confronted, as
by Major Shepherd at Springfield, by General Cobb
at Taunton, and by General Brooks at Cambridge, it
shrank from the encounter, while the kindest appeals
were listened to with contempt. Still, one cannot
regret measures which were so full of the spirit of
moderation and of respect even for the mistaken idCas
of honest men. When the sword was drawn, it was
with the consent of all thoughtful people.
In the afternoon of Monday, September 11th, a body
of men and boys, numbering perhaps a hundred,
marched into the square in front of the Court House.
The real leader of this party was Job Shattuck of
Groton. Associated with him, and altogether more
noisy and forthputting, was Nathan Smith of Shirley.
Oliver Parker and Benjamin Page of Groton were also

216 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
present and prominent A brief account of these men
will help us to understand what influences were then at
work in the social and political life.
Job Shattock was a man past mid-life, the son of a
respectable farmer, and himself one of the largest land
owners in Groton. He had filled various places of
trust in his native town, and near the close of the war
had been for three years selectman. At the early age
of nineteen he was one of the two thousand Massachu
setts men whom Colonel John Winslow led to Nova
Scotia to aid Colonel Monckton in that expedition
against the Acadians to which " Evangeline " has given
such painful immortality. A minute-man in the Revo
lution, he was at Concord fight, and in the battle of
Bunker Hill. Promoted to a captaincy, he led a com
pany to Boston after its evacuation, and later another
to that campaign which closed with Burgoyne's sur
render. Strong and athletic in person, skilful in the
use of the broadsword and proud of the accomplish
ment, utterly insensible to fear, his position and means,
his remarkable physical vigor, and his good war rec
ord gave him great influence over his neighbors and
townsmen. But he had qualities which made his influ
ence of no advantage to them. He was uneducated, by
natore obstinate, and full of strong prejudices. In
temperament he was what would be called a fighting
man, ready to give battle to maintain an opinion or
to resent a real or fancied injury. Added to this were
ideas of liberty and personal rights of the broadest
kind. That, when the necessary contraction of currency
and burden of debt and taxation were working practical
injustice in all quarters, he should be in the forefront
of the insurrection was natoral. That thirty years
later, when all clear-sighted men saw how nearly that

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 217
insurrection had brought the experiment of self-govern
ment to a disastrous close, " he should look upon no act
of his life with more satisfaction," may speak volumes
for his honesty, but very little for his fitness to meddle
with deep questions of political economy. He had
already been engaged in an affair known as the Groton
riots. In 1781 a State tax was levied, which, because
it was to be paid in silver or its equivalent, was called
"the silver tax." This tax Shattuck resisted. For
two hours, with sixteen companions armed with clubs,
he threatened and bullied the unfortunate constables
to whom its collection was intrusted. Having pleaded
guilty at the October term of the Supreme Judicial
Court held at Concord, he was sentenced to pay a fine
of JGIO and the costs of prosecution. Such were the
character and antecedents of the man who undertook
to settle whether or not Middlesex County should
continue under legal authority.
Nathan Smith was a man two years younger than
Shattuck, forty-eight years old. He too had been a
soldier in the Revolution and noted for daring. He
was a great pugilist, and counted skill in that art the
highest possible evidence of manly character. In one
of his frequent fights he had lost one eye. He was
quarrelsome in the grain, coarse in speech, and given
to drink. Tradition, which rarely fails to preserve the
salient points of character, remembers him as a glutton,
who used every Thanksgiving day to eat a whole goose,
and wash it down with the oil which had been tried
from it in cooking. A dark stain was on his reputa
tion. In January, 1783, he had been indicted for
having in possession with intent to utter twenty counter
feit bills of £50 each. To avoid trial he absconded
or else concealed himself. Loammi Baldwin, High

218 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
Sheriff of Middlesex County, testified that he had sum
moned him at his last place of residence, and by
advertisement five weeks in Willis's "Independent
Chronicle," and that he had publicly called him at the
several Courts of General Sessions in the county.
Thereupon the sentence of outlawry was pronounced.
Where he was, and how he escaped arrest then and
after the affair at Concord, is uncertain. The neigh
borhood story is that he had a secret closet in his own
house to which he retired when officers of the law were
in the vicinity. Certainly after the collapse of the
rebellion he resided in his native town. His coarse
and dissipated habits clung to him in later life. At
ninety-six he died in miserable solitude, possessed of
no property except a remnant of the pension which a
forgiving country granted him.
Of the lesser actors, Oliver Parker and Benjamin
Page were men not unlike Shattock, as honest, hardly
as persevering, and certainly not as influential. Par
ker was forward in the Groton riots, was fined £8 and
costs, and ordered to recognize in the sum of ^£100, with
sureties to keep the peace three years. He escaped
conviction for his course at Concord, and died early in
1790, poor and deeply in debt Page, for his part, was
found guilty of sedition, fined ^6100, and ordered to
obtain sureties to keep the peace in the sum of .£200.
These were fair specimens of the mob who, for the
space of a year, filled every part of Massachusetts with
turmoil. They were mostly officers of the lower grades
in the Revolution. They were all bold to reckless
ness, generally narrow-minded and obstinate, often
needy, sometimes unprincipled, but more frequently
sincere and patriotic according to their light
But to return to the men whom we left standing in

CONCOED DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 219
Concord Square. Monday night a heavy rain set in,
which continued through a part if not the whole of the
next day. The insurgents found shelter in the Court
House, in the neighboring barns, and in shanties or
booths built of boards stripped from the fences. Tues
day morning they assumed something like military
array, occupying the square in front of the Court
House, and setting guards to keep people out of it.
Such as attempted to pass through were treated with
insolence, and in several instances bayonet thrusts
were wantonly made both at horses and men. Several
barrels of rum were on tap at convenient places, and a
load of hay was procured for the use of parties from a
distance who were expected to arrive. At nine o'clock
Smith bestirred himself, and thus addressed the by
standers : " I do not know who you are, or from whence
you have come. I am going to give the Court four
hours to agree to our terms. I and my party will force
them to it. " During the morning small parties dropped
in until the whole band was estimated to number two
hundred. About half past two a man, acting as ser
geant, with two drummers and fif ers, went with a small
party up Main Street, and returned in a half-hour at
the head of ninety horsemen from Worcester and
Hampshire Counties, who were under the lead of
Captain Adam Wheeler of Hubbardston and Benjamin
Converse of Hardwick. By this time, what with rum
and what with natural temper. Smith became out
rageous. He beat round with a drum for recruits, and
with " horrid oaths and imprecations " declared that
" any person who did not follow his drum and join his
standard should be driven out of the town at the point
of the bayonet, let them be Court, town committee, or
what else." His threats, however, did not secure many

220 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
recruits. A short time after, he again addressed the
spectators with still greater violence : " As Christ laid
down his life to save the world, so will I lay down my
life to suppress the government from all triannical
oppression, and you who are willing to join in this
here affair may fall into our ranks. Those who do
not, after two hours, shall stand the monuments of
God's saving mercy." Finally he became so savage
that his own party had to interfere, and the Worcester
leaders declared that, if he did not take back his words,
they would go home and leave the movement to its
fate. This seems to have suppressed him, for we hear
nothing more- of him for the rest of the day, or indeed
for the succeeding months.
Meanwhile the Peace Convention met on Tuesday at
Brown's Tavern, adjourned to the meeting-house, and
organized by the choice of Isaac Stearns of Bedford,
Chairman, and Samuel Bartlett of Concord, Secretary.
Two Committees were appointed. .The first, of which
Rev. Ezra Ripley was chairman, was to inform the
Justices of the Courts of the assembling of the Con
vention, and of its purpose to dissuade the armed force
now gathered at the Court House from violent measures.
The second Committee was " to confer with the armed
men paraded before the Court House, and to know
their views and designs in thus assembling. Some of
the ablest and most influential men in the county were
on this Committee, as can be seen from the list, — Dr.
Josiah Bartlett, Hon. Joseph Hosmer, Hon. Eleazer
Brooks, Colonel William Prescott, Colonel John
Buttrick, Mr. John Bishop, and Mr. Samuel White.
Dr. Bartlett of Charlestown was the father of Dr.
Josiah Bartlett, who, by more than fifty years of faith
ful service in his profession, has become so thoroughly

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 221
identified with our town. He had himself been a
surgeon in the public service, both by land and sea,
through the whole eight years of the Revolution. He
was a close friend of General Brooks, the head of the
Middlesex militia, and was in his lifetime Representa
tive, Senator, Councillor, and in all respects, in his
profession and out of it, a man of mark. Major Joseph
Hosmer was in many respects the most prominent man
in the town, and widely known in the county. To a
great old age he preserved the confidence and esteem of
his neighbors, having been tried in about as many
offices of trust as one man could hold or one town
confer. Of Colonel John Buttrick it is only necessary
to say that he was the man who at Old North Bridge
on the 19th of April leaped into the air crying, "Fire,
fellow soldiers, for God's sake, fire!" The other
members of the Committee were persons of the highest
respectability. It was with just reason expected that
the representations of this body would have a whole
some influence upon the insurgents. But the leaders of
these, though earnestly requested, refused to send a
Committee to the Convention, or in any way to point
out how they wished a redress of grievances, saying,
"they, and not the Convention, represented the
County." No stipulations of any sort in favor of a
peaceable opening of the courts could be obtained.
Finally, at one o'clock this note was received: —
To the Honorable Justices of the Court of General Sessions
of the Peace and Court of Common Pleas for the County
of Middlesex, etc.
The voice of the people of this County is, tbat the Court
of the General Sessions of the Peace and the Court of Com
mon Pleas shall not enter this Court House until such time

222 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
as the people shall have a redress of a number of grievances
they labor under at present, which will be set forth in a
petition or remonstrance to the next General Court.
Job Shattuck.
CoNCOKD, September 12, 1786.
Farther arguments obtained this trifling modification
indorsed on the back of the original document : —
Half past 3 o'clock.
Since writing the within, it is agreed that the Court of
Sessions may open and adjourn to the last Tuesday in No
vember next without going into the Court House. Job Shattuck.
The Convention "then voted that Dr. Bartlett and
his Committee should wait upon the Justices with the
aforesaid writing, and likewise state the particulars of
their conference with the armed men." Soon they
returned, stating that the Justices would like the
opinion of the Convention as to the opening of the
Courts. That opinion was conveyed in the following
communication. That it be recommended to the Honorable Justices of the
Court of Common Pleas and Court of Sessions to suspend
for the present term the execution of all public business, on
account of the armed force now paraded to oppose their
proceedings. By order of the Committee.
Josiah Bartleit, Chairman.
The result of these interviews can be best told in the
very language of the Judge, Samuel Phillips Savage,
which gives, from the pen of one of the actors, a vivid
picture of the furious nature of the mob, and uncon
sciously of his own courage and energy.

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 223
" Dr. Bartlett of Charlestown, a very intelligent gentle
man, delivered the flnal determination of the mob. ... To
ripen an answer I desired the sentiments of the Committee,
who were almost unanimous in tbe sentiment to give up
effort to hold court. ... I asked them to get the opinion of
the whole body. . . . They returned with a paper which Dr.
Bartlett said expressed the opinion of three fourths and
probably of seven eighths of the gentlemen. ... I then at
the request of my brethren desired Dr. Bartlett to return to
the mob for our answer, — that as the Justices of the Court
were held in duress by a body of men in arms, they neither
could nor would act. Which answer the Doctor declined de
livering, assuring us that he was afraid, and told us, as did
the rest of the gentlemen of the Committee, that such was
the temper of those people that, unless something was done,
they feared the house in whieh we were would be pulled
down. We then after some pause very reluctantly consented
to return the humiliating answer that we would not act."
In their report to the Governor the Committee say : —
"After many conferences with the armed men who were
assembled in that town, and endeavors by every possible
means to convince their leaders of the impropriety of their
conduct, to show the ill consequences of shutting the doors
of justice, to dissuade them from violence, this body can
not forbear to express their disagreeable and painful sensa
tion that their endeavors to dissuade from rash and unlawful
measures have been ineffectual. They declare their utter
abhorrence of the measures adopted by the body in arms,
and are fully sensible of the high criminality of such opposi
tion to established authority, which, if not speedily prevented,
must unavoidably involve the Commonwealth in calamities
innumerable." Holland, in his "History of Western Massachusetts,"
falls into a Strang^ error in respect to the objects and

224 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
real conduct of this Convention- He says (ToL L p.
243): —
" At this time a Convention was sitting in the town, and
for the first time in the Convention movement direct com
munications were opened between the deliberative and armed
bodies, and they acted in concert. It was the day appointed
for holding the Courts of Middlesex, and the Convention and
the mob joined in a message to the justices, informing them
of their determination to resist any attempt to proceed to
business. The Court was intimidated, and the object of the
mob accomplished."
More mistakes could hardly be crowded into so brief
a space. In the first place this meeting of gentlemen
at Concord formed no part of the Convention movement
so called. It was not a gathering either to represent
grievances or to do away with them. It was a volun
tary, and from the briefness of the notice necessarily
an informal, gathering of persons from the different
towns of the county. The members of that gathering
must have been largely persons whose influence from
the first had been thrown against illegal measures.
How the thing looked to the man who had direct
charge of the conference with the rioters can be seen
from the following entry in Dr. Bartlett's private diary:
" Sept 11, 1786. Elected by the Town as a member of
a Convention at Concord to quell the insurgente who
had assembled to oppose the Court of Common Pleas. "
The ostensible and the real object of the gathering
was to support government by withholding misguided,
but as they believed honest men, from acts of sedition
by candid representotions. The call for the gathering
had received the warm approval of the State authori
ties. " The deliberative body " in no other way opened

CONCORD DURING THfi SHAYS EEBELLION. 225
communications with " the armed body '' than by using
its utmost efforts to secure for the Courts peaceable
possession of the Court House. The only sense in
which it could be said "to have joined the mob in a
message to the justices " is, that, when all peaceable
efforts had failed, it stated to the Court what was a
simple fact, that " any attempt to proceed in business
would be useless and dangerous." It is easy enough
to see now, with all the preceding and succeeding
events too before us, that this Peace Convention was
from the outset sure to fail. But it was a humane and
Christian experiment; and to accuse those who took
part in it of joining with the mob to intimidate the
Courts is in the highest degree unjust and absurd.
At any rate, the slow, and, in a comparative sense,
moderate course to which they had persuaded the
leader of the insurgents did not satisfy his followers.
Deliberation of any sort had not entered into their
plans. A little after the middle of the afternoon the
Worcester horsemen and a body of footmen marched up
Main Street until they came to Jones's Tavern, where
the Justices then were.' They halted and faced to
wards the house in a stern and menacing manner. The
Justices assured them that they should not attempt to
open the Courts, as the presence of such an armed force
made it impossible. Hearing this, the party marched
back to the main body. In a few moments they reap
peared, demanding that the verbal promise should be
repeated in writing. The Justices at this point seem
to have used a little art, and referred them to the clerk
of the courts. He, on being applied to, declared that
he was only a recording officer, and had no authority
to give any such paper without express orders from the
Justices. The Justices in the mean time had called for
15

226 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
their horses and ridden away, and when the insurgents
came back again and in vain sought them, the air was
filled with angry and violent complaints.
It is admitted that the mob at Concord was made np
of far poorer material than composed the rank and file
of similar previous gatherings. The ignorance of some
of its members was so great that they believed that
Govemor Bowdoin received a salary of $50,000, and
stated this as their greatest grievance. The horsemen
from Worcester County were indeed a body of strong
and well equipped men. But the infantry was a motley
crew. Forty or fifty were boys drawn from curiosity.
The rest, poorly clad, drenched with rain, bespattered
with mud, were properly as much objects of pity as of
fear. Two thirds of them had muskets, h'alf of which
were furnished with bayonets. The rest had swords
and clubs. A few had cartridge boxes. By five o'clock
most of the guns were rendered useless by the rain,
and three quarters of their owners by rum. At sun
down it was thought that thirty could not have been
brought into rank to resist an attack. Three or four
companies of trustworthy mflitia would at any time
during the day have swept the whole body out of town.
Long before sunset, many of the rioters were worn out
and anxious to retorn home, and were kept only by the
strenuous efforts of the leaders. By Wednesday morn
ing they had all disappeared. Thus ended this painful,
and in some aspects ludicrous, episode in the annals
of our town and county.
The Convention of Towns for the consideration of
grievances, according to agreement, assembled a second
time at Concord, October 3, 1786. But it came back
diminished in numbers. Only eighteen of the forty

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 227
towns were now represented. Weston and Lincoln had
dismissed their delegates, because, as it is quaintly
reported, "they had no further use for them." The
aspect of affairs was such, indeed, as might well " give
pause " to thoughtful people. The insurrection had
now reached a new stage. At first only the Courts of
Common Pleas were to be stopped, that honest debtors
might not be pressed too sharply. But in the last
week in September, at Springfield and Great Barring
ton, the Supreme Judicial Court was interrupted and
forced to adjourn. This dangerous condition of affairs
seems to have had its influence upon the members of
the Convention at Concord. The petition to.the General
Court, adopted previously to its final adjournment, was
comparatively moderate in tone. It runs thus : —
Your petitioners, being chosen by their respective towns
for the purpose of collecting the sentiments of those towns
whieh they represent respecting their present grievances,
and to seek relief in a peaceable, orderly, and constitutional
w&j, — viewing with great abhorrence and detestation the
late riotous proceedings of a rash and inconsiderate body
of people, in opposing the sitting of the Courts of Justice,
notwithstanding 'their leaders did falsely pretend to signify
the voice of the people in this County in so doing, — aud
having coUected the sentiments of the several towns which
we here represent, do point out the following particulars as
grievances and pray the honorable Court for redress, viz. :
1st. The sitting of the General Court in the town of Bos
ton, which, for reasons we trust obvious to the honorable
Court, is by no means adapted to expedite public busi
ness. 2d. That tbe Court of Common Pleas is burthensome,
by reason of the extraordinary expense ai-ising therefrom,
without any considerable advantage to the people.

228 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
3d. That lawyers are permitted to exact such exorbitant
fees to the great injury of many in the community.
4th. That the salaries of several public offlcers are greater
than the ability of the people will admit of.
5th. The want of a circulating medium has so stagnated
business that, unless speedily remedied, it will involve the
greater part of the community in a state of bankruptcy.
6th. The taking of men's bodies and confining them in
jail for debt, when they have property sufflcient to answer
the demands of the creditors.
7th. That the accounts of the United States are not set
tled, by which means we apprehend ourselves dispropor
tionately burdened.
Sth. That greater duties or imposts are not laid on super
fluities imported from foreign nations.
9th. The manner of electing jurors, as to their qualifica
tions and pay. Serving as jurors has been esteemed as a
burden on the subject, which have been the means of fill
ing our boxes with many men entirely unqualified for that
business. 10th. That such heavy taxes are laid on lands, and no
encouragement given to agriculture and our own manufac
tures. 11th. That our unappropriated lands are not disposed of
toward the discharge of our domestic debt.
12th. That the moneys arising from imposts and excise
are not appropriated towards the discharge of our foreign debt.
13th. That the registering of deeds under the present
establishment is far more expensive than is necessary, as
the same might be done in several towns.
14th. That the duties on writs and executions "should be
exacted of the debtors.
loth. The present fee table, as it now stands, being
higher, in some instances, than is necessary.
16th. The present mode of collecting excise, as the same
might be collected in the several towns at much less expense
to the government.

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION! 229
17th. That the thirtieth article in the BOl of Eights in the
Constitution is not more strictly attended to,^in admitting
persons to hold seats in our legislature to enact laws, and
at the same time hold and exercise the judicial powers of
government, as thereby our government becomes a govern
ment of men and not of laws.
Your petitioners humbly beg your honors' attention to
these our grievances, and pray for a speedy redress, and as
in duty bound will ever pray.
By order of the Committee. Samuel Reed, Chairman.
October 9th the town of Concord met to consider the
petition drawn up by the Convention of Towns, and
voted to take up the same article by article. "The
first, second, third, fourth, tenth, and sixteenth the
town accepted as matters, of grievance. The fifth,
sixth, seventh, eighth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth,
fourteenth, and seventeenth the town considered that
many of them were evils that ought to be rectified by
the General Court."
In order that its Representative might clearly under
stand the mind of the town on these matters, a Com
mittee was appointed to draft instructions. These
instructions were submitted, read and accepted at an
adjourned meeting. How firm and wise was the spirit
of the town the following extracts will show: — "As.
this town has lately declared their utter abhorrence
and disapprobation of the late disorderly and riotous
proceedings of a number of infatuated people, in oppos
ing by force of arms the Courts of Justice, and thereby
aiming, apparently at least, to destroy all civil govern
ment, we now declare our full determination to support
and maintain the constitutional authority of this Com
monwealth,^ fully convinced that, our obligations here-

230 CONCORD DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
unto are indispensable. In this determination we are,
if possible, more fixed by the late violent and treason
able opposition to the sitting of the Supreme Judicial
Courts of this Commonwealth, in some of the upper
counties, as hereby we are more convinced that the
designs and wishes of many in the state are not merely
a redress of grievances, but a total change of our wise
and happy Constitotion of Government. . . . We are
far from making light of many of the complaints of the
people; but yet the consideration of the present per
plexed and embarrassed state of public affairs is a
powerful inducement to this town to avoid an unneces
sary enumeration of grievances and evils, imder which
we apprehend ourselves to labor. The hands of govern
ment should be strengthened, not weakened." Wiser
or more loyal words could hardly have been penned.
The fall term of the Supreme Judicial Court was to
be held in Cambridge, October 31st. Government was
now thoroughly alarmed. On the 26th, companies in
all towns adjacent to Cambridge were warned to be
ready to march at a moment's notice. On the 30th,
four companies of artillery and three of infantry were
called out. Early the next morning the troops to the
number of two thousand poured in. The Billerica
Artillery Company gained especial credit, having
marched the day before all the way to Cambridge in a
driving snow-storm. General Brooks, afterwards Gov
ernor, was in command. The adjutant was Colonel
Hull, whose name is so painfully connected with the
surrender of Detroit in 1812. This military demon
stration accomplished its purpose. Not an insurgent
appeared. The Court was opened. The Governor re
viewed the troops, praised them, and then dismissed

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 231
them. " It was like a brilliant parade, " says an eye
witness, and, waxing humorous, adds, "the military
were like Caesar, — veni, vidi, viei, — came, saw nothing,
conquered everything." Coneord lost one man by acci
dent. And as it was the only death which was directly or
indirectly occasioned by the Middlesex rising we chroni
cle it William Heywood, a native of the town, a young
man of twenty-four, was preparing to join his company.
That he might clean his musket he discharged it ; when
it burst, and some of the fragments lodged in his skull ;
and after lingering a few days in great agony he died,
November 3d. At this session the grand jury found
bills against Shattuck, Smith, and Parker for treason,
and Benjamin Page for sedition.
It was hoped and believed that the approaching ses
sion of the Court of Common Pleas at Cambridge would
occasion no fresh excitement. The Middlesex leaders
had promised to remain quiet But as November 28th
drew near, there were unpleasant rumors. Parties of
armed men under Parker and Page came as far as
Concord. Shattuck went on to Weston, where there
were fifty or sixty more. The Worcester men advanced
to Shrewsbury.
There was now an end of half-way measures. War
rants for the arrest of Job Shattuck, Oliver Parker,
and Benjamin Page of Groton, and Nathan Smith and
John Kelsey of Shirley, were put into the hands of
Aaron Brown and William Scott. The immediate
occasion of these warrants was the request of Judge
Oliver Prescott, one of the best citizens of Groton, who
stated that "they were dangerous persons, who should
be restrained of their liberty. " Resistance was expected.
Rumor said Shattuck had fortified his house. Colonel

232 CONCOED DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
Benjamin Hitchborn with seventy horsemen volunteered
to accompany the oflBcers. Near Concord, Colonel
Henry Wood of Pepperell joined them with thirty or
forty more. Smith and Kelsey could not be found.
Parker and Page were arrested very easily near Concord
that evening. Shattiick for a few hours evaded pursuit.
But the next morning it was ascertained that he had
slept at a neighbor's house., Twelve or fifteen horse
men tracked him through the new fallen snow, and
overtook him near the banks of the Nashua. With the
reckless courage characteristic of him he resisted, —
the story was, attacked his pursuers with a broadsword.
At last a frightful wound, nine inches long, running
obliquely across the kneepan and severing the capsular
ligament, brought him to the ground. Even then he
would not yield ; and only after a cut which disabled
his right hand was he captured. He was a pitiable
object, stained with the mire of a swamp through which
he had waded, covered with blood, and helpless. He
was put in a sleigh and brought to Concord jail, and
thence transferred to Boston. His capturers had ridden
a hundred miles in the worst of weather between
Wednesday morning and Thursday night.
All sorts of wild rumors were circulated. That
Shattuck had been wantonly hacked to pieces, that his
wife and children had been abused, and his house
destroyed. There was a good deal of talk, too, about
the harsh treatment received during his imprisonment,
apparently without reason. For a time he was not
permitted to communicate with his friends. But he
was placed in an upper room usually given to poor
debtors in Boston jail, in which was a fireplace and
some means of ventilation. He had good bedding, a
nurse, and was attended by the best surgeons that

CONCORD DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 233
Boston could furnish. Finally, at his own request, he
was put under the care of Dr. Kittredge of Tewksbury.
His wounds not healing properly, and his health suffer
ing from confinement, he was in April, 1787, released
on baiL In May he had his trial for high treason.
There were accusations of a packed jury. S. Hoar was
foreman and Captain N. Barrett a juryman. There
could be but one verdict, — guilty. He was sentenced
to be executed June 28th, reprieved to 26th of July,
then to September 20th, and finally, on the 12th of
September, was pardoned by Governor Hancock, who
had succeeded Governor Bowdoin. Ever after he was a
good citizen, and apparently respected by his townsmen.
While his political course must be condenmed, and
while he certainly was rash, obstinate, and a dangerous
man, there is no reason to doubt that he was brave,
honest, and in his intentions patriotic. The crutch
which he always had to use, and the stiff fingers of his
right hand, were the penalties which he paid for his
errors. He died, January 13, 1819, aged eighty-four
years. What part the men of Concord took in the closing
scenes of the Shays insurrection cannot be stated with
any precision. All that is known is that our part of the
Middlesex quota of General Lincoln's army, under the
command of Captain Roger Brown, was atteched to
the regiment of Colonel Harry Woods ; that between
January 19th and February 26th it marched almost
to New York line and back again ; that a bounty was
raised by subscription; and that the town voted "to
provide the families of those soldiers that were gone
with the necessaries of life, while absent, if asked
for." It has been very often assumed, with very little reason,

234 CONCOED DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
that the Shays Rebellion, though defeated on the
field, really accomplished the objects for which it
was undertaken. That this and other troubles con
vinced thoughtful people that a stronger national
government was a necessity is probable. But a stronger
government of any kind was the last blessing for which
the insurgents were seeking. Some slight modifica
tions were made of the State law, supposed to be favor
able to debtors; such, for instance, as reducing the
fee table and omitting in each county one session of
the Court of Common Pleas. But even these trifling
changes did not work well, and the laws creating them
were repealed. In respect to most of the special griev
ances, the insurrection literally accomplished nothing.
Even imprisonment for debt, the most real and the
most unjustifiable of them, lingered for a generation.
Probably the outbreak followed the natural law, and
retarded rather than forwarded real reforms.
The year 1787 brought a great political overturn.
Governor Hancock was elected chief magistrate of the
State by nearly four fifths of the votes, while three
fourths of the House of Representatives and two thirds
of the Senate and Council were from the opposition
side. This result was to some extent owing to the
great personal popularity of John Hancock. In part it
was the penalty which Governor Bowdoin had to pay
for resorting to strong measures when they alone were
suflBcient. But more than all else, it proved the exist
ence of a wide-spread dissatisfaction among classes of
persons who were not willing to go to the extremity of
civil war. And perhaps it is the most triumphant
vindication of the real wisdom of Governor Bowdoin's
course that the very men who were elected from a feel-

CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION. 235
ing of opposition to him, when called to administer
government, were forced to accept and sustain his
policy. In this political overturn Concord assisted, but not
with the same unanimity as was shown elsewhere.
She threw seventy-five votes for Hancock and forty-
three for Bowdoin. But if she helped to change men,
she refused to change measures. She had never uttered
a stronger condemnation of violent men than is con
tained in what proved to be her last instructions to a
Representative. To Mr. Isaac Hubbard : —
Sir, — The critical period in which you are appointed to
represent this town in the General Court points out to us
the importance of a strict adherence to the principles of our
Constitution, while we express our sentiments on those
measures we suppose necessary to be adopted. With real
sorrow we have seen, in the course of the year past, an
attempt made by wicked and unreasonable men to destroy
that Constitution we have so lately established, and to inter
rupt the execution of those laws without which our lives,
property, and everything dear and sacred, would be insecure.
We should be wanting in gratitude should we neglect, on
this occasion, to express our hearty approbation of the wise
and spirited measures adopted by the legislature for pre
venting the calamities which of late threatened this Com
monwealth, and for supporting the dignity and authority of
our government, and for the effects which have happily fol
lowed those measures. We conceive it to be highly expe
dient that a similar line of conduct should still be preserved,
in order to perfect peace and tranquillity among us.
The happy privilege enjoyed by us of choosing annually
our rulers, men from among ourselves, who must share
equally with their brethren the weight and burden which may

236 CONCORD DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
be necessarily laid, and who are responsible to their constit
uents for the faithful discharge of their duty, must greatly
aggravate the foUy and madness of those who, under pre
tence of procuring a redress of grievances, have drawn the
sword against their own govemment and laws ; especiaUy as
our representatives, if they are men of ability and integrity,
may remove every real grievance complained of. Many
causes concur to render our present situation critical and
distressing. The debts contracted in the late war, public
and private ; the decay of public faith and credit ; the want
of public and private virtue ; the shameful neglect of econ
omy, frugality, and industry ; and unbounded fondness for
foreign luxmies, fashions and manners, with a restiess, im
patient and unreasonable jealousy of our rulers, — are the
causes of our present unhappiness; to remove which we
conceive no eflfectual remedy can be applied, unless as a
people we tread back the steps that have led us to our
present unhappy situation.
The want of confidence in public promises requires that
every exertion should be made, when promises are made by
public bodies, that they should be held sacred and inviolable.
To restore public and private virtue, those in higher stations
(whose manners are readily copied by the lower classes of
men) should set the example and all endeavor to revive and
practise that honesty and simplicity of manners that have
hitherto been the characteristics of the inhabitants of this
state. There is certainly need of economy and prudence in the
expense of government, as far as consists with the preserva
tion of the same ; that every encouragement be given to our
own manufactures, and that such further duties be laid on
foreign luxuries as shall tend to stop theu- importation. And
that our government may be preserved and respected, it is
necessary that the laws should be punctually executed. To
provide some way of raising supplies for the public expenses,
which shall be less burdensome on the landed interests, is an

CONCORD DUEING -THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 237
object we particularly recommend to you. And we espe
cially instruct you to oppose the emission of paper money.
When any matter of importance is to be transacted, respect
ing which the mind of your constituents is not known, you
will have recourse to them for direction. At the close of
the session, or at the end of the year, in order that your
constituents may have the fullest information of the doings
of the legislature, as well as the reasons therefor, that you
be ready to satisfy them. And in every respect, that you
make the Constitution of this Commonwealth your rule, and
the happiness of this and the United States the end, in all
measures adopted. By order of the Comrnittee,
Ephraim Wood, Chairman.
CONCOED, May 28, 1787.
With the nation, and with the town no less, the period
from 1783 to 1789, from the declaration of peace to the
adoption of the Constitution, was a period of transi
tion. Amid great doubts and perils, our people were
emerging from a position of vassalage as Colonies to
an assured place as a great and free nation. It is a
happy circumstance that the last full expression of
the town upon public affairs should give us, as in a
mirror, the true portrait of our people at that turning
point of their history. Their ardent loyalty to the
country for which they had sacrificed so much, their
deep respect for law and Constitution, their admiration
of the simple and as we are apt sometimes to think
stern virtues of the fathers, their democratic contempt
for luxury and ostentation, their unwillingness to
gain even great public advantages except according to
exact legal precedents, their disposition to hold public
servants to a strict account, — all these qualities are
clearly exhibited in this interesting document. And

238 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS REBELLION. '
with it we close a period scarcely less important than
that of the Revolution itself.

1 At first the Shays Rebellion was a tumultuous rising
of exasperated people to get rid of heavy burdens. Then
it was a more organized effort to prevent the punishment
of those who had engaged in such risings. Finally,
it became rebellion pure and simple. Leaders were
chosen. Martial law was proclaimed in the camps.
Travellers were stopped and searched, and those active
for government held in custody. Shays sent a circular
letter to the selectmen of the towns in Hampshire
County, requesting them to hold the men of their
respective towns ready to march at a moment's notice,
armed and equipped, properly officered, and with sixty
rounds of powder to a man. He even issued a procla
mation for the arrest of those who resisted his author
ity. Luke Day summoned the troops under General
Shepard at Springfield to lay down their arms, prom
ising that upon their so doing they should be permit
ted to return home on parol. This was war; and it
needed only vigor and forces enough to make it bloody
and fatal war. But, as often happens with our Saxon
race, when the danger looked greatest it was least. At
the outset, so many were miserably poor and suffering
that they felt ready for anything, while the great mass
of the people looked on supinely, if not sympathetically.
But the troubles, the outrages, the drunken violence,
the increasing confusion, of the last four months had
sobered people. The great body ranged themselves on
1 The latter part of a lecture on the Shays Eebellion, delivered
before the Concord Lyceum, January 31, 1877, is added to the above
paper. — Editor.

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 239
the side of the law, and all but the desperate or crimi
nal deserted a sinking cause. The first plan of Shays
was to gather his forces at Worcester and thence to
march to Boston, and by force to release Shattuck and
his compatriots. To this end twelve hundred actually
gathered there in the month of December. But the
attitude of the government and the bitter winter awed
them. They retreated westward, so cast down, so
thinly clad," so footsore, so hungry, that some of them
dropped dead in their tracks ; and all along the way
the doors of the friends of government, in pure human
pity, were thrown open to receive the forlorn creatures.
The story which is told of Dr. Bancroft, then the young
minister of Worcester, sitting on his doorstep, the key
of his house in his pocket and telling Shays, when he
marched into town and in the conscious pride of power
demanded entrance for his followers, that no rebel
should pass through his doorway except over its owner's
prostrate body, furnished a strange picture to have its
original in the heart of law-abiding Massachusetts.
All this time government had not been idle. A force
of forty-four hundred men had been called out and
placed under the command of that Revolutionary vet
eran. General Benjamin Lincoln. For this army the
country towns furnished provisions, and a voluntary
subscription of the merchants of Boston supplied the
money necessary to equip it. With two thousand men,
the levies from the Eastern counties, General Lincoln
began his march on January 19th, 1787, and reached
Worcester on the 22d. Here tidings came which
filled him with alarm and hastened his steps. Shays,
Day, and Parsons, the most resolute of the insurgents,
had gathered two thousand men, half of them, report
said, old Continental soldiers, and had marched to

240 CONCORD DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
attack Springfield arsenal, then held by General
Shepard with only nine hundred men. The' assault
was actually attempted. General Shepard warned off
the insurgents, then fired over their heads, then gave
them a volley. Four fell dead, and the remainder
scattered almost instantaneously. When General Lin
coln reached Springfield the next day, the danger was
over. Shays with two thousand men took a strong
position on two hills in Pelham. His home was here,
as the doggerel song declares : —

-^On^

" My name is Shays, in former days
-In Pelham I did dwell, sir.
And I was forced to quit that place
Because I did rebel, sir."
There was for several days a correspondence going
on, while the rebels secretly withdrew to Petersham.
Then occurred the one remarkable event of the cam
paign. On the night of the 3d of February, Lincoln's
army marched in a winter's storm from Hadley to
Petersham. There was no track. A furious north
wind whirled the snow and hail in clouds over the bare
hills. Yet between seven in the evening and nine the
next morning the troops made over thirty miles. A
great achievement for veterans! Almost a miracle for
green militia ! The rebels were completely surprised.
Some were abed, and escaped half naked. Some were
cooking their breakfasts, and left their kettles hanging
on the cranes over the fire. An old Middlesex sergeant
used to tell, with great glee, that he himself ate Shays's
breakfast,, which that arch-rebel had left spread at his
headquarters. Lincoln might, had he chosen, have
made great slaughter. He did take one hundred and
fifty prisoners. The rest did not stay their flight until

CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 241
they found safety under the jurisdiction of neighboring
States. The rebellion was over.
The rebellion was over, but rapine took its place.
From the security of neighboring States bands of men
stole in, ready for anything which promised revenge or
plunder. Petty larceny, burglary, arson, varied the
life of the devoted citizens of Berkshire and Hampshire.
The account of a score or more of acts of open or secret
violence has been preserved. In the month of February
five or six men entered the house of Nehemiah Kellogg
of Bgremont, knocked him down, half stripped him,
insulted his sick mother, while he escaped by leaping
from a window and running barefoot in the snow two
or three miles to a guard of soldiers. In March,
stores and barns in Egremont and Shefiield, belonging
to friends of government, were set on fire. In June, a
gentleman in Lanesboro' woke up to find a band of men
armed with muskets ¦ in his room, who beat his hired
man, fired at his apprentice, robbed his house, and
departed, threatening to return and do worse. A writer
says : " The human mind grows melancholy, beholding
the situation of these counties, so deplorable. Father
against son, brother against brother, friend against
friend. The whole country is in arms, and there is a
cessation of all business."
One plundering expedition rises almost to military
dignity. A certain Captain Hamlin with one hundred
and twenty-two men crossed the New York line. These
marauders passed through Stockbridge, pillaging right
and left. From one man they took military stores and
a relic in the shape of a wampum belt received from a
friendly Indian ; from a poor seamstress, a pair of silver
buckles ; from a store, liquors. Still advancing, bear
ing with them no little booty and some prisoners, they
16

242 CONCOED DURING THE SHAYS REBELLION.
Came to Great Barrington, where similar scenes were
enacted. At Great Barrington they required the
jailer's wife to show them the jail, jokingly saying
that they wished to see if it was strong enough to hold
their prisoners. As the good lady, who seems to have
been of the Revolutionary type, carried them from cell
to cell, she sung for their edification these appropriate
words : — "Ye living men, come view the gTonnd
"Where you must shortly Ue."
This prophecy, in respect to some of them, was ful
filled very shortly, as inside of five hours they were
tenants of the cells which they had so jocosely exam
ined; for a hundred militia from Great Barrington
and Shefifield collected under Colonel John Ashley,
pursued the now retreating robbers, and overtook them
in Egremont, within three miles of the New York line.
A sharp skirmish ensued. Two of the militia felL
Four of the invaders were killed, thirty including their
captain were wounded, and fifty captored, and the band
broken up. Colonel John Ashley had that mingled
persuasion and vigor which are at the root of all disci
pline, as the following anecdote shows. During the
Shays Rebellion he was in command of a company,
whose term of enlistment had expired. He called a
parade, represented as eloquently as he could the need
the State had of their services, and added that he did
not want any cowards with him, and that he was going
to see who were brave and who were cowards. He
would give the word, " Shoulder arms ! " " Then let
every brave man bring his musket to his shoulder, and
let every coward slink back out of the ranks. " Paus
ing a moment to see the effect of his eloquence, he drew
his sword and added, with a strong oath, " But remem-

CONCORD DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION. 243
ber that I '11 run the first man through the body who
leaves the ranks. Attention, fellow soldiers, shoulder
arins ! " Up went every musket, and there was not a
break in the ranks. How equitable this was moralists
must decide, but that it was thoroughly Jacksonian
every careful reader of the campaign at New Orleans
must admit. It was at this skirmish probably that he
gave the order which tradition preserves ; when, having
entreated his misguided opponents to return to their
allegiance, and they had interpreted his leniency to be
a symptom of fear, he called out, " Pour in your fire,
my boys, and God have mercy on their souls !
By September, 1787, arrangements had been entered
into with the neighboring States to repress marauders.
Pillage had ceased. The military were withdrawn.
After a year of as nearly utter anarchy as a civilized
State can experience, Western Massachusetts rested.
The greatest forbearance was exercised towards the
offenders. All the rank and file, upon taking the oath
of allegiance, were received back to citizenship. Six
or seven of the leaders were sentenced to be hung, but
after a few months' probation they too were pardoned.
That this leniency was wise as well as merciful is
clear. For almost at once these men, who had threat
ened the stability of government, sensible of their
errors, settled down into orderly and industrious mem
bers of society, and nothing remained of the Shays
Rebellion but its memory and its lessons. Of some
things you cannot speak bitterly. The folly of the
insurgents is palpable; their sin against the social
state not less so. But folly and sin alike so had their
root in the debt, in the misery, and in the disappointed
hopes of overburdened men, that good people condemned
with a strong sense of compassion, and gladly tempered
justice with mercy.

244 CONCOED DUEING THE SHAYS EEBELLION.
One result may be fairly traced to these troubles;
and that was the increasing desire for a stronger central
government, which contributed to the acceptance of
the Constitution of the United States. Said the Hon.
Jonathan Smith of Lanesboro in the Massachusetts
Convention for the ratification of the Constitotion: "I
have lived in a part of the country where I have known
the worth of good government by the want of it. I am
going to show you, my fellow farmers, what were the
effects of anarchy. People took up arms, and then, if
you went to speak to them, you had the musket of
death presented to your breast. They would rob you
of your property, threaten to burn your homes, oblige
you to be on your guard night and day. Alarms
spread from town to town. Families were broken up.
The tender mother would cry, ' 0, my son is among
them ! ' Our distress was so great, that we should
have been glad to snatch at anything that looked like a
government for protection. Had any person th^t was
able to protect us set up a standard, we should have all
flocked to him, even if he had been a monarch. Now,
Mr. President, when I saw this Constitution, I found
that it was a cure for these disorders. It was jtist the
thing we wanted. " Multitudes thought the same. And
so, rejoicing in this great nationality which sectional
jealousy and civil war have not been able to destroy,
we can believe that to found it and to consolidate it
was required, not only the bold prescience of Samuel
Adams, and the wisdom of Franklin, Jefferson, and
the rest, and the valor of Washington, Greene, and so
many more, but, under God, the folly also of those who
projected and the rashness of those who carried on the
Shays Rebellion.

MY MEMORIES OF CONCORD IN THE GREAT
CIVIL WAR.
Mabch 17, 1886.
MEMBERS of the Old Concord Post of the Grand
Army of the Republic : —
You well know that it was with unfeigned reluctance
that I consented to address you, — that I, who had been
a partaker neither in your perils nor your glory, — that
I, who had only observed while you achieved, and sym
pathized when you suffered, — that I should undertake
to say anything to you of that great controversy in which
you were actors, seemed presumptoous indeed.
I see that I was mistaken. You only ask me to
speak of my memories of Concord in the Great Civil
War. Other men will tell of experiences on the
tented field. Other tongues will depict the courage
and endurance, the sadness and the brightness, the
many failures and the final successes, which make up
the immortal story. My part is a humbler one ; — to
recall the thoughts and feelings which filled all minds
and hearts in one quiet New England town ; to report
with what varied emotions we sent our brothers out in
an ever lengthening procession ; to remember with what
mingled anguish and exultation we received back our
dead who had found it sweet to die for country; to
narrate how our women prayed and worked, and worked
and prayed again, if so be they might bring one added
comfort to tent or hut on bleak hillside, or soften one

246 CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE.
pang of the sick or dying in hospital. Yes ; my part
is to try to make live again that wondrous four years'
experience which held us all in its grasp, and gave a
great gravity and a fresh moral dignity to mere living.
But it is not an easy thing to do. In any complete
ness it is an impossible thing to do. The emotions
which give greatness to such a time; the hopes, the
fears, the anxieties, the relief; the consecration to a
holy cause which counted no sacrifice too great; the
courage which defied all danger ; the f aintness of heart
in the presence of unexpected calamity ; the solemn tri
umph when tidings of a great victory came ; and that
awful moment when the blood seemed to stand still in
our veins, as across the wire was borne the doleful
message that our good President had been basely slain,
— these are not things which can be printed in books,
or written on formal records of town or State. In
their depth of meaning they are written only in the
hearts that felt all the august greatness of the hour.
I am looking back over twenty-one years of unbroken
peace, — years which have made great events look un
real and shadowy like dreams, — years in which a whole
generation has grown up, to whom Bull Run, the Seven
Days' battle, Donelson, Missionary Ridge, Gettysburg,
and that long siege of Richmond, are hardly as familiar
as Thermopylae or Marathon or Cassar's Gallic Wars, or
Alexander's march across Asia. Forgive me if, in my
retrospect of facts around which the mists of age are
even now gathering, I sometimes err. Forgive me if, in
recalling memories about which a hundred books might
be written, my story seems fragmentary and rambling.
Let me go back for a moment to events which pre
ceded by a few months the actual opening of the war.

CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL "WAE. 247
Twenty-seven years ago, in 185S, on the very ground now
occupied by the Massachusetts Reformatory, was held
what was called the great State encampment Twenty-
seven years ago! More than half my audience either
had not come into this troubled world, or were in the
first years of innocent childhood. Owing to the sick
ness of Father Taylor, I was appointed Chaplain at
headquarters. It had not. been my fortune to come
before into close contact with the militia of Massachu
setts. The whole thing impressed me greatly. The
gathering of six thousand armed men, their exact
mancBuvres, the reviews, the martial music empha
sized by the roar of cannon, all furnished me a fresh
sensation. I was not alone in my feeling of interest.
Tens of thousands of people from all parts of our own
State and from neighboring States thronged to see the
sight. Concord has rarely been more thoroughly alive
than when those; thousands tramped, in what seemed
an interminable: procession, from the muster field
through our dusty streets to the site of Old North
Bridge. I have often wondered whether the gift of
prescience was granted to Governor Banks, so that in
imagination he saw the forces, already gathering for
the mighty contest, and was seeking to prepare us to
do our part When we consider that he carried his
plan into execution contrary to the advice of many,
who feared lest disorder and riot should come in the
train of such a gathering, we are inclined to think so.
At any rate, that muster had a clear connection with
the Civil War, and exercised a powerful influence upon
it. It is hardly too much to say that the military zeal
which it created and the well knit organization it
fostered saved, not indeed: the country, from ruin, but
Washington from the feet of foemen. It enabled

248 CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE.
Massachusetts in April, 1861, in the brief space of
seven days, to send the first five regiments of Well
armed and well disciplined troops to the front.
Fifteen months after this encampment the air was
full of hostile threats, which many thought would
prove to be but empty words. Then it was whispered
about that Governor Andrew, with that large states
manship which knows when to transcend law to save
the law, was without any legal enactment purchasing
uniforms, and gathering arms and military equipments.
Then too we were told, as a profound secret, that a
messenger had been sent to our Concord Artillery to
ascertain how many of its members stood ready to
march at a moment's notice. These were the fore-
gleams of that conflagration which was so soon to
envelop the land.
The 19th of April is the epoch day of Concord.
April 19, 1689, Lieutenant John Heald led a Concord
company to Boston to aid in the overthrow of Andros.
Eighty-six years later, April 19, 1775, Major John But
trick gave that order which cut the bond that united this
new realm to the mother country. Eighty-six other
years rolled away. By one of those striking coinci
dences that so frequently appear in history, upon the
anniversary of the very day and almost of the very
hour, April 19, 1861, our company departed for the
war. I find it impossible fitly to describe the scenes
which took place at the time of that departure. From
the moment that the tidings came that a shot had been
fired at Fort Sumter, we, in common with the whole
community, were in a state of feverish excitement.
All usual occupations seemed tame. All duties for the
hour gave place to the duty of the citizen and the

CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE. 249
patriot With the fall of Sumter the excitement deep
ened. Would our company be called out ? And if it
were, how many of its members could and would go ?
Natural questions these, and, no matter how sincere the
love of country, in many a home dread questions. For
these fifty-one soldiers were not hired substitutes.
They were out of the heart of our homes, our sons, our
brothers, our neighbors. I mention the first three
names on the roll, Prescott, Derby, Buttrick. You see
how essentially representative of Concord that company
was. As soon as it was known that our men were to
go, a subscription was started to care for them while
in the field. In less than twenty-four hours, I think,
almost we may say without an effort, five thousand
dollars were secured. William Munroe, a name ever
to be held, in honor here, was sick in Boston and very
feeble. When I called to see him he seemed to forget
his weakness. He asked question after question, and
when I dared not stay longer, he begged me to put his
name down for a liberal sum. Sick or well, he would
not, he said, have his name absent from that list.
That was the spirit of our men. JjTor were the women
in any respect behind them. With the call of the
company, they organized what afterward became the
Concord Soldiers' Aid Society, to supply any needed
comforts to our men. In the first thirteen days in
May they met six days, having often over one hundred
present. Even the children did their part. It is
recorded that Miss Dillingham's school sent sixty-four
crash tovvels, and Miss Bean's sixty bags containing
thread, pins, needles, and the like ; while later I note
gifts from every school in the town. We had several
meetings in the Town Hall. The excitement was
simply tremendous and overpowering. For men to

250 CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAR.
meet was like coming in contact with jars charged to
the full with electricity. How well I recall the march
of our company at one o'clock on that April afternoon
to the station. The old homely depot was crowded
with men and women. We literally greeted the brave
fellows with cheers and tears. I hardly know of which
the most. One instinctively recalled those touching
words of Ezra when the foundations of the second
temple were laid : " Many . . . wept with a loud voice,
and many shouted aloud for joy; so that the people
could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the
noise of the weeping of the people. "
We watched the cars until they disappeared behind
Walden woods, then walked silently home, and the
first chapter in Concord's Book of Memory of the Civil
War was complete, A humorous little incident, I re
collect, relieved the tension somewhat, and at the same
time showed how thoroughly the interest had pervaded
the community. The next, morning a little fellow, not
over six or seven years, whose father was in the com
pany, walked up to the station, and with perfect serious
ness asked the station master to furnish him a ticket
to Washington, as he was going to the war. So even
the babes were patriotic.
In July the company was back after the disastroug
encounter of Bull Run, leaving four of its number in a
rebel prison. As the soldiers, dusty and grimy, with
their uniforms torn and faded, marched wearily down
the street to a bountiful repast and a loving reception
at the Town Hall, the wide difference between play
war and the real stem article was pretty clearly taught
In November of the same year there came a fresh stir
in the town. Captain Prescott, whose tender heart
shrunk from the sight of human suffering, had said

CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 251
after the carnage of Bull Run that he never could be
hold another battle. But he could not escape the sense
of duty. Making his headquarters at our Town Hall
he proceeded to enlist what became Company B in the
32d Regiment, an organization in which there were
forty Coneord men. By November what was hot and
feverish in feeling had pretty much passed away, and
we with the rest of the North had settled down to a
long, hard pull. So there was little excitement, but a
great deal of interest A general desire was felt to do
all we could to promote enlistment and to increase
comfort. The record of the Soldiers' Aid Society reads,
" The ladies met several days in November and worked
for Captain Prescott's company." One brancb of in
dustry was probably for the first time pursued. I mean
the knitting of mittens with one finger as well as a
thumb. The company was to be stationed at Fort
Warren for a time, and winter was at hand. So one
hundred mittens were made and marked on the wrist
with the initials of the owners. I know not why it is
that, when the thoughts are most grave and serious,
any amusing fact stamps itself so deeply on the mind.
But, with a quarter of a century between, I recall
nothing more clearly than the difliculty with which my
good wife succeeded in placing the initials of John
Chrysostom Wolfgang Theophilus Mozart Sherwin on
the little circlet of the wrist of a seamed mitten.
Essentially the same experiences were passed through
when Company G of the 47th Regiment went, under the
command of Captain Riehard Barrett, to New Orleans.
This was very largely a Concord company. I count
on its rolls the names of Barrett, Buttrick, Wheeler,
Ball, Heywood, Clark, Farrar, Hosmer, — names as
old as the town itself, and which in all the two hun-

252 CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR.
dred and fifty years of our history have been apt to
come to the front when danger has been near. In the
list of the Massachusetts Volunteers appear more than
one hundred and seventy Concord names which are not
included in the three companies to which 1 have
alluded. But they are scattered through so many regi
ments that I can ouly mention the fact and pass on.
It must ever be a just cause of pride, that we did not
to any extent resort to the purchase of substitotes to
fill the quota of the town. Indeed, I am not sure that
we resorted to it at all. The courage and patriotism
of our young men saved us from that. But we had
ample opportunity to see what the substitute business
meant. One of the district drafting stations was at
the Court House, now the Insurance Building. Thither
came men, seeking for money, to take the place of
those who had had the fortune to be drafted. One
afternoon it was rumored that a body of New~ York
roughs in the guise of laboring men had thus enlisted,
and that, now they had obtained their money, an effort
would be made during the night by their fellow roughs
to release them. I remember that I asked Captain
Moore how he knew they were roughs. "By their
hands, " was his reply. " They are dressed like honest
mechanics, but their hands are as white and delicate as
a lady's. " At any rate our company was called out.
The old agricultural building in which these precious
recruits were housed was sedulously watched. During
the night sundry whistlings and cat-calls, supposed to
be signals, were heard. But nothing more happened.
Early the next day the men were sent to Boston. The
only tangible result was this. A man who sometimes
did chores for me found hidden among the boards of

CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 253
Captain Barzillai Hudson's lumber-yard three or four
suits of coarse clothes. The theory was, that they
were put there to replace the regimentals in case any
recruit escaped. They were never called for, and I
suspect that the tailor's bill of the fortunate finder was
for a year or two light.
Before I dismiss this matter of enlistments, let me
allude to a striking feature in the experience of our
good town. I should say that we were constantly com
ing in contact with what we may call heredity of
patriotism. Long words these. Translated into com
mon speech, they mean that the same love of country,
the same devotion to freedom, and the same readiness
to be sacrificed for a good cause which distinguished
the fathers, were found in equal measure in the sons.
The men who left a good lot in England, and for con
science' sake planted the wilderness, the men who
fought at North Bridge, had worthy representatives in
the great Civil War. The record is certainly a remark
able one. I have studied carefully the list of Concord
volunteers. I have added thereto the names of such as
my memory recalls, who enlisted from other places.
Hardly one of the old patriotic families fails to be
represented. Three certainly of the direct descendants
of Colonel James Barrett, the Revolutionary com
mander, were in the war, two of them holding commis
sions. Adjutant Joseph Hosmer had unquestionably as
many more. How many of the stock of Major John
Buttrick entered the ranks, I dare not say. I can
count up at least half a dozen. While Simon Willard,
Dolor Davis, William Emerson, John Hoar, Thomas
Flint, Nehemiah Hunt, Thomas Brown, John Ball,
George Wheeler, John Melvin, Joseph Merriam, Robert
Blood, George Hayward, and I know not how many

254 CONCORD IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAR.
more, had enrolled in our army men of their name
and lineage. I hold that this is not of chance. The
grand old history, the patriotic memories, somehow get
into the blood. Amid what in us is selfish and limited
they generate qualities akin to themselves. Heredity
of martial spirit too seems to have marked those towns
which were most closely connected with the first Revo
lutionary encounter. For, account for it as you will,
this is simple fact, that more than twice as many men
from Lexington, Acton, and Concord in proportion to
numbers were promoted to be oflBcers than from any other
towns in Massachusetts. I. do not think this either was
of chance or favor. It was the direct result of constant
and proud remembrance of the deeds of the fathers, —
of what may be called a noble historic sense, feeding
martial fire and patriotic purpose. Not in vain is
honest town pride ! Not in vain are stately anniversa
ries ! Not in vain do we pour into the attentive ears
of the children the story of the virtue and the valor of
their sires !
Many interesting recollections are connected with
visits made by myself and others to the front. I begin
with the earliest. Just before the first battle of Bull
Run a party of our townspeople went from Concord to
Washington. What followed shows how unaware our
people were of the gravity of the situation ; how little
they dreamed of the long, heart-breaking conflict which
was before them ; and what a hold upon their minds
had the theory of a thirty or sixty days', or at most a
six months' war, which was to close this slight unpleas
antness. The cry, " On to Richmond ! " was the true
child of this sanguine temper. When tidings came
that a fight was imminent, large numbers, members of

CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 255
Congress, public oflBcers, and others, started across
Long Bridge over to Virginia to behold it; just as we
might go over to Lowell to see the circus or to Framing
ham to the muster. Of course our people were not to
be behind these in enterprise. So three or four of
them chartered a carryall and two smart horses, and,
taking a Congressman for a passenger, set out. But
alas ! when they drew near the scene of action, what
met them was not victory but defeat. In all my read
ing or hearing I have received no such vivid account of
what a defeat is as 1 gained from the lips of these
gentlemen. The teamsters, who followed the army
closely with supplies, first took fright, and turning
their wagons around, and lashing furiously their mules
or horses, fled helter-skelter towards Washington;
meanwhile to lighten their load tossing out here a bag
of coffee, or a chest of tea, and there a box of hard
tack. The civilians could do no otherwise than follow
them. But the narrow roads or wood-paths were now
filled with the disjecta membra of the Commissary
Department So they went bumpety bump, now up,
now down, each step a hair-breadth escape until a ref
uge was reached. Then followed the soldiers, gaunt,
weary, dusty, discouraged. So " On to Richmond ! "
had come to a disastrous conclusion.
It was just about a year later that Dr. Bartlett went
to Harrison's Landing on the James. It was after
what is variously termed the Seven Days' battle or
retreat which began north of the Chickahominy and
ended at Malvern Hill. The Doctor went to look after
some of our sick men. The time had passed when
people visited the camps for a sight. The war had
taught us something. A few days before the Doctor
started, I had a conversation with an English lady,

256 CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAE.
who had been for several years a governess on one of
the plantations on which our army was then encamped.
" The soldiers have a terrible time before them, " she
said. "No white man dares to remain there in the
summer months, the malaria is so fatal." So I was
prepared to hear sad accounts. But to me, all unac
customed to the ravages of war, the Doctor's tale was
sadder than my expectations. "As I came down to
the landing, " said he, " every available house, barn, or
shed was filled with the sick and wounded. More than
three thousand lay wrapped in their blankets awaiting
transportation, — no roof over them but the stars, no
couch beneath them but the damp earth. They lay so
closely together that in the twilight I had to pick my
way carefully and with diflficulty lest I should tread
upon these helpless folks." It was on this occasion
that the Doctor brought home on a furlough Captain,
afterward Colonel Prescott. So sick was he when he
started that he had to be carried to the boat. The
moment he got outside the James he began to recover,
and a few days of clear Northern air completely restored
him. Of this Harrison's Landing, Colonel Parker
writes, " If there be on the face of the earth a place
intended for breeding pestilence, the country about
Harrison's and Westover was ordained to that use.
For weeks one third of the command (then having only
six companies) was on the sick list. . . . Not less than
one hundred and fifty men, or one fourth, never returned
to our colors. "
In the fall of 1864 I received an invitation from my
friend and classmate, Mr. Knapp, who was at the head
of the Washington department of the Sanitary Com
mission, to go to the front and examine their work. I
have elsewhere given a full account of that intensely

CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE. 257
interesting trip, and shall here mention only two or
three incidents. Let me illustrate by one scene how
the love of home kept fast hold amid all these strange
excitements. I was in Harewood Hospital near Wash
ington perhaps an hour and a half. In the middle of
the floor was a young soldier. He had lost a leg in
one of the battles, but had nearly recovered, and was
hopping about on two crutches. He asked me if I
knew anything about Boston. I told him that I had
lived two thirds of my life in Boston or its vicinity.
" Where ? " he asked. " On Fort Hill. " " Well, I too
lived at the foot of Fort Hill. Did you ever go to the
old Washington Grammar School ? " " Yes, five years. "
"So did I." "Did you know this and that street,
and this and that blind court and alley ? " " Certainly ;
I have played coram and I spy in them all many times,
and chalked with my own hands all the corners. " The
moment he was satisfied I was a genuine article, he
adopted me, followed me round as though I was one of
the family, plied me with all sorts of questions, and
evidently had an hour of pure delight, simply because
I reminded him of home, and could recall the old
familiar spots.
As I went to the front, what struck me was the diflfi
culty I experienced in getting within the lines, and the
absolute freedom which I apparently had from all
observation when once the magic barrier had been
passed. When I went on board the transport, the sen
tinel saluted me, "Your pass, sir." When I left the
boat, another sentinel repeated the salute, " Your pass,
sir." Thrice going from City Point to the camp the
old demand met me, "Your pass, sir." But once
inside you went where you pleased. One evening I
walked idly toward headquarters and saw General
17

258 CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE.
Grant sitting in the dusk under a tree, and actoated
by curiosity approached within a stone's throw before I
was stopped. Once more I saw General Grant. He
was riding apparently to the front, — on a good horse,
I am sure, for his staff were behind trying to keep up
with him, and a good way behind too.
On the way down in the government steamer I had
abundant evidence what comfort soldiers get from an
article which my soul hateth, I mean tobacco. The
boat was full of men returning from a furlough or from
hospitals. They had laid in a good stock of the weed,
and before night the deck was in such a state that
there was hardly a clean place on which to put your
foot. I slept, I remember, on a settee with a chair for
a pillow, and was not reminded of spring beds and
feather pillows. On the return the case was different.
The poor fellows who were going home on furlough
evidently had exhausted their stock. The deck was as
clean as a lady's parlor, that is comparatively. A
Michigan lieutenant, observing that the night was cold,
courteously offered me one of his blankets. I fell into
conversation with him. lie said he had been a British
sergeant and fought at Alma and Inkermann. I said,
" Then you have seen just as severe fighting before you
came to America as since. " " You are mistaken, " he
replied, "Alma and Inkermann were child's play com
pared with what we have seen since we crossed the
Rappahannock." I give the remark for what it is
worth. The first thing which struck you as you advanced
was the field hospital. A wonderful sight ! A city of
tents, arranged in perfect order, with streets and paths
between, clean swept of all rubbish every day. Within
were six thousand sick and wounded, six hundred of

CONCOED m THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE. 259
them colored men, carefully and neatly tended. It was
Sunday. I do not think that the whites were, as the
boy said, "overly devout." Very cheerful they cer
tainly were, and the convalescent, so far as the rules
permitted, no little given to jokes and sky-larking.
The blacks, on the contrary, were grave and subdued,
such as could read poring over their Bibles. In the
. afternoon some two hundred of them crept from their
tents and listened to a very earnest exhortation from a
black sergeant, who murdered the King's English in a
fearful manner. I was somewhat taken aback when in
twenty minutes he suddenly stopped, turned to me, and
said, "Brudders, I sha'n't no more expatiate on this
matter, as we have a brudder minister from Boston who
will speak to you. "
One more scene. Monday morning, I think, I rode
out to the advance stations of the Commission. On
the way I met a sad procession, — a train of ambulances
bringing in nearly one thousand wounded men from the
disastrous fight at Ream's Station. The road was
rough, very rough, — so rough that I, though in a good
express wagon, found on my return that the jolts which
threw me against the forward seat had taken from
each knee a piece of skin as large as an old-fashioned
copper cent. In fact a road across the humps of a
Virginia cornfield' is a trifle worse than a corduroy.
Your movements are at any rate more unexpected.
These wounded men must have suffered inexpressibly.
Yet not one groaned loud enough for me to hear across
the intervening space of fifteen or twenty feet. To
endure takes manhood perhaps more than to achieve.
One is forced to recall two painful subjects, the
return of prisoners of war, and the burial of the dead.

260 CONCOED m THE GEEAT CIVIL WAR.
When the men taken at Bull Run came back we made
it a joyful occasion. They had suffered many hard
ships and deprivations. To insuflficient exercise was
added bad food. Young pig soup or stew as a steady
diet is probably neither healthy nor nutritious. The
constitution of one of them certainly was greatly under
mined. But they looked so much better than we feared,
we were so glad to see them again, that we did not per
mit any clouds to darken our pleasure. But as the war
went on the pain grew greater than the pleasure. You
all recollect the poor fellow who came home a wreck
from Andersonville, and whose bones rest in yonder
quiet cemetery. (Charles Nealey.) When you asked
him about his experience, he feebly answered, " Don't
ask me any questions. I have suffered enough. Let
me die in peace, forgetting all I can forget. " And so
in silence he faded away. How much these sufferings
were of necessity, and how much of human passion and
cruelty, we do not care now to ask. If we cannot for
get, let us try to forgive. Phil Dolan, Captain of the
4th Massachusetts Cavalry, who had himself suffered
much, who told me that for many days his sole ration
for the twenty-four hours was a square of corn-cake not
more than half as big as your hand, and whose sickness
and death date back to his imprisonment at Danville,
always felt that in Virginia at any rate these priva
tions were, to a considerable degree, of necessity. He
liked to tell of a venerable Southern minister, who
used to bring them soup and such other comforts as his
narrow means permitted. When they said anything
about North and South, he would say, " Stop, boys, do
not talk politics ; I am a Southerner to the marrow of
me, but you are my brothers, and I want to do all I
can for you. Let me ! let me ! "

CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAE. 261
My first soldier's funeral I How well I recall it ! A
stranger to me, a citizen of Maine, had sickened and
died before he saw the foe, or could strike one blow for
the cause to which he had given his life. (James S.
Fernald.) A young woman, his wife, a boy of less
than a year, a few sympathizing neighbors, a connec
tion or two, were with us as we laid him away in our
quiet graveyard. Then other occasions came in rapid
succession. There was one of our best young men who
succumbed to the deadly malaria at Harrison's Land
ing. (William J. Damon.) Born to the possession of
means, comforts, and luxuries, when asked why he did
not hire a substitute, he replied in words which we
should never forget, "How can we hope to save our
country if no one enlists who has anything to lose ? " I
think it was from the hotel we buried one who was in
the South when the war broke out, and who with great
risk and hardship stole through the rebel lines and
enlisted in an Ohio regiment. (Charles H. Wright.)
After Gettysburg there was brought home one who
had an historic name. (Francis Buttrick.) He was
scarcely more than a boy in years. When he enlisted
in Captain Prescott's company we were all struck by his
attractive face and his modest and unassuming manners.
Prom the Trinitarian Church we buried two of three
sons of one family who perished in the war. (Asa H.,
John H., and Samuel Melvin.) When Captain Bar
rett's company returned, a young man, justly dear to all
the boys of the town, who had escaped all the perils
of the foe and of the Louisiana marshes, was struck
down by the perils of peace within a day's march of
home. (Erastus H. Kingsbury.) But I cannot fur
ther specify.
If I choose out the name of Colonel Prescott for a

262 CONCOED IN THE GEEAT CIVIL WAR.
little more extended notice, it is not that I claim that
his patriotism was any more pure, or his sacrifice more
complete, than that of many another who sleeps in a
nameless grave. I choose it because by character and
position he is the fitting type of the patriotism and
sacrifice of the town. It was a beautiful day in June,
a slight haze giving softness to the air, the grass
beneath our feet green as an emerald, the trees full of
unspoiled foliage and blossoms, when yonder church
was crowded in every part by those who wished to pay
their meed of respect. As I looked on his manly form,
a conversation I had with him three years before came
back vividly to my mind. We were walking across
that little sandy strip which is now our common.
"You know," he said, "I hate war; a battle is dread
ful to me. Do you think it to be my duty to go back ? "
I replied, " This is a question whose aflfirmative answer
may cost you your life. I cannot advise you." He
did go back. Quickly he was promoted to Lieutenant
Colonel, Colonel, and finally Brevet Brigadier Gen
eral. In the Wilderness he commanded a brigade. For
weeks he ate, fought, and slept without change in the
same clothing. Finally, after many dangers escaped,
he fell gallantly leading his men in the first assault on
Petersburg, June 18, 1864. "Have I done my duty?"
was his dying word to his division general. "Always,"
was the reply. So duty carried him, as it carried
many another, to scenes they loved not. And duty
simply performed softened the last pangs and hallows
the memory.
You ask, perhaps, why recall painful scenes ? Be
cause, in the language of the ancient writer, "the
memorial of virtue is immortal. " We have no right to
permit the waters of oblivion to bury the names and

CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 263
memory of our dead heroes. It is our business to teach
our children and their children that in this historic
town there were men who emulated their sires. We
are forgetting soon enough. We are permitting the
pomp and pleasure of this world to remand the heroic
and the self-sacrificing qualities into obscurity. To
remember the days when men took their lives in their
hands for duty's sake and their country's sake will do
us no hurt. Perhaps none of you will sympathize with
my feeling, but to me there was an august sadness in a
soldier's funeral shared by few other occasions. The
rest of us go when our time comes, when in the great
Divine order our work is done. But in that war men
left behind home, chosen employment, agreeable sur
roundings, all that makes life desirable, and died
before their time, because they felt it to be their duty
so to do. I cannot forget it. I do not wish to forget
it. To my eyes the meanest life thus lost takes on
some nobility.
I turn to one aspect of our Great Civil War which is
altogether fair and attractive. I mean the women's
work. A whole generation of girls have grown up
since those days. I wish that I could show to them
how cheerful, how persistent, how' laborious, the devo
tion of the mothers was. We have seen that almost
immediately after the departure of our first company,
a Concord Soldiers' Aid Society was organized to care
for our men. This in the nature of the case was in its
intent temporary and limited. But the record, Octo
ber 1, 1861, reads, "The Society was reorganized, and
the same officers were chosen /or the war." Prom that
time for the next three and a half years not a week
passed in which there was not a large meeting for

264 CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR.
work. When there Was a great demand two whole
days were given up. On one occasion it is noted that
four successive days were devoted to such employment
Not less than fifty or sixty, often over one hundred
were present Many women did as much work at
home as in the hall. I have alluded to the interest
felt by the children. In several of the schools the
great reward of merit was permission in school hours
to ravel lint. I have myself been in schools where
half the pupils, boys as well as girls, were engaged at
it, having won the privilege by good conduct and good
lessons. The results were Commensurate. Five thou
sand dollars were collected by the women and spent in
materials for their work. Much more was given in
cloth and goods. Forty thousand different articles
were sent forward. Consider what that means. At
most one hundred persons were in a position to work
steadily. Perhaps one hundred was the highest average
of those who did work. Then each one furnished not
far from one hundred and twenty articles, great and
small, every year. Each thing was carefully examined
before it was sent, and then stamped with the name of
the society. No slipshod work could pass muster.
I am tempted to repeat in substance what I have said
in my sketch of Concord about bandages. ^ Our women
made bandages a specialty. All the good soft cotton
cloth in the town was considered proper prey for them.
In some homes, at the close of the war, a piece of cot
ton four years old a yard square would have been a real
curiosity. On one or two occasions, enterprising
women went into neighboring villages, where Soldiers'
Aid Societies were not, on foraging expeditions, and
came back with great baskets of spoil in the shape of
1 Drake's History of Middlesex County, 1880.

CONCORD m THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 265
old sheets and pillow-cases. Twenty thousand ban
dages were made, and they were good ones, soft,
Strong, well rolled, each with three of the best pins in
them. Twenty thousand! Enough, if unrolled and
placed in a continuous line, to go from Boston to
Fitchburg. When I Went up the James, in 1864, in a
little government steamer, we stopped a moment by a
great hospital ship, which towered far above us, and
was just weighing anchor. I looked up. On the upper
deck was a gentleman who saluted me, calling me by
name. I recognized him. He was an old friend, the
surgeon in charge of the wounded and sick on board. I
think it could not have been three weeks before that he
had written me a letter stating what a blessing a box of
Concord bandages had been, replacing the cruelly stiff
and harsh ones which the government had been able to
furnish, and then mentioning with great commendation
the fine sharp-pointed pins. I had a letter from Mr.
Knapp of the Sanitary Commission at about the same
time, in which he stated that the first bandages which
reached Sheridan's army after his great victory at
Opequan and Fisher's Hill were from Concord. One
thousand wounds, he says, were dressed by them. The
next morning the surgeons kept coming in saying,
" Can you not give us some more Concords ? They
are the best we ever laid hands on." This was a
proper recompense for that decision, early made by the
Society, and steadily adhered to, that nothing should
go forward which the women would not be willing to
send to their own husbands, brothers, or sons. I shall
not attempt to enumerate the other articles which made
up this great list. Time would fail me to do so. I
want only to say one word about the general impression
the meetings of this Society inade on my own mind. I

266 CONCORD IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR.
hardly missed being present a few moments at any of
them, — never, I am sure, when I was in town. They
fascinated me. There was such a pervasive feeling of
a really noble purpose, of work done for goo'd and
worthy ends, that you felt better by contact with them.
Much hard and wearing labor was given. But I doubt
whether you can find a woman who was a faithful
member of the Concord Soldiers' Aid Society who does
not look back with genuine satisfaction to the days and
weeks given to its service.
I was in a car bound to New York when a newsboy
came through shouting, " Sheridan's great victory at
Five Forks ! Richmond taken ! " Of course there was
a great excitement. The tidings seemed too good to
be true. But as their veracity became more and more
clear, everybody congratulated everybody. The sun
seemed to shine brighter and the horizon to grow
wider. Then followed Lee's surrender. The war was
over. A few days or weeks might elapse before all
the scattered forces of the Confederacy should imitate
the example of its central army. We had yet to pass
through that Saturday, the blackest day in my memory,
when we heard of the atrocious and meaningless mur
der of our great and good President. But the war
was over. The great burdens would be lifted. The
mighty strain might cease. Such of our sons and
brothers as war and disease had spared might come
home. As I look back upon those four years of irrepressible
conflict, I cannot feel that they were an unmixed evil.
They destroyed forever that one institution which per
petually put apart and kept apart the North and the

CONCOED IN THE GREAT CIVIL WAR. 267
South. That of course. They knit us as never before
into one strong nationality. Few will deny that.
They demonstrated that a republic can, as it were by
one stamp of the foot, summon out of the groUnd an
army, and then by one wave of the hand send it back
whence it came. So quickly our farmers' boys, our
mechanics, our clerks and professional men, became
accustomed to the panoply of war ; and so silently the
great array melted into the ranks of civil life, leaving
but little trace of itself. All this we see and admit.
But as memory carries me back to those days, I feel
that in a higher than any material sense the war was
not an unmixed evil. Great burdens had to be borne.
Great gaps were made. Great sorrows were endured.
But we were lifted out of ourselves. Mean and petty
things were in abeyance. We felt our own pulse beat
with the nation's pulse, and quicken or stagnate with
its rising or falling fortunes. Yes, it was a great
thing to live then. Life had the dignity which comes
from consecration to large duties.
The memories of Concord in the Great Civil War
are not therefore all sorrowful. How can they be,
when they tell of simple devotion to great principles,
of beautiful love of native land, of power in men like
unto ourselves to do, to dare, to suffer, and to die that
the nation might live ?
I thank the members of this Grand Army Post for the
pleasure, sad and solemn often, and for the renewed in
spiration which has come to me, as at your bidding my
mind has gone back through all the distractions of these
later years, and communed with the mighty memories of
a mighty past.

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
Pabt of an Akticle feinted in the Atlantic Monthly,
Februabt, 1865.
FOR three years I had been a thorough believer in
the United States Sanitary Commission. Read
ing carefully its publications, listening with tearful
interest to the narrations of those who had been its
immediate workers at the front, following in imagina
tion its campaigns of love and mercy, from Antietam
to Gettysburg, from Belle Plain to City Point, and
thence to the very smoke and carnage of the actual
battlefield, I had come to cherish an unfeigned admira
tion for it and its work. For three years, too, I had
been an earnest laborer at one of its outposts, striving
with others ever to deepen the interest and increase
the fidelity of the loyal men and women of a loyal New
England town. I was prepared, then, both from my
hearty respect for the charity and from my general
conception of the nature and vastness of its operations,
to welcome every opportunity to improve my knowledge
of its plans and practical workings. I therefore gladly
accepted the invitation which came to me to visit the
headquarters of the Commission at Washington, and to
examine for myself the character and amount of the
benefits which it confers.
The evening of August 23d found me, after a speedy
and pleasant trip southward, safely ensconced in the

A EOETNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 269
sanctum of my good friend Mr. Knapp, the head of the
Special Relief Department. Starting from that base of
operations, I spent two crowded weeks in ceaseless
inquiries. Every avenue of information was thrown
wide open. Two days I wandered, but not aimlessly,
from office to ofifice, from storehouse to storehouse, from
soldiers' home to soldiers' home, conversing with the
men who have given themselves up unstintedly to
this charity, examining the books of the Commission,
gathering statistics, seeing, as it were, the hungry
soldier fed and tho naked soldier clothed, and the sick
and wounded soldier cared for with a more than fra
ternal kindness. I visited the hospitals, and with my
own hands distributed the Sanitary delicacies to the
suffering men. Steaming down the Chesapeake and up
the James, and along its homeless shores, I came to
City Point ; was a day and a night on board the Sani
tary barges, whence full streams of comfort are flowing
with an unbroken current to all our diverging camps ;
passed a tranquil, beautiful Sabbath in that city of the
sick and wounded, whose white tents look down from
the bluffs upon the turbid river; rode thirteen miles
out almost to the Weldon Road, then in sharp contest
between our Fifth Army Corps and the Rebels; from
the hills which Baldy Smith stormed in June saw the
spires of Petersburg ; went from tent to tent and from
bedside to bedside in the field hospitals of the Fifth
and Ninth Corps, where the luxuries prepared by will
ing hands at home were bringing life and strength to
fevered lips and broken bodies. I came back with my
courage reanimated, and with a more perfect faith in
the ultimate triumph of the good cause. I came back
with a heartier respect for our soldiers, whose patience
in hardship and courage in danger are rivalled only by

270 A EOETNIGHT WITH THE SANITAEY.
the heroism with which they bear the pains of sickness
and wounds. I came back especially with the convic
tion that, no matter how much we had contributed to
the Sanitary work, we had done only that which it was
our duty to do, and that, so long as we could fumish
shelter for our families, and food for our children, it
was our plain obligation to give and to continue giving
out of our riches or out of our poverty.
Just now the Sanitary is seeking to enter into closer
relations with the hospitals through the agency of
regular visitors. The advantages of such a policy are
manifest. The reports of the visitors will enable the
directors to see more clearly the real wants of the
sick ; and the frequent presence and inquiries of such
visitors will tend to repress the undue appropriation of
hospital stores by attendants. But the highest benefit
will be the change and cheer it will introduce into the
monotony of hospital life. If you are sick at home you
are glad to have your neighbor step in and bring the
healthy bracing air of outdoor life into the dimness
and languor of your invalid existence. Much more
does the sick soldier like it, for ennui, far more than
pain, is his great burden. When I was at Washington
I accepted with great satisfaction an invitation to go
with a Sanitary visitor on her round of duty. When
we came to the hospital, I asked the ward-master if he
would like to have me distribute among his patients
the articles I had brought. He said that he should,
for he thought it would do the poor fellows good to see
me and receive the gifts from my own hands. The
moment I entered there was a stir. Those who could
hobble about stumped up to me to see what was going
on ; some others sat up in bed full of alertness ; while
the sickest greeted me with a languid smile. As I

A FOETNIGHT WITH THE SANITAEY. 271
went from cot to cot, the politeness of la belle France,
with which a little Frenchman in the corner touched
the tassel of his variegated nightcap at me, and the
untranslatable gutturals, full of honest satisfaction
with which his German neighbor saluted me, and the
" God bless your honor ! " which a cheery son of Old
Erin showered down upon me, and the simple " Thank
you, sir, " which came up on all sides from our true-
hearted New England boys, were alike refreshing to my
soul. No doubt the single peach or two which with
hearty good-will were given to them were as good as a
feast ; and it may be that the little comforts which I
left behind me, and which had been borne thither on
the wings of this divine charity, perhaps from some
village nestling among the rocky hills of New England,
or from some hamlet basking in the sunlight on the
broad prairies of the West, had magic power to bring to
that place of suffering some breath of the atmosphere
of home to cheer the sinking heart, or some fragrant
memory of far-off home affection to make it better. I
came away with the feeling that visits from sunny-
hearted people, and gifts from friendly hands, must be
a positive blessing to these sick and wounded people.
Of course, the deepest throb of interest is given to
the work at the front of battle. That is natural. It is
work done on the very spots where the fortunes of our
nation are being decided, — on the, spots whither all
eyes are turned, and towards which all our hopes and
prayers go forth. It is work surrounded by every
element of pathos and of tragic interest. The waver
ing fortunes of the fight, the heroic courage which sus
tains a doubtful conflict, the masterly skill that turns
disaster into triumph, the awful carnage, the terrible
suffering, the manly patience of the wounded, all com-

272 A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
bine to fix the attention there and upon everything
which is transacted there. The questions constantly
asked. What is the Sanitary doing at the front-? What
at City Point ? What at Winchester ? — are natoral
questions. Let me state first the general plan and
method of what I may call a Sanitary campaign, and
afterwards add what I saw with my own eyes at City
Point and before Petersburg, and what 1 heard from
those who had themselves been actors in the scenes
which they described.
When the army moves out from its encampment to
the field of active warfare, two or three Sanitary wagons
loaded with hospital stores of all sorts, and accompa
nied by a sufficient number of relief agents, move with
each army corps. These are for the supply of present
need, and for use during tha march, or after such skir
mishes and fights as may occur before the Commis
sion can establish a new base. In this way some of
the Commission agents have followed General Grant's
army all the way from the Rapidan, through the Wil
derness, across the Mattapony, over the James, on to
the very last advance towards the Southside Railroad,
refilling their wagons with stores as opportunity has
occurred. As soon now as the march commences and
the campaign opens, preparations upon an extensive
scale are made at Washington for the great probable
demand. Steamers are chartered, loaded, and sent
with a large force of relief agents to the vicinity of the
probable battle-fields ; or, if the campaign is away from
water communication, loaded wagons are held in readi
ness. The moment the locality of the struggle is
determined, then under the orders of the Provost
Marshal, an empty house is seized and made the Sani-

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 273
tary headquarters or general storehouse ; or else some
canal barge is moored at the crazy Virginia wharf and
used for the same purpose. This storehouse is kept
constantly full from Washington, or else from Balti
more and New York ; and the branch depots which are
now established in each army corps are fed from it,
while the hospitals in their turn make requisitions for
all needful supplies on these branch depots.
A few details need to be added. Where the distance
from the battle-field to the base of supplies is great,
what are called feeding stations are established every
few miles, and here the wounded on foot or in ambu
lances can stop and take the refreshments or stimulants
necessary to sustain them on their painful journey.
At the steamboat landing the Commission has a lodge
and agents, with crackers and beef tea, coffee and tea,
ice-water and stimulants, ready to be administered to
such as need. Relief agents go up on the boats to help
care for the wounded ; and at Washington the same scene
of active kindness is often enacted on their arrival as
at their departure. This is the general plan of action
everywhere, modified to suit circumstances, but always
essentially the same. It will apply just as well West
as East, only for the names Baltimore, Washington,
and City Point, you must put Louisville, Nashville,
and Chattanooga.
When I was at City Point, the base of operations had
been established there more than two months; and
though there was much sickness, and the wounded
were being brought in daily by hundreds from the pro
longed struggle for the Weldon Road, everything moved
on with the regularity of clockwork. As you neared
the landing, coming up the James, you saw, a little
farther up the river, the red flag of the Sanitary Com-
18

274 A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
mission floating over the three barges which were its
ofifice, ite storehouse, and its distributing store for the
whole Army of the Potomac. Climbing up the steep
road to the top of the bluff, and advancing over the
undulating plain a mile, you come to a city, — the city
of hospitals. The white tente are arranged in lines of
almost mathematical accuracy. The camp is inter
sected by roads broad and clean. Every corps, and
every division of every corps, has its allotted square.
Somewhere in these larger squares your eye will be
sure to catch sight of the Sanitary flag, and beneath it
a tent, where is the corps station. You enter, and you
find within, if not as great an amount, at least as
varied a supply of hospital stores as you would find
anywhere, waiting for surgeons' orders. To a very
great extent the extra diet for all the sick and wounded
is furnished from these stores, and very largely the
cooking of it is overseen by ladies connected with the
Commission. In every corps there are from five to
fifteen relief agents, whose duty it is to go through the
wards once, twice, three times in each day, to see what
the sick need for their comfort, to ascertoin that they
really get what is ordered, and in every way to alleviate
suffering and to promote cheerfulness and health.
I shall never forget a tour which I made with a relief
agent through the wards for the blacks, both because it
showed me what a watchful supervision a really faith
ful person can exercise, and because it gave such an
opportonity to observe closely the conduct of these
people. The demeanor of the colored patients is really
beautiful, — so gentle, so polite, so grateful for the least
kindness. And then the evidences of a desire for
mentel improvement and religious life which meet you
everywhere are very touching. Go from bed to bed.

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 275
and you see in their hands primers, spelling-books, and
Bibles, and the poor worn sick creatures, the moment
they feel one throb of returning health, striving to
master their alphabet, or spell out their Bible. In the
evening, or rather in the fading twilight, some two
hundred of them crept from the wards, and seated
themselves in a circle around a black exhorter. Re
ligion to them was a real thing; and so their worship
had the beauty of sincerity, while I ought to add that it
was not marked by that grotesque extravagance some
times attributed to it. One cannot but think better of
the whole race after the experience of such a Sabbath.
The only drawback to your satisfaction is that they die
quicker and from less cause than the whites. They
have not the same stubborn hopefulness and hilarity.
Why indeed should they have?
Speaking of the white soldiers, everybody who goes
into their hospitals is happily disappointed, — you see
so much order and cheerfulness, and so little evidence of
pain and misery. The soldier is quite as much a hero
in the hospital as on the battle-field. Give him any
thing to be cheerful about, and he will improve the
opportunity. You see men who have lost an arm or a
leg, or whose heads have been bruised almost out of
likeness to humanity, as jolly as they can be over little
comforts and pleasures which ordinary eyes can hardly
see with a magnifying glass. So it happens that a
camp of six thousand sick and wounded, which seems
at a distance a concentration of human misery that you
cannot bear to behold, when near does not look half so
lugubrious as you expected; and you are tempted to
accuse the sick men of having entered into a conspiracy
to look unnaturally happy.
If you go back now six or thirteen miles to the field

276 A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
hospitals you find nothing essentially different. The
system and its practical workings are the same. But
it is a perpetual astonishment to find that here, near to
the banks of a river that has not a respectable village
on its shores from Fortress Monroe to Richmond, —
here, in a houseless and desolate land which can only
be reached by roads which are intersected by gullies,
which plunge into sloughs of despond, which lose
themselves in the ridges of what were once corn-fields,
or meander amid stumps of what so lately stood a
forest, —that here you have every comfort for the
sick. All needed articles of clothing, the shirts and
drawers, the socks and slippers, -^ and all the delica
cies, too, the farinas, the jellies, the canned meats and
fruits, the concentrated milk, the palatable drinks and
stimulants, and even fresh fruit and vegetables. And
in such profusion too. I asked the chief agent of the
Commission in the Ninth Corps how many orders he
filled in a day. " Look for yourself. " I took down the
orders, and there they were, one hundred and twenty
strong, some for little and some for much, some for a
single article and some for a dozen articles.
But it is not in camps of long standing that the
wounded and sick suffer for want of care or lack of
comforts. It is when the base is suddenly changed,
when all order is broken up, when there are no tents
at hand, when the stores are scattered, nobody knows
where, after a great battle perhaps, and the wounded
are pouring in upon you like a flood, and when it seems
as if no human energy and no mortal capacity of trans
portation could supply the wants both of the well and
of the sick, the almost insatiable demands of the battle
field and the equally unfathomable needs of the hos
pital, it is then that the misery comes, and it is then

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 277
that the Commission does its grandest work. After
the battles of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania twenty-
five thousand wounded were crowded into Fredericks
burg, where but ten thousand were expected. For a
time supplies of all kinds seemed to be literally
exhausted. There were no beds. There was not even
straw. There were not surgeons enough nor attendants
enough. There was hardly a supply of food. Some
found it difficult to get a drop of cold water. Poor,
wounded men, who had wearily trtidged from the
battle-field and taken refuge in a deserted house,
remained hours and a day without care, and without
seeing the face of any but their wounded comrades.
Then the Sanitary Commission sent its hundred and
fifty agents to help the overburdened surgeons. Then
every morning it despatched its steamer down the
Potomac crowded with necessaries and comforts. Then
with ceaseless industry its twenty wagons, groaning
under their burden, went to and fro over the wretched
road from Belle Plain to Fredericksburg. A credible
witness says that for several days nearly all the ban
dages and a large proportion of the hospital supplies
came from its treasury. No mind can discern and no
tongue can declare what valuable lives it saved, and
what sufferings it alleviated. Who shall say that
Christian charity has not its triumphs proud as were
ever won on battle-field ? If the Commission could
boast only of its twenty-four hours at Antietam and
Gettysburg, and its forty-eight hours at Fredericksburg,
it would have earned the everlasting gratitude and
praise of all true men.
But, above and beyond all, there are great national
and patriotic considerations which more than justify,
yea, demand the existence of our war charities. Allow-

278 ' A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
ing that the outward comfort of the soldier might be
accomplished just as well in some other way, — allow
ing that in a merely sanitary aspect the government
could have done all that voluntary organizations have
undertaken, and have done it as well as they or better
than they, — even then we do not allow for a moment
that what has been spent has been wasted. What is
the Sanitary Commission, and what are kindred asso
ciations, but so many bonds of love and kindness to
bind the soldier to his home, and to keep him always a
loyal citizen in every hope and in every heart throb ?
This is the influence which we can least of all afford to
lose. He must have been blind who did not see at the
outset of the war, that, beyond the immediate danger
of the hour, there were other perils. We were trying
the most tremendous experiment that was ever tried by
any people. Out of the most peaceful of races we were
creating a nation of soldiers. In a few months, where
there seemed to be scarcely the elements bf martial
strength, we were organizing an army which was to be
at once gigantic and eflficient. Who could calculate
the effect of such a swift change ? The questions many
a patriotic heart might have asked were these : When
this wicked Rebellion is ended, — when these myriads
of our brethren whose lives have been bound up in that
wondrous collective life, the life of a great army, shall
return to their quiet homes by the hills and streams of
New England or on the rolling prairies of the West,
will they be able to merge their life again in the
simple life of the community out of which they came ?
Will they find content at the plough, by the loom, in
the workshop, in the tranquil labors of civil life ? Can
they, in short, put off the harness of the soldier, and
resume the robe of the citizen ? Many a one could

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 279
have wished to say to every soldier, as he went forth
to the war, " Remember that, if God spares your life,
in a few months or a few years you will come back,
not oflficers, not privates, but sons and husbands and
brothers, for whom some home is waiting and some
human heart throbbing. Never forget that your true
home is not in that fort beside those frowning cannon,
not on that tented field amid the glory and power of
military array, but that it nestles beneath yonder hill,
or stands out in sunshine on some fertile plain.
Remember that you are a citizen yet, with every in
stinct, with every sympathy, with every interest, and
with every duty of a citizen."
Can we overestimate the influence of these associa
tions, of these Soldiers' Aid Societies, rising up in
every city and village, in producing just such a state
of mind, in keeping the soldier one of us, one of the
people ? Five hundred thousand hearts following with
deep interest his fortunes, — twice five hundred thou
sand hands laboring for his comfort, — millions of
dollars freely lavished to relieve his sufferings, — mil
lions more of tokens of kindness and good will going
forth, every one of them a message from the home to
the camp ; — what is all this but weaving a strong net
work of alliance between civil and military life, between
the citizen at home and the citizen soldier ? If our army
is a remarkable body, more pure, more clement, more
patriotic than other armies, — if our soldier is every
where and always a true-hearted citizen, — it is because
the army and soldier have not been cast off from public
sympathy, but cherished and bound to every free insti
tution and every peaceful association by golden cords of
love. The good our Commissions have done in this
respect cannot be exaggerated; it is incalculable.

280 A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY.
Nor should we forget the influence they have had on
ourselves, — the reflex influence which they have been
pouring back into the hearts of our people at home, to
quicken their patriotism. We often say that the sons
and brothers are what the mothers and sisters make
them. Can you estimate the electric force which runs
like an irresistible moral contagion from heart to heart
in a community all of whose mothers and daughters
are sparing that they may spend, and learning the
value of liberty and country by laboring for them ? It
does not seem possible, that, amid the diverse interests
and selfish schemes of men, we ever could have sus
tained this war, and carried it to a successful issue,
had it not been for the moral cement which these wide
spread philanthropic enterprises have supplied. Every
man who has given liberally to support the Commission
has become a missionary of patriotism. Every woman
who has cut and made the garments, and rolled the
bandages, and knit the socks, has become a missionary.
And so the country has been full of missionaries, true-
hearted and loyal, pleading, " Be patient, put up with
inconveniences, suffer exactions, bear anything rather
than sacrifice the nationality our fathers bequeathed to
us. " And if our country is saved, it will be in no small
degree because so many have been prompted by their
benevolent activity to take a deep personal interest in
the struggle and in the men who are carrying on the
struggle. These national and patriotic influences are the
crowning blessings which come in the train of the
charities of the war, and they constitute one of their
highest claims to our affection and respect. The unpa
triotic utterances which in these latter days so often
pain our ears, the weariness of burdens which tempt so

A FORTNIGHT WITH THE SANITARY. 281
many to be ready to accept anything and to sacrifice
anything to be rid of them, admonish us that we need
another rebirth of patriotism; and they show us that
we should cherish more and more everything which
fosters noble and national sentiments, And when this
war is over and the land is redeemed, and we come to
ask what things have strengthened us to meet and over
come our common peril, may we not prophesy that high
among the instrumentalities which have husbanded
our strength and fed our patriotism, and knit more
closely the distant parts of our land and its divided
interests, will be placed the United States Sanitary
Commission ?

CHEVALIER BAYARD:
A SAINT AND HEEO OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
Lbctuee delivered before the Concord Ltceum,
January 10, 1894.
WHEN your committee kindly asked me to lecture
once more before the Concord Lyceum, I would
gladly, had time and strength permitted, have chosen
some person, or some subject, connected with our noble
town life. For I count it a duty, as it should be a
pleasure, for every citizen, and even for those who are
only citizens by adoption, to do what they can to make
clear the process by which the tangled wilderness has
been made the home of civilized life. For nothing does
us more good than really to understand what our privi
leges have cost. So I should of preference have chosen
some local topic, which would in itself have enlisted
your interest But it was impossible.
I turn to what is possible, and ask your attention to
a subject, to which heretofore I have given an imperfect
treatment, A Saint and Hero of the Middle Ages!
Such is the title. In other words we speak of the life,
the exploits, the pure and noble qualities, of one widely
enough known by fame, little known in fact, Pierre du
Terrail, commonly called " Bayard, the knight without
fear and without reproach," — a man who, with all his
ability, valor, and trustworthiness, was never called to
a high command, but whose name survives when the

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 283
names of the nominally great commanders have sunk
into merited oblivion.
I am well aware that this career fell, as we might say,
on the outer edge of the Middle Ages. Chronologically'
speaking, it might be more correct to say a saint and
hero of the opening modern time. But Bayard was so
essentially the result of influences and tendencies which
then were waning, — ip his breast the principles and
vows of that chivalry, which in all other bosoms seemed
to have fallen into shameful decay, were so vital, — that
we must hold fast to the title " a saint and hero of the
Middle Ages." He was as one born out of due time.
He was like that last bright ray that darts across the
horizon beneath which the sun itself has gone down.
Let us pause a moment to sketch tho dark background
on which this bright career was cast. That is, let us
seek to comprehend that general condition of thought
and action, which makes this life wellnigh unique in
its purity, its unselfishness, and its contempt of rapine
and lawless violence. Note first the decay of chivalry,
which was itself the glory of the Dark Ages, and one
of the influences which kept society from falling asunder,
and men from flying at one another's throats like wolves.
At its heart what was chivalry ? Read the word of its
latest historian : " It was the Christian form of the mili
tary profession. The knight was a Christian soldier."
He entered tbe ranks through vigils and prayer. He was
to serve God and the Church. He was to abide by the
truth and keep his pledge. The weak must look to him
for defence. The love of gold must not corrupt him.
The Right and the Good must find in him a champion
against Injustice and Evil. The theory perhaps was
better than the practice. Still in that long period of
darkness and bloodshed one of the few bright spots was

284 CHEVALIEE BAYAED.
the institution of chivalry. If you wish to read the story
of true and false knighthood told as only the Northern
Magician could tell it, take down your Ivanhoe, and com
pare Richard the Lion-hearted and the son of Cedric
with the mean and crafty Prince John and the cruel
and sensual Knight Templar. But when Bayard came
on the stage the glamour and the good of chivalry
had alike departed. There was temerity enough ; thirst
enough for adventure and glory ; but little of conse
crated valor, little care for the weak and helpless, less
devotion to the things which were true and just. This
is the first point to be noted.
Incessant warfare was another condition of the times.
Green, in his History of the English People, calls the
period from 1336 to 1431 the Hundred Years' War. Not,
I suppose, that the conflict of arms was absolutely un
broken ; but that peace, when it came, was a hollow,
precarious, and always brief truce, hardly a breathing
spell between strife and strife. From 1504 to 1542
France was in a state of almost continuous warfare;
rarely with entire success, rarely with complete failure ;
but all the time the sapping of her strength, the decrease
of her prosperity, the debasement of her people, went on.
By name the Thirty Years' War in Germany is widely
known. It involved in its fatal embrace half the so
called civilized world. But who shall count up the
almost innumerable battles which drenched with fra
ternal blood the fatherland ? Who shall enumerate the
towns that were burned, the cities that were stormed
and desolated, the citizens that were slain, the women
that were dishonored ? A well informed writer tells us,
that the crowd of lost women which followed an army
were more in number than the soldiery, — that in a
district, more than usually favored by distance from the

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 285
principal seats of war, before the conflict began 1,733
families dwelt peacefully in 1,716 houses, while after
the war only 627 houses were left standing and but 316
families to occupy them, -^ and that of flocks of many
thousand sheep not one was left. "Two centuries
later," he adds, " the losses thus suffered were scarcely
recovered. In all ranks, life was meaner, poorer, and
harder," while intellectual and moral decadence kept
pace with the physical misery.
The atrocity which marked warfare cannot be over
looked. The restraints which chivalry in .its best days
imposed on cruelty had passed away ; those of the
modern code of war had not come into existence. The
wealth, honor, life, of the conquered depended upon the
stern will of prince or commander, or the mercy of a
rude and passionate soldiery.
In 1466, Philip the Good of Burgundy (I think the
title must have been an ironical one) besieged Dinant, a
flourishing town in the Low Countries. Its chief offence
was, that a few of its rabble had insulted the Duchess by
carrying about an eflfigy and using vile language. After
a brief resistance the town surrendered at discretion.
With a cool malignity the Good Duke took his revenge.
Eight hundred of the citizens were tied back to back by
twos and cast into the Meuse. All the rest of the males
were sold into slavery. The women and children were
driven out to live or die as it might happen. Every
particle of personal property was seized. Then the
town was set on fire and wholly consumed. Finally,
contractors spent seven months demolishing walls,
bridges, and towers. So at last the good duke carried
out his threat Men no longer said, " Dinant is," but
" Dinant was." This was the mercy granted by the
great. What was the clemency of the soldiery ? Fifty

286 CHEVALIEE BAYAED.
years ago I read an account of the sack of Magdeburg,
written by an eyewitness and sufferer. I have never
seen the account since. But the dreadful picture hangs
in the gallery of memory. Robbery, murder, rape,
arson, were visited upon the hapless people. No form of
cruelty or horror was spared. When the orgies ceased,
thirty thousand of the slain strewed the streets of a city
of which nothing remained but the blackened walls of
its cathedral. One more instance. In 1527 the army
of Constable Bourbon stormed Rome. No consideration
for the sacredness of the place restrained the fierce sol
diery, most of whom were by birth and association
Catholic. Every outrage which history records or the
imagination can conceive was inflicted upon the high
and the low alike. And all this went on, not for a few
hours, but for weeks and months, with scarcely an
abatement. Rome, says the historian, has been the
prey of barbarian hosts of Huns, Goths, and Vandals, but
from the hands of neither did she ever experience such
cruelty as from the subjects of a bigoted Catholic mon
arch. These are terrible instances. We admit it. But
they are only exhibitions of what in a lesser degree was
the wellnigh universal ferocity. Even so wise and
clement a prince as Gustavus Adolphus had to grant
his army the privilege of sacking the towns it stormed.
Such at any rate was one side of that martial experience
with which every soldier had to come into contact. It
was into a world in which such influences were universal
and rampant that Bayard was ushered. Amid them
he lived, and played his part, and if we are to accept
the statement of his generation, unconquered aud un
stained. By this contrast between the career and the
environment we can better estimate the character and
the high purpose which was behind the life men saw.

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 287
Certainly, if he had any purity, any humanity, any un
selfish devotion, these qualities will shine with a clearer
lustre upon such a dark background. Perhaps we are
prepared now to study the life in its true perspective.
Bayard was born in the province of Picardy at the
beginning of tbe last quarter of the fifteenth century, in
1475, month and day unknown. This place of his birth,
we are told, had reared knights and nobles so heroic and
virtuous, and so many, that they were called " the scarlet
of the gentlemen of France." " For," says the chron
icler, " without disrespect to other nobles, they excelled
all as the scarlet surpasses all other hues in brilliancy."
Whether this be true or not, it certainly shows that local
pride did not wait till the nineteenth century to be born.
If you examine now the pedigree of Bayard, you will
question whether in France or anywhere else could be
found a family which had manifested so much loyalty
at so great a cost His grandfather with four greats
prefixed died fighting for his Dauphine against the
Duke of Savoy. His grandfather with three greats
prefixed fell in the service of his prince on an un
known battle-field. His great-great-grandfather was
with King John when he met the Black Prince at
Poitiers, and with hundreds of the French nobility
perished on that disastrous day. His great-grandfather
met a similar fate at Agincourt, which closed with an
English victory a campaign which every schoolboy in
my day would remember by the words Shakespeare puts
into the mouth of King Henry Fifth : —
"In peace there 's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility.
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger," —

288 CHEVALIEE BAYAED.
a counsel which one ventures to think they were not
slow to obey. The grandfather, faithful to the crown
amid many who were faithless, met his fate at Mont-
Ihery, sleeping on the bed of honor with six mortal
wounds. The father was so sorely wounded at Guine-
gate, the Battle of Spurs as it is sometimes called, that,
though he lived many years after it, he was never able
to leave his house. With such progenitors our hero
could hardly help becoming the knight without fear, or
sealing his loyalty to his country and king by occupying
the post of honor and danger, and dying on his arms.
The chronicle records that, a little time before his
death, Bayard's father, " considering that by nature he
could not make much longer sojourn in this mortal
life," called into his presence his four boys, and asked
them what they desired to be. The oldest wished " to
stay at home and care for his father to the end of his
days." The youngest two were ambitious of church
preferment ; and in process of time became abbots.
But there was one into whose breast the heroic memo
ries of his ancestors had sunk, and made him unfit for
the quiet career of a country squire, or even tlie learned
leisure which would be the lot of a faithful abbot. It
was Bayard, then only thirteen years of age. " My
lord and father, although by your paternal love I feel
myself so greatly bound that I ought to be forgetful of
all else, and serve but you till your life's end, neverthe
less the recital of the great and noble deeds that often
times you have told to us of noble knights in bygone
times, even of some of our own house, has taken such
root in my heart, that I will be, if it may please you, of
the same estate in which you and your ancestors have
been, and follow the pursuit of arms. For it is the one
thing in this world that I the most desire ; and I trust,

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 280
by God's help, to bring you no dishonor." This answer
touched the old warrior more than either of the others.
No doubt it recalled his own warlike dreams. For it
was with tears that he replied, " My child, may God
give thee his grace. Thou bearest much resemblance
in face and figure to thy grandfather, who was in his
time one of the most accomplished knights in Christen
dom. I will forthwith endeavor to further thy desires."
So he straightway sent a messenger to summon the
Bishop of Grenoble, his wife's brother. The prelate
came right speedily, and with certain neighboring gen
tlemen took counsel as to the fate of the boy. Finally
it was decided the Bishop should take him away and
put him as a page into the household of the Duke of
Savoy. This, so far as we have any record, severed the
connection of the boy with his ancestral home. The
young eagle plumed his wings and left the nest to take
alone his flight. I cannot refrain from quoting the last
charge of his mother. It shows that in tbat home, half
house, half castle, where to our eyes life might have
been rough and rude, one good woman dwelt, who was
full of womanly graces. She was in the tower of the
castle, we are told, tenderly weeping. But when she
learned that her son was already mounted and ready to
depart she descended and spoke her last words : " My
child, you are going into the service of a noble prince.
As a mother can command her child, three things I
entreat of thee. The first is, that thou shalt love and
fear God's service. Each night and each morning rec
ommend thyself to Him, and He will assist thee. Tbe
second is, that you be gentle and courteous unto all men.
Keep thyself from pride. Be humble and useful to all
men. Be loyal in word and deed. Be a man of your
word. Help poor widows and orphans, and God will
19

290 CHEVALIEE BAYAED.
reward you. And thirdly, with the goods God gives
unto thee, be charitable unto the poor and needy ; and
believe me such charities, my child, will profit you
much in body and in soul. I much think that your
father and I will not live a long time. May God give
us at least the happiness, whilst we still live, of always
hearing good tidings of you." What mother a genera
tion ago, sending out her choicest to struggle in the
Wilderness, or to die at Gettysburg, could add much to
the counsel of this mother, living in what we are apt to
think the Dark Ages of morals as well as intelligence ?
It was a strange life into which the boy was intro
duced. But it was the life in those days of every young
aspirant for knightly honors and martial fame. The
family relinquished all control of their own. It was an
apprenticeship, only more stern as the ways of war are
sterner than those of peace. The very form of expres
sion by which the conveyance was made was significant.
" This is my nephew," said the good Bishop. " He is of
a goodly race. I come to make you a present of him."
" It is a good present," is the reply. " I gladly receive
it. God make a brave man of liim." The transaction
is concluded. For the time being the youth belongs to
his feudal lord ; — to stay in tbe home castle, learning
the art of war, or to go afield and to face every danger,
just as his lord wills. In either case, the life of page or
squire was no sinecure. The reverse. At every stage
his martial training made the first demand. Every day
he must run, jump, wrestle, cast the stone or heavy
bar ; — in short, practise such exercises as would make
him both stroug and supple ; able to bear heavy armor ;
able to climb the steep embankment and scale the
ruined wall ; fit to encounter in tournament or battle

CHEVALIEE BAYARD. 291
sturdy knights. But this was not all. This would only
make him a strong churl. He was to be a knight.
He must learn the use of arms, be able to mount his
charger without stirrups, and keep his seat however the
steed might rear or leap. Then at full gallop he must
strike fairly the quintain, that is, the image of a man
set at the right height on a post. For was he not in his
lord's house to learn to fight skilfully and to endure
manfully ?
But this was but a fraction of his work. Practically
he was valet, waiter, and groom. The clothing and
arms of the knight he served were in his charge. In
the morning he robed and armed his superior and at
night disrobed him. At the table he stood and served,
supplying the meat and the bread, the water and the
wine. It was his business to wash and groom his lord's
chargers, and especially to see that they were well fed
and well shod. Should a visitor appear, who but the
page should relieve him of his steed and take charge of
his impediments ? So even in piping times of peace a
page or squire did not have time hang heavy on his
hands. In a well ordered military household, his
labors extended from dewy morn till latest eve.
Nor did war or the mimic battle of the tournament
lessen his labors. He must stand near his lord to sup
ply a fresh lance should the first be broken in the rude
encounter. Should his lord fight on foot, he must hold,
ready to be mounted, the charger. Especially he must
be at hand to receive the steeds and armor of the van
quished, from which a successful knight derived great
revenues. Are not these things all written in Walter
Scott's story of the gentle and joyous passage of arms
of Ashby ? No doubt all these young people and most
of their elders have read it. The more the pity if they

292 CHEVALIER BAYAED.
have not. And between fighting and fighting, was there
not the shield, the breastplate, and the helmet, and the
sword, the spear, and the battle-axe, to be kept free from
spot or rust, and flashing like a mirror ? No light duty
this for a boy between twelve and twenty. No wonder
that those old knights were able, alike in the icy North
and sultry South, to bear their armor and the wear of
perpetual conflict. No wonder either that at the end of
his four years' apprenticeship our hero is described as
being " lean and colorless."
Bayard remained in the household of the Duke of
Savoy but six months. His progress in all military ac
complishments and in all chivalric courtesy was such
that it was determined that he ought to be transferred
into the immediate service of the King. This is the way
he is described by the Duke himself. " His page," says
the chronicler, " was beloved of all ; and was of use in a
marvellous degree to lords and ladies. Neither was there
page nor squire that could compare with him. He wres
tled, jumped, threw the bar, and bestrode a horse as well
as possible." All this of a boy not fourteen years old.
So there was nothing to be done, but that the Duke
should visit the Court, exhibit the surprising accom
plishments of his charge, and make a present of him to
the monarch. All of which was carried out according
to the programme ; and the page of a duke became the
squire of a king.
What progress Bayard made in his new service we can
only judge by what happened at its close. At seventeen
he was released from pupilage, and knighted. At this
time a gentleman of Burgundy greatly skilled in arms
appears on the scene. He hangs up his shield as a
challenge to all comers. This lean and colorless youth,
as he was described, of seventeen, this fifteen days old

CHEVALIEE BAYARD. 293
knight, desires to accept the challenge^ But how could
he do it ? He has neither fitting horse nor armor ; and
he has no money. He bethinks him of a rich uncle, an
abbot. To him he goes. His reception is not encourag
ing. " Ho, master boastful," was the salutation. " From
whence get you this temerity ? You have lived barely
seventeen years. You are of an age still to be whipped ;
and you show great conceit." But in the end he got
his equipment Perhaps for the Scripture reason, that
his continual coming wearied the good abbot. The
chronicle says he won the first honors. His apprentice
ship was ended, and his personal life began in great
glory. The records of Bayard's early life are plentiful
enough, but to what extent they are traditions rather
than history it is impossible to determine. Still,
through the mists of doubt you catch sight of the real
man. This was a youth of great attractiveness. The
sturdy principles of truth and honor were already
planted in his breast. In body and mind alike he was
precocious. A courage which nothing daunted both
foresaw and produced success.
He was now to step out upon the field of well ascer
tained history, if indeed there be any such. By the
King's order he reported for service in the garrison of
Aire, a fortified town of his native Picardy. It is an
amusing illustration of his chivalrous tendencies, that
the first thing he appears to have done in his new home
was to proclaim a tournament in honor of a fair lady ;
in which tournament he played his part manfully, or
shall we say boyfully ?
It is impossible to note all the events in Bayard's
military life. That would be to write the war history
of France for thirty years. We select a few to illustrate

294 CHEVALIER BAYARD.
this side of his career. His first experience of actual
warfare was in 1497. At the age of twenty-one, he
accompanied King Charles in his expedition against
Naples. This was the first of a series of campaigns,
lasting through three reigns, which cost France much
blood and treasure, won her little honor, and ended in
shameful expulsion from Italy. With barely fifteen
thousand men, the King defeated an army of forty
thousand men. In this first battle Bayard displayed the
same fiery courage and the same aptitude for war which
marked his later years. Two horses were killed undei"
him, but he defeated the opposing troop and captured
its standard. For all of which he won from his King
honorable notice and a purse of five hundred crowns.
The story of his defence, single-handed, of a bridge,
seems to be accepted as veritable history, but it looks
like the ancient Roman myth. It runs thus. The
French and Spanish armies were encamped on the op
posite sides of a deep and swift river, spanned by a nar
row bridge. Secretly the Spanish general planned to
seize this bridge, pass over it, and so surprise and per
haps defeat the French forces. Only Bayard and his
squire were awake and armed. The knight despatched
his follower to hurry up reinforcements, while he,
single-handed, defended the narrow pass, the chronicle
says, "half an hour." Perhaps we may without disre
spect intimate that much less time would seem half an
hour, when a dozen spears were thrust at his breast, and
a dozen swords were making deadly passes. True or
false, the story shows of what stuff they who knew him
best thought the good knight was made.
In 1515, King Francis at Marignan fought almost for
his kingdom and his life. A great army of Swiss mer
cenaries, enraged that the monarch should take into his

CHEVALIER BAYARD. 295
service a body of lansquenets, hurled themselves upon
his lines with indescribable ferocity. The conflict be
gan at three o'clock in the afternoon, and was waged,
with no certain result, by moonlight far into the night.
It was renewed the next morning ; but the better distri
bution of the French troops "secured them the victory.
Around the camp-fires, the soldiers discussed the merits
of their leaders ; but all voices united in the verdict
that on this, as on every field of honor, Bayard was the
hero. In that verdict the young monarch agreed ; and
conferred on the knight without fear or reproach the
almost unparalleled distinction of bestowing knighthood
on his own king.
In 1521, Charles the Fifth, unmindful of his solemn
agreement, despatched a large army to surprise and con
quer the northeastern provinces of France. There was
no preparation, and Mouzon fell with little or no resist
ance. Mezieres was a little farther inland. Its walls
were weak, its defenders few and discouraged. It was
proposed to burn the town and to lay waste the environs,
that the enemy, who could not be resisted, might be
starved out. Bayard protested. He would undertake
the defence of the town himself. Then the soldiers
said, " Better an army of sheep with a lion for a leader,
than an army of lions with a sheep in command." But
the good knight did not have to depend upon sheep.
There was magic in his name. A thousand, including
many of the noblest of the land, enlisted under the
banner of a private gentlernan. He was worthy of their
trust. When reminded that the stores were scanty,
with fine satire he answered, " Then we will eat our
horses and our boots." With untiring activity he re
paired the broken walls, working with his own hands,
seeming to fill every place with his ubiquitous presence.

296 CHEVALIER BAYARD.
The enemy were tardy in their advance. Their leaders
were at odds, and in three weeks retired, leaving Bayard
master of the city and the French frontier safe.
But the end was at hand. In 1524 the reign of
Francis the Magnificent, which opened so bravely, was
drawing toward a close hardly less than ignominious.
The King had fallen into gross licentiousness. His
mother's malice and greed had robbed his greatest com
mander. Constable Bourbon, of his estates, driven him
into disloyalty, then into exile, and finally into the arms
of her son's greatest enemy. Emperor Charles the Fifth.
The vain and incompetent Bonnivet was appointed in
Bourbon's place, but could not fill it. What he lacked
in military ability he made up in mean jealousy of those
who had it. Bayard was sent, as he believed, for his
destruction, with an insignificant force, to occupy a place
incapable of defence, in face of a powerful enemy, for
the ostensible purpose of cutting off supplies from the
beleaguered city. " Sire, the place is in an open plain ; I
need half your army to do the work." But, like a good
soldier, he went where he was ordered. Reinforcements
were promised, but they never came. At last, amid great
est danger, he disentangled his command and reached
tbe camp in safety, boldly accusing his commander of
treachery. But the time had passed for considering private griev
ances. The army was in peril. The incompetency of
the commander had left open no way of safety but that
of retreat. Bonnivet, whose redeeming grace was per
sonal courage, took command of the rear guard, and
retained it till a severe wound forced him to retire. " I
conjure you," he said to Bayard, " for the sake of your
own honor and tbe glory of the French name to defend,
as you so well know how to do, the standard which I

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 297
am compelled to intrust to your tried valor and fidelity."
" I thank you, my lord, for the confidence which you
express in my loyalty," replied the good knight. " Had
you always done me the same honor, both my country
and my sovereign might have profited by my exertions.
In any case I will do my duty." Hardly had he assumed
command, when he was struck by a stone hurled from
an arquebuse which fractured his spine. He reeled in the
saddle, exclaiming, " Jesus, my God, I am killed ! " and
fell into the arms of his friends, who placed him with his
back against a tree. "Be comfbrted," he said; "it is
the will of God. His will be done." Then, no priest be
ing near, he made a confession to a layman. Finally, he
begged them to leave him, and not fall into the hands of
the enemy. " Go, and pray for my soul." Friend and
foe alike mourned. The Spanish general tenderly kissed
the hand of the dying man. " I would rather," he ex
claimed, "have shed my own, blood, or given the half of
all I possess, than this had chanced." Bayard lingered
a few moments, then murmured, " God and my country,"
and expired. " Alas, I have lost a great captain ! "
exclaimed the King. The soldiers, when peril was near
or honor to be won, would say, " Bayard should have
been here ; but Bayard is in his grave." The body was
laid in the family tomb at Dauphiny. " For the space
of a month you would have said that the people of
Dauphiny were expecting immediate ruin ; for they did
naught . save lament and weep ; and feasts, dances, ban
quets, and all other pastimes ceased. Alas ! they were
right indeed;. for a greater loss could not happen for
the country, and every man soever was grieved to the
heart thereby. Be assured thatit.touched right closely
the poor gentlemen, gentlewomen, . widows, and poor
orphans to whom he secretly gave and distributed his

298 CHEVALIEE BAYAED.
goods. But with time all things pass away but the love
of God. The good chevalier had feared and loved Him
during his life ; after his death may his renown abide."
With this touching eulogy the loyal servitor closes
his account of the leader he had followed and loved,
and whose memory he has done so much to preserve. I
think that we shall have to concede the title hero. Not
hero according to the highest Christian plan, not hero
in that wide brotherhood which includes in its regard all
races and all nations ; but hero according to the light of
the time in which he lived. He who faced death every
day for honor, and not for self or power, he who won
from twice ten thousand brave men the distinction of
" the knight without fear," must have had a courage of
finer temper than comes to most. Whether we can add
saint remains to be seen.
We have hastily sketched what Bayard did, — how
and with what honor he passed through that curious
apprenticeship, by which the page became a knight,
what record his life has left on the military annals of
France, and what the soldier thought of his fellow soldier.
It remains now to ask, not what he did, but what he
was, — to go beneath outward acts and ascertain the real
quality of the man. Was he a bravo fighting for the
pure love of bloodshed ? Or did he play his part, as
many a plumed knight before him had done, for the sake
of the rich rewards of place and wealth which successful
warfare brought? Or was there infused into the dis
position of this man something more lofty, something
more gentle and generous, which separated him from
the common herd of mercenary fighters ? These are
the questions we seek briefly to answer. They are the
questions upon whose settlement depend Bayard's claim

CHEVALIEE BAYAED. 299
to the title of saint ; or, to use the language of his day,
" the knight without reproach or spot."
Bayard was the last of the true knights. He rep
resented the spirit and purpose of chivalry in its best
estate. Chivalry was not instituted to put an end to
war. With the spirit of men and nations, it was theu
impossible. Is it quite possible to-day ? Chivalry was
instituted to put nobler elements into warfare, — to
make Christian soldiers. Singular perversion of the
title 1 And chivalry was going down in the presence of
the mightier forces of modern civilization. But before it
set, it sent across the bloody fields one flash of intensest
glory. On one side of him Bayard was a knight. He was
that in all externals. Knighthood flourished when the
fate of the combat depended upon the prowess of the
single man, upon the battle-axe of Richard the Lion-
hearted. To be this decisive man the body must be
strong, agile, and enduring. In his own person he must
have, as the proverb reads, " onset of greyhound, de
fence of boar, flight of wolf," the knowledge of arms
perfect, the apprehension of the senses quick and sure.
Bayard had all these. Never did he find a single man
who could cross swords with him successfully. The
knight must be, too, a rare horseman, ready to mount
without use of stirrups ; able to keep his seat, however
vicious the steed ; skilled to guide his charger in curvet-
tings and wheelings such as we should now look for in
the circus. The boys, when they read again their
Ivanhoe, will note how in the account of the tournament
at Ashby, applause greeted the Disinherited Knight
because he reined his horse backward with such skill
down the long lists. Well, Bayard was born to witch
the world with noble horsemanship. Thrice as a boy of

300 CHEVALIEE BAYARD.
less than fourteen he exhibited a dexterity almost
miraculous. Tournaments also, run for honor's sake',
were eminently characteristic of chivalry. Bayard did
not outgrow his taste for these, and certainly never his
capacity. The good knight therefore, on one side of
him, kept undimmed the traditions of the elder time.
Justice demands that we add that he had another side,
open to the life which was dawning. He was a com
petent soldier as well as champion, — better far than
most who commanded him.
Turn now to the moral side of chivalry, as it was in
its best days ; its side of sentiment. The true knight
must be loyal to his country and his king. Bayard had
little for which to thank his king. For great services
he received small reward, and, fit to command, he lived
and died in a subordinate position. In the light of this
read his own words. Emperor Maximilian, then in
alliance with Prance, said to the good Chevalier, " My
lord of Bayard, I should willingly give a hundred thou
sand florins to have a dozen such as you." To which
the Chevalier replied, " Sire, for your praises I most
humbly thank you. Of one thing, rest assured, that,
while my master remains your ally, you can have no
more faithful follower than myself." Pope Julius
desired to purchase, his services, offering to make him
Captain General of his forces. With the low tone of
patriotism then prevalent, when boundaries were con
tinually unsettled, and you might rise in the morning a
subject of the King of Spain and go to bed a subject of
the King of France, as happened more than once in
Milan, such a sale of services would not have been con
sidered peculiarly disgraceful. Major Dalgettys were
roaming about by hundreds. The swords of half the
Swiss confederacy were for sale to the highest bidder.

CHEVALIER BAYARD. 301
Black companies and white companies were everywhere
seeking employment. But Bayard was not of this sort.
"Sire, I know of but two masters, the God in heaven
and the King~ of France on the earth." Even at the
hour of death he could not overlook the desertion of one's
standard. When Bourbon, who, if any could be justified
in such a desertion, expressed his grief, writhing in pain
the dying man said : " I thank you for your sympathy,
but I desire no pity at your hands. I die like a true man,
in the service of my King and my country. Save your
pity for yourself, who are bearing arms against your
faith, your sovereign, and your nation." And in a
few moments expired, murmuring, — the ruling passion
strong in death, — " God and my country ! "
Chivalry said the true knight must not descend to
rapine and violence with the conquered. But the habit
of the age was the reverse. When a city was taken,
every innocent burgher had to tremble for his property,
his own life, and the honor of his family. Note, now, the
language of the knight, who in this respect certainly
was without reproach. When told that, if he did not
take a poor man's money, somebody else would, he
answers : " My lord, I do that which I ought God has
not set me in this world to live by pillage or rapine.
And, moreover, this poor man can go and hide his
money, and when the war shall have passed out of the
country he will be able to help himself therewith, and
will pray to God for me." Note his practice. His works
and his faith were yoked together equally. When he
retired from a town which he had occupied, he first paid
the good man or woman at whose house he had lodged
a proper recompense, then remained the last man, that
no mean camp follower might linger to insult and
plunder.

302 CHEVALIER BAYARD.
A town in Naples revolted againt the King of Prance,
who then held sway. At the entrance of the French
general the frightened people flocked around him, hum
bly begging clemency, and bringing as a peace offering
their poor store of silver, to the value of about $3,000.
Their lives were granted. Then, looking round, the
commander espied the good Chevalier. " Take these
vessels," he said, "I present them to you for your
kitchen." " My lord, I thank you humbly for your
consideration ; but for God's sake I pray of you not to
make me take into mine house that which has belonged
to this wretched people." Then, taking the vessels, he
presented them piece by piece to each one present, with
out retaining one. And he but twenty-two, with not
ten crowns that he could call his own ! One saying of
the good knight deserves to be written in letters of gold
everywhere : " All empires, realms, and provinces, with
out justice, are forests full of brigands."
If there was any duty which the fourteenth, fifteenth,
and sixteenth centuries set at naught, it was that which
says that the strong must care for the defenceless, the
widows and children who have none to look to for aid.
Every hamlet was at the mercy of the spoiler. Every
city stormed witnessed a saturnalia. But this was the
very rule which was at the foundation of chivalry. We
may say that it was the chief reason for its creation. It
could not make wars to cease. It could strive to rob
war of some of its needless horrors. Bayard in this
respect was a true child of chivalry. This is the story
which is told of the capture of Brescia. That unhappy
town was taken, retaken, and taken again, the last time
by the French. A scene ensued, not so awful as at
Rome and Magdeburg, but terrible to the sufferers
and disgraceful to the actors, — " full," as the historian

CHEVALIER BAYARD. 303
says, " of profligacies and enormities." Our knight was
severely wounded at the moment of the capture, and was
borne on a door to the house of a wealthy inhabitant.
Grievously wounded as he was, he ordered the door of
the mansion to be bolted, and set two archers to guard
it, that no unauthorized person should enter. The lady
of the house fell on her knees and said, " The house and
all that is in it is yours by the right of war. But save
my life and honor, and the life and honor of my two
daughters." " Madam, I know not that I shall be able
to escape from the wound that I have, but so long as
I live neither to you nor to your daughters shall any
offence be done." So this one house dwelt in safety
amid the surrounding revelry. When at the end of a
month he was able to go, the grateful woman brought
a box containing two thousand five hundred ducats as
an offering. This with thanks he declined. Seeing
that she was pained at his refusal, he said, " Summon
your two daughters," who had given him much diversion
in his weakness by singing and playing on the lute and
spinet. The two damsels, who were fair to look on,
quickly came. He bid them spread out their aprons
and then poured a thousand ducats into each. " For my
recompense, pray to God for me." Then, turning to the
mother, he adds, "Madam, I will take these five hun
dred ducats for my own profit, to distribute them among
the poor convents of ladies who have been plundered,
and thereof I give you the charge, for you will under
stand better than any other where the need is." This
unbounded generosity was a part of himself. He car
ried out to the full the precept of ancient chivalry :
" Be generous, give largesse, despise parsimony." He
might have been rich. Into the purse of so successful
a soldier the ransom money of captured knights and

304 CHEVALIER BAYAED.
their equipments poured more than a hundred thousand
crowns. But he gave it all to those poorer than he,
and died having little more than the small patrimony
which he received by inheritance.
With this I close my insuflficient account of one of the
most brilliant and attractive figures which lights up the
darkness and softens the harshness of the military
annals of that period. The outlines of that life are an
inalienable part of French history. But I am well aware
that the anecdotes which fill up the outline are drawn
from the report of one who calls himself " The Loyal
Serviteur," and who was a soldier under Bayard, and
served as his secretary. None but a really great and
good man can be a hero to his valet. Nor could any
commander inspire a humble dependant with such rev
erence, and lead him with no hope of reward to write
with such childlike eloquence, unless his master had
been a great and a good man too. Within this last
thirty years many a saying and many a story have gath
ered around the memory of our martyr President, Abra
ham Lincoln, which may not be true to the letter, but
so far as I know them they are true to the spirit. They
let you into the real soul of the man. So these stories
undoubtedly give you the genuine flavor of the life.
" You can cheat one man, but you cannot cheat all
rnen," is the French proverb. Especially you cannot
cheat a whole generation. The chorus of praise, with
out one discordant sound, which comes down to us,
cannot be disputed. Shall we not add our little note
and say " the knight without fear and without re
proach," or translate it into modern phrase, and call
him " a saint and hero of the Middle Ages " ?

FRANCIS DRAKE AND HIS TIMES.
Leotdrb delivered before the Concord Lyceum,
January 26, 1870.
"A SHORT, sturdy, plainly dressed man, with keen
.t\ gray eyes, bullet head of crisp brown hair,
wrinkled forehead, high cheek-bones, short square face,
the temples broad, the lips thick but firm as granite.
A coai'se plebeian stamp of a man. Yet the whole
figure and attitude are full of boundless determination,
self-possession, and energy."
Here is a portrait from a competent hand. The
original was Francis Drake, mariner, buccaneer, world
encompasser, vice admiral, in all capacities the pride of
his countrymen, and feared and hated by Spaniards.
To-day Francis Drake is scarcely more than a tradi
tional name; and exploits which once startled all Eu
rope take their place almost side by side with mediaeval
legends. But Francis Drake was the most robust reality
of the sixteenth century. A sailor wellnigh from his
cradle, the ablest navigator of his generation, in temper
audacious yet prudent, in counsel secret, in preparation
patient, in execution swift and fiery, he was the type of
a great bold sea captain. If his achievements to our
modern eyes smack of piracy, not on that account was
he less fitted to play his part manfully in a contest not
by any means waged according to Grotius and Vattel.
Glance for a moment at the nature and origin of that
conflict in which Drake was so prominent an actor. In
20

306 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
the last third of the sixteenth century war between Eng
land and Spain was inevitable. In that war the stake
would be honor and naval supremacy; for England more
yet, — national existence. Naturally enough, the prin
cipals hesitated to begin what might prove to be a death
grapple. Their subjects had no such scruples. The
world saw the strange sight of two nations, nominally
at peace, cutting and thrusting at each other, capturing
and robbing by sea and land, and reciprocating injuries
with a persistent and mutual ill-will.
The popular explanation of this state of things is
religious animosity. Spain was papal and the bulwark
of Rome. England was heretic and the perpetual pro
moter of heresy everywhere. That does not tell half
the story. " A great many threads went into that woof."
Religious difference ? Yes. Political difference just as
much. Rivalry of race did its part 111 concealed hatred
of rulers, and the sting of private wrongs were not
wanting. But perhaps, after all, the most potent cause
was a commercial one. By right of discovery, Spain
claimed the fairest provinces of the New World. And
she proposed to put up gates, and to bar the entrance
against all intruders ; to make the Gulf of Mexico and
the Pacific Ocean Spanish lakes, and Tropical America
a Castilian park. "No Englishman," says Philip the
Second in his instructions, "shall under any pretext
have dealings with Spanish subjects, or enterprise trade
or voyage to the West Indies." Nor was this prohibi
tion a dead letter. Confiscation of goods was the least
punishment. Hopeless labor beneath the lash at the
oars of galleys, until death came to deliver, was a more
probable- result. To rot in the dungeons of the Inqui
sition, to be broken on its rack, to burn at its stake,
were all possible consequences.

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 307
And to whom was this menace offered ? To the most
maritime, the most adventurous race then on the globe ;
to the dwellers on an island, all of whose shores were
washed by stormy seas, scooped into harbors, and made
ragged by innumerable firths and bays; to English
men, the descendants of those Northmen whose keels
ploughed all waters, and whose incursions vexed all
shores. Of course there were collisions. By fair means
or foul these sturdy islanders would have their share
of the good things of the new paradise. Seeing that
Queen Elizabeth and subtle King Philip would not
come to open war, private Englishmen took the matter
into their hands, armed ships, fitted out expeditions,
traded where they pleased, resisted violence and offered
it too, made reprisals, captured ships, captured cities.
This they did for twenty years. Observers may call
this robbery, piracy, war, according to the broader or
narrower aspect in which they view the events of the
times. But clearly we are contemplating one of those
periods, which come, alas ! too often, when human pas
sions, national antipathies, and conflicting interests so
entangle the relations of two people that nothing but
the sharp edge of war can cut the knot.
Let one illustration show how things worked. One
fair summer's afternoon John Hawkins, Devon sailor,
engaged in what was then counted the God-fearing
business of slave-trading, dropped anchor in a little
Spanish harbor in Central America. But not a colonist
would buy a negro or furnish a pound of fresh fruits or
provisions. And this, not because the colonists had any
moral objections to slave-trading, — for nobody could be
fonder of it, — but because tbe King had forbidden inter
course of all kinds with Englishmen. " Since you have
given me such a supper," quoth honest John, " I will

308 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
bring you as good a breakfast." Which breakfast con
sisted of a volley of ordnance, and three boats, with a
cannon in the bow of each, " with balls in their noses
and men armed accordingly," rowed landward by sailors
armed to the teeth, to supervise peaceful traflfic. This
performance Sir John, with humorous gravity, termed
opening up a new line of commerce. To such a pass
had King Philip's principles of commercial monopoly
brought the national relations. War then was inevi
table. But war with what prospects ? In 1571 Spain
dominated the globe. Columbus had given her the New
World, Fortune and the astute counsels of Charles the
Fifth had made her the first land power in Europe.
That very autumn, in the closing hours of a bright
October day, five hundred war galleys and sixty thou
sand men struggled for victory in the Gulf of Lepanto.
At twilight forty Turkish ships, all that was left of
three hundred, fled, leaving Spain without a peer on
the ocean.
In 1571 England in the comparison was hardly a
second rate power. Fifty years of civil war had drained
her of her life blood. The early reigns of the Tudors
had been weakened by a doubtful title, and distorbed by
religious divisions. So when Queen Bess climbed to a
tottering throne, and looked around, she saw what might
well have daunted a heart less stout. Her treasury
was empty. Her army had no existence. Her navy
was a little collection of worn-out hulks. " Only one
hundred and thirty-five vessels, public and private, in all
England over a hundred tons," — such is the record.
Only this with which to confront a power that had just
arrayed two hundred and fifty great galleys against the
Turks, and won.
Twenty-five years passed. England had come off

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 309
victor in this tremendous struggle. Sho had inflicted
a wound upon her gigantic adversary from which he
never recovered. Her freebooters had ravaged his colo
nies. Her navies had insulted his ports. The ships of
his great Armada had been torn and battered by the
violence of men and the blasts of heaven. The world
woke up, and found that this island power had won
the first encounter in the great tournament for naval
supremacy, and put Spain out of the lists.
The man who did more than a thousand common men
to accomplish this result, the man whose life almost
Contains the history of English naval affairs at this
period, was Francis Drake. He was born in Tavistock,
County Devon, about the year 1542. One involuntarily
stops to pay a tribute of admiration to this little County
of Devon, which in the sixteenth century gave birth to
more naval heroes than all the rest of England besides.
This was the home of stout John Davis, earliest of Arc
tic voyagers, who was first to try the terrors of the icy
North beyond the seventieth degree, while pressing up
the Strait, familiar to every school boy, which bears his
name. Here burly John Hawkins first saw the light.
Controller of the navy for twenty years, he may be said
to have created Queen Elizabeth's fleets. Amid its
broken hills and within sight of its rocky shores Richard
Grenville was trained up to serve God and the Queen. In
his manhood with his single ship he fought fifty Spanish
ships fifteen long hours, sinking three beside him, and
yielding the combat only when he had received his mor
tal wound. From Devon it was that Humphrey Gilbert
sailed out on that fatal voyage to Newfoundland, and
found God as near him on the deck of his sinking shal
lop as on land. Sir Walter Raleigh, courtier, man of

310 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
letters, soldier of fortune, colonizer, and in his old age
victim ou the scaffold of the malice of enemies, was a
child of Devon. In this heroic county Drake was born.
He was the son, as traditions hold, of a common sailor,
and brought up by the side of that sea on which he was
to win his laurels. The home of his infancy was a bat
tered old ship's hulk, stranded on the beach, the best
shelter which his father's poverty could furnish to a
great family. At twelve he was apprenticed as a cabin
boy. At twenty he was his own master, and already a
bold, self-reliant man and a consummate navigator.
The first clear glimpse we have of Drake is in 1568.'
He is at St. Juan de Ulloa with John Hawkins, and in
command of one of the smallest of five little ships, which
make up his kinsman's fleet. A hollow truce has been
concluded with the Spanish admiral, who with thirteen
stout ships is anchored in the same harbor. Suddenly
the truce is broken. Without a word of warning, from
all sides, from the forts, from concealed batteries, from
the Spanish fleet, a relentless volley is poured upon the
English. Three of Hawkins's ships sink. Drake, with
his accustomed good luck, escapes unharmed in a fourth.
Hawkins is forced to put ashore from the crowded deck
of his sole remaining ship one hundred men ; and with
forty-two haggard, half starved sailors, the remnant of
one hundred more, arrives at Mounts Bay, Cornwall. Of
those who fell into Spanish hands, four were burnt at the
stake, and sixty-one, having endured many stripes, were
condemned to that living death, the oars of a war galley.
Scarcely a half dozen out of seven score ever reached
England. And if any one wishes to know what it was
that stirred the heart of England with a desire of re
venge, and filled every sea with her desperate rovers,

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 311
let him read the story of the sufferings of certain Eng
lish sailors in Spanish ports, as written by MUes Philips
and John Hartop, mariners.
The most noteworthy result of this treacherous attack
was, that Drake, ruined in purse and unable to get legal
redress, swore a mighty oath that " he would get his pay
and more out of the subjects of the King of Spain." He
kept his word. But he proceeded to execute his auda
cious plans with his characteristic prudence. Had his
purposes been purely peaceful and mercantile, he could not
have proceeded more coolly. In 1570 and 1571 he made
what he terms voyages of observation to the Caribbean Sea
and the adjacent Gulf of Mexico. He wished to have a
clear knowledge of those waters, of the nature of the Span
ish harbors, of the situation of the treasure stations, of the
amount of forces guarding them, and to establish con
venient retreats and depots for his own use in the future.
Then he proceeded to business, and in 1573 fitted out
his grand expedition against the West Indies. It con
sisted of just two ships, one of fifty tons and the other
of twenty tons. Hardly fair-sized yachts for sunny
weather. The crews all told were seventy-three men
and boys. That was all. If anythingtcan heighten our
sense of the personal resources and dauntless determina
tion of the men of that generation, it is a consideration
of the means with which they accomplished great re
sults. Martin Frobisher made one of the first genuine
Arctic expeditions on record. And he made it " in a
ship of five hundred tons " ? No, in a little craft of just
twenty-five tons. With this he discovered and explored
the straits which ever since have borne his name. John
Davis pushed his way through the ice fields of Davis's
Straits far up Baffin's Bay, two hundred and fifty miles

812 FEANCIS DRAKE AND HIS TIMES.
beyond where civilized man had been. And this in
what he dignifies by the title of the " Bark Sunshine," of
fifty tons. Humphrey Gilbert sailed the stormy Atlan
tic, and met his fate, in a shaky little saU-boat of ten
tons. With his armament such as it was Drake reached his
rendezvous in the West Indies in the summer of 1573.
With a force of fifty men he surprised the treasure
station of Nombre de Dios ; fought his way to the very
door of the treasury of silver, where ten million dollars'
worth of silver bars met his gaze, and then and there
would have won this splendid prize had not a profuse
hemorrhage from a random shot forced him to retire
just on the verge of entire success. He was not dis
couraged. With the help of Cimeroon Indians, he laid
an ambush for the great mule treasure train as it wound
its way over the mountains and through the gorges be
tween Panama and Nombre de Dios. A drunken sailor,
stumbling forward in a white shirt a moment too soon
gave the alarm, and again his prey escaped just as he
was grasping it. Finally he took, in the woods near
Nombre de Dios, a small train with thirty thousand
pounds of silver. For fourteen long months he re
mained in the enemy's waters, took and destroyed sev
eral ships, some of them fourfold the size of his own,
drove many smaller ones ashore, insulted the towns,
broke up the treasure trains, and became the terror of
the whole region. Then when he had wrought his will,
he made a quick and prosperous voyage home, carrying
thither jE 60,000.
" A pretty brisk and venturous war this," you say.
My friend, there was no war at all. The virgin Queen
and his Serene Majesty were in profound peace. This
was — what shall we call it ? — a little sharp and un-

FRANCIS DRAKE AND HIS TIMES. 313
authorized skirmishing between advance sentinels ; and
Francis Drake was a sort of self-constituted picket guard,
serving without commission, pay, or rations, and doing
a little private campaigning on his own account. Or,
to speak seriously, this was one of those incidents which
marked how swiftly two great peoples, rivals in religion,
rivals in commerce, jealous, angry, goaded by the mem
ory of mutual insults and wrongs, were hurrying on
to an irrepressible and deadly conflict.
While on the Isthmus, a Cimeroon chief conducted
Drake to the top of a high hill, and up a lofty tree on
which steps had been cut, and showed him the Pacific
ocean. With that strange mixture of piety and piracy
so characteristic of the men of the times, Drake fell on
his knees and " thanked God for the sight, and prayed
God to give him grace to sail that ocean." For what
devout purpose we shall soon see. " And thereunto
he bound himself with a vow. And from that time
forward his mind was pricked continually day and night
to perform that vow." The diflficulties were vast
Merely to contemplate traversing, in the high-sterned
unseaworthy crafts of the period, fifteen thousand miles,
over all seas, through all climates, required incredible
courage. Then beyond the Equator literally it was
unknown water. No Englishmen had ever sailed over
it. What dangers, there might be, what stormy circles,
what fatal currents, what hidden reefs, nobody knew.
And should he reach his goal, he was alone, far away
from all friendly aid, in a hostile sea. Nor was this all.
The medical skill of that day did not make it possible
for sailors to be confined on shipboard during such a
prolonged voyage, and live. To land, and more than
once, whether to confront friends or foes, was an impera-

,314 FRANCIS DRAKE AND HIS TIMES.
tive necessity. Consider too what a width of knowledge,
covering all possible human wants, was needful. This
little ship, bound on a voyage for three whole years,
must be a world to itself. Sir Richard Hawkins's ac
count of the ship stores of a similar expedition runs
thus : " I was victualled completely for eighteen months.
But whether the baker, brewer, and butcher, and others,
were masters of their art, I know not This I am sure
of, I had excellent fat beef, strong beer, good wheaten
bread, good Iceland ling, butter and cheese of the best,
admirable sack and aqua-vitae, pease, oatmeal, wheat-
meal, oyle, spices, sugar, fruit, and rice ; with chyrurgerie
as syrups, julips, condits, trecbisses, antidotes, balsams,
gums, ungvents, implaisters, oyles, potions, suppositers,
and purging pills. My carpenter was fitted from the
thickest bolt to the pump nail or tacket The boatswain
from cable to sail twine. The steward and the cook
from the caldron to the spoone." But enough. If now
the elegances of life are added, and if one insists that
for ornament and use there must be expert musicians,
and rich furniture, — " all the vessels for the table,"
as it is recorded, " yea, many belonging even to the
cooke roome being of solid silver," — one comprehends
that the burdens of a great captain were heavy, even
before he lifted an anchor or loosed a sail.
But whatever the dangers, Drake dared them, and
whatever the cares, he bore them. For on the 13th of
December, 1577, his little fleet slipped from ite moor
ings and dropped down Plymouth Bay into the English
Channel. As usual, the equipment seemed ludicrously
insuflficient. Drake's own ship, the " Pelican," afterwards
christened the " Golden Hind," was a vessel of a hundred
tons. Four smaller ships made up the whole tonnage
to two hundred and seventy-five tons, — less than one

FRANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 315
half that of a coal schooner from Philadelphia. One
hundred and sixty-four men and boys made up the
crew. In thirteen days, Drake was at Mogadore. Six
months brought him to Port St Julian, on the eastern
side of Patagonia, where he tarried two months to refit
his ships and refresh his men.
The 1st of November, 1578, found Drake, with one soli
tary ship, the " Goldeu Hind," backed by a scanty crew
of forty-five, on the bosom of the broad Pacific. One
month before the " Marigold" parted from him in a storm,
whether to go down beneath the billows of the Southern
Sea, or to be ground to pieces on the jagged rocks of
Terra del Fuego, no man knows. Captain Winter in
the "Elizabeth," against the will of his men, steered
Westward, leaving his commander to his fate, — a deed
never forgiven by the sturdy seamen of England.
All the annals of maritime adventure cannot produce
another chapter so remarkable as that furnished by
the " Golden Hind " in the next six months. Here was
a private vessel, of a nation nominally at peace with
Spain. Yet week after week she sails along the coast,
plundering, not like pirates, hastily and fearfully as with
a bad conscience, but coolly and methodically, as per
forming legitimate and praiseworthy work. You go on
board the ship. No coarse and profane language strikes
your ears. Twice a day, at morn and eve, " at call of
bell, all repair to hear public prayers in a godly and
devout manner, as good Christians ought." You might
think yourself on board a missionary ship. But the'
work of plunder goes on all the same. ' The record of
the day's doings has a business-like simplicity, and is
often enlivened by a touch of humor. Thus : " We met
a Spaniard with an Indian boy driving eight lambs or
Peruvian sheep. Each sheep bare two leathern bags,

316 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
and in each bag was 50 lbs. weight of refined silver.
We could not incline to see a gentleman Spaniard torned
courier. Therefore, without entreaty, we offered our
services and became drovers, — only that his direc
tions were not so perfect that we could keep in the way
he intended. For almost as soon as he was parted from
us, we with our new kind of carriages were come into our
boats." Here is another entry : " We stopped at a town
to refresh; not forgetting before we got on shipboard
to take with us a certain pot of about a bushel in bigness
full of ryals, of plate, together with a chain of gold and
some other jewels, which we entreated a gentleman
Spaniard to leave behind as he was flying out of town."
That is gamesome enough.
The most profitable and jolly buccaneering must come
to an end. So when Drake had fallen in with the great
galleon " Cacafuego " and rifled her, he found that what
with gold and what with provision his little " Pelican "
was full. What should he do ? Whither should he torn ?
If he sailed Southward, back over his track, there were
probably Spanish galleys waiting to intercept him. He
even considered the audacious plan of making straight
for the North, turning Behring Strait, and seeking amid
polar ice-fields a homeward passage. Fortonately his
men protested. Then he turned Westward, steering for
the Cape of Good Hope, and with few incidents reached
England the 26th day of September, 1580, having been
absent nearly three years, and circumnavigated the globe.
Drake came home successful beyond all rational ex
pectations. The amount of his treasure has never been
definitely stated. Probably it was not less than four
hundred thousand dollars. The vast stores of diamonds,
pearls, and other precious stones must have increased
greatly the grand sum total. Legal people, and jealous

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 317
people, and we may well believe some honest people,
called Drake's achievements pure thieving and piracy.
Queen Elizabeth did not know what to say. She was
not ready to approve openly what she secretly permitted,
if not counselled, and the results of which she probably
shared. For she did not wish to precipitate war. She
did not condemn. For it was not in her heart to let so
much good specie go out of her dominions. So she
waited. But the masses were not to be restrained by
any dictates of cold prudence. They believed that
Drake was fighting audaciously and successfully, if not
legally, an inevitable battle. He was their hero. They
followed him with open-mouthed exultation. The Queen
came to their opinion ; or at least made up her mind
that war could not be escaped. After five months'
delay, she dined with her bold sailor at Deptford on
board the " Golden Hind," and then conferred upon him
knighthood. Here ends the first chapter. Adieu now to wild ven
tures and patriotic piracy. The dashing, somewhat
questionable, but always successful guerilla warfare,
quite proper for Francis Drake, late cabin boy, bold
Plymouth mariner, and unknown adventurer, would be
quite improper for Sir Francis Drake, man of substance,
honorable knight and Queen's oflficer. Henceforth his
course, if not less adventurous, must go through the
channels of regular, legal, and commissioned warfare.
So he paused. But he could not be an idler. On land
or sea he must be busy. One year he was Mayor of
Plymouth. Four months of a winter he acted as an
engineer, conducting with a skill beyond his time, and
largely at his own expense, fresh water from the hills,
nine miles away, to the almost waterless town over

318 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
which he presided. Twice he served in Parliament.
With Sir John Hawkins he established a naval charity
called " The Chest of Chatham." So this was not simply
a fanatic fighter of Spaniards, or a rapacious bucca
neer, but a man of well rounded common sense, full of
capacity for all stations.
For five years Drake kept quiet, — no doubt by the
Queen's command. Glad she might be to see Spain
weakened, but not ready to face the perils of open war.
At the end of that period, with a decision by no means
characteristic of her, she took a step forward and made
an alliance with the Dutch Provinces, then in actual
rebellion against King Philip. This was equivalent to
a declaration of war. Almost simultaneously a West
Indian expedition was planned. This had the Queen's
sanction, and in her economical way her aid ; that is, to
tbe extent of granting the use of four armed ships to
help make up his fleet of twenty-five. This was a type
of the naval efforts of this reign. Partly they were sup
ported by the nation ; more largely by the liberality of
the private purse. Drake, however, carried the Queen's
commission, no longer chief adventurer, but England's
admiral. The objects of the expedition were twofold ;
to distract the King's attention, and so to draw his forces
away from Holland ; and to weaken him financially by
seizing some of the vast treasures which were flowing in
from the New World. Measured by the Drake pattern,
the expedition was a scant success. What it gained in
numbers it seems to have lost in unity and vigor. Still
it was not a failure. St. Domingo and Carthagena,
great centres of Spanish wealth, were taken, partly
burned, and what was left ransomed by a heavy pay
ment. A few Spanish towns on the coast of Florida

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 319
were destroyed. The fleet retorned, having given the
Spamards a thorough fright, and bringing home £60,000
of booty, enough to repay the thrifty queen all her ad
vances and more. Unfortunate delays at the outset
and much sickness at the end made greater success
impossible. 1587 was a memorable year in Drake's life. For then
he stood forth a shield and buckler for all England.
Then he opened the eyes that were blind to see her
danger. You cannot explain Drake, Hawkins, Gren
ville, by calling them mere sea robbers. You have to
remember the blindness of Queen Elizabeth and the
duplicity of King Philip. You have to remember that
all through the period of so called peace, enormous
preparations for war were going on in Spain ; that
great ships were building ; that in all the great ports
armaments were being collected, and supplies gathered
for that invasion of England known as the Great
Armada. Rumors of these proceedings were borne on
all winds. Nay, direct information came to England's
foreign minister. Still the Queen clung to a delusive
hope. These preparations were not for England, but
Holland ; and so the good fortune of England and her
very existence seemed about to be thrown away. What
the government could not see, the common people saw.
These sailors might be according to our stricter modern
ideas buccaneers, and even pirates, and no doubt by such
a standard were. They may even have transgressed a
little the loose conceptions of international obligation
then prevalent. But something higher than vulgar love
of plunder dictated their course. They felt that they
were fighting in a wild way their nation's battles.
Drake at any rate was sick of mere buccaneer achieve-

320 FRANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
ments ; tired of striking feeble blows at the extremities
of this vast empire. To use his own words, " he wanted
to singe King Philip's beard." He proposed a for
midable attack upon the great ports of Spain ; that he
" might show her Majesty what fare Philip was pre
paring for her " ; that he might inflict a blow which
should delay the Armada ; and at any rate that British
sailors might find out what these great galleys which
threatened all Europe were made of. He wrung a
reluctant consent from the Queen, and even obtained
four warships and two tenders. The merchants of Lon
don added ten ships, other adventurers nine more. The
total tonnage of the twenty-five vessels was only two-
thirds that of a modern Cunard steamer, while the
crews numbered but 2,300. But eleven ships were of
fifty tons, and of no use in actual conflict. At the last
moment the Queen weakened, and sent a messenger for
bidding an attack to be made on the great ports of
Spain. It was too late. Drake, taking advantage of
the first fair wind, had sailed on April 2d. The bold
sailor was on his way.
What followed is as fabulous as a tale from the
Arabian Nights' Entertainments. In one fortnight he
was in the great port of Cadiz. Despite the forts which
feebly saluted him, despite twelve great galleys which
he swept like leaves before him, he forced his way to the
heart of the port. Forty-eight hours, as only men
taught by experience of the value of time and opporto
nity could do, they burned and sank and destroyed.
Fifty vessels with a tonnage twice that of the whole
English squadron destroyed, — 4,000 pipes of wine,
2,000 tons of biscuit, 3,000 tons of wheat, and all
other things in proportion, is the story of destruction.
Six hundred thousand dollars, not counting ships, six

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 321
months' bread and drink for the fleet, and three months'
provision for a small army, were brought away. Such
is the sum total of two days at Cadiz. Sweeping west
ward to Cape St. Vincent on the way to Lisbon, Drake
took and destroyed one hundred and fifty vessels, great
and small, besides storming a fort or two. Looking
into the entrance of Lisbon, he found perils too great
even for his bold heart, and paused. Here the compo
site nature of the fleet wrought out the proper result.
Sixteen private ships, thinking that enough. had been
done for glory, deserted him and went home. Nine
ships, five of them the Queen's, remained with him.
With these, sailing southward to the Azores, he inter
cepted and took a rich East Indian carrack, laden with
five hundred thousand dollars. And so came home,
having done his work thoroughly. He had illustrated
his own principles, which he states curtly thus :: '•' 1st,
to serve his country ; 2d, to serve his proprietors ;
3rd, to serve his own interests, of which he was not
careless." One asks, " What was the result of this remorseless
raid ? " It saved England. Not alone by the prodigious
injury it inflicted ; though that was a mighty stroke, and
postponed the coming of the Armada a full twelve
months. But equally because it revealed to all her
holders what a blow was impending, and more yet
because it taught British sailors that their little barks,
manned by those who had been rocked upon the deep
from boyhood, might contend hopefully with the gigantic
hulks of Spain, peopled indeed by brave men, but men
who had no familiarity with ocean needs and ocean
dangers. Drake came home to receive from the Queen
only coldness and reproofs, -^ from the people un
bounded admiration. Well might he appeal from Eliza-
21

322 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
beth blind to Elizabeth restored to sight by the terrors
of the Armada.
The old tales of the Armada ; of its proud bearing as
it steadily sailed up the Channel in a vast half-moon
with tips seven miles apart ; and how, to use Drake's
own words, " it was beaten and shuflfied together from
the Lizard to Calais, and from Calais driven with
squibs from their anchors, and chased round about
Scotland and Ireland " ; and how the ribs of many score
of stout ships were left to rot on those same shores of
Scotland and Ireland ; and how some thousands of
brave gentlemen of Spain with their retainers went
down to sleep in the waters of the German Ocean and
of the narrow seas ; and how fifty-three battered hulks
and a few thousand wretched men got back to Spain
again ; and how with all that died forever Spain's naval
supremacy ; — that old tale need not be told again, when
so many times it has been so well told that every school
boy knows it. Enough to say, that while Charles
Howard was Lord Admiral, and with his loyal heart,
brave soul, and gentle manners was perhaps the best
man of all England to keep together aud eflficient a
fleet, three quarters of which was made up of volun
teers, Drake was the right arm. Old Fuller says, " Lord
Admiral Howard was not a deep sailor ; an osier was
admiral, the navy was oak ; and after all John Hawkins
and Francis Drake counsellors."
King Philip was not quite satisfied. " Great thanks
were due Almighty God," he said, " that he could, if
he pleased, send out many such fleets." Apparently
he thought to try one more experiment. England was
ready now to meet him more than half way. An expe-

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. > 323
dition was fitted out of fifty ships and 15,000 men, with
Drake as admiral and Sir John Norris as land com
mander. The make up of this fleet was curious. It
shows how privateering ventures and national effort
were welded into one warlike movement. The stock
holders in this enterprise were : —
First, the Queen, in ships  £16,000
Second, Drake and friends  8,000
Third, Norris and friends  20,000
Fourth, City of London merchants . . . 15,000
Total  £59,000
In fine, government one quarter, private purse three
quarters. That was a fair sample of the way the best
naval work was done in the sixteenth century.
The result disappointed its projectors. For one
reason, the vice of privateering is that it asks personal
gain as a proof of success, and not increase of the com
mon good. Drake's success in Cadiz harbor had estab
lished, too, a standard not easily maintained. Still, an
expedition which held for weeks Corunna, which de
feated in open field 15,000 men, which took many great
ships and destroyed sixty merchantmen, filled with
provisions, as it was supposed, for a new Armada, could
hardly be called, by Spaniards at any rate, a failure.
Drake's life closed in sadness and disappointment.
In 1595 a fleet was fitted out under the joint command
of Drake and John Hawkins. Its destination was the
West Indies, the scene of the first achievements of both
commanders. Its general purpose may be stated in the
quaint language of the sailor who narrated its fortunes :
" They held no better means to curbe the King's unjust

324 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
pretences than by sending forces to invade him in that
Kingdome, from whence he hath feathers to fly to the
toppe of his high desires." The particular feather
aimed at this time was a certain treasure ship detained
in the harbor of Porto Rico, said to have on board some
millions of bullion. This was a ventare upon which Sir
Francis Drake should uot have been sent. In his youth,
his skill to gain, his fame to win, with the ideas of his
time it might have been well. But at fifty-four, the first
sailor of England, the first sailor of the world, there was
better work for him to undertake than this enterprise,
half privateer, half guerilla.
From the beginning there settled down upon it a great
cloud of misfortune. First, there was the curse of a
divided command. One chief was slow ; the other swift
and impatient. The one a worn-out veteran of nearly
eighty years ; the other in the prime of his strength.
The old chronicle says : " Sir John Hawkins was joined
in equal commission with Drake, a man old and wary,
entering into matters with so laden a foot that the
other's meat would be eaten before his spit would come
to the fire." It was not with a laden foot that Drake
went forth to plough the waters of both hemispheres,
and with his ship's keel to put a furrow round the world.
Then all the English plans were known to the enemy.
Maynarde suggestively says : " John Hawkins let out all
his plans to the meanest mariner, so the first sailor that
fell into Spanish hands found in the rack of the Inqui
sition a potent father confessor." Hawkins died of
disappointments and hardships, too heavy for fourscore
years. Drake found all the heights around Porto Rico
bristling with cannon, great ships sunk at the entrance,
war vessels awaiting his attack, and the treasure ship
itself unladen and the bullion placed in safety. A des-

FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES. 325
perate boat attack was repulsed. It was then resolved
to pass over the Isthmus and take Panama. Here, too,
preparations had been made for their reception. Eight
hundred and fifty Englishmen essayed to pass through
forty-five miles of tropical luxuriance. Only two thirds of
that distance had been achieved, when they came upon a
rugged defence of rough palisade ; and behind it another,
and then another ; while men were heard felling, trees be
yond so as to make every rood's advance the scene of a
new skirmish. At the outset the attack failed. The men
came back, '^ so their annalist records, — " so wearied
by the illness of the way, surbeated for want of shoes.
and weak with their dyet, that it would have been a poor
day's service we could have done an enemy. Drake
never carried mirthe or joy in his face again." Here
he began to sicken, and on the 27th of January, 1596,
died. His body was enclosed in a leaden coflfin, and
dropped in the Bay of Porto Bello, there to rest, almost
within sight of that Nombre de Dios where first he
roughly woke the Spaniard from his dream of unchal
lenged supremacy of the seas, and unquestioned mo
nopoly of the commerce of half this earth; — -within
sight, too, of the eastern terminus of that isthmus rail*
road, across which commerce, the restless spirit of
adventore, curiosity, the Saxon love of roving, for so
many years sent its great unexhausted human tide.
Fit spot for him to rest ! The mightiest seaman of his
age! Yet not one out of ten thousand that passes his
ocean grave remembers his name or knows where he
sleeps. So fades the glory of this world.
I add no prolonged character. That is stamped on
every part of his wonderful career. He was the transi
tion man from Viking to modem naval hero. He was

326 FEANCIS DEAKE AND HIS TIMES.
a sailor who never saw his superior, and who left no
peer behind. Audacious in his plans to the verge of
recklessness, he provided for their execution, in study
of seas to be gone over, in the gathering of all needful
supplies, in care of men, with a forecasting prudence
which brought wildest dreams into the realms of solid
reality. Before the bar of modem international law much
of his conduct cannot stand. But the sixteenth cen
tury recognized no very close relations between nations,
nor scanned the rights of an alien race with the eyes of a
delicate conscience. Certainly he was a great deal more
than a bold and skilful freebooter. Just as clearly he
was a sober Englishman, fighting after his own fashion
the battles of his native land, when her rulers had not
vision to see her danger nor courage to face it. But
take what view you may of his striking career, now
that his name and fame are so nearly forgotten, it will
do us no hurt to have recalled a few of the incidents of
the life of Francis Drake, heroic Devon mariner, whose
name stands second to none in that brief list of sea-
kings in which are included Van Tromp the Dutch
man, Horatio Nelson, and our own Farragnt, and a few
beside.

JOHN CALVIN.
Printed in the Christian Examiner, July, 1860.
1. Leaders of the Reformation. (Art. John Calvin.) By John
Tulloch, D.D. Boston : Gould and Lincoln. 1860.
2. The Life and Times of John Calvin. By Paul Henry, D.D.
Translated from the German by Henry Stebbings, D.D.,
F.E.S. New York : Eobert Carter and Brothers. 1854.
3. The Life of John Calvin. By Thomas H. Dyer. New York :
Harper and Brothers. 1830.
4. History of the Life, TVorks, and Doctrines of John Calvin.
By J. M. V. Audin. Translated from the French by Eev.
John McGill. Baltimore : John Murphy.
5. Westminster Revieiv. (Art. Calvin at Geneva.) No. 137,
July, 1858.
AMPLE materials- for a true understanding and just
appreciation of the labors and merits of Calvin
are now before the American reader. Henry's Life is
a rich placer rather than available metal. It contains
ore which will amply reward the careful miner. He
has given us two huge, ill arranged, and not very read
able volumes, full of the results of patient research,
and bearing everywhere the marks of two very different
sentiments, — a genuine love of truth and a thorough
ness of idolatry for his hero not common even in biog
raphers. The result is that you have for the most part
the real facts, from which you may form your own
judgment ; and you have also extravagant theories and

328 JOHN CALVIN.
special pleadings, from whose influence you must sedu
lously guard yourself. Dyer's work, on the contrary,
is clear, methodical, quite interesting, and, though
neither so full nor profound as the former, apparently
free from the influence of prejudice. Audin gives us
the Romish view. His book is abusive without being
vigorous; bitter and not witty; full of the parade of
original research, yet carrying no conviction. Ite
chief value consiste in furnishing an antidote to Hen
ry's undue adulation. TuUoch's article is a popular
sketeh, on the whole marked by a candid and liberal
spirit, but from its brevity necessai'ily omitting the
consideration of some points of largest interest and
importance. The article in the Westminster Review,
entitled "Calvin at G^ieva," is a very ingenious
attempt to prove that Calvin's destruction of liberty at
Geneva was the salvation of liberty in Western Europe.
Overstating the value of the Reformer's really great
influence, and apparently overlooking other forces
which existed independently of him, and would have
worked out their results had he never lived, the author
draws from the acknowledged premise that theological
dissent providentially widened into political rebellion
the enormous and questionable inference that Calvin
was the great bulwark of freedom, against which tie
waves of tyranny beat in vain. For those who wish to
stody Calvin's own words, we have the excellent edition
of his great work, published by the Presbyterian Board
of Education, and trans^lations of all or most of his
Commentaries. So that, witiiout reference to the more
minute works in French and Latin, the English reader
possesses the means of forming an intelligent judg
ment conceming the character and work of the great
Reformer.

JOHN CALVIN. 329
The time of Calvin's appearance was a,uspiciouS.
The Reformation had passed through its first stage. A
great spiritual movement had been successfully inau
gurated. What the age now wanted most was a man
who could give a spiritual direction to the discordant
energies and aspirations of the times. Emphatically
that man was John Calvin. Differ as we may in our
estimate of his character and works, no one can doubt
his ability to give wide and permanent sway to his own
ideas of truth. A man bold in the fields of theological
inquiry rather than in the actual conflict of man with
man ; by nature a recluse ; his proper weapon the pen,
and not the sword or the eloquent tongue ; lacking the
fiery courage which impelled Luther to go forward when
the bravest might well draw back; lacking too the
kindling warmth and genial sympathies of the Saxon,
' — he yet had qualities which especially fitted him to
meet and satisfy the great religious demand of the age.
Not indeed a great original discoverer in the realms of
truth, he was gifted with a mind vigorous, precise, and
logical, and he shrank from no deduction of his reason,
however terrible ; with a persistent will which nothing
could daunt or turn; and, above all, with that power
of classification which out of the fragmentary thoughts
of more creative minds builds up a system logically
coherent. He put in clear light, and bound together
with strong bands of argument, and marshalled in
battle array, the ideas which men were blindly cher
ishing, and which were shaking to their foundations the
strong walls of Church and State ; and so his private
life penetrates into and becomes a part of the public
life. Of the early days of John Calvin we know but little.
That he was born at Noyon, Picardy, July 10, 1509;

330 JOHN CALVIN.
that his father, Gerhard Calvin, was a man of severe
character and more than ordinary probity and intelli
gence ; that his mother was profoundly religious after
the fashion of her Church, and sought zealously to
impress her Catholic piety upon her son, praying with
him, often beneath the open sky; — these few scanty
hints comprise all we know of the parentage and child -
hood of this remarkable man. He owed his education
to the bounty of the noble De Mommor family of
Picardy. By their kindness he was saved from the
hardships incident to a poor stodent's experience.
Under their roof he was domesticated- With their sons
he went to Paris to pursue his stodies. From their
patronage he received early preferment At first he
was destined for the Church, and indeed was appointed
chaplain of the cathedral of Noyon at the early age of
twelve years, and a little later began to preach, — a
fact which he records with boyish exultation. But the
portentous aspect of theological affairs and the parental
ambition awakened by his extraordinary mental vigor
conspired to work an entire change in his father's pur
pose, and in obedience to the paternal command he
abruptly quitted the stody of theology, and entered a
school of law at Orleans. Here he made such progress
in his new vocation that, when the question of the
legality of the marriage of Henry VIII. was submitted
to the learned bodies of Europe, Calvin, then only
twenty-one, was personally consulted, and gave a
written opinion favorable to the monarch's wishes.
His later career as legislator at Geneva proves that this
legal training was not lost upon him. Nay, the marks
of that training may be found written deep in a char
acter whose prevailing tendency and weakness was a
disposition to limit the range of thought, and to confine

JOHN CALVIN. 331
the warm, gushing religious sentiments, which are in
their very nature liberal and expansive, within the
narrow bounds of technical precedents and dogmatic
creeds. In these student years the characteristics of his later
life appear sharply defined. A stern censor of morals
in the schools, as afterwards at Geneva, he rebuked
with unsparing severity the vices of his comrades. A
bitter enemy declares that his fellow students at Orleans
called him "Monsieur Accusatif," scornfully saying,
" John knows how to decline as far as the Accusative
case." He was always laborious. Withdrawing from
society, maintaining the most abstemious habits, devot
ing his days and the larger portion of his nights to
arduous and systematic study, he reaped the natural
fruits of such a course, — exact erudition and a shat
tered physical frame.
Biographers have not failed to notice the wide differ
ence between the youthful experience of Calvin and
that of his great compeer, Luther. While young
Martin, in the hut of the poor miner, was early inured
to hardship, or in the village school, brutally beaten by
a savage pedagogue, was painfully acquiring the rudi
ments of knowledge, or begging from house to house
or singing in hamlets and villages for bread, Calvin,
received into a noble family and enjoying a tender and
even aristocratic nurture, wandered at will through the
fertile fields of knowledge. This experience had its
influence. It gave him those scholarly habits and that
nice adjustment and balance of the faculties so essential
to the dialectician. It could not give him that glorious
nature of Luther's, in sympathy with all humanity. It
could not give him those tumultuous passions, those
gentle home affections, nor that lyric fire and elo-

332 JOHN CALVIN.
quence, which made Luther in the presence of men the
mightiest of the sons of God. Courage he had; but
not that courage which courts danger, not that courage
which rides and controls the turbulent waves of popular
agitation. His courage sprang rather from an inflexi
ble will ruling a timid nature. In obedience to that
will he could encounter any danger, and with unflinch
ing vigor compel a whole city to bend to his fixed
purpose. But not of choice. To the last, his recluse
habits and aristocratic refinement clung to him. His
true field was his study, his natural companions were
books. At the age of twenty-one he stood to the worldly eye
in an enviable position. At a period when most young
men are looking forward to the future with anxiety and
doubt, his success was secure. He had a mind of
rare clearness and force. His legal attainments were
acknowledged. He was sure of patronage. Yet even
then influences were at work which were to call him
away from the peaceful triumphs of a prosperous legal
career to stormier scenes and a more transcendent
success. The Romanist Audin says, that as early as
the age of fourteen he had read the pestilent works of
Luther, and lost the repose of faith. But of this there
is no proof. Certain it is, however, that at the age of
nineteen he met Pierre Robert Olivetain, a relative,
a translator of the Holy Scriptures, and a Protestant,
who did much to unsettle his faith in Catholicism.
And at Bourges, whither he went from Orleans, he was
confirmed in the new doctrine and diverted from the
study of the law by the arguments and counsels of
Melchior Wolmar, the Greek Professor. "Do you
know, " said he to his pupil one evening as they were
taking their usual walk, "that your father has mis-

JOHN CALVIN. 333
taken your vocation ? It will do fpr Alciata to preach
law, and for me to spout Greek ; but give yourself up
to theology, the mistress of the sciences." Calvin
recognized the wisdom of the advice. It is probable
that before the death of his father he preached secretly.
It is certain that immediately after that event he aban
doned his legal studies, came to Paris, and gave him
self wholly to the ministry, preaching with great zeal
to the few Protestants who gathered by stealth for
worship in that city.
In 1533 Calvin for the first time brought upon him
self the open displeasure of the French authorities.
Tbe occasion .was this. Nicholas Cap, Rector of the
Sorbonne, was to have preached a sermon before the
theological faculty of that University on a regular feast
day. Having a leaning toward Protestantism, and
perhaps distrusting his own very limited abilities, he
employed Calvin to prepare his discourse. That dis^
course covertly attacked the Catholic Church. The
result may be imagined. The Sorbonne was in arms.
The aid of the temporal power was invoked. Cap fled
to Basle. The order was given- for the arrest of
Calvin, whose complicity was suspected. He escaped,
as some will have it, by letting himself down from his
window by a sheet, and assuming a vinedresser's frock,
and in this disguise, a bag upon his back and a hoe
upon his shoulder, taking the road to Noyon; or, as
others with more probability assert, by the powerful
interposition of Marguerite, Queen of Navarre, sister
of the King.
Por two years he lived the life of a fugitive, through
all his wanderings and amid the surging waves of per
secution holding fast his faith, quietly extending his
influence, pursuing his studies, putting his last touches

334 JOHN CALVIN.
to his great work, and waiting for the place which
Providence was even then preparing for him.
It was during these years of exile that he published
the work by which he is most widely known, his " Insti-
totes of the Christian Religion. " Dedicated to Francis
I. in an epistle of such power that it has been included
in the list of the Three Remarkable Prefaces, its object
was to supply the French Protestante with a systematic
manual of doctrine, while at the same time, by a pub
lication of the real opinions of the Reformers, it
furnished a refutation of the slanderous accusations of
the Papists. Calvin was already widely known, but
this work raised him at once to a commanding position.
It was not, indeed, on its first appearance, either in
fulness or systematic arrangement, what it afterwards
became. But its subsequent modifications were changes
in form, not in substance; and it is the boast of his
admirers that after the age of twenty-five he never
materially changed an opinion. Says Beza, his inti
mate friend and eulogist, " The doctrine which he held
at the first he held to the last, " — a fact which marks
not only his early matarity, but also that characteristic
mental rigidity which never permitted him to reopen a
question for fresh inquiry, or to see that there could
be any ground, either in reason or conscience, for an
opinion differing from his own.
It is not our intention to analyze the contents of this
book. It is known to all theologians as a body of
divinity, comprehensive in its plan, systematic in its
construction, logically coherent, full in ite illustrations,
whose comer stone is the doctrine of Predestination.
Calvin has stated this doctrine with terrible con
ciseness when he says, "In conformity, therefore, to
the clear doctrine of Scripture, we assert that, by an

JOHN CALVIN. 335
eternal and immutable counsel, God hath once for all
determined both whom he would admit to salvation,
and whom he would condemn to destruction. . . . For
they are not all created with a similar destiny ; but
eternal life is foreordained for some, and eternal dam
nation for others." What constitutes a striking pe
culiarity — we had almost said charm — of the work, is
the calm, perspicuous language, as far removed from
passion and extravagance on the one hand as from
timidity and vagueness on the other, with which the
author propounds and elucidates doctrines from which
every natural instinct revolts, — doctrines which lay
the axe to the root of every principle of justice, which
make God virtually the author of evil and plainly
responsible for its continuance, and which destroy all
reasonable inducements to struggle against depravity,
whether native or acquired. It is instructive to see
these terrible and dishonoring views of God and his
dealings with men stripped of all sentimental glosses
and disguises, and standing forth in their true char
acter. No better remedy can be prescribed to a
desponding Liberal Christian than a perusal of Calvin's
Institutes. Let such a one take down this book of old
divinity, peruse its pages, comprehend its ideas, and
then take courage and acknowledge that the world does
move. Here is what half a century since was the
spiritual food of our churches, as much the milk for
babes as it was the meat for strong men. How is it
now ? Very truly does Tulloch declare that " the
old Institutio Christianoe Religionis no longer satisfies,
and a new Institutio can never replace it. A second
Calvin in theology is impossible. " Freedom and pro
gress are now the laws of religious life, and will
remain so. Some eyes may torn fondly backward,

JOHN CALVIN.
some hearts and pens may desperately resist the cur
rent, but they cannot stay it. The fearful and unbe
lieving may flee the Liberal ranks, and take shelter
beneath the shadow of the past. Like the Arctic navi
gator, they may hope to secure their position by an
choring to vast fields of ice ; but meanwhile those very
fields, impelled by an irresistible undercurrent, are
drifting from their old moorings into temperate climes,
to be dissolved by southern breezes and the rays of the
sun's full orb.
What gave the Institutes their immediate influence
was the fact that they furnished the first systematic
expression of the thoughts which were burning in the
hearts of those champions of the Reformation. But
•the book explains its own success. It has rare merits.
Calvin apprehended his own position, and he dared to
accept the logical consequences of his own premises;
and, to crown all, he knew how to present with crystal
clearness his exact thought. Of the views of that
school of religious philosophy to which he gave the
name, no abler exposition has ever appeared.
The time had now come when Calvin's life work was
to assume a definite shape. In the summer of 1536, in
the second year of his exile, he visited secretly the
home of his childhood, and having disposed of his
little patrimony, bade a final adieu to his native land.
His purpose was to go to Basle. But the invasion of
Lorraine by the Emperor Charles V. forced him to
take a circuitous southern route. In the prosecution of
this journey he reached Geneva, proposing to tarry
there one night. But his presence was made known to
William Farel, who had already preached the doctrines
of the Reformation in that city, but whose hot and
impulsive character made him unequal to the consoli-

JOHN CALVIN. 337
dation of his own work. Farel entreated Calvin to
remain and assist him. Calvin replied that " he could
not bind himself to one church, for by so doing he
should have no time for his own improvement, and that
he was not one of those who could be forever giving
out and never receiving in. " Whereupon Farel, assum
ing the attitude of an ancient prophet, exclaimed,
"Now I declare unto you in the name of Almighty
God, to you who only put forth your studies as a pre
tence, that, if you will not help us to carry on the work
of God, the curse of God will rest upon you, for you
will be seeking your own honor rather than that of
Christ" Calvin has himself recorded the impression
made by this fearful expostulation. "I was kept at
Geneva," he says, "not properly by any express exhor- ,
tation or request, but rather by the terrible threaten
ings of William Farel, which were as if God had
seized me by his awful hand from heaven. " He with
drew his objections, was elected Teacher of Theology
and Preacher, and rose at once to paramount influence.
Geneva, which was henceforth to be the scene of
Calvin's labors, was perhaps the most favorable spot
for the exercise of his peculiar influence. Situated on
the western extremity of the beautiful lake of the same
name, just outside the boundary of France, it gave the
Reformer all the advantages, while it freed him from
all the perils, of a residence in his native country.
Nominally a fief of the Empire, and for many years
under the sway of a bishop and the Dukes of Savoy, it
had three years before, by its own prowess, and by the
help of the Canton of Berne, achieved a real indepen
dence, and given in an open adhesion to the Reformed
faith. In form, its government was republican; in
fact, an oligarchy. Its oflficers were four syndics, — to
22

338 JOHN CALVIN.
whom the order and discipline of the city were con
fided, — an executive council of twenty-five, and a
general council of two hundred. In theory, all impor
tant questions were under the direct control of the
citizens. But as, in practice, nothing came before
the citizens which had not received the sanction of the
council of two hundred, and as that body undertook
only such business as the council of twenty-five
approved, it is easy to see in whose hands the real
authority was vested. As the executive council, how
ever, consisted of the four syndics chosen annually by
the people, of the four retiring syndics, the city treas
urer, and sixteen persons elected by the council of two
hundred, it might be thought perhaps that this arrange
ment would practically limit its power. But when we
consider that the syndics could be selected only from
a meagre list of eight names submitted to the people
by the executive council itself, and that the remaining
sixteen members could be elected only from a list of
thirty prepared also by the same body, and that the
members of the council of two hundred were in fact
creatures of the executive council, being nominated
and chosen by it, we readily perceive that the barriers
to its power were likely to be suflBciently feeble. Indeed,
with some limitations growing out of the impossibility
of overriding entirely the will of a people trained to
freedom by long conflicts, the authority of the execu
tive council was absolute. To sway it was to rule
Geneva. We must bear these facts in mind if we would
understand how Calvin acquired his all-controlling
influence. ^ His position was one of great diflficulty. At first he
had been received with open arms; but soon a bitter
opposition arose. This was due in part to the unsettled

JOHN CALVIN. 339
condition of affairs, but more to the essential repulsion
which existed between the rigid nature of Calvin and
the free disposition of the native Genevans. These
seem to have been a gay volatile people, who loved not
to look on the stern side of life; who were fond of
music and dancing, fond of dress and show; who did
not object to a play or cards, nor, it is to be feared, to
wine and revelry and the grosser vices. To such a
people came John Calvin, — a man who despised all
these things, — who considered them to be heinous
sins, — a man of grave manners and austere character,
engaged in a work to which he felt everything else
must bow. A conflict was inevitable. The nominal
causes of discontent were, that the clergy refused to
their flock permission to erect in the churches baptismal
fonts, to celebrate four feast days in the year, aud to
eat unleavened bread at the communion, privileges
which were enjoyed by the churches in the neighboring
Canton of Berne. The real cause was a desire to
throw off that stern church discipline which Calvin
would impose upon them, — a discipline which must
have pressed with intolerable severity upon such a
people ; which forbade all dancing and cards, all mas
querades and plays; which would have no pomp and
festivities at marriages ; which doomed the bride her
self to imprisonment, if she dared to wear on her
wedding day flowing tresses; and which must have
made the whole week seem to the light-hearted Genevese
a long Puritan Sabbath. On the points at issue Calvin,
with his usual inflexibility, declined all concession.
The citizens sought the advice of Berne. The authori
ties of that town addressed to Calvin and his colleagues
a letter, couched in courteous language, recommending
conciliation. The advice was spurned. Whereupon

340 JOHN CALVIN.
the Genevan council passed an order enjoining submis
sion. The preachers refused to obey. The council
directly ordered them to administer communion with
unleavened bread. They flatly declared that they
would not administer the communion at all to so dis
orderly and licentious a people. Forbidden to preach,
they despised the order, and delivered discourses reflect
ing severely upon the authorities. At once there was
a tumult. Swords were drawn, and the lives of the
preachers threatened. The next morning the council
commanded them to leave the city within three days.
They departed, Calvin saying, " Very well, it is better
to serve God than man." At once the fonts were
raised, the feasts kept, the unleavened bread eaten, and
even greater license of manners prevailed. Rigid as
was Calvin's nature, it is idle to suppose that he made
a stand at such cost on matters which he himself con
fessed to be immaterial. Underneath them he saw
greater questions, — whether the temporal authorities
should interfere in matters of church discipline, and
whether too he should relinquish those purposes dear
to his heart, which proposed nothing less than to build
at Geneva a Christian commonwealth, based on his
own narrow and austere conceptions. On such ques
tions it was not in the heart of Calvin to bend.
During the three years of his banishment he resided
at Strasburg, where he accepted a call as assistant min
ister. They were busy years, and, so far as his real
influence was concerned, not lost years. He devoted
himself assiduously to literary labors. He attended
the Diets at Frankfort, Worms, and Ratisbon, and
came into personal contact with the leaders of the
Reformation, and suffered nothing by a comparison
of his mind and powers with theirs. At Worms,

JOHN CALVIN. 341
Melanchthon conferred upon him the appropriate title of
" the theologian. " While residing at Strasburg Calvin
was married. A biographer has said that " Calvin in
love was a peculiar phase in history. " And it must be
confessed that his feelings were not of that ecstatic
kind which takes captive the judgment. On the con
trary, he seems to have had a keen eye to his own com
fort. In a letter to Farel he says : " I beseech you tq
bear in mind what I seek in a wife. I am not one of
your mad kind of lovers, who doats even upon faults,
when once they are taken by beauty of person. The
only beauty that entices me is that she be chaste,
obedient, humble, economical, and that there be hopes
that she will be solicitous about my health," If, how
ever, Calvin had few of the transports of a lover, he
manifested what was better, the fidelity and care of a
true Christian husband. Of his domestic life we have
but few glimpses, but those few are altogether favorable
to his character. He ever exhibited a grave affection
and kindness, befitting well his serious and reserved
character. For years after the death of his wife, he
deplored her loss with a sober grief, which proved the
sincerity and depth of his regard. He had but one
son, who died in infancy. His enemies taunted him
with his childless state. His answer is pathetic in its
simplicity : " Baldwin reproaches me as childless. God
gave me a little son; He took him away again."
The way was now opening for his return to Geneva.
What ensued in that city after his departure furnishes
perhaps the best defence of his course. Released from
his stern discipline, a madness seems to have possessed
the people. Not only did they return to their old
frivolous life ; not only did they restore the innocent
amusements, the music and the dance, the masquerades

342 JOHN CALVIN.
and the plays, the gay marriage festivities and similar
pleasures ; but they plunged more deeply than ever into
vice. The streets resounded with blasphemy and inde
cent songs ; and so far did this license go, that persons
paraded the streets stark naked, keeping step to martial
music. The successors of Calvin, men of moderate
talents and not unstained reputations, were powerless.
Two, disgusted and disheartened, threw up their com
missions. Things went from bad to worse. The city
was torn by dissensions. The rival factions met in
the streets in bloody conflict. At last a leader of the
Artichokes — so the party opposed to Calvin named
itself — killed his adversary, and was doomed to death.
Another, accused of sedition, in an attempt to escape
the oflficers of justice, jumped from a window and broke
his neck. Two more, suspected of treason, fled the
city. These things broke the power of the party, until
finally the citizens, sick of the tumult, sick of violence
and impudent lust, ready to bear anything rather than
this scourge of sedition and vice, with one consent
tumed to Calvin for relief.
Calvin came back to Geneva with unfeigned reluc
tance. We have seen that, though he had an unbending
will, his natural disposition was timid, and his tastes
such as made him shrink from scenes of tumult He
plainly foresaw the conflict which his rigid principles
made inevitable. "Pardon me," he says, in a frank
letter to Farel, "if I do not willingly throw myself
again into that whirlpool. When I remember what has
passed, I cannot help shuddering at the thought of
being compelled to renew the old conflicts. " Not until
he had received three invitations, and not until he had
been subjected to the angry expostulations of his
brethren, could he resolve to return.

JOHN CALVIN, 343
He came back a conqueror. Not a point had he con
ceded. Not a word of conciliation had he breathed.
He came with his power increased, and with a determi
nation to use that power with no sparing hand. He
came, resolved to bend the inconstant Genevans to his
will, to root out their gay, vicious life, and to build
them up after that stern model which his tastes, his
habits, and his conscience alike approved. He estab
lished an iron despotism, which not only repressed all
free opinion, but took cognizance of daily actions, and
even unguarded words. He lost no time in attempting
to put into practice his theories of church and state
government. Within three days of his return to Geneva
he had represented to the council that there was "a
necessity for a scheme of discipline agreeable to the
word of God and the practice of the ancient Church."
What he desired was not progress, but consolidation ;
not a polity which should encourage fresh inquiry and
new advances in the knowledge of truth, but one which
should organize and perpetuate those opinions to which
he himself had attained, and which he implicitly
believed to be in each and every particular a faithful
transcript of God's laws. To achieve this end, he
sought to establish on an enduring basis a church and
state closely connected in aim, in, spirit, and in meas
ures, — a church which in its own province should be
strictly independent of the state, but whose mandates
should be supported by the civil power, — a state which
should not confine itself to matters of temporal interest,
to the regulation of social relations, and to the repres
sion of crime and dangerous immorality, but which
should punish with unsparing severity the errors of
opinion, the private vices, and the indulgence of those
innocent customs and recreations which were con
demned by the spiritual authorities.

344 JOHN CALVIN,
He carried triumphantly through the councils his
schemes of church polity. The duties of the church
and state were carefully discriminated, and the secular
power as carefully excluded from all interference in
ecclesiastical matters. The control of the church
rested in a consistory, composed of six ministers and
twelve laymen, chosen by the council of twenty-five
from a list prepared by the clergy. It is a striking
evidence of the power of Calvin, that, without any elec
tion, he assumed and kept during life the presidency of
this body. The power of the consistory extended only
to the reprimanding and excommunication of the of
fenders. If they continued obstinate, they were handed
over to the temporal power to receive a punishment,
which under Calvin's influence was almost as inevita
ble as destiny.
Having finished his ecclesiastical labors, he was next
called by the council to revise the laws of the state.
The direct tendency of his labors was to take the power
out of the hands of the people, and to concentrate it in
the council of twenty-five. For instance, it had been
no uncommon thing to originate business in great
public meetings; now nothing was to be transacted
there, or even at the meetings of the council of two
hundred, which had not first been sanctioned by the
all-powerful council of twenty-five. Previous to his
coming, these citizens' meetings could be called at the
request of any member of the council of two hundred :
now, such a request was of itself considered to be an
evidence of a seditious spirit. The influence of Calvin
was felt too in the increasing severity of the laws,
whose rigor grew every year more intolerable, and
whose widening application threatened to take from
the citizens all freedom, even in the most minute and

JOHN CALVIN. 345
private interests of life. That influence was nearly
omnipresent as well as all-powerful at Geneva. " One
reads," says his admiring biographer and eulogist,
"with astonishment, essays in his handwriting on
questions of pure administration, on all kinds of
matters of police, on modes of protection from fire, as
well as instructions for the inspectors of buildings, for
the artillery superintendent, and for the keepers of the
watch-towers.'' And he adds, "If Calvin therefore
considered a new law necessary, he appeared before the
council and demanded it in the name of the consistory. "
So that in a literal rather than a figurative sense it has
been said that "he was the main-spring of the Genevan
republic, which set all its wheels in motion."
That such an authority was not attained without
opposition may be readily believed. For years a
powerful party struggled desperately against his in
creasing authority, sometimes with a prospect of suc
cess, but generally overmatched by his superior genius
and perseverance. At length, in 1556, rising against
him, four of its members were executed, the rest ban
ished, their property confiscated, and the mention of
their return made a capital offence. What were the
real character and principles of this party it is not easy
to determine with any definiteness. Their enemies have
v(Titten their history, and the title of Libertines, with
which those enemies stigmatized them, yet clings to
their memory. That all those uneasy and reckless
spirite, who hated Calvin's yoke because he repressed
their vicious inclinations, contributed to swell the
numbers of the party, is probable. That a few entered
its ranks whose opinions struck at the root of all reli
gious faith, and all personal virtoe, and even of all
social safety, is also probable. But that the leaders as

346 JOHN CALVIN.
a body were men of intelligence, rectitode, and noble
aims, — men who sighed for rational freedom, and for
a just influence in civic affairs, — is still more evident
They had risked their fortunes and their lives in a
conflict with the Church and with the Dukes of Savoy, to
deliver themselves from the burden of superstition and
the chains of despotism. And it is not wonderful that
they did not submit easily to a govemment which
robbed them at the same time of personal freedom and
of that public consideration which naturally belonged
to men who had birth, wealth, culture, and a career
spent in their city's service, to recommend them.
They sought, not unbridled license, but liberty of
thought and speech. Henry, in the midst of a glowing
eulogy of Calvin, makes the remarkable admission that
" the Libertines desired nothing but emancipation from
the despotism of Savoy and the establishment of free
institotions. " What naturally awakened their fears
was the fact that Geneva was virtoally coming again
under a foreign yoke. Refugees from every quarter,
driven from their homes by religious persecution, fled
thither. They were welcomed by Calvin and his col
leagues. Peculiar privileges were conferred upon them.
As soon as possible they received the righte of citizen
ship, as many as three hundred having been enrolled
in one day. These men, from gratitode, from interest,
and from the sympathy of common opinions, allied
themselves closely to Calvin, and warmly supported
him in all his measures. Quite early their numbers
were sufficiently great to arouse the jealousy of the
native Genevans. In the end they so increased as to
enable him to drive into exile those who had fought to
achieve the freedom of the city, and who had occupied
the highest places of trust and influence. The Liber-

JOHN CALVIN. 347
tines may have erred in judgment in some of their
measures; but in their aspirations for rational free
dom, and in their struggles to maintain it, they deserve
the sympathy of every liberal mind, and the more that
in that contest they perilled and lost everything.
It is becoming the fashion to speak of John Calvin
as a champion of political liberty. Indeed, one of our
prominent reformers, one whose whole life has been
marked by a rare devotion to the cause of human
rights, has taken occasion to use language which has
the force of a eulogy on Calvin as the creator or
defender of Republicanism. If by this it is meant
that he asserted some principles which, fc-eed from his
general system, and received and interpreted by more
liberal minds, and advanced by more enlightened
spirits, have yielded the good fruit of personal and
political liberty, we allow, though with some doubts,
that the position may have foundation in fact. If it is
meant that his " Spartan discipline " trained up men
who were ready to hurl themselves against kings and
nobles. Church and State, rather than yield one iota of
their convictions; and that thus, amid the chaos of
civil war and the wreck of institutions and powers,
God's providence evolved by their instrumentality the
grand principles of personal and national enfranchise
ment, we shall not deny it. Nay, we go further, and
say that, inasmuch as the Reformation itself was an
uprising against the old and the established order, it
was natural for the noble and the privileged to array
themselves on one side, while the common people
arrayed themselves on the other, often passing from
theological rebellion to political rebellion. But, as
Hallam has justly remarked, " it is a fallacious view of
the Reformation to fancy that it sprung from any

348 JOHN CALVIN.
notions of political liberty." Still further, as Calvin
ism was a more radical departure from Romanism than
the system established by Luther, this tendency to
which we have adverted was likely to be more distinct
and influential where it prevailed. But to maintain
that Calvinism has always been on the side of freedom,
or, with Buckle, that " Calvinism is always democratic
and Arminianism aristocratic, " is to maintain what is
not true. In Holland, for generations, it was not the
Calvinists, but the Arminians, who struggled for repub
lican liberty. In Holland it was the Calviniste, allied
to Maurice of Nassau, who put to death Barneveldt,
whose unstained character and freedom from all sus
picion of selfish aims, and whose fifty years of unde-
viating attachment to the principles of political and
religious liberty and untiring labor for their advance
ment made him the very impersonation of rational
patriotism. It is in New England, where Arminianism
and the spirit of Liberal Christianity have wrought
most powerfully on religious opinions, on literatore
and social life, that the spirit of democracy rises high
est, and the hatred of oppression is most profound
and vehement. It is in the South, whose theology
bears the decided impress of Calvinism, that aristoc
racy the proudest and slavery the most cruel are cher
ished institutions. Certainly, there is no necessary
alliance between the rigid formula and the principles
of human equality and freedom. Especially to affirm
that Calvin himself was by conviction a republican,
or that he felt one throb of sympathy for human free
dom in any large and generous sense, is to affirm that
which has not the shadow of a foundation in fact He
of all men would have repelled it as an aspersion. By
nature he was a despot; by taste, a monarchist; by

JOHN CALVIN. 349
conviction, an oligarchist. In fact, he established an
unmitigated despotism. When he had finished his
work at Geneva, he left her citizens but little either of
political, religious, or personal freedom. In his Insti-
totes he maintains the divine right of kings and the
duty of passive obedience. In his chapter on Civil
Government he thus expresses his views: "It has hap
pened in almost all ages that some princes, regardless
of everything to which they ought to have directed
their attention, give themselves up to their pleasm-es in
indolent exemption from every care; others, absorbed
in their own interest, expose for sale all laws, privi
leges, rights, and judgmente ; others plimder the public
of wealth, which they afterwards lavish in mad prodi
gality; others commit flagrant outrages, pillaging
houses, violating virgins and matrons, and murdering
infants. Many cannot be persuaded that such ought to
be acknowledged as princes whom as far as possible
they ought to obey. . . . But if we direct our attention
to the word of God, it will carry us much torther : even
to submit to the government not only of those princes
who discharge their duty to us with becoming integrity
and fidelity, but of all who possess the sovereignty,
even though they perforni none of the duties of their
function. " Again : " If we have this constantly present
to our eyes and impressed upon our hearts, that the
most iniquitous kings are placed upon their thrones
by the same decree by which the authority of all kings
is established, those seditious thoughts will never enter
our minds, that a king is to be treated according to his
merit, and that it is not reasonable for us to be subject
to a king who does not on his part perform toward us
those duties which his office requires." Language
could hardly convey a more complete assertion of the

350 JOHN CALVIN.
divine right of kings, and the duty of passive obedience
on the part of the governed. Any oppression, however
intolerable, might find a shelter beneath so broad an
apology. Charles I. and Strafford and not Vane and
Hampden, the Cavaliers and not the Roundheads, are
the true exponents of such a doctrine. The legitimate
tendency of such language was early perceived. Sir
Dudley Digges, the fit representative of a father who
was a smooth patriot under James I., and as smooth a
courtier under Charles I. , in a work entitled " The Un-
lawfulnesse of Subjects taking up Armes against their
Soveraigne, in what Case soever," quotes Calvin to
sustain his servile arguments. And Calvin's admiring
biographer frankly acknowledged that he had no love
for the republican form of government, and makes it a
reason for eulogy that he did not, like Knox, give to
Protestantism a political tendency. - It is true that
Calvin limits his general position so far as regards
religious opinions and duties. But even here he so
caretolly guards his statement, that no oppression,
however intolerable, or crime, however monstrous,
would justify either active resistance or secret plots.
So that if any one believes that in theory or in fact
Calvin was a champion of freedom, he must do it in
opposition to the testimony both of the Reformer's
words and his practice.
Consider for a moment what his practice was, for in
that we have an ample illustration of the spirit and
meaning of the theory. The government civil and
ecclesiastical which he established at Geneva, or which
was established there under his influence, realizes in
a broader sense than the author used it what Hallam
has said, that "the Reformation was but a change of
masters." Wehave already seen that, so far as Cal-

JOHN CALVIN. 351
vin meddled with the framework of the government,
he did so only that he might take the control of affairs
out of the hands of the many and place it in the hands
of the few. And the regulations which those few
enacted were of the most vexatious and tyrannical
nature, violating the rights of conscience, and the right
of private judgment in matters of a purely personal
nature. Here are a few of them. He who absented
himself from church was fined. If one was sick three
days and failed to give notice to the ministers, he was
liable to be punished. Dancing, cards, masquerades,
and the wearing of tresses or clothing not according to
the church pattern, were met by imprisonment or the
scourge, the pleasant vices of the , Genevans by death.
In 1546 one Chapuis was imprisoned four days, because
he persisted in calling his child Claude, instead of
Abraham as the minister required, and because he
said that he would rather that his child went fifteen
years unchristened than accept the name. Ami Perrin,
who more than once filled the highest offices of the
state, had been active in securing Calvin's recall.
The wife and father in law of this man were imprisoned
for dancing. To a remonstrance against this degrad
ing treatment, Calvin broadly intimated that they
might seek a home elsewhere if they pleased, but while
at Geneva would have to submit to such regulations;
an answer which, coming from a foreigner to those
who had been largely instrumental in securing the city's
freedom, and from one who had derived from them
much of the very power by which he crushed them,
must have been sufficiently galling. And what made
the yoke of Genevan bondage yet more bitter was the
system of espionage which caught up and reported every
unguarded word or act

352 JOHN CALVIN.
The most remarkable feature, however, of Genevan
administration was the severity with which any disre
spect to Calvin was punished. Berthelier was excom
municated because he said that he thought that he was
as good a man as Calvin. A lady of Ferrara for a
similar offence was forced to beg pardon of God and
man, and to leave the city in twenty-four hours on
pain of being beheaded. And these are not solitary
instances, but the like were of almost daily occurrence.
The culmination of this form of tyranny was seen in
the case of Pierre Ameaux, himself a member of the
council of two hundred. This man at a party in his
own house, under the influence of wine, was foolish
enough to say "that Calvin was a wicked man, and
only a Picard. " Por this offence he was arrested and
lay in jail two months, when, confessing his fault, and
upon the payment of a fine amounting to sixty dollars,
he was released. Whereupon Calvin, deeply incensed,
came before the council attended by the clergy, and
demanded a revision of the sentence, saying, "There
was an end of all discipline if matters were thus dealt
with." Ameaux was re-arrested, forced to make the
amende honorable, marching through the town in his
shirt, with bare head, torch in hand, and concluding
by falling on his knees, and expressing his contrition.
Are we reading the annals of some irresponsible Ori
ental despotism ? Even the inflexible Frederic of
Prussia was willing that his subjects should say what
they pleased, while he did what he pleased.
But the despotic character of Genevan policy was
most clearly displayed in its treatment of religious
opinions. In this respect no liberty was allowed. To
fall away from the state religion was to lose the rights
of citizenship and to assume the character of a criminal.

JOHN CALVIN. 353
Calvin's view, no doubt conscientiously adopted, was,
that whoever opposed God's truth deserved punishment,
and might be justly removed by banishment, and if
necessary by death. His mind, which never knew the
doubts and changes which disturb the experience of
most men, considered all opinions differing from his
own to be the offspring of impudence, or petulance, or
madness. "If any man should call in question," says
he, "the existence of Plato, or Aristotle, or Cicero, who
would deny that such madness ought to receive corporal
punishment ? " " Those who despise the honor of God
must be punished with the sword, " is his axiom. Such
were the principles on which he acted ; and the history
of Geneva for twenty-five years was a commentary on
these views.
Look at some of the results of this entire abrogation
of free inquiry. Jerome Bolsec had fled from Paris on
account of religious opinions, and established himself
as a physician at Geneva. He seems to have been a
man of character and some intellectual force, and suc
ceeded at any rate in securing the confidence of the
leading citizens and of Calvin himself. Soon, however,
he expressed in private doubts of the doctrine of Pre
destination. He was admonished, but remained uncon
vinced. He crowned his offence by a public declaration
of his opinions. Taking advantage of a custom which
permitted even laymen to make remarks upon religious
discourses, he rose in the church of St. Andrew after a
sermon on the doctrine of Election, and put the follow
ing very pertinent questions: "How can you believe
that God has determined the lot of every man before
his birth, destining this one to sin and punishment,
and that one to virtue and eternal reward ? Would
you make God, the Eternal and Righteous One, a sense-
23

354 JOHN CALVIN.
less tyrant ? Would you rob virtue of its glory, free
vice from its shame, and the wicked from the terrors
of conscience ? " For this he was brought before the
council, and, refusing to retract, was banished. Cal
vin's own recorded words make it at least probable that
only the interposition of the ministers of Berne saved
Bolsec from the penalty of death, or at least that of
imprisonment for life ; and this, too, when apparently
on all points except the dark and mysterious question
of God's decrees he was in perfect agreement with the
Genevan Church.
The second case is still more interesting. Sebastian
Castellio, at the request of Calvin, came to Geneva,
and became the Rector of the High School. He was a
man of profound culture, a scholar among scholars,
with a devotion to learning which neither misfortone,
poverty, nor hunger could cool, — a man of gentle temper
and a liberality which raised him high above his age.
This man in an evil day left the serene walks of litera
ture to enter the theological arena. He maintained
that Solomon's Song was an amatory poem, and not
deserving a place in the Canon, especially adverting to
the seventh chapter. He added to his offence by doubt
ing the truth of that horrible dogma of Calvin's by
which he asserts that Jesus not only suffered corpore
ally on the cross, but went down into hell, and there
in his soul endured the dreadful torments of condemned
spirits. Calvin angrily expostulated with him; and
he retorted with warmth, severely reflecting upon the
selfish and unjust course of Calvin and his colleagues.
The council unceremoniously banished him. The
closing scenes of Castellio's life are full of sadness.
Poverty came upon him like an armed man. With
eight children to support by his pen, he was forced to

JOHN CALVIN. 355
go with the poor of Basle to the side of the river, hook
in hand, to fish up, if might be, driftwood to warm his
desolate home. But all was unavailing. He perished
of cold and hunger. Living in an age when the true
principles of religious freedom were not so much as
dreamed of by most, he needs no higher eulogium than
has been bestowed upon him by an enthusiastic defender
of Calvin in the guise of criticism: "Castellio con
tinued all his life through the same noble but absurd
defender of unlimited toleration. " The language with
which he replies to the attacks of his opponent and
persecutor, who had not hesitated to heap upon him
opprobrious epithets, and who had not respected even
his misery, but had distorted that unhappy necessity
which drove him to depend upon the river's bounty
into thefts, is full of gentleness and dignity : " Were I
as truly all these things as I really am not, yet it ill
becomes so learned a man as yourself, the teacher of so
many others, to degrade so excellent an intellect by so
foul and sordid abuse. "
We shrink from the mention of the case of Michael
Servetas. Every true friend of Calvin, every one who
believes that he had some of the elements of the highest
greatness and virtue, must wish that this foul spot
could be erased from the record of the great Reformer's
life. We shall not recall the details of the mournful
and too familiar story. It concerns us here, not as it
illustrates the unchristian temper and deep malignity
of Calvin's spirit, but only as it bears on his claim to
be regarded as the friend of liberty. It was never pre
tended that the noble Spaniard had in any way offended
against the laws of Geneva. The heresies with which
he was charged had been committed under another
jurisdiction, and by a subject of the Church of Rome.

356 JOHN CALVIN.
The unfortunate man was a fugitive from the holds of
the Inquisition, seeking shelter in a Protestant city
from Romish persecution, when he fell into the hands
of a new inquisitor, as remorseless as any who had
wielded that office in the elder Church-
Calvin's best defence is, that he acted in accordance
with the spirit of the age, and that he did no more
than many others would have done had they stood in
his place. Whether this plea, in iteelf true, altc^ther
explains his course, or whether his conrictions of duty
were made more ardent by personal dislike of one who
had denied his authority, attacked his opinions, ridi
culed his arguments, and doubted his character, we
shall not undertake to decide.
The facts to which we have adverted prove incontest
ably that Calvin was neither in theory nor practice an
intelligent supporter of freedom, whether political,
religious, or personaL He had no sympathy with the
human yearning for untrammelled liberty of thought
and action ; especially be had little faith in the masses,
and by nature was intolerant of opposition- To call
him a champion of liberty, or the father of republican
ism, is simply to give the reins to the wildest vagaries
of fancy, or to the largest license of eulogy. Yet we
need not be harsh to the memory of the man. With
him, as with many another, the private purpose and
the public policy must be divided. Though we cannot
place one who was so poorly endowed on the side of his
sympathies, and so largely endowed with severity and
pride of opinion, in the first rank of Christian man
hood, every candid mind must allow that it was from
honest conriction that he sustained his doctrines by
the scourge and the stake. We can readily understand
how Calvin, whose conservative mind never felt the

JOHN CALVIN. 357
lust of theological roving, whose untempted experience
bred but little charity for others' faults, should trample
down with grim satisfaction the light and frivolous
Genevans, and the lawless theologians, who put in
peril his dearest notions of religious truth and church
polity. So did those terrible Commonwealth men,
before whom went down the delights of life, and under
whose iron tramp kings and nobles and prelates alike
were ground to the dust. But whatever we may think
of the man, and whatever apology we may find for his
manifest faults, we cannot put out of sight his system,
his inexorable system, — a system which, so far as reli
gious freedom was concerned, was not at all in advance
of that Romanism which it superseded, and which, in
respect to personal and civil rights, may vie with the
most thorough despotism of modern or ancient times.
If rational liberty in these later days has made any
advance, it is not by help of John Calvin, but in spite
of him; and his nominal followers, who have often
been in the van of the good fight for man and his privi
leges, have really discarded the opinions of him by
whose name they are known.
It would be unjust to deny that Calvin's career at
Geneva had a fairer side, or to doubt that his despot
ism, intolerable as it was to any free mind, had its
compensations. That it was a despotism which had
its origin in intense religious convictions, that it was
the despotism of a man of pure morals, not to say
ascetic habits, is sufficient proof that it could not have
been a base and vulgar despotism. Its aims may have
been false, its measures unjust, its demands vexatious,
and altogether inconsistent with the exercise of private
rights; it may have denied all cultore to one side of
human natore, but it could not have fostered weakness

358 JOHN CALVIN.
or encouraged vice. If we could allow that a system
can ever be permanently a blessing which runs counter
to that Divine order by whicb human virtoe must be
the result of free choice and a voluntary practice of
goodness, then we might allow that in many respecte
his way was beneficial to tbe native Genevans. This
at least it did accomplish, — it wrought an outward
reform. While it destroyed their freedom, and abridged
their pleasures, and despised tbe graces and tbe arts,
it also scourged with unrelenting severity their rices ;
it enforced an unnatural sobriety, but at the same time
gave to their lives more grarity, more rigor, and per
haps more worth. The old Geneva, whose genial life
-seemed in keeping with tbe merry Rhone that dances
through its streets, was replaced by a new Greneva,
whose stern and immovable life was patterned from tbe
cold and icy Alpine peaks which overflown it From
this stronghold, with none to dispute his sway, sur
rounded by a social life congenial alike to his feelings
and convictions, Calvin toiled through his few remain
ing years with untiring assiduity, by word and by pen,
for the extension of his influence, and the dissemina
tion of bis views of doctrine and of theocratic order.
Thither from every quarter came tbe exiles in toe cause
of religion, — men whose indomiteble wills and fixed
conrictions had enabled them to dare tbe vengeance
of power, — men originally cast in iron moulds, —
men whose experience of hardship and oppression bad
shom from them the gentler qualities only to add con
centrated energy, and who were thus fitted to receive
from Genevan discipline what it was eminently fitted
to impart, fresh intensity of faith, a sterner interpre
tation of life, and courage hardened to adamant by its
Christian fatalism and ascetic training. It would be

JOHN CALVIN. 359
exaggeration to assert that Calvin moulded these men
and sent them forth with his stamp upon them to do
his Work; for they came to him in the maturity of their
strength, with characters brought by a similar expe
rience into sympathy with his own. But he deepened
what was already profound, and confirmed what indeed
was not wavering. To say what in substance has often
been said, that he created the Puritan character, would
be equally an exaggeration. That character, like his
own, in its virtues and its defects, in its stubborn
hardihood and its remorseless severity, in its clear
apprehension of heavenly things and its unjust depre
ciation of earthly things, was a proper result of the in
tellectual and spiritual struggles, the antagonisms, the
perils, and the persecutions of the times. But he more
than any other man consolidated the elements of that
character, gave it a definite expression, and so provided
for its permanent and increased efficiency. Whether,
on the whole, this influence was for man's final good ;
whether this organized Protestant crusade against free
inquiry was a benefit to humanity ; or whether it had
been better that these great questions, from which
man cannot forever shrink, had been then and there
pursued to their legitimate conclusions, — are idle
questions which every one will answer according to
his private prejudices. This point alone is settled, that
among the mightiest of the forces which have affected
modern -history Calvin takes his place.
The hour was at hand which must come alike to the
strong and the weak. His constitution, never vigorous,
had been sapped in early life by devotion to study ; in
later life by the manifold labors and the fierce conflicts
amid which his maturer years were spent In 1561 he
was forced to sit while preaching. In 1564 this weak-

360 JOHN CALVIN.
ness had so increased, that on the 6th of February he
preached his last discourse. But he gave himself no
rest, persisting to the end, against every remonstrance,
in dictating to an amanuensis, saying, "Would you
have the Lord find me idle ? " On the 27th of March
he was carried to the council chamber, and with bared
head and faltering voice thanked them for all their
favors, saying, "I feel this is the last time I shall
appear in this place. " Yet he lingered another month,
and on the 28th of April, with unwonted tenderness,
gave his last charges to his fellow laborers. His suf
ferings, still prolonged, though acute and agonizing,
he bore with uncomplaining fortitude, only at intervals
lifting his eyes to heaven, and murmuring, " How long,
0 Lord ? " On the 27th of May peacefully he resigned
his soul to that God to whose service, with stern and
awful sincerity, he had given his best strength.
It is plain to see what constituted the groundwork
of his character. He had a dogmatic rather than a
catholic nature. He had none of that tendency which
deliberates long, and determines only when every side
has been duly examined, every point considered, and
every difficulty weighed. Espousing the opinions which
his prejudices or reason recommended, he applied to
their defence all the resources of an affluent learning
and an acute and powerful logic, until his ideas deep
ened into convictions rigid and unalterable, and a
contrary opinion seemed not so much intellectual error
as moral perversity ; and when we add to this dogmatic
mind a will despotic and remorseless, which would not
spare himself, and which would not spare those who
stood in his path, we have all we need to explain what
is painful in his career. To his mind, his own ideas
were but the earthly expressions of the Divine ideas ;

JOHN CALVIN. 361
and he who doubted or opposed them was wilfully blind
or obstinately rebellious, and worthy of any severity of
punishment. In reading the annals of his conflicts, one
looks in vain for the marks of that doubt or hesitation
or pity which in the hour of victory spares the van
quished foe. Nor did he spare himself. Called as he
felt himself to be by a voice from heaven to do God's
work, he abandoned his legal studies just as they
promised their highest rewards. With a frail body,
full of disease and anguish, he undertook superhuman
labors. Sick or well, at home or in exile, in safety or
in peril, he did his work. By his literary labors,
enough for one life, by his correspondence, so wide that
it seemed a suflficient task for one mind, by his weighty
counsels and arguments at the solemn deliberations of
the Reformers, by his heavy cares as head of the Church
and adviser of the state, by his manifold parochial
labors and his incessant preaching of the word, he
proved that, while granting no freedom to others, he
asked for himself no rest.
Of his mental resources there can be but one opinion.
With a mind of wonderful fecunditj', prompt, vigorous,
acute and logical, and expanded by a varied culture, —
with a style pointed, perspicuous, and weighty, equally
good for attack or defence or illustration of a solemn
theme, — he maintained the place of a great intellectual
leader in an age profuse of great men. Cold and harsh,
with a nature deficient in kindly sympathy, he inspires
no sympathy in others. It is one of the most striking
things about his history, that not one anecdote illustra
tive of his private and domestic life has been preserved ;
nothing that lets you into the heart of the man, no
glimpse of the inner genuine self. He had nothing of
•Luther's genial humor, his quaint rough talk and gush-

362 • JOHN CALVIN.
ing affection; no touching revelations of the foibles,
doubts, struggles, triumphs, of a great but tried spirit,
all warm from the throbbing heart. Nothing of this in
Calvin. AU hope and fear, all joy and anguish, are
concealed behind toe sober and formal drapery of
I)ublic life. Yet perhaps we do him in this respect
imperfect justice. Within a narrow circle of friendship
he seems to have displayed warm aud even tender feel
ings, and to have attached men to bim. Beza, a man
of large powers, cherished for him a respect which
bordered on idolatry. And few things could be more
touching than the sight of Farel in his old age, just
trembling on the verge of the grave, insisting upon com
ing to Geneva to look once more into Calrin's face, and
to grasp once more Calvin's hand. In some of his
famihar letters, in his counsels to toe erring, in his
condolence with the suffering, there is found a grave
sincerity and honest kindness, revealing another aspect
of his character whicb we regret that we are not per
mitted to contemplate more frequently.
He was a man of godly sincerity ; a very stern man ;
a man utterly regardless of what we call human righte ;
a most unlovely man in some respects, but not a man
devoted to selfish aims, as appears from his honorable
poverty and stainless purity of life ; a man of great vir
tues and great faulte, — f aulte which in part were toe
errors of the time, in part the excess of an austere
nature and bodily disease, in part, too, springing from
the frailties and passions of our common humanity ; a
great man, whose power for good or evil was larger
than belongs to ordinary manhood, and whose signature
was written with an iron hand upon bis age. As we
gaze upon the features which art has preserved, — toose
features worn by disease, ploughed by thought and care,

JOHN CALVIN. 363
and on every lineament bearing the traces of an inflexi
ble will, if we cannot feel sympathy, we feel respect.
We cannot call him saint, we cannot sympathize with
the opinions for whose diffusion he labored, or approve
the methods by which he sought to compel assent ; we
must hope that his influence will continue to grow less
in the future as in the past ; but while remembering his
reverence toward God, his allegiance to conscience, his
fidelity in labor, his moral purity, we can with the
Church Universal rejoice in his virtues.

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
Peinted in the Atlantic Monthly, October, 1865.
ALL doubtless remember the story which is told
of the witty Charles H. and the Royal Society :
how one day the King brought to the attention of its
members a most curious and inexplicable phenomenon,
which he stated thus : " When you put a trout into a
pail full of water, why does not the water overflow ? "
The savants, naturally enough, were surprised, and sug
gested many wise, but fruitless explanations ; until at
last one of their number, having no proper reverence
for royalty in his heart, demanded that the experiment
should actually be tried. Then, of course, it was proved
that there was no phenomenon to be explained. The
water overflowed fast enough. Indeed, it is chron
icled that the evolutions of this lively member of the
piscatory tribe were so brisk, that the difficulty was the
exact opposite of what was anticipated, namely, how to
keep the water in.
This story may be a pure fable, but the lesson it
teaches is true and important. It illustrates forcibly
the facility with which even wise men accept doubtful
propositions, and then apply the whole power of their
minds to explain them, and perhaps to defend them.
Latterly, one hears constantly of the physical decay
which threatens the American people, because of their

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 365
unwise and disproportioned stimulation of the brain.
It is assumed, almost as an axiom, tbat there is " a
deficiency of physical health in America." Especially
is it assumed that great mental progress, either of races
or of individuals, has been generally purchased at the
expense of the physical frame. Indeed, it is one of the
questions of the day, how the sainte, toat is, those de
voted to literary and professional pnrsnite, sbaU obtain
good and serviceable bodies ; or, to widen tbe query,
how the finest intellectoal culture can exist side by side
wito toe noblest physical development; or, to bring
this question into a form toat shall touch us most
sharply, how our boys and girls can obtain all needful
knowledge and mental discipline, and yet keep full of
graceful and buoyant ritality.
What do we say to toe toeories and conrictions which
are undemeato this language ? What answer shall we
make to toese questions ? What answer ought we to
make ? Our first reply would be. We doubt toe proposi
tion. We ask for toe broad and firm basis of undoubted
facts upon which it rests. And we enter an opposite
plea. We affirm that tbe saints have as good bodies as
other people, and that toey always did have. We deny
that toey need to be patched up or watched over any
more toan toeir neighbors. They live as long and
enjoy as much as toe rest of mankind. They can
endure as many hard buffete, and come out as tough
and strong, as the veriest dolt whose intellectoal bark
foundered in the unsounded deptos of his primer. The
world's history through, toe races whicb are best taught
have the best endowment of healto. Nay, in our own
New England, with just such influences, physical, men
tal, and moral, as actoally exist, toere is no deteriora
tion in real ritality to weep over.

366 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
We hold, toen, on this subject very different opinions
from those which prevail in many quarters. We believe
in toe essential healthfulness of literary cultore, and in
toe inrigorating power of sound knowledge. Emphati
cally do we believe toat our common schools have been
in the aggregate a positive physical benefit We are
confident toat just to toe degree toat toe unseen force
witoin a man receives ite rightful development does
rigorous life flow in every current toat beats from heart
to extremities. Wito entire respect for toe opinions of
otoers, even while we cannot concur with toem, wito a
readiness to admit toat toe assertion of those opinions
may have been indirectly beneficial, we wish to stote the
truto as it looks to us, to exhibit the facte whicb bear
upon tois subject in toe shape and hue toey have to our
own minds, and to give the grounds of our conriction
that a cultivated mind is the best friend and ally of toe
body. Would it not be singular if anytoing different were
true ? You say, and you say rightly, that tbe best part
of a man is his mind and soul, those spiritoal elemente
which diride him from all tbe rest of tbe creation, ani
mate or inanimate, and make him lord and sovereign
over them all. You say, and you say wisely, toat the
body, however strong and beautiful, is nothing, — toat
the senses, however keen and vigorous, are nothing, —
that the outward glories, however much toey may min
ister to sensual gratification, are nothing, — unless they
all become toe instruments for the upbuilding of toe
immortal part in man. But what a tremendous im
peachment of the wisdom or power of the Creator you
are bringing, if you assert that the development of this
highest part, whether by ite direct influence on the

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 367
body, or indirectly by the habits of life which it creates,
is destructive of all the rest, nay, self-destructive ! You
may show that every opening bud in spring, and every
joint, nerve, and muscle in every animate creature, is
full of proofs of wise designs accomplishing their pur
poses, and it shall all count for less than nothing, if you
can demonstrate that the mind, in its highest, broadest
development, brings anarchy into the system, — or, mark
it well, produces, or tends to produce, habits of living
ruinous to health, and so ruinous to true usefulness.
At the outset, therefore, the very fact that the mind is
the highest creation of Divine wisdom would force us to
believe that that development of it, that increase of
knowledge, that sharpening of the faculties, that feed
ing of intellectual hunger, which does not promote joy
and health in every part, must be false and illegitimate
indeed. And it is hardly too much to say, that, in a rational
being, thought is almost synonymous with ritality of
all sorts. The brain throws out its network of nerves
to every part of the body ; and those nerves are the
pathways along which it sends, not alone physical voli
tions, but its mental force and high intelligence, to
mingle by a subtile chemistry with every fibre, and give
it a finer life and a more bounding elasticity. So one
might foretell, before the stody of a single fact of expe
rience, that, other things being equal, he who had few
or no thoughts would have not only a dormant mind,
but also a sluggish and inert body, less active than
another, less enduring, and especially less defiant of
physical ills. And one might prophesy, too, that he
who had high thoughts and wealth of knowledge would
have stored up in his brain a magazine of reserved power
wherewith to support the faltering body ; a prophecy

368 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
not wide apart, perhaps, from any broad and candid
observation of human life.
And who can fail to remember what superior re
sources a cultivated mind has over one sunk in sloth
and ignorance, — how much wider an outlook, how
much larger and more varied interests, and how these
things support when outward props fail, how they
strengthen in misfortune and pain, and keep the heart
from anxieties which might wear out the body ? Scott,
dictating "Ivanhoe" in the midst of a torturing sick
ness, and so rising, by force of a cultivated imagination,
above all physical anguish, to revel in visions of chival
ric splendor, is but the type of men everywhere, who,
but for resources supplied by the mind, would have sunk
beneath the blows of adverse fortune, or else sought
forgetfulness in brutalizing and destructive pleasures.
Sometimes a book is better far than medicine, and more
truly soothing than the best anodyne. Sometimes a
rich-freighted memory is more genial than many com
panions. Sometimes a firm mind, that has all it needs
within itself, is a watchtower to which we may flee, and
from which look down calmly upon our own losses and
misfortunes. He who does not understand this has
either had a most fortunate experience, or else has no
culture, which is really a part of himself, woven into
the very texture of the soul. So, if there were no facts,
considering the mind, and who made it, and how it is re
lated to the body, and how, when it is a good mind and a
well stored mind, it seems to stand for all else, to be food
and shelter and comfort and friend and hope, who could
believe anything else than that a well instructed soul
could do naught but good to its servant the body ?
After all, we cannot evade, and we ought not to seek

¦ SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 369
to evade, the testimony of facts. No cause can properly
stand on any theory, however pleasant and cheering, or
however plausible. What, then, of the facts, of the
painful facts of experience, which are said to tell so
different a tale ? This, — that the physical value of
education is in no way so clearly demonstrated as by
these very facts. We know what is the traditional pic
ture of the scholar, — pale, stooping, hectic, hurrying
with unsteady feet to a predestined early grave ; or else
morbid, dyspeptic, cadaverous, putting into his works
the dark tints of his own inward nature. At best, he is
painted as a mere bookworm, bleached and almost mil
dewed in some learned retirement beneath the shadow
of great folios, until he is out of joint with the world,
and all fresh and hearty life has gone out of him. Who
cannot recall just such pictures, wherein one knows not
which predominates, the ludicrous or the pitiful ? We
protest against them all. In the name of truth and
common sense alike, we indignantly reject them. We
have a vision of a sturdier manhood : of the genial, open
countenance of an Irving ; of the homely, honest strength
that shone in every feature of a Walter Scott; of the
massive vigor of a Goethe or a Humboldt. How much,
too, is said of the physical degeneracy of our own peo
ple, — how the jaw is retreating, how the frame is grow
ing slender and gaunt, how the chest flattens, and how
tenderly we ought to cherish every octogenarian among
us, for that we are seeing the last of them 1 If this is
intended to be a piece of pleasant badinage, far be it
from us to arrest a single smile it may awaken. But if
it is given as a serious description, from which serious
deductions can be drawn, then we say, that, as a delinea
tion, it is, to a considerable extent, purely fanciful, —
as an argument, utterly so. The facts, so far as they
24

370 SAINTS WHO HAVE TTAT> BODIES.
are ascerteined, point unwaveringly to this conclusion,
— toat every advance of a people in knowledge and re
finement is accompanied by as striking an advance in
health and strengto.
Try this question, if you please, on the largest possi
ble scale. Compare the uneducated savage with his
cirilized brotoer. His form has never been bent by con
finement in the school-room. Overburdening thoughts
have never wasted his frame. And if unremitting
exercise amid the free airs of heaven will alone make
one strong, then he wiU be strong. Is the savage
stronger ? Does he live more years ? Can he compete
side by side with civilized races in toe struggle for
existence ? Just the opposite is true. Our puny boys,
as we sometimes call toem, in our colleges, will weigh
more, lift more, endure more than any barbarian race
of toem aU. This day the gentie Sandwich Islanders
are wasting hke snow-wreaths, in contect wito educated
races. This day our red men are being swept before
advancing civilization like leaves before the breath of
the hurricane. And it requires no prophet's eye to see,
that, if we do not give the black man education as well
as freedom, an unshackled mind as well as unshackled
limbs, he too wiU share the same fate.
To all this it may natorally be objected, that toe
reason so many savage races do not display toe greatest
physical stamina is not so much intellectual barrenness
as their rices, native or acquired, — or because tbey
bring no wisdom to the conduct of life, but dwell in
smoky huts, eat unhealthy food, go from starvation to
pletoora and from plethora to starvation again, exchange
the indolent lethargy which is toe law of savage life for
the frantic struggles of war or the chase which diversify
and break up its monotony. Allow the objection ; and

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 371
then what have we accomplished, but carrying the argu
ment one step back ? For what are self-control and
self-care but the just fruits of intelligence ? But in
truth it is a combination of all these influences, and not
any of them alone, that enables the civilized man to out
live and outrival his barbarian brother. He succeeds,
not simply because of the superior address and sagacity
which education gives him, though that, no doubt, has
much to do with it; not altogether because his habits
of life are better, though we would not underrate their
value ; but equally because the culture of the brain gives
a finer life to every red drop in his arteries, and greater
hardihood to every fibre which is woven into his flesh.
If it is not so, how do you explain the fact that our
colored soldier, fighting in his native climate, with the
same exposure in health and the same care in sickness,
succumbs to wounds and diseases over which his white
comrade triumphs ? Or how will you explain analogous
facts in the history of disease among other uneducated
races ? Our explanation is simple. As the slightest
interfusion of carbon may change the dull iron into
trenchant steel, so intelligence working through invisi
ble channels may add a new temper to the physical
nature. And thus it may be strictly true that it is not
only the mind and soul which slavery and ignorance
wrong, but the body just as much.
It may be said, and perhaps justly, that a comparison
between races so unlike is not a fair comparison. Take,
then, if you prefer, the intelligent and unintelligent
periods in the history of the same race. The old
knights! Those men with mail-clad bodies and iron
natures, who stand out in imagination as symbols of
masculine strength ! The old knights ! They were not

372 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
scholars. Their constitutions were not ruined by study,
or by superfluous sainthood of any kind. They were
more at home with the sword than the pen. They
loved better " to hear the lark sing than the mouse
squeak." So their minds were sufficiently dormant.
How was it with their bodies ? Were they sturdier
men ? Did they stand heavier on their feet than their
descendants ? It is a familiar fact that the armor which
enclosed them will not hold those whom we call their
degenerate children. A friend tells me that in the
armory of London Tower there are preserved scores, if
not hundreds, of the swords of those terrible Northmen,
those Vikings, who, ten centuries ago, swept the seas
and were the dread of all Europe, and that scarcely one
of them has a hilt large enough to be grasped by a man
of this generation. Of races who have left behind them
no methodical records, and whose story is preserved
only in the rude rhymes of their poets and ruder chroni
cles, it is not safe to make positive affirmations ; but all
the indications are that the student of to-day is a larger
and stronger man than the warrior of the Middle Ages.
If we come down to periods of historical certainty, no
one will doubt that the England of the present hour is
more educated than the England of fifty years ago, or
that the England of fifty years since had a broader diffu
sion of intelligence than the England of a century pre
vious. Yet that very intelligence has prolonged life.
An Englishman lives longer to-day than he did in 1800,
and longer yet than in 1700. Here is a curious proof.
Annuities calculated on a certain rate of life in 1694
would yield a fortune to those who issued them. Calcu
lated at the same rate in 1794, they would ruin them ;
for the more general diffusion of knowledge and refine
ment had added, I am not able to say how many years

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 373
to the average British life. Observe how this statement
is confirmed by some wonderful statistics preserved at
Geneva. From 1600 to 1700 the average length of life
in that city was 13 years 3 months. From 1700 to 1750
it was 27 years 9 months. From 1750 to 1800, 31 years
3 months. Prom 1800 to 1833, 43 years 6 months.
One more pertinent fact. Take in England any num
ber of families you please, whose parents can read and
write, and an equal number of families whose parents
cannot read and write, and the number of children in
the latter class of families who will die before the age
of five years will greatly exceed that in the former class,
— some thirty or forty per cent. So surely does a
thoughtful ordering of life come in the train of intelli
gence. If faith is to be placed in statistics of any sort,
then it holds true in foreign countries that human life
is long in proportion to the degree that knowledge,
refinement, and virtue are diffused. That is, sainthood,
so far from destroying the body, preserves it.
1 anticipate the objection which may be made to our
last argument. Abroad, we are told, there is such an
element of healthy, outdoor life, that any ill effects
which might naturally follow in the train of general
education are neutralized. Abroad, too, education with
the masses is elementary, and advances also with more
moderation than with us. Abroad, moreover, tbe whole
social being is not pervaded with the intense intellectual
activity and fervor which are so characteristic especially
of New England life.
Come home, then, to our own Massachusetts, which,
as some will have it, is school-mad. What do you find ?
Here, in a climate proverbially changeable and rigor
ous, — here, where mental and moral excitements rise

374 S^VIXTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
to fever heat, — hero, where churches adorn every land
scape, aud school-houses greet us at every corner, and
lyeeums are established in every village, — hoi-e, where
newspapers oiixnihito by the hundred thousand, and
magazines for our old folks, and " Our Young Folks,"
too, reach fifty toousand, — here, in Massachusetts,
health is at its climax : greater and more enduring than
in bonnie England, or vine-clad France, or sunny Italy.
I read some statistics toe other day, and I have ever
since had a greater rospeot for tho land of " cast winds
and salt fish aud scliool-houscs." as scandalous people
have termed Massachusetts. What do tooso statistics
say ? That, while in England tho deaths reach annually
2.21 per cent of tho whole population, and iu France
2.36 per cent, and iu Italy 2.94 per cent, and in Austria
3.34 per cent, in Massachusetts tho deaths are ouly 1.82
per cent annually. Even in Boston, with ite largo pro
portion of foreign elements, tho percentage of doaths is
only 2.35. It may be said, in criticism of those state
ments, that in our country statistics are not kept wito
sufficient accuracy to furnish correct data. However
this may be in our rural districts, it certainly is not
true of the metropolis. The figures aro not at hand,
but they exist, and thoy prove conclusively that toose
wards in Boston which have a population most purely
native reach a salubrity unexcelled. So that, with all
the real drawbacks of cliniato, and tiio pretondod draw
backs of unnatural or excessive luontal stimulus, the
health bore is absolutely unequalled by that of any
country in Europe. Certainly, if the mental and nioral
sainthood which we have does not build up tho body, it
cannot be said that it docs any injury to it.
Have we noted what a splendid tostimony tho war
whicb has just closed has given to toe physical results

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 375
of our educational training ? A hundred or a thousand
young men taken from our New England villages and
put into the ranks of our army — young men who
learned the alphabet at four, who all through boyhood
had the advantages of our common school system, who
had felt to the full the excitement of the intellectual life
abaut them — have stood taller, weighed heavier, fought
more bravely and intelligently, won victory out of more
adverse circumstances, and, what is more to the point,
endured more hardship with less sickness, than a like
number of any other race on earth. We care not where
you look for comparison, whether to Britain, or to France,
or to Russia, where the spelling-book has almost been
tabooed, or to Spain, where in times past the capacity
to read the Bible was scarcely less than rank heresy,
at least for the common people. This war has been
brought to a successful issue by the best educated army
that ever fought on battle-field, or, as the new book has
it, by " the thinking bayonet," by men whose physical
manhood has received no detriment from their intel
lectual culture.
These assertions are founded upon statistics which
have been preserved of regiments whose members were
almost exclusively native born. And the results are
certainly in accordance with all candid observation. It
may, indeed, be said that the better health of our army
has been after all the result of the better care which the
soldier has taken of himself. We answer, the. better
care was the product of his education. It may be said,
again, that this health was owing in a great measure to
the superior watchfulness exercised over the soldier by
others, by the government, by the Sanitary Commission,
and by State agencies. Then we reply, that this tender
ness of the soldier, if tenderness it be, and this sagacity.

376 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
if sagacity prompted the care, were both the offspring
of that high intelligence which is the proper result of
popular education.
There is but one possible mode of escape from such
testimony. This whole train of argument is inconclusive,
it may be asserted, because what is maintained is not
toat intellectual culture is unhealthful, where it is woven
into the web of active life, but only where the pursuit
of knowledge is one's business. It may be readily al
lowed, that, where the whole nature is kept alive by the
breath of outward enterprise, when the great waves of
this world's excitements are permitted to roll with
purifying tides into the inmost recesses of the soul, the
results of mental culture may be modified. But what of
the saints ? What of the literary men par excellence ?
Ah! if you restrain us to that line of inquiry, the
argument will be trebly strong, and the facts grow over
whelmingly pertinent and conclusive. Will you examine
the careful registry of deaths in Massachusetts which
has been kept the last twenty years ? It will inform
you that the classes whose average of life is high up,
almost tlie highest up, are with us the classes that work
with the brain, — the judges, the lawyers, the physicians,
the clergymen, the professors in our colleges. The very
exception to this statement rather confirms than con
tradicts our general position, that intellectoal culture
is absolutely invigorating. The cultivators of the soil
live longest. But note that it is the educated, intelligent
farmers, the farmers of Massachusetts, the farmers of
a State of common schools, the farmers who link toought
to labor, who live long. And doubtless, if they carried
more thought into their labor, if they were more intelli
gent, if they were better educated, they would live yet

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 377
longer. At any rate, in England the cultivators of her
soil, her down-trodden peasantry, sluggish and unedu
cated, do not live out half their days. Very likely the
farmer's lot, plus education and plus habits of mental
activity, is the healthiest as it is the primal condition
of man. Nevertheless, considering what is the general
opinion, it is surprising how slight is the advantage
which he has even then over the purely literary
classes. Will you go to Harvard University and ascertain
what becomes of her children ? Take up, then. Dr.
Palmer's Necrology of the Alumni of Harvard from
1851 to 1863. You will learn that, while the average
age of all persons who in Massachusetts die after they
have attained the period of twenty years is but fifty
years, the average age of Harvard graduates who die in
like manner, is fifty-eight years. Thus you have, in
favor of the highest form of public education known
in the State, a clear average of eight years. You may
examine backward the Triennial Catalogue as far as
you please, and you will not find the testimony essen
tially different. The statement will stand impregnable,
that, from the time John Harvard founded our little
College in the wilderness, to this hour, when it is fast
becoming a great University, with its schools in every
department, and its lectures covering the whole field of
human knowledge, the graduates have always attained a
longevity surpassing that of their generation.
And you are to' observe tbat this comparison is a
strictly just comparison. We contrast not the whole
community, old and young, with those who must neces
sarily have attained manhood before they are a class at
all ; but adults with adults, graduates with those of
other avocations who have arrived at the period of

378 SATNTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
twenty years. Neither do we compare the bright and
peculiar luminaries of Harvard with the mass of men, —
though, in fact, it is well known toat toe best scholars
live the most years, — but we compare the whole body
of toe graduates, bright and dull, stodious and unstodi-
ous, wito the whole body of toe conummity.
To the array of evidence whicb may be brought from
all the registries of all the states and universities under
heaven, some may triumphantiy exclaim, " Statistics are
unworthy of trust." " To lie hke statistics," " false as
a fact," these are the stalest of witticisms. But toe
objection to which they give point is practically frivolous.
Grant that statistics are to a certain degree doubtful,
are they not the most trustworthy eridence we have?
And in toe question at issue, are they not the only
evidence which has real force? And allowing toeir
general defectiveness, how shall we explain that, though
gathered from all sides and by all kinds of people, they
so uniformly favor education ? Why, if they must err,
do they err so pertinaciously in one direction ? How
does it happen toat, summon as many witoesses as you
please, and cross-question toem as severely as you can,
tbey never falter in tois testimony, toat, where intelli
gence abounds, there physical vigor does much more
abound ? that, where education is broad and generous,
there the years are many and happy ?
If, therefore, facts can prove anything, it is that just
such a condition of life as that which is growing more and
more general among us, and which our common school
system directly fosters, where every man is becoming an
educated man, — where the farmer upon bis acres, toe
merchant at his desk, and the mechanic in his shop, no
less than the scholar poring over his books, shall be in toe

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 379
truest sense educated, — that such a condition is the one
of all others which promotes habits of thought and action,
an elasticity of temper and a breadth of vision and inter
est most conducive to health and vigor. It is the fashion
to talk of the appearance of superior robustness so char
acteristic of our English brethren. But we suspect that
ill this case, too, appearances are deceitful. That cli
mate may produce in us a restless energy inconsistent
with rounded forms and rosy cheeks we freely allow.
But in strength and real endurance the New England
constitution will yield to none. And the stern logic of
facts shows beyond a peradventure that here there are
no influences, climatic or intellectual, which war with
longevity. What may be hidden in the future, what
results may come from a still wider diffusion of educa
tion, we cannot tell, but hitherto nothing but good lias
come of ever increasing knowledge.
We hasten now to inquire concerning the health and
years of special classes of literary men : not, indeed, to
prove that there is no real war between the mind and
the body, — for we consider that point to be already
demonstrated, — but rather to show that we need shrink
from no field of inquiry, and that from every fresh field
will come new evidence of the substantial truth of our
position. We have taken the trouble to ascertain the average
age of all the English poets of whom Johnson wrote
lives, some fifty or sixty in all. Here are great men
and small men, men with immortal names and men
whose names were long since forgotten, men of good
habits and men whose habits would undermine any con
stitution, flourishing too in a period when human life
was certainly far shorter in England than now. And

380 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
how long did they live ? What do you think ? Thirty,
forty years ? No ; they endured their sainthood, or
their want of it, for the comfortable period of fifty-six
years. Nor is the case a particle different, if you take
only the great and memorable names of English poetry.
Chaucer, living at the dawn almost of English civiliza
tion ; Shakespeare, whose varied and marvellous dramas
might well have exhausted any vitality ; Milton, strug
gling with domestic infelicity, with political hatred, and
with blindness ; Dryden, Pope, Swift : none of these
burning and shining lights of English literature went
out at midday. The result is not altered if you come
nearer our own time. That galaxy of talent and genius
which shone with such brilliancy in the Scottish capital
at the beginning of the century, — Sydney Smith, Lord
Jeffrey, Christopher North, Macaulay, Mackintosh, De
Quincey, Brougham, — all these, with scarcely an excep
tion, have lived far beyond the average of numan life.
So was it with the great poets and romancers of that
period. Wordsworth, living the life of a recluse near
the beautiful lakes of Westmoreland, lasted to fourscore.
Southey, after a life of unparalleled literary industry,
broke down at sixty-six. Coleridge, with habits which
ought to have destroyed him early, lingered till sixty-
two. Scott, struggling to throw off a mountain load of
debt, endured superhuman labor till more than sixty.
Even Byron and Burns, who did not live as men who
desired length of days, died scarcely sooner than their
generation. You are not willing, perhaps, to test this question by
the longevity of purely literary men. You ask what can
be said about the great preachers. Y''ou have always
heard, that, while the ministers were, no doubt, men
of excellent intentions and much sound learning, what

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. ' 381
with their morbid notions of life, and what with the
weight of a rather heavy sort of erudition, they were
saints with the very poorest kind of bodies. Just the
contrary. No class lives longer. We once made out
a list of the thirty most remarkable preachers of the
last four centuries that we could call to mind. Of
the age to which most of these attained we had at the
outset no idea whatever. In that list were included
the men who must figure in every candid account of
preaching. The great men of the Reformation, Lutherj
Melanchthon, Calvin, Beza, Knox, were there. That re
splendent group which adorned the seventeenth century,
and whose names are synonyms for pulpit eloquence,
Barrow, South, Jeremy Taylor, and Tillotson, were
prominent in it. The milder lights of the last century,
Paley, Blair, Robertson, Priestley, were not forgotten.
The Catholics were represented by Massillon, Bossuet,
Bourdaloue, and Fenelon. The Protestants as truly, by
Robert Hall and Chalmers, by Wesley and Channing.
In short, it was a thoroughly fair list. We then pro
ceeded to ascertain the average life of those included in
it. It was just sixty-nine years. And we invite all
persons who are wedded to the notion that the saints
are always knights of the broken body, to take pen
and paper and jot down the name of every remarkable
preacher since the year 1500 that they can recall, and
add, if tbey wish, every man in their own vicinity who
has risen in learning and. talent above the mass of his
profession. We will insure the result without any pre
mium. They will produce a list that would delight the
heart of a provident director of a life insurance com
pany. And their average will come as near the old
Scripture pattern of threescore years and ten as that of
any body of men who have lived since the days of Isaac
and Jacob.

382 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
If now any one has a lurking doubt of the physical
value of an active and well-stored mind, let him pass
from the preachers to the statesmen, from the men who
teach the wisdom of the world to come to the men who
administer the things of this world. Let him begin with
the grand names of the Long Parliament, — Hampden,
Pym, Vane, Cromwell, — and then gather up all the
great administrators of the next two centuries, down to
the octogenarians who are now foremost in the conduct
of British affairs ; and if he wishes to widen his observa
tion, let him pass over the Channel to the Continent,
and in France recall such names as Sully and Richelieu,
Mazarin and Colbert, Talleyrand and Guizot ; in Austria,
Kaunitz and Metternich. And when he has made his
list as broad, as inclusive of all really great statesman
ship everywhere as he can, find his average ; and if he
can bring it much beneath seventy, he will be more for
tunate than we were when we tried the experiment.
Do not by any means omit the men of science. There
are the astronomers. If any employment would seem
to draw a man up to heaven, it would be this. Yet, of
all men, astronomers apparently have had the most
wedded attachment to earth. Galileo, Newton, La
Place, Herschel, — these are the royal names, the fixed
stars, set, as it were, in that very firmament which for
so many years they searched with telescopic eye. And
yet neither of them lived less than seventy-eight years.
As for the men of natural science, it looks as though
they were spared by some Providential provision, in or
der that they might observe and report for long epochs
the changes of this old earth of ours. Cuvier dying
at seventy-five. Sir Joseph Banks at seventy-seven, Buffon
at eighty-one, Blumenbach at eighty-eight, and Humboldt
at fourscore and ten, are some of the cases which make
such a supposition altogether reasonable.

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAT) BODIES. 383
Cross the ocean, and you will find the same testimony,
that mental culture is absolutely favorable to physical
endurance. The greatest men in our nation's history,
whetoer in walks of statesmanship, science, or literatore,
almost without exception, have lived long. Franklin,
Washington, Jefferson, Madison, toe elder Adams, and
Patrick Henry, in earlier periods, — the younger Adams,
Clay, Calhoun, Webster, Choate, and Everett, Irving,
Prescott, Cooper, and Hawthorne, in later times, — are
cases in point These men did not die prematurely.
They grew strong by the toil of the brain. And to-day
the quartette of our truest poets- — Bryant, Whittier,
Longfellow, and Holmes — are with us in the hale years
of a green age, never singing sweeter songs, never harp
ing more inspiring sti'ains. Long may our ears hear
toeir melodies!
If now we could enter the walks of private life, and
stody widely toe experience of indiridual men, we should
have an interesting record indeed, and a manifold and
wellnigh irresistible testimony. Consider a few remark
able, yet widely differing cases.
Who can read attentively the life of John Wesley,
and not exclaim, if varied and exhausting labor, if
perpetoal excitement and constant drafts upon the brain,
would ever wear a man out, he would have worn out ?
It was his creative energy that called into existence
a denomination, his ardent piety that inspired it, his
clear mind that legislated for it, his heroic industry
that did no mean part of the incessant daily toil needful
for ite establishment. Yet this man of many labors,
who through a long life never knew practically the mean
ing of tbe word leisure, says, at seventy-two, " How is it
that I find the same strength toat I did thirty years ago,

384 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
that my nerves are firmer, that I have none of the
infirmities of old age, and have lost several that I had in
youth ? " And ten years later, he devoutly records, " Is
anything too hard for God ? It is now eleven years
since I have felt such a thing as weariness." And he
continued till eighty-eight in full possession of his
faculties, laboring with body and mind alike to within a
week of his death.
Joseph Priestley was certainly a very different man,
but scarcely less remarkable. No mean student in all
branches of literature, a metaphysician, a theologian, a
man of science, he began life with a feeble frame, and
ended a hearty old age at seventy-one. He himself
declares at fifty-four, that, " so far from suffering from
application to study, I have found my health steadily
improve from the age of eighteen to the present time."
You would scarcely find a life more widely divided
from these than that of Washington Irving. Neverthe
less, it is like them in one respect, that it bears emphatic
testimony to the real healthfulness of mental exertion.
He was the feeblest of striplings at eighteen. At nine
teen, Judge Kent said, " He is not long for this world."
His friends sent him abroad at twenty-one, to see if a
sea voyage would not husband his strength. So pale,
so broken, was he, that, when he stepped on board the
. ship, the captain whispered, " There is a chap who will
be overboard before we are across ! " Irring had too
his share of misfortunes, — failure in business, loss of
investments, in earlier life some anxiety as to tbe ways
and means of support. Even his habits of study were
hardly what the highest wisdom would direct. While
he was always genial and social, and at times easy
almost to indolence, when the mood seized him he
would write incessantly for weeks and even for months,

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 385
sometimes fourteen, fifteen, ob sixteen hours in a day.
But he grew robust for half a centory, and writes, at
seventy-five, that he has now " a streak of old age."
The example of some of those who are said to have
been worn out by intense mental application furnishes
perhaps the most convincing proof of all that no reason
able activity of the mind ever warred with the best
health of the body. Walter Scott, we are told, wore out.
And very likely, to a certain extent, the statement is
true. But what had he not accomplished before he wore
out ? He had astonished the world with that wonderful
series of romances which place him scarcely second to
any name in English literature. He had sung those
border legends which delighted toe ears of his genera
tion. He had produced histories whieh show toat, had
he chosen, he might have been as much a master in the
region of historic fact as in the realm of imagination.
He had edited other men's works ; he had written essays ;
he had lent himself with a royal generosity to every
one who asked his time or influence ; and when, almost
an old man, commerical bankruptcy overtook him, and
he sought to lift the mountain of his debt by pure
intellectoal toil, he wore out. But declining years, dis
appointed hopes, desperate exertions, may wear anybody
out. He wore out, but it was at more than threescore
years, when nine tenths of his generation had long slept
in quiet graves, — when the crowd of.the thoughtless
and indolent, who began life with him, had rusted out
in inglorious repose. Yes, Walter Scott wore out, if you
call that wearing out.
John Calvin, all his biographers say, wore out. Per
haps so ; — but not vrithout a prolonged resistance.
Commencing life with the frailest constitution, he was
25

386 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
as early as twenty-five a model of erudition, and had
already written his immortal work. For thirty years
he was in the heat and ferment of a great religious
revolution. For thirty years he was one of the con
trolling minds of his age. For thirty years he was
the sternest soldier in the Church Militant, bearing
down stubborn resistance by a yet more stubborn will.
For thirty years neither his brain nor his pen knew
rest. And so at fifty-six this man of broken body
and many labors laid down the weapons of his war
fare ; but it was at Geneva, where the public registers
tell us that the average of human life in that century
was only nine years.
One writes words like these : " John Kitto died, and
his death was the judgment for overwork, and over
work of a single organ,. — the brain." And who was
John Kitto ? A poor boy, the son of a drunken father,
subject from infancy to agonizing headache. An un
fortunate lad, who at thirteen fell from a scaffolding
and was taken up for dead, and escaped only with total
deafness and a supposed permanent injury to the brain.
A hapless apprentice, who suffered at the hands of a
cruel taskmaster all that brutality and drunken fury
could suggest. A youth thirsting for knowledge, but
able to obtain it only by the hardest ways, peering into
booksellers' windows, reading at book-stalls, purchasing
cheap books with pennies stained all over with the sweat
of his toil. An heroic student, who labored for more
than twenty years with almost unparalleled industry,
and with an equally unparalleled neglect of the laws of
health ; of whom it is scarcely too much to say literally,
that he knew no change but from his desk to his bed,
and from his bed to his desk again. A voluminous
writer, who, if he produced no work of positive genius.

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 387
has done more than any other man to illustrate the
Scriptures, and to make familiar and vivid the scenery,
the life, the geography, and the natural history of the
Holy Land. And he died in the harness, — but not so
very early, — at fifty. And we say that he would have
lived much longer, had he given his constitution a fair
chance. But when we remember his passionate fond
ness for books, how they compensated him for the want
of wealth, comforts, and the pleasant voices of wife and
children that he could not hear, we grow doubtful. And
we hear him exclaim almost in rhapsody : " If I were
blind as well as deaf, in what a wretched situation should
I be ! If I could not read, how deplorable would be my
condition ! What earthly pleasure equal to the read
ing of a good book ? 0 dearest tomes ! O princely and
august folios ! to obtain you, I would work night and
day, and forbid myself every sensual joy ! " When we
behold the forlorn man, shut out by his misfortune from
so many resources, and finding more than recompense
for this privation within the four walls of his library,
we are tempted to say, No, be would not have lived as
long; had he studied less, he would have remembered
his griefs more.
Of course it is easy to take exception to all evidence
drawn from the life and experience of individual men,
— natural to say that one must needs be somewhat old
before he can acquire a great name at all, and that our
estimate considers those alone to whom mere prolong
ation of days has given reputation, and forgets the
village Hampdens, the mute, inglorious Miltons, the
unrecorded Newtons, the voiceless orators, sages, or
saints who have died and made no sign. To this the
simple reply is, that individual cases, however numerous
and striking, are not relied upon to prove any position.

388 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
but only to illustrate and confirm one which general
data have already demonstrated. Grant the full force
of every criticism, and toen it remains true that the
widest record of literary life exhibits no tendency of
mental culture to shorten human life, or to create habits
which would shorten it. Indeed, we do not know
where to look for any broad range of facts which would
indicate that education here or anywhere else has
decreased or is likely to decrease health. And were it
not for the respect which we cherish towards those who
hold it, we should say that such a position was as nearly
pure theory, or prejudice, or opinion founded on frag
mentary data, as any riew well could be.
But do you mean to assert that there is no such toing
as intellectual excess ? that intellectual actirity never
injures ? that unremitting attention to mental pursuits,
with an entire abstinence from proper exercise and
recreation, is positively inrigorating ? that robbing the
body of sleep, and bending it sixteen or eighteen hours
over toe desk, is the best way to build it up in grace and
strength ? Of course no one would say any such absurd
things. There is a right and wrong use of everything.
Any part of the system will wear out with excessive use.
Overwork kills, but certainly not any quicker when it is
overwork of the mind than when it is overwork of the
body. Overwork in the stody is just as healthful as
overwork on the farm, or at the ledger, or in toe smoky
shop, toiling and moiling, with no rest and no quicken
ing thoughts. Especially is it true that education does
not peculiarly tempt a man to excess.
But are you ready to maintain that there is no ele
ment of excess infused into our common school system ?
Certainly. Most emphatically there is not. What,

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 389
then, is there to put over against these terrible state
ments of excessive labor of six or seven hours a day,
under which young brain's are reeling and young spines
are bending until there are no rosy-cheeked urchins and
blooming maids left among us ? The inexorable logic of
facts. The public schools of Massachusetts were taught
in the years 1863 and 1864 on an average just thirty-
two weeks, just five days in a week, and, making proper
allowance for recesses and opening exercises, just five
and a quarter hours in a day. Granting now that all the
boys and girls studied during these hours faithfully, you
have an average for the three hundred and thirteen work
ing days of the year of two hours and forty-one minutes
a day, — an amount of study that never injured any
healthy child. But, going back a little to youthful
recollections, and considering the amazing proclivity of
the young mind to idleness, whispering, and fun and
frolic in general, it seems doubtful whether our children
ever yet attained to so high an average of actual study as
two hours a day. As a modification of this statement,
it may be granted that in the cities and larger towns
the school term reaches forty weeks in a year. If you
add one hour as the average amount of study at home
given by pupils of over twelve years, (and the allowance
is certainly ample,) you have four hours as the utmost
period ever given by any considerable class of children.
That there is excess we freely admit. That there are
easy committee-men who permit too high a pressure,
and infatuated teachers who insist upon it, that there
are ambitious children whom nobody can stop, and silly
parents who fondly wish to see their children mon
strosities of brightness, lisping Latin and Greek in
their cradles, respiring mathematics as they would the
atmosphere, and bristling all over with facts of natural

390 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
science like porcupines, till every bit of childhood is
worked out of them, — that such things are, we are not
inclined to deny. But they are rare exceptions, — no
more a part of the system than white crows are proper
representatives of the dusky and cawing brotherhood.
Or yet again, do we mean to assert toat no attention
need be given to the formation of right physical habits ?
or that bodily exercise ought not to be joined to mental
toils ? or that the walk in the woods, the row upon the
quiet river, the stroll with rod in hand by the babbling
brook, or with gun on shoulder over the green prairies,
or the skating in the crisp December air on the glisten
ing lake, ought to be discouraged ? Do we speak dis
respectfully of dumb-bells and clubs and parallel bars,
and all the paraphernalia of the gymnasium ? Are we
aggrieved at the mention of boxing-gloves or single
stick or foils ? Would it shock our nervous sensibilities
if our next door neighbor the philosopher, or some near
by grave and reverend , doctor of divinity, or even the
learned judge himself, should give unmistakable evi
dence that he had in his body the two hundred and odd
bones and the five hundred and more muscles, with all
their fit accompaniments of joints and sinews,, of which
the anatomists tell us ? Not at all. Far from it. We
exercise, no doubt, too little. We know of God's fair
world too much by description, too little by the sight of
our own eyes. Welcome anything which leads us out
into this goodly and glorious universe ! Welcome all
that tends to give the human frame higher grace and
symmetry ! Welcome the gymnastics, too, heavy or
light either, if they will guide us to a more harmonious
physical development.
We ourselves own a set of heavy Indian clubs, of
middling Indian clubs, and of light Indian clubs. We

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 391
have iron dumb-bells and wooden dumb-bells. We
recollect with considerable satisfaction a veritable bean-
bag which did good service in the household until it
unfortunately sprung a leak. In an amateur way we
have tried both systems, and felt the better for them.
We have a dim remembrance of rowing sundry leagues,
and even of dabbling with the rod and line. We always
look with friendly eye upon the Harvard Gymnasium,
whenever it looms up in actual or mental vision. Never
yet could we get by an honest game of cricket or base
ball without losing some ten minutes in admiring con
templation. We bow with deep respect to Dr. Windship
and his heavy weights. We bow, if anything, with a
trifle more of cordiality to Dr. Lewis and his light
weights. They both have our good word. We think
that they would have our example, were it not for the
fatal proclivity of solitary gymnastics to dulness. If
we have not risen to the high degrees in this noble
order of muscular Christians, we claim at least to be
a humble craftsman and faithful brother.
Speaking with all seriousness, we have no faith in
mental activity purchased at the expense of physical
sloth. It is well to introduce into the school, into the
family, and into the neighborhood any movement
system which will exercise all the muscles of the body.
But the educated man is not any more likely to need
this general physical development than anybody else.
Establish your gymnasium in any village, and the
farmer fresh from the plough, the mechanic from swing
ing the hammer or driving the plane, will be just as
sure to find new muscles that he never dreamed of as
the palest scholar of them all. And the diffusion of
knowledge and refinement, so far from promoting inac
tivity and banishing recreations from life, directly feeds

392 SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES.
that craving for variety out of which healtoful changes
come, and awakens that noble curiosity which at fit
seasons sends a man out to see how the wild-flower
grows in the woods, how the green buds open in the
spring, how the foliage takes on its painted automn
glory, which leads him to struggle through tangled
toickets or through pathless woods that he may behold
the brook laughing in cascade from rock to rock, or to
breast the steep mountain that he may behold from a
higher outlook the wonders of the risible creation.
Other things being equal, the educated man in any
vocation is quite as likely as another to be active, quick
in every motion, and free in every limb.
But admit all that is claimed. Admit that increasing
intelligence has changed the average of man's life from
the twenty-five years of the seventeenth century to the
thirty-five of the eighteenth or the forty-five years of
the nineteenth century. Admit, too, that the best
educated men of this generation will live five or ten
years more than the least educated men. Ought we
to be satisfied with things as they are ? Should
we not look for more than the forty or fifty years
of human life ? Assuredly. But it is not our super
fluous sainthood which is destroying life. It is not
that we have too much saintliness, but too little, too
limited wisdom, too narrow intelligence, too small an
endowment of virtue and conscience. It is our fierce
absorption in outward plans which plante anxieties hke
thorns in the heart. It is our sloth and gluttony which
eat out vitality. It is our unbridled appetites and pas
sions which burn like a consuming fire in our breasts.
It is our unwise exposure which saps the strength
and gives energy and force to latent disease. These,

SAINTS WHO HAVE HAD BODIES. 393
tenfold more than any intense application of the brain
to its legitimate work, limit and destroy human life.
The truly cultivated mind tends to give just aims,
moderate desires, and good habits.
Ay, and when the true sainthood shall possess and
rule humanity, — when the fields of knowledge with
their wholesome fruits shall tempt every foot away
from the forbidden paths of vice and sensual indulgence,
— when a wise intelligence shall cool the hot passions
which dry up the refi'eshing fountains of peace and joy
in the heart, — when a heavenly wisdom shall lift us
above any bondage to this world's fortunes, and when
a good conscience and a lofty trust shall forbid us to
be slaves to any occupation lower than the highest, —
when we stand erect and free, clothed with a real saint
liness, — then the years of our life may increase, and
man may go down to his grave " in a full age, like as
a shock of corn cometh in in his season."
Meanwhile, we must stand firmly on this assertion,
that, the more of mental and moral sainthood our people
achieve, the more that sainthood will write fair inscrip
tions on their bodies, will shine out in intelligence in
their faces, will exhibit itself in graceful form and
motion, and thus add to the deeper and more lasting
rirtues physical power, a body which shall be at once
a good servant and the proper representative of a refined
and elevated soul.

OUR BEDOUINS:
WHAT CAN WE DO WITH THEM?
Peinted in the Unitarian Review, August, 1877.
WHEN that steady friend of the Indian, Bishop
Whipple, came to Washington to plead for the
rights of the red man, Secretary Stanton said : " What
does the Bishop want ? If he has come here to tell us
that this government is guilty of gross crimes in its
dealings with the Indians, we all know that is true.
Tell him that the United States Government never
redresses any wrongs until the people demand it ; and,
when he can reach the heart of the people, these wrongs
will end." The sturdy and sham-hating Secretary was
right. Among a free people, a just and lasting settle
ment of any great question is not possible, unless first
there is an intelligent and trustworthy public opinion.
This is as true of the Indian problem as of any other.
So the most direct way to secure the red man justice is
to place before people's minds the exact facts and
conditions upon which a righteous public sentiment
must rest.
Two hundred and fifty years ago, our fathers came
face to face with the Indian. Three modes of treatment
were then possible. These savage neighbors could be
destroyed. They could be banished. They could be civ
ilized. In fact, all three methods were tried. Some of
the most powerful of the New England tribes perished

OUE BEDOUINS. 395
in wars whose justice we, who have only the conqueror's
story, cannot determine. Other tribes, stripped of their
possessions, were sent westward. The Stockbridges —
who once owned a' large part of Western Massachusetts,
who early rose above coarse savagery, and who stood
manfully by the Colonists in the struggle of the Rev
olution — have been pushed from one home to another,
until a remnant now occupies a reservation in Wisconsin
with soil so poor and cold that their agent reports " that
a white man could not get a living from it" On the
prairies there are Delawares, Senecas, Oneidas, — tribes
which have made half the long journey from the Atlan
tic to the Pacific without finding any sure rest to their
feet. Missionary labor was not lacking. In 1646, John
Eliot began to preach to the Indians of Massachusetts,
and so successfully tbat, twenty-nine years later, there
were in that State eleven hundred praying Indians.
These poor folks were peaceable and friendly. They
adopted the habits of civilized life, — built houses, cul
tivated land, gathered schools, joined churches, and
lived worthy of their profession. But the terrible King
Philip's War ruined this hopeful experiment. Goaded
by their suspicions and fears, the whites inflicted every
indignity upon these helpless people. Yoked neck to
neck, they were hurried to Boston to answer unfounded
charges. In the fancied security of their homes, they
were aroused by the hum of musket-balls, bringing
wounds and death. Finally, whole villages, torn from
comfortable homes, were transported to the bleak shores
of Deer Island. Very pathetic was the plaint of some
of them : " We are not sorry for what we leave behind,
but we are sorry that the English have driven us from
our praying to God. We did begin to understand a

396 OUE BEDOUINS.
little of praying to God," What wonder if a few tumed
with savage hate upon their oppressors ! What wonder
that the rest came back from their dreary exile, without
heart or hope, to sink into shiftiess, though not unkindly,
hangers-on upon a prosperous community ! Any candid
student must admit that our first experiment in Indian
civilization failed, because our fathers were not patient
enough and just enough. In the stress of mighty dan
ger, there was no intelligent public opinion to give that
experiment efficient support.
The problem of two centuries ago is the problem of
to-day. In the United States there are three hundred
thousand Indians. What shall ,we do with them ? One
thing we cannot do, — we cannot banish them to new
soil. The tide of population from the Atlantic, pressing
them westward, is met by a fresh tide from toe Pacific,
pressing them eastward. They are like deer at bay, sur
rounded by the circle of the hunters. Says the Indian
Report of 1873 : " The progress of our industrial en
terprise has left the Indian without resource. Had the
United States not been extended beyond the frontier
of 1867, all the Indians would have found beyond it
an inexhaustible supply of food and clothing. Even
in 1872, the Indian might have hope of life. But
another five years wiU reduce those of Dakota and
Montana to absolute and habitual suffering." The In
dian problem has reached a stage where it must be
settled. Perpetoal removals are no longer possible.
The savage must meet his fate, whetoer it be life or
death, where he is.
You talk with a frontiersman, and his solution is
ready : " The only toing to do wito an Indian is to

OUR BEDOUINS. 397
exterminate him. He is a dirty, vicious, treacherous
brute. You must wipe him out, sir." Even in Christian
New England, one sometimes hears the echo of this
horrible sentiment. Now,, to say nothing about the
right to shelter and food, which the descendants of the
original owners of the soil might be supposed to have,
and not to count the dreadful cost in treasure and blood
which such a process of extermination would involve,
definitely to propose tbe annihilation, whether by
violence, disease, or starvation, of three hundred thou
sand human beings is something so absolutely heathen
ish that every thoughtful person turns from it with
horror. Out on those far-off plains, extermination may
look to be something unreal and impersonal, and we may
talk about it lightly and airily, as we would of some
startling scene in a melodrama ; but let one family of
these " dirty, vicious, treacherous brutes " be starving
in any New England village, and how soon the word of
malediction would change to the deed of charity ! No !
Extermination, whether slow or swift, of myriads of
men, women, and children means unutterable and im
measurable woe. It is no solution at all of the problem,
only a brutal evasion of it. It is a word a Christian
people should be ashamed to speak.
To attempt honestly the civilization of the Indian;
to attempt it, whatever the discouragements ; to attempt
it, no matter how many our failures ; and to attempt it,
so long as there is one tribe, or one man, for whom we
are responsible, — this, for a Christian people, is the
only possible course. But the Indian is incapable of
cirilization is the objection which comes back with
wearisome iteration. All this talk about good Indians,
and the power of kindness over them, is the weak sen
timentality of parlor philanthropists. It is the old

398 OUE BEDOUINS.
story, — shifting off the burden qf our plain duty, by
casting contempt upon another's — if you please exag
gerated — benevolence. The Indian, you say, is a savage
in grain, a man of the wilds. Do what you will with
him, he goes back to his wigwam and his canoe, and
leaves behind the delights of cirilization as easily as he
throws off its garments. As though all races were not
once savage in grain, — men of the wilds, more familiar
with the instruments of warfare and the chase than
with the tools of peaceful industry. As though we,
Saxon oppressors that we are, were not once as filthy,
as cruel, and as impatient of restraint as any Sioux or
Comanche of them all. As though, indeed, all races did
not climb from lower to higher life by slow and uncertain
steps. In face of this persistent sophism which has dogged
the red man, let it be said once for all, that the question
of his capacity for cirilization is no question at all.
Nothing but pure ignorance permits any one to entertain
it. The best proof of capacity is achievement. There
are civilized Indians. And if whites, in their relations
with Indians, could temper power with simple justice
and large wisdom, in ten years there would not be a
tribe within our borders which had not taken at least
the first tottering infant steps in that path whose goal
is knowledge, refinement, and rirtue. It is our selfish
ness trampling upon clear rights, it is our greed on
smallest pretext rending asunder solemn treaties, which
is the one fatal bar to Indian improvement. All the
rest — the dirt, the laziness, the revolting cruelty, toe
fascination of the wilds — might be overcome. If Chris
tians could only learn to be Christians ! Is this strong
language ? Very well, it is plain truth.
What constitutes civilization ? Is it living in com-

OUE BEDOUINS. 399
fort, having good houses and furniture, wearing decent
garments ? Then twenty thousand Indian families, de
serting the traditional wigwam, have reared and occupy
humble homes, and wear the attire of civilized life. Is
it earning support by regular and honest industry?
Then twenty-six thousand savages, heads of families,
last year, by faithful toil, made no inconsiderable addi
tion to the great material resources of the United States.
Is it interest in education ? Then in three hundred and
fifty schools, eleven thousand Indian children are being
led out of darkness into light. Is it capacity of self-
control ? A visitor to a settlement of Oneidas, at
Green Bay, Wisconsin, reports that, while these people
in respect to houses, schools, churches, agricultural im
plements, and the like, are on a par with their white
neighbors, their quiet, peaceable, and orderly demeanor
on Sunday puts to shame the average frontier town.
Is it attachment to religion ? There are in this Union
twenty-seven thousand Indians who are members of
Christian churches, and who do as much credit to their
profession as their white brethren. Is it power and
willingness to deal with larger than merely personal
interests ? In the official report of a visiting committee
to the Indian Territory occur these remarkable words :
" We were deeply interested in a risit to the Cherokee
Legislature, convened at Telequah. We were kindly
received in a joint session of both houses, and witnessed
a display of talent, ability, and intelligence, and dignity
in the management of business, becoming any legisla
tive body of whites." If, then, habits of decent life and
labor, if support of schools and churches, if self-govern
ment and tribal government, make men civilized, then
there are civilized Indians, — a hundred thousand of
them.

400 OUE BEDOUINS.
• But some one asks for special instances of Indian
improvement, in confirmation of this general assertion.
The demand is reasonable. Take the nearest example.
In the State of New York there are five thousand
Indians. They are the descendants of the once famous
Six Nations, of whom it is not too much to say that
their name is written in letters of blood and fire on
frontier history. Scarcely a century ago it was gravely
stated, in a formal paper, " that these Indians are such
an ignorant and barbarous people, that they are incapa
ble of being civilized, or brought over to Christianity,"
just as to-day many a one says the same thing of their
brethren in Dakota or Arizona. Fortunately, there were
men who thought differently; and the State wisely
guaranteed to these people eighty-six thousand fertile
acres, and to their children the benefit of her public
school system. Note the results. These tribes have
emerged from the perishing class. Instead of dwin
dling, they steadily increase. Not waiting, with sullen
apathy, to be overwhelmed by the advancing tide of
higher life, they have welcomed the habits of cirilized
people. They cultivate as much soil as our average
New England farmers; and to such purpose, that in
1876 they raised grain to the amount of one hundred
and sixty bushels to every family. One Seneca Indian
sold two thousand dollars' worth of fruit, the product
of his own orchards. They live in good houses, send
their children to the public schools, build churches and
support them, and, upon an emergency, can supply a
valuable staff officer to the Lieutenant General of the
United States army. If this is not civilization, what is
it ? Yet, thus much have simple justice and the grant
ing of equal privileges done in a few generations for
savages who were once counted the fiercest and most
untamable of their race.

OUE BEDOUINS. 401
Go, in imagination, to toe distant Indian Territory,
"that paradise of the red man," as Bishop Whipple
terms it. Here are sixty thousand civilized Indians, —
Cherokees, Creeks, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Seminoles, —
names how familiar in the records of Southern war !
names of what dread in how many a Southern house
hold scarcely fifty years ago! These Indians are no
longer barbarians. Nobody would pretend! it. Tliey
wear our costume. All have comfortable homes, de
cently furnished. Some have elegant homes, in which
you find carpets, sewing-machines, pianos, pictures, and
all the paraphernalia of advanced American life. The
United States Official Report states that the Indians of
this Territory raised, in 1872, five times as much grain
as was raised in any other Territory ; and that the
farms and improvements were twice as valuable as those
of any other. At the National Fair at St. Louis, the
Creeks, in free competition with white producers, took
three premiums for the best specimens of cotton. Put,
now, in a condensed form, the actual condition and
achievements of these children of a race said to be
incapable of progress ; then look at it, until you take
in the full meaning of its testimony. Here, in round
numbers, are sixty thousand Indians. They cultivate
two hundred thousand acres of land. From those acres
they raise two million bushels of grain, one hundred
and eighty thousand bushels of vegetables, and one hun
dred and forty thousand tons of hay. From their wood
lands they cut six millions of feet of lumber, and they own
more than a million of domestic animals, — a number
greater than is owned in twenty-six of our States and
Territories. Turn from material achievements, to see
if there are any tokens of mental and spiritual advance
ment As these people are not barbarians, so too they
26

402 OUE BEDOUINS.
are not heathen. They support two hundred and eight
schools. They have eighty-five churches, with twelve
thousand members. A competent witness gives it as
his opinion, that these Indians, in the three qualities of
industry, frugality, and sobriety, will bear comparison
with an equal population taken bodily out of any agri
cultural district in the Southern or border States. The
Indian Report of 1869, written when these tribes had
scarcely emerged out of that Civil War whose bitterness
and demoralizing power they had known to the full,
speaks in these striking terms : " Their condition,
socially and politically, will bear favorable comparison
with that of the white settlers upon the borders of
Texas and Arkansas, and " — mark it — " the laws are
more respected and better enforced among these people
than among their white neighbors."
There is no need of exaggeration. No wise person
could wish to invest these people with romantic and un
real virtues, or ascribe to them an improbable excellence.
No doubt there are less agreeable features to contem
plate. Strange if there were not. Very likely, in the
best of their settlements, there is much indolence, much
vice, and some crime. But must one travel all the way
to the Indian Territory to discover these erils ? Or if,
perchance, in the dark retreats of Boston and New
York true savages with barbarian instincts lurk, does
any one on that account doubt the possibility of Chris
tian life in these great cities ? Grant, if any one affirms
it, that, compared with European and American stand
ards, this civilization is not high civilization, still it
remains true, that, in all human history, there is
scarcely an instance of progress out of barbarism so
rapid, so entire, and so satisfactory as that which, in
less than a century, has transformed one hundred thou-

OUE BEDOUINS. 403
sand savages — liring in wigwams or buts, lurking in
thickets, tomahawks and scalping-knives in their hands,
to destroy the unwary — into law-abiding and Christian
people. And the unvarnished and unexaggerated fact
is, that scant justice, a fair opportunity in life, only
moderate protection from the greed and violence of un
principled men, and the active efforts of Christian
teachers and missionaries to foster industry, knowledge,
and rirtue, have carried these of old time fierce bar
barians far up in the scale of mental and spiritual man
hood. But admit this, the soberest conclusion possible,
and you admit everything. If these Indians are capable
of civilization, all Indians, under proper conditions, are
capable of it. To those, therefore, who say that an
Indian cannot be civilized, we point to one hundred
thousand Indians already far advanced in the arts of
life, self-supporting, self-respecting, learning to value
education, learning to crave the comforts and even the
luxuries of refined life, — to thousands of Indians bow
ing like ourselves, in Christian churches, to worship the
same God, and to learn to follow the same Master. If
anybody does not know these things, it is his own fault.
They are an open secret, outspread, year after year,
upon the pages of official reports. Most effectually do
they dispose of the foolish assertion that men, — im
mortal beings, — because, forsooth, the color of their
skin is not white, are incapable of that great advancing
life of industry, of enterprise, of knowledge, and of
virtue proper to our humanity.
So much for the results in the past of scanty justice and
humanity. We emphasize the word past. Por, however
faithfully the good work may have been continued in these
latter days, its initiation must, in all fairness, be placed

404 OUE BEDOUINS.
to the credit of a former generation. But what of the
present ? As clearly, within the last dozen years there
has been a rerival of interest, and a revival of conscience,
in respect to the red man and our duties to him. The
origin of this revival may be traced, in part, to that
great act of justice, the emancipation of the blacks, which
tended to fix the attention of thoughtful persons upon our
relations to all dependent people. Still more, this revival
originated in the emergencies of the times. The construc
tion of the great Continental Railroad, and the discovery
at various points in the Trans-Mississippi country of rich
mining regions, brought the people of the United States —
and not a few hunters and trappers — into contact with
that great horde of savages whose home was the vast
plains of the extreme West, and whose only support was
the almost innumerable herds of bison which roamed
over those plains. This revival was the opposite of ro
mantic OT sentimental. It was fed, not by a perusal of
Cooper, but by a stody of the dry yet suggestive details
of official reports, in which not one feature of Indian
sloth, cruelty, or degradation was witoheld. The prac
tical outcome of that revival was what is familiarly
called President Grant's peace policy. To what extent
that policy originated in the President's own mind, or
was the result of the recommendations of the committee
of Congress, appointed in 1867, to examine into the con
dition of the Indian tribes, it is impossible to say. But
that, during the eight years of his administration, General
Grant adhered to it with steady fidelity is generally ad
mitted. And, when the transient heats of the time shall
cool, this uniform spirit of justice and humanity toward
a helpless people will shed a pure lustre upon his mem
ory. This policy may be defined to be an honest effort,
by peaceful methods, to withhold the Indian from hos-

CUB BEDOUINS. 405
tOity ; to instmct him in toe employmente and arte of
civilized life ; to replace in bis mind beatoen supersti
tions by Christian foito and practices, and tous to lift
him to a position in whicb be shall be fit for full citizen
ship, — owning bis own land, receiving as otoers toe
protection, and bearing as otoers toe burdens and penal
ties of law.
Of tois peace pohcy, five salient features may be noted.
In the first place, toe Indian tribes have been put in
charge, not of toe War Office, bnt of toe Department of
toe Interior ; and this, not because military men are, on
toe whole, less disposed toan otoers to render justice and
kindness, but because an army from ite very intent, and
especiaUy from the material which fills ite ranks, is an
unfit instrument for toe advancement of a savage people
in toe arts of peaca What toe Austrian explorer said
of toe French colonies applies here, — '-No industrial
progress where toere is too mach dank of the sabre ! "
In the second place, all just means have been used to
bring tribes into reservations of moderate extent, where
support must depend more upon toe plough and toe
reaper toan upon toe rifle and the fishing-rod. This is
according to toe philosophy of human progress. Man
b^ins a hunter, and too often a robber. The next stage
is pastoral lif& Then follows toe tilling of toe soU. So
toe moment our American Bedouin setties down to agri-
cnltore, he makes two vast leaps forward. In toe toird
place, it has more cles^ly established the principle, that
annuities already due Indians, or any sums whicb shall
be appropriated by Congress to Indians, sb^ more
largely be devoted to toe establishment of influences
permanently elevating. Seed and farmer's tools are
^ven to encourage agricnltnre. Comely and durable
houses are bmlt to discourage migratory life. Scbool-

406 OUE BEDOUINS.
houses are erected, books provided, teachers sent, to
create new and higher desires. In the fourth place, the
great religious sects have been enlisted in the work. To
each of these bodies special tribes have been assigned ;
and it is understood that they will suggest suitable per
sons to act as agents, and supplement the government
work by educational and religious influences furnished
by them. This is a striking feature of the peace policy.
The persons in charge of Indians, at any rate, are selected
because of their supposed mental and moral fitoess ; and
if bad men occasionally get into posts of duty, and cheat
their clients, it is not the fault of the system, but of a
careless application of it. Again, just to the degree that
the religious bodies enter with zeal into the work will an
intelligent idea of the real condition of the Indians be
diffused, and a healthy public sentiment grow up. In
the fifth place, the President selects, from men eminent
for their practical wisdom and philanthropy, a Board of
Commissioners, who, serving without pay, shall exercise
in Indian affairs advisory and supervisory powers. And
these five methods are adopted to the end that as
speedily as possible an Indian may become, in the eye
of the law, a man, with all the rights and privileges
which should belong to him as an individual. To-day
government does not recognize a private Indian, but only
the tribe of which he is a member. To-day an Indian
owns no land ; he is simply a fraction of a tribe which
owns land. To-day an Indian has no rights which he
can maintain in our courts of law. To-day an Indian
may rob an Indian, or kill him ; or a white man may
cheat an Indian, or hunt him to death ; and it is difficult
to say what is the remedy, if not private revenge. Could
anything be worse ? Under such conditions, are not
bloody wrongs and bloody reprisals daily possibilities ?

OUR BEDOUINS. 407
And is not the inducement to an Indian to be honest, to
be peaceable, and to be industrious reduced to its lowest
terms ? The sooner Indians can be prepared to give up
tribal relations, and become citizens of the United States,
toe better. And that the peace policy, from the begin
ning, has clearly seen toe necessity of such a step, and
steadily pressed forward to it, should have saved it from
those sneers about sentimentality in which many who
should know better have indulged.
Pass now from toe toeory to the practical working of
toe peace policy. At the outset it is to be observed that
it had to deal wito an entirely new set of conditions.
The Six Nations, the tribes of the Indian Territory, the
Shawnees, toe Miamis, and indeed aU the red men who
make up the civilized one hundred toousand in the
United States, had confronted civilization for two cen-
tmies. They were familiar with ite aspects ; they under
stood toe tremendous elements of power which it wielded ;
they had come to know that there was no escape from
annihilation except through a desertion of the ways of
toeir fathers. But toe Indians of the plains had beeu
touched only by the outmost fringe of civilization. They
knew of its virtues and its power only torough hunters
and trappers almost as savage as toemselves. Thus the
peace policy had to do with some of toe wildest tribes on
tois continent, who had been accustomed from time im
memorial to a roving Hfe, whose instinct was to spurn
all control, and who had gained from the whites nothing
but memories of bad faito, and new and revolting forms
of cruelty, to add to their native and almost untamable
fierceness. All of these tribes despised habite of indus
try. Some were so supremely ignorant of agriculture
that toey could not conceive for what purpose seed was

408 OUE BEDOUINS.
sown. Add now that on the frontier are many bad men,
whose interest it is to keep the Indian ignorant and hos
tile, and multitudes of honest men, whose prejudices
and fears make them terribly unjust ; consider too how
hard it is, under any system, to find agents who shall be
wise and capable, and at the same time honest and
self-sacrificing ; and one sees that, amidst such obstar
cles, slow and doubtful success was all which could be
expected. Some striking results, however, have followed the
adoption of the peace policy. At any rate, it has justi
fied its name ; it has promoted peace. During the last
seven years, only two considerable outbreaks have dis
turbed the tranquillity of the frontier, — the frantic ris
ing of a handful of Modocs, and the defiant revolt of
Sitting Bull. Neither of these, it will be admitted, were
occasioned by too great, but by too littie adherence to
the principles of justice and forbearance. In 1876, there
were seventy-three agencies, having under more or less
close supervision over two hundred thousand Indians.
These wards of the nation ranged all the way from
the most civilized tribes down to Cheyennes, Kiowas,
Comanches, Apaches, and Blackfeet, — names whicb
come even now with a wild flavor to the lips, and smack
more of the tomahawk and the scalping-knife than of
the plough or the school ; yet seventy-two of these
agencies report perfect peace in their borders, and in
the seventy-third the breach of peace amounts only to
this, that a dozen Indians in a fit of intoxication killed
the trader and his two assistants who supplied the whis
key which put fire into tiieir wild blood, — hardly a
greater outrage than may happen any day in the slums
of any one of our large cities. A few cases of sudden
and generally unpremeditated violence may be added;

OUE BEDOUINS. 409
and then you have the whole story of that class of
crime among two hundred thousand Indians confronted
by twice that number of not always over-scrupuloua
whites. But peace is not the sole result of this policy. In
sixty-nine of the agencies there are Indians who have
abandoned the dress and habits of savage life. In some,
only here and there one ; in others, many ; in a few, all.
Sixty-three agencies report that members of their tribes
are steadily engaged in farming. Most of the tribes
have schools ; many have churches. One thousand
Indians learned to read last year. Twenty-seven thou
sand are church members. And, when one considers
what an abandonment of old supersitions and old habits
of life church membership indicates, the fact is sig
nificant And over and above all special facts, and
perhaps more important than all special facts, is the
general fact, that the idea is getting entrance into the
savage mind that the days of wild freedom are about
numbered, and that industry and settled life — in fine,
civilization — is coming to be a stern necessity. The
official Report sums up by saying that, of the two
hundred and seventy-five thousand Indians in the
United States, one hundred thousand may be called
civilized, one hundred thousand semi-civilized, while
seventy-five thousand have not as yet been gathered
into reservations. Of the whole number, hardly ten
thousand are in any sense hostile; while the rest are at
peace, and would gladly remain so. And in justice to
the innocent it should be stated that, almost without
exception, those acts of ferocious cruelty and of revolt
ing wrongs to female captives, which figure so largely
in books of the frontier, and which tend to create bitter
ness towards all Indians, are the acts of this insignificant
fraction of the race.

410 OUE BEDOUINS.
Would that we could get behind these cold figures,
and see the living facts which these figures record, —
the slow growth of degraded human beings out of filth,
indolence, and violence into better life ! Here are the
Sioux. The general idea is that they are an altogether
fierce, sullen, intractable, treacherous race. The dis
tinguished members of the Sioux Commission dissent.
They say that they are one of the finest tribes of Indians
on this continent ; that once they were friends ; that
even now not one sixth of them have been driven by bitter
wrongs into hostility. Of one rillage of eighteen hun
dred of these people, this is the story. All wear citizen's
dress, and live in decent houses. Eight hundred can
read and write. One hundred and fifteen children are
in school. Four churches, with three hundred and fifty
members, are supported. To which their agent adds,
that almost without exception every able-bodied Indian
works ; and those who work most are most respected.
The church Indians stand firmly by their faith, and by
word and practice endeavor to lead others to the Gospel
light. In another little Sioux village, one hundred
heads of families have taken homesteads under the law
of the United States. They have married their wives
after the Christian manner, live on their own farms, pay
their taxes promptly, obey strictly the laws, and give no
cause of offence. As much as this cannot be said of all
branches of this great tribe. But it can be said that
twenty-five thousand Sioux are to-day living on their law
ful reservations, and minding their own business, and at
least looking toward civilization. Here again are the
Chippewas of Minnesota, six thousand strong. Ten
years ago the report was that they were a roving people,
in a low and degraded condition, living by hunting and
fishing, and it is feared by no little stealing, and were

OUE BEDOUINS. 411
much demoralized by contact with ricious whites. In
ten brief years, these low and degraded Chippewas have
settled down into orderly, decent living, industrious,
moral, — yes, and God-fearing communities. Their
minister, who has given his life to them, warmly writes :
" Our Chippewas have never imbrued their hands with
white blood. Though deeply wronged, though left liter
ally to starve for want of that of which they have been
fleeced, they have stood by government and fought for
government. Had they not been the most patient of
people, they would have risen against their plunderers,
and died to the last man." Of the children he says,
" A better set of children in a school than our pupils I
never saw." These examples are favorable ones. Cer
tainly. For that they were chosen, — not to show what
stupidity, carelessness, and selfish greed can do, but what
real sagacity and Christian spirit have accomplished and
can again accomplish. Still, in the whole seventy -three
agencies there is scarcely one where there is not to be
discerned some little ray of light piercing the darkness,
to prophesy a coming day.
And now let it be freely admitted that in respect to
the later efforts for Indian improvement, as in respect
to the earlier efforts, these favorable staitements, though
coming from a source not usually infected with enthu
siasm, namely, United States Official Reports, may be
too hopeful. Probably, if you were to go into the best
of the Indian towns, you would find more indolence and
more vice than would be quite cheering. Certainly
from all these tribes there drift into our frontier towns
dirty, drunken, ricious red men, who are the merest
wrecks of humanity. But to-day do not white men
come to our doors as shiftless, as dirty, as given to
drink, as dangerous, as any Indian of them all ? And

412 OUB BEDOUINS.
despite aU toat, despite tramps who bring terror to
lonely women and secluded homes, despite dangeroos
savages who lurk in dark corners and dens of great
cities, do we not hold toe white man capable of civil
ization ? And do we not refuse to be judged by toese
waifs and drift-wood, which toe refluent wave of human
progress has left stranded ? Might we not grant what
we ourselves ask, and judge of toe capacity of toe red
man by toose who stay at home and cultivate toeir
acres, and support toeir families, and worship toeir God
in peace ? Very likely toe truto demands that we
should see darker shadows, and admit toat even in toe
so called peaceful tribes toere grow up young warriors
in whose veins courses the untamable blood of toeir
ancestors, who cannot teach toeir wild hearte to submit
to restraint, who slip out from toe reservations and be
come outiaws, and as outlaws commit nameless horrors.
Very likely toere are such. Few, however, in com
parison wito the whole. But what inference shall we
draw? How wide? How inclusive? Three quarters
of a centory ago Wellington's veterans, the soldiers
of Christian England, stormed several Spanish cities.
Then ensued scenes of rapine, of riolence, of unbridled
and wholesale lust, whicb toe pen refuses to describe.
Yet on account of these exceptional horrors we do not
deny England her high seat among cirilized people.
Shall we discriminate against toe race which has had
little advantages, and because one per cent, or at most
two, break loose from toe new bonds, and relapse into sav
agery, pronounce toe policy of peace and steady kindness
and justice sheer imbecility ? Establish as trenchant
limitations as you please, still it remains true that
the peace policy has proved toat the Indians of the plains
can be cirilized, and toat if toe process of extermination

OUB EEDOUDiTS. 413
is not replaced by that of civilization, it is because a
Christian people despises tbe duty whicb lies at ite
door. What now, outside the native and inherited fierceness
and waywardness of Indian character, stands in toe way
of toe success of any policy, peace or otoerwise, whiph
seeks the advancement of the vrild men of toe plains ?
One thing, — injustice. Injustice ! in spirit ever the
same; in form, protean. Injustice! in toe first place,
taking the shape of petty wrongs, perpetoally exasperat
ing a brave, iigh-spirited, and revengeful race. An
Indian, like every other savage, is a grown up child, in
whom a child's carelessness of consequences is wedded
to toe strong passions of a man. His temptation is to
act upon first impulse. Now, when your righte are
trampled upon, and your property stolen, and you have
no hope of peaceable redress, what is your first impulse ?
To right yourself wito your own strong arm. That is
toe very feeling of toe Indian. But if he follow it, no
matter what the provocation, farewell to peace, farewell
to progress ! Red Cloud, toe great chief of toe Northern
Sioux, looking from his encampment across toe river,
sees white men cutting hay and felling trees on the
land which had just been secured to him by solemn
treaty; and he says, "I leamed, when I was in toe
States, that, if a man cut bay or wood on anotoer's land,
be bad to pay for it Why can't I get pay for my wood
and bay ? " To be sure, why not ? For no reason,
except that there was no court on earto before which
he could come to get justice. The Indians of Fort
JBerthold cut and piled on toe banks of the Missouri
five hundred cords of wood, hoping to tom an honest
penny by toe sale of the same to steamboate ; but when

414 OUE BEDOUINS.
the captains took it without giving so much as thanks,
the Indians were soniewhat shaken in their faith in the
value of labor. Would not you, my reader, have been
a trifle discouraged ? The agent appointed by our
Association writes that the Utes are very friendly
Indians; but that they understand the terms of their
treaty, and cannot be fooled. If he has any trouble,
it will be on account of whites who will encroach upon
their lands. These wrongs may not separately look
large. But multiply them a hundred-fold, let them
occur constantly, and with no hope of redress, and
would they not try a saint's temper, much more an
Indian's, who, like Rob Roy's Highlander, is "not
famous for that gude gift " ?
These petty injuries may deepen into mighty wrongs,
which make the red man feel that he can find justice
nowhere. Take the Black Hills question, as being
nearest to us both in time and interest. Three years
ago, the great tribe of fifty thousand Sioux was peace
able, with the exception of a little band under Sitting
Bull, variously estimated at five hundred to a thousand
braves, encamped near the head waters of the Missouri.
This chief had refused to enter into treaty relations,
saying, with bitter irony, " that when the United States
would send a man who could tell the truth, he should
be glad to see him." But he was too weak in resources
to attempt much, and was forced to be content with
raids upon his tribal foes, — the Crows and Pawnees, —
and was sure to be crushed or driven over the border
as soon as government seriously took him in hand.
What has changed this hopeful condition of affairs?
The unjust appropriation of the Black Hills. This
tract of country had been secured to the Sioux by as
solemn a compact as man can frame, — secured after

OUE BEDOUINS. 415
Red Cloud had stated the nature of former injuries, and
how " the railroad had passed through his country and
paid for his land nothing, — no, not so much as a brass
ring ! " The valleys too, which ran up among these hills,
were extremely fertile, and contained the only land in
the Dakota reservation fitted for agriculture. In 1874,
there came a rumor that there was gold in these hills.
Quickly General Custer is sent with surveyors and
mineralogists to examine, much as if one should open
your pocket-book to see tf there was anything in it
worth stealing. Then thousands of squatters followed,
and took possession. How barefaced, and how sus
tained by a bad public sentiment, this violent seizure of
another's property was, we learn, not from the defenders
of the peace policy alone, but equally from its oppo
nents ; for in the biography of Custer we find tois re
markable admission : " All arreste of miners by the
military in the Black Hills proved a farce ; because, when
said miners were carried before the Dakota courts, they
were immediately released without punishment, and as
immediately went back." It is not. wonderful that the
able men who made up the Sioux Commission felt their
cheeks crimson as they listened to the simple, shameful
truth as it fell from the lips of these rude men of the
woods. It is not very wonderful that these painted and
plumed diplomatists were not anxious to take part in
a miserable sham of a treaty, whose ink might not be
dry before its conditions were trampled upon. It is not
so surprising if many a Sioux thought that a quick,
and to his savage mind honorable, death was better,
than to sink from haughty freedom to wretched depend
ence. For to barbarians' as well as to their civilized
brethren there come times when, in the presence of
mighty wrongs, all selfish interests sink into insignifi-

416 OUR BEDOUINS.
cance. Least of all is it wonderful that, when our
government, with all its resources, cannot prevent vol
unteers from going to Nicaragua, to Cuba, to Canada,
Red Cloud and the other Sioux chiefs could not prevent
some thousand or two of their braves, under such provo
cation, stealing away to join the hostile band. The
Black Hills outrage sealed the fate of Custer and his
brave companions ; for it changed Sitting Bull from an
outlaw into the bold avenger of a broken treaty.
Recall the once famous Chivington massacre, — an old
story, but pregnant with lessons, and whose featores we
know, not by the representations of friends or foes of the
Indian, but through sworn testimony from all classes of
people except the Indians themselves, taken by a select
committee of Congress. In 1864, a war broke out be
tween the whites and the Cheyennes and Arapahoes.
Which was the aggressor is in dispute, though the
weight of evidence is against the whites. Be that as it
may, in September of that year. Black Kettle, a chief
whom General Harney said " was as good a friend of
the United States as he himself was," led a band of six
hundred men, women, and children to Fort Lyon. He
stated that " he desired peace, and had never desired
war." Colonel Wynkoop, the commander, permitted
him to encamp in the vicinity of the fort to await the
action of government. While they were thus encamped.
Colonel Chivington with a thousand or two volunteera
appeared on the scene. He was told what the condition
of affairs was. The Indians raised the American flag
and under it a white flag. Relying upon the promise of
protection, at first they made no resistance. Finally,
finding themselves attacked by ten times their number,
and no quarter given, the scanty band of warriors rallied,
and, by desperate fighting, succeeded in escaping with

OUR BEDOUINS. , 417
two thirds of the village. After all resistance was over,
women and even children of six or eight years were shot
in cold blood. The bodies of men, women, and children
were scalped and mutilated in a manner too vile and too
horrible for pen to record. Wliat a lesson to rude sav
ages in civilization ! What a plea to ignorant heathen
for Christianity ! It is sometimes said, as though it was
an all-sufficing excuse, that these Cheyennes have com
mitted acts just as horrible. Admitted. Yet methinks
the noble words of the latest biographer of Edmund
Burke fit the Western as well as the Eastern hemi
sphere : " Ingenious apologists assure us, with impressive
gravity, that the East India Company and its servants
were not any more cruel and greedy than the native
princes. If they are content that Europeans in the
latter half of the eighteenth century should be no worse
than these barbarians, this protest is perfectly adequate.
But enlightened public opinion rests on this pardonable
hypothesis, that Europeans ought not only to have been
less tyrannical, perfidious, and destructive than bar
barous rajahs, but not to have been tyrannical and per
fidious at all."
Nor are these solitary cases of injustice. Take the case
of the Round Valley Indians of California, from whom,
by a few strokes of the pen in a legal enactment, twenty
thousand acres of beautiful arable land were taken, to be
replaced by a wild, desolate mountain, on which a single
sheep could hardly get support ; or that of the Osages,
whose very cornfields were seized and occupied by squat
ters ; or that of the Ottawas, from whom the State of
Kansas took and held twenty thousand acres of land
which had been granted them by solemn treaty to be
used for purposes of education. If it be true, and,
alas! true it is, that in this country ndt a foot of Indian
27

418 OUE BEDOUINS.
land is safe, or that no treaty, however solemn, has ever
bound whites in opposition to their supposed interest,
how can the savage have faith in our justice, or what
possible inducement is there for him to enter upon a
course of civilized life ? His civilization must always be
threatened, as the Alpine village is threatened by some
overhanging precipice or great avalanche, which at any
moment may be loosed to sweep away the beauty, the
comfort, and the bomes which the labor of generations
has gathered.
And so persistent injustice tends to press its rictims
down to a point where not only is civilization impossible,
but even so active a rice as revenge is impossible ; when
the Indian, losing all legal possession of the soil, having
no right to the ground on which he treads or the sod
which shall cover him, sinks into pure hopelessness
and shiftlessness. Here is the tale of the Mission
Indians of Southern California, condensed from Official
Reports. About a century ago, the Catholic prieste of
the Pacific Coast established in that fertile region mis
sion stations, and gathered around them the neighboring
Indians, whom they instructed in the simpler arts of life,
and especially in agricnltnre. For nearly three quarters
of a century the descendants of toese Indians continued
to live on the land which their fathers had occupied,
without however acquiring any legal title to it. When,
in 1833, the church lands were secularized, tois whole
domain was divided among a few great Spanish and
Mexican proprietors. The Indians remained on the
land, careless of the change, and probably unaware of it.
But with the great tide of emigration occasioned by the
gold fever, everything altered. Land became valuable.
Gradually these original occupants have been driven out
Writs of ejectment have been obtained without the

OUR BEDOUINS. 419
knowledge of their victims, served, and in some cases
the very crops and other personal property of the In
dians taken to satisfy legal costs. Thus cast out naked
into what had proved to them a cold world, they have
easily fallen into destitution and vice. Disease and
death have followed, until the twenty-five thousand of
1826 have become the four thousand of 1876.
One readily sees, therefore, that, in addition to the
necessary difficulties springing out of the inherited
qualities and traditional habits of the savage, there are
other obstacles to Indian improvements quite as great,
for which his civilized brother is accountable. Very
easy is it for a tribe, deceived many times, seeing little
to encourage, and robbed of all rights and privileges, to
drop into a vagrant race of beggars and drunkards. Or
in a clear sky a cloud may gather, and the very people
for whom we were hoping much, exasperated beyond the
limits of savage patience, hurl themselves in blind hate
upon friend and foe alike ; and in that Saturnalia, a six
months' border war, all the little results, and more, of
ten years' wise and patient labor be swept away.
All through this paper we have indicated what things
are needful to make efforts for Indian improvement suc
cessful. Unquestionably the first and the all-essential
requirement is the creation of a wide-spread, permanent,
sensible, and Christian public sentiment. So long as
the great body of the people are careless about the ques
tion, we shall always be in danger of drifting into acts
of stupidity or injustice. And so long as it is possible
to-day to create a furor for the Indian by some story of
his wonderful progress in knowledge and virtue, and to
morrow to replace it by as great & furor against him on
account of some other tale of his ferocity, all policy

420 OUR BEDOUINS.
concerning him must be prorisional. We need, toen, a
permanent Christian sentiment. Not less do we need a
sensible, we may say a common sense public sentiment
Nobody but an idiot wishes to create or continue any
ideal or fantastic romance about toe red man, as toough
he were a true king of toe woods, — Natare's nobleman,
— a sort of primitive Washington or Franklin in breech
cloth and blanket Least of all do those who are now
laboring for toe Indians wish to lend toeir names and
influence to the support of such nonsense. They rec
ognize, and desire that all othera should recognize, that
the Indians of the plains are savages, wito toe rices and
cruelty, toe waywardness and intolerance of restraint,
which belong to savages ; but toey see, and woidd have
other people see, that they are also human, wito all the
possibilities of humanity, wito elements in them out of
which may come, under proper conditions, intelligent
and noble life ; but toey understand that toese elemente
are not to be freed from toe dense ignorance and brutal
ity in which they are wellnigh smotoered, in a day or a
year. They know, toerefore, that what most of all is
needed is a permanent and sensible Christian sentiment,
which takes up the work of Indian improvement, not be
cause it is attractive, and not because it has no dis
couragements and obstacles, but because it is toe work
which has been given us to do.
Should such a wise and just public sentiment ever be
established, its first business will be to repress toe petty
and the wholesale injustice which so often drive our
native tribes to madness, and which make equitable
people look upon the savage outrages which succeed
with divided sentimente ; and to repress wito no less
unspating vigor the bai-barous ferocity which not only
refuses to take up the habite of civilized life, but which.

OUR BEDOUINS. 421
unprovoked, seeks to ravage and lay waste toe frontier ;
for what toe true friend of toe Indian asks is not his
immunity from law, but an equal and equitable applica
tion of law to all parties.
If, now, we come to metoods, — if any wise lessons
can be drawn from experience, — the metoods of the
futore must be much like toose of toe past : to bring
the tribes by all just means into reservations so narrow
that roving life shall no longer be possible, so fertile
toat honest labor shall easily win a liring; then to pour
into those reservations aU elevating influences, — instruc
tion in tbe mechanic arte, helps to agricultore, teachers
for tbe mind, missionaries for toe soul. The late treaty
wito toe Nortoern Sioux — largely, we suspect, the
work of Bishop Whipple — shows how true wisdom can
walk hand in hand with true philanthropy. That treaty
prorides toat the amount of toe paymente made for toe
Black Hills shaU depend largely upon the fidelity wito
which toe tribe engages in agriculture, and upon toe
steadiness with which it sends ite chUdren to toe govem
ment schools ; a new application of the old Scripture, —
" If any would not work, neither should he eat."
But wise methods we shall find just as soon as we re
aUy want toem, even if toe old ones are not good. Still
we run round toe circle, and come again to our starting
point. Give us a just, a wide, an enduring pubUc senti
ment, and aU the rest wiU f oUow, — toe wisdom to plan,
toe patience to persist, the generosity to give, tbe Chris
tian love and zeal to override aU obstacles, and by ite
own fervor to melt toe cold heart and icy barriers of
barbarism.

MEMOIR OP GRINDALL REYNOLDS, SENIOR.
Peepaked bt his son, Rev. Gedtdall Eeykolds, foe the Seventt-
fiest Anniveesaet of the Peovidence Association of Me
chanics AND Makufactheees, Eebeuaet 27, 1860.
GRINDALL REYNOLDS was the second of seven
sons of John and Dorothy Reynolds.^ He
was born at Bristol, R. I., October 12, 1765. His
parents were in humble circumstances, but of great
integrity and firm religious principle. At the age of
nine years, he was apprenticed to Jonathan Capron, a
tailor of Providence. His opportonities for educa
tion while at home were quite limited, and after he
entered upon his apprenticeship he never enjoyed for
a day school privileges, — a deprivation which, so far
from destroying, seemed rather to stimulate his love
of learning. To increase his scanty stock of knowl
edge, he employed the long winter evenings in reading
by the firelight, and often rose before the sun to peruse
the few books which fell in his way. Very early he
became deeply interested in religious subjects, and
when Mr. Whitefield preached in Providence he at
tended the four o'clock morning meetings, because that
1 !Mr. Reynolds's eldest brother died from the efEects of a bay
onet wound received at the capture of Gteneral Charles Lee of the
Revolutionary army, of whose life-guard he was a member. The
youngest died in infancy. The remaining four deceased at the
following advanced ages : William, eighty-four ; Edward, eighty-
six ; Benjamin, eighty-six ; John, eighty-eight.

MEMOIE OF GEINDALL EEYNOLDS, SENIOR. 423
was the only time he could snatch from toil. At four
teen he entered the Presbyterian Church, though after
wards his views very materially changed.
About 1774, Mr. Capron gave up all charge of his
apprentices, and left Providence ; and thus, at the age
of eighteen or nineteen, young Reynolds was thrown
upon the world, dependent upon his own unaided re
sources, at a time when political convulsions had made
the returns from mercantile and mechanical industry
at once scanty and uncertain. Of the next six or
eight years of his life we have only slight hints. It is
known that he went to Boston, where his parents then
resided ; that he was in that town during its occupation
by the British; that he was dangerously sick then and
there with the small-pox, a disease which the soldiers
had introduced into Boston, and which made fearful
ravages ; that he was in the mob which assembled after
the murder of Crispus Attucks ; that he escaped with
his parents into the country, about the time of the
battle at Concord ; that from a neighboring hill he wit
nessed the terrible struggle at Bunker Hill ; that he
worked at his trade in West Roxbury, the place where
his mother was boru ; that for a portion of three years,
at least, he served as Sergeant, Ensign, and Lieutenant
in the Revolutionary army, though it does not appear
that he saw much actual service.
In 1780, Mr. Reynolds returned to Providence. Por
twelve years he continued working quietly at his trade,
in a shop next north of the present No. 83, North Main
Street. During this time business was dull and pros
pects were discouraging, and he was induced to go to Nor
folk, Virginia, and engage in business with his brother
Benjamin, who made that place his permanent home.
His stay there, however, was short. He returned to

424 MEMOm OF GEINDALL REYNOLDS, SENIOE.
Providence prerious to 1795, and engaged in the shoe
business, m company wito James Temple. In 1796,
toe partoership was dissolved, and Mr. Reynolds opened
a wholesale boot and shoe store " at Governor Fenner's
corner," on the east side of Norto Main Street near
Market Square, " one door norto " of his former loca
tion, where was kept for sale a general assortment for
men's, ladies', and children's wear, "as neat as any
made in toe United States or imported from Europe."
In 1801, he removed his business "to the bouse of
Jolm Mason, Esq., on toe west side of the bridge, next
westward of Mr. Aldrich's tavern," on Weybosset
Street As an evidence of his busmess energy, it may
be mentioned toat at a period of great depression be
commenced, and by persevering industry and unfltoch-
ing economy finished witoout debt, a house on toe
corner of Chestnut and Pine Streete. As marking toe
changes that have taken place in toat neighborhood, it
is wortoy of note tiiat his house was set so low in toe
side of a bill toat a plank could be put horizontally
from toe top of the hill to toe roof of toe building.
The hill has since disappeared. He also erected and
occupied the house on the corner of Benefit and Chureb
Streets, now ovmed by Mr. Samuel Hamlin, but whetoer
before or after be lived on toe west side is imknown.
Mr. Reynolds was an original member of tbe
Mechanics Association, and as a member of various
committees gave his active influence to the advance
ment of its intereste. When the Association determined
on a course of quarterly lectures, he by appointment
delivered the second, which was received wito com
mendation. He also, on another occasion, delivered
an address before toat body. He sympatoized with
toe movement for establishing free schools in Rhode

MEMOIE OF GRINDALL REYNOLDS, SENIOR. 425
Island, and, with a cle^r appreciation of the worth of
education to the State as well as to the individual, he
proved himself a worthy coadjutor of the leading spirits
in that noble enterprise. He built the first public
. schoolhouse on the west side of the town, on land now.
owned by Peleg Gardner, Esq., on Claverick Street,
and to the amusement of many placed it in a sort of
bowl, the hill rising six or eight feet above the sill on
every side. He gave as his reason that in a brief time
the growth and convenience of the town would demand
that the hill should be dug away, — a prediction ful
filled within ten years. To the material interests of
the town he also gave a cheerful service, and, as com
mander of the United Train of Artillery, contributed
his share to the martial spirit of the day.
Mr. Reynolds was one of twelve who established a
private Insurance Association, which, in 1799, was
merged in the Washington Insurance Company. The
first directors of this institution were Richard Jackson,
Jr., Jabez Bullock, Amos Thropp, Joseph Tilling-
hast, Thomas Jackson, Grindall Reynolds, Ebenezer
Macomber, George Benson, Wheeler Martin, Samuel
Aborn, Jr., Abher Daggett, Charles Sheldon, and
George Jackson. Of this board, Richard Jackson,
Jr. was elected President, and George Benson,, Secre
tary. For the years of the separate existence of the
private company, Mr. Reynolds was its sole agent,
and apparently chief manager. While it continued it
seems to have had eminent success. In the early votes
of this body is a clause instructing the agent not to
insure vessels which were to be employed in the slave
trade. In 1808, Mr. Reynolds removed to Boston, though it
was not until late in life that he altogether relinquished

426 MEMOIR OF GRINDALL REYNOLDS, SENIOR.
the hope of returning to Providence. From 1814 to
1818 he resided at Stratford, Vermont, and had charge
of the manufacturing department of the Vermont Cop
peras Company. In the latter year he was appointed
manufacturing agent of the Franconia Iron Company,
and for ten years gave himself to this work. In 1828
he returned to Boston. Seven years later, in his
eighty-first year, he fell and was made a cripple for the
rest of his life. He died. May 8, 1847, at the ad
vanced age of ninety-one years and six months, retain
ing to the last an unbroken and unclouded intellect. In
accordance with his expressed wish, his remains were
brought to Providence, and when the graveyard of the
First Congregational Society, of which he had been an
influential member, was removed, they, with the dust of
the loved - ones who had many years before been taken
from him, were transferred to Swan Point Cemetery.
He was married three times, viz. : in 1780, to Abigail
Rhoades, of Providence, who died in 1789, preceded
to the grave by three of her children; in 1795, to
Mehitable Russell, of the same place, who lived only a
few years, her only child dying before her; in 1820, to
Cynthia Kendall, who with her tbree children is still
living. One of the number. Rev. Grindall Reynolds,
is pastor of the First Congregational Church and
Society in Concord, Mass.
Mr. Reynolds cherished to the close of life a tender
attachment to his native State, and to the city where
his youth and mature years were spent It afforded
him great pleasure to converse upon the occurrences of
former days, and to recall the names and persons of
those with whom he had then been familiar. The
occasional visits of a relative residing here were made
by him a conversational jubilee. In person he was

MEMOIR OF GRINDALL REYNOLDS, SENIOR. 427
tall, well formed, and of commanding presence; in
manners, grave and courteous ; in friendship, reliable ;
in counsel, trustworthy. He was a man of strong
native powers, improved by extensive reading and
much reflection. He had a respectable knowledge of
the French and Latin languages, acquired after he was
fifty years of age. He had a fixed religious faith,
founded upon the Bible, and has left behind him an
honored name for unbending truth and rectitude.

THE PLAGUE OP THE HEART.
October 4, 1868.
Give me any plague but the plague of ihe heart.
ECCLESIASTICUS XXV. 13.
OUR troubles in this world may with propriety be
divided into two classes; — first, the burdens
which God gives us to bear ; and second, the burdens
which we give ourselves to bear. First, there are bur
dens which God gives us to bear. Without undertaking
to decide how far the griefs and disappointments of
life grow out of a general proridence regulating the
great features of human discipline, and to what de
gree they are the result of a special providence fitting
the private experience to the personal need, — without
entering into that question at all, — this we can con
fidently assert, that a very considerable share of man's
burdens have their origin in causes largely, if not en
tirely, beyond his control. They are the result of the
constitution of things. They are caused by toe frail
and perishable nature of the human body. They exist
because mortal minds are finite, and the best spiritual
perceptions limited. Or they spring out of the relations
of friendship and society in which we are placed. Here
are a few illustrations.
A man is in business and prosperous ; he conducts his
affairs honestly and prudently ; and has a fair share of
foresight and enterprise. But commercial interests gen-

THE PLAGUE OF THE HEAET. 429
erally get into an unhealthy condition. There is a crisis
in the mercantile world. And this merchant with many
others fails and loses all the results of years of hard
and honest labor. We call this God's burden. Not that
we mean to assert that God directly imposed it, or that
there is no human element in the causes which are be
hind it. But simply that no ordinary prudence, that is,
no prudence that we have a right to demand, would have
enabled the man to avoid bearing it.
A farmer plants his fields with the best seed which
he can procure, and at the right season. He is no slug
gard either. He rises early and tills faithfully the soil.
All through the sultry summer even to the harvest he is
at his post and active. But a drought parches the soil
and makes the crop scanty and unremunerative ; or
some army worm destroys it just when the hopes of the
husbandman are brightest. These troubles are outside
our control. They are not to be averted by any probable
sagacity and toil.
One instance more. A person is afflicted with a pain
ful and chronic sickness, so that you are wellnigh sure
he will be an invalid all his days. You look back over
the past conduct of such a one. He has been a man of
good habits, temperate and industrious. He has taken
at least the usual care of his health. Perhaps his origi
nal constitution was at fault ; perhaps he was subjected
to some unforeseen or unavoidable exposure; perhaps
such were the conditions of his lot that he was obliged
to work too hard, too constantly. At any rate, looking
fairly at his trouble, you cannot say that he brought it
upon himself. It really was the result of causes beyond
his control.
The number of these illustrations might be indefinitely
increased. For no one considering candidly human life

430 THE PLAGUE OF THE HEART.
can doubt that there is in it an element of burden, of
grief, of bereavement, which had its origin back of the
individual well-doing or evil-doing. This we call God's
burden. Not, we repeat, that we affirm that any special
evil is directly and immediately laid upon man by God.
But that as much as this is certainly true : that life is full
of troubles, which have their roots back of the private
purpose and act in that general order of things whose
first source is God.
There are then troubles which we may in a very proper
sense call God's burdens. Tliere are other troubles which
we may with equal propriety entitle man's burdens, the
burdens which he needlessly puts on his own shoulders,
the evils which would never afflict him if he conducted
his life according to the plain dictates of wisdom and an
enlightened conscience; inconveniences and griefs, in
short, which are the direct results of an unwise or wicked
indulgence of one's passions and appetites. The seat of
these burdens is in a person's own heart. They are, not
the plague of circumstance, not the plague of God's
Providence, but the plague of the heart, more to be
shunned Etnd feared than any other loss or suffering. It
is very easy, too, to find examples of this kind of burden
bearing. I know people who started life with at least average
opportunities. They had strong health, good intellects,
and a respectable education. They embarked in profit
able business, and formed pleasant connections in life.
But for years they have been growing more poor and
miserable, — shabby in person, bloated and tremulous in
body, confused and incapable in mind, coarse and sensual
of heart. The home shares the general wretchedness.
The house is dilapidated, the table scantily spread.

THE PLAGUE OF THE HEART. 431
toe children ragged, toe wife full of fears and unspeak
able sorrows. I know and everybody knows the one
cause of all this. These people have not exercised a
proper self-control. Tbey have indulged the appetite
for strong drink until it bas become incontroUable.
Their lower nature has toe mastery over the nobler part
of toem. What do you caU tois misery ? God's bur
den ? Is it not the plague whose roots are in a man's
own heart?
Here again is another, who is always in hot water, as
we say ; at odds wito half his little world ; a neighbor-
in-law to toe whole neighborhood. Even wito his own
famUy be Uves in a sort of armed neutraUty. One need
not add that toe life of such a one is a miserable and
unsatisfactory kind of life. But what is the origin of
the misery ? Some pecuUarity of surroundings and re
lations for which nobody in particular is accountable ?
Not at aU. The trouble is toe plague of the heart. It
is a want of any just self-restraint permitting the growth
of a sorly, unreasonable, fault-finding temper, which is
an equal curse to its owner, to bis immediate friends,
and to the commnnity in general.
It is easy to multiply examples. Everybody who
cherishes a discontented temper, and learns to look at
Ufe wito morbid eyes, untU be finds nothing but dis
comforts in a good lot, has toe plague of the heart.
Everybody who, in his thirst for gain or place, despises
the sanctious of truth and justice, so that his neighbors
and the world vritodraw their confidence from him, has
toe plague of toe heart. Everybody who loves money
imtil he sells aU toat he has to get it, — his sympathies,
bis charity, his public spirit, — and becomes a miserable
miser, tbe object of general contempt, bas the plague
of the heart. In short, any burden, deprivation, or suf-

432 THE PLAGITE OF THE HEART.
fering in life, whoso real cause is a want of fidelity to
the principles of purity, truth, and love, is a plague of
the heart. Any sin or folly which exists because of our
own evil counsels, and because of our want of good
counsels, and which will cease to exist the moment we
square our conduct by the laws of God and tho moni
tions of conscience, — anything of that sort, any evil of
our own creating, — that is a plague of the heart.
What reason now is there why toe plague of the heart,
toe evil which is of our own creating, should be gi\en
such pre-eminence over those great natural calamities,
such as pain and sickness and poverty aud bereavement,
of which we usually make such account ? Why should
the wise man reverse the ordinary modes of thinking
and feeling, and say, " Give me any plague but the
plague of the heart " ? Who is right ? We who think
so much of the calamities which are outside our souls,
and so littie of the troubles which are growing up in our
souls ? Or he who counted every other grief inconsider
able beside the grief of bad passions or a bad heart ?
One reason why the plague of the heart is flic greatest
of plagues is on the surface. It is a plague of the heart,-
— it is something which is our own fault, and for which
we alone are responsible. Other griefs may be very
heavy, very sorrowful. They may be of such a nature
as to break up all our plans of life, and put a sense of
vacancy into all our usual haunts and occupations. But
we are not obliged to bear our burden ourselves. Wo
can cast it upon the Lord. Thore is this comfort
always, our grief is not of our own making. Its roots
are in the counsels of God. It is somehow a part of a
great, loving plan. It is somehow a blcssinj>'. So any
one who suffers a great stroke of misfortune, while he

THE PLAGUE OF THE HEART. 433
is walking in the plain path of duty, has a right to look
to God for support. But you have the plague of the
heart. You walk contrary to God's law. You trample
upon the truth. You indulge your appetites. You
slander your neighbor. You do anything which is not
right. And then you take the whole responsibility of
your conduct. If your wrong works badly, you cannot
look anywhere for sympathy, to man or God. This
plague of the heart isolates you and leaves you alone
with an outraged conscience.
There is ariother reason akin to the last why the
plague of the heart is the worst plague. It puts us into
collision with our own moral nature, with our conscience.
It is not so with God's burden. It may be a very heavy
burden. It may be sickness filling our life with bodily
pain. It may be adversity giving us the daily discom
forts of poverty. It may be bereavement taking away
the light of the household. But however heavy and
however grievous, it lacks that sharpest sting, self-
reproach. But the man who has acted basely has lost
his self-respect. It does not matter what anybody else
says or does, he can do only one of two things, forget
his own conduct, or condemn his own conduct. When
now you consider how large a part of every man's life
is solitary life, how many thoughts, feelings, and hopes .
there are concerning which he can enter into no part
nership, how many joys and griefs with which no
stranger can intermeddle, you can understand what a
burden it is to be at war with your own conscience.
But do you not perceive instantly the infinite differ
ence which that one word or that one fact — crime —
would have made in the experience of an honest man ?
It is the very thing which divides an apostle in a Roman
jaU lifting songs of praise to God from a convict fiUing
28

434 THE PLAGUE OF THE HKAKT.
his ceU wito curses or p^)pling it wito remorse. It is -
toe very thing which separates a martyr going up to
heaven in a chariot of fire from a murderer expiating
his crime on toe gallows. Sin! Crime! smaU words
toese, and easUy spoken. Change toem to sinless, crime
less, and toe difference to toe ear is Utfle. But toe
change marks infinite inward distinctions. It mauers
not whetoer toe sin be great or small, for one of toe
essential differences always, everrwhere, between God's
burden aud toe plague of toe heart is toe possession
or toe loss of our self-respect.
One more distinction. When toe immediate pain
of God's burden has pa^ed away, toe after consequences
are, or sbould be, altc^toer good : whfle toe worst
resulfe of toe plague of toe heart are in toe future, and
not in toe present You suffer in one way or anotoer
a great grief, pain it may be, earthly l(^s possibly, a
terrible bereavement perhaps. Bnt whatever it is, the
eternal fact is, " No chastening for toe present seemeto
joyous, but grievous : neverthele^ afterward it yieldeto
toe peaceable fruit of rig^teonsness." Your burden was
intended by God to help you in the deepest and best way,
— to make you richer in your spiritual part And if you
receive your trial ari^t. it wiU certainly happen toat
your faito and your reU^ous principle will be purified
and quickened, and your life with God and your rision
of heaven become more r^d. By no means is it rme
toat toe life which bas bad great misfortunes, or
known toe most solemn bereavements, is necessarily
an unhappy life. Often it has toe seren^it peace. Often
it is fiUed fuUest wito useful and contenting deeds. So
many a Gbristian character, rich in aU toe fruite of faito
and purity, bas been ripened in tbe fiery beat of afflic
tion. So many an experienoi, most tmly good to have,

THE PLAGUE OF THE HEART. 435
and most satisfying to look back upon, has had its clouds
as well as its sunshine, — its crosses before its crown.
But the worst thing about the plagues of the heart
is not in any outward momentary evil, but in the
future which they corrupt, and in the heart itself which
they have debased. Plagues of the heart are not simply
ugly facts in the present, but vicious habits which are
self-perpetuating. You are a drunkard. What is the
worst penalty of your fault ? Is it that to-day you and
your family are poor and miserable ? Is it that now
the health of body and mind suffer ? Or rather is it
not that the plague is in your heart ? Is it not that a
law of evil is written in body and soul ? That you have
a habit, a tendency, which for these years will be just
so much power of darkness to struggle with ? You
are a cheat. What have you worst to fear ? The ill
opinion of men ? Or that the fair form of truth will
be so obliterated in your heart that you will have no
instinct to choose truth rather than falsehood? You
indulge in vulgarity. Is the only penalty that you lose
the society of pure and refined people ? Or that your
own soul gets full of impurity, that your mind gets a
vulgar tone, that coarse language and language which
borders on indecency drops naturally from your lips ?
This is the most important distinction of all. God's
burden is an outward affliction touching, and with our
consent purifying the heart. The plague of the heart
is an inward vice working outward in daily corruption
of manners and life. God's burden is a blessing in dis
guise. The plague of the heart is sometimes a seem
ing blessing, but always a real curse.
You see then that it was not a fanciful and imagina
tive predominance which the wise man ascribed to the

436 THE PLAGUE OF THE HEAET.
plague of the heart. If we could get at the root of
things, we should find that there was no other plague
which is a plague at aU. Any one who understands
human nature takes up this same word of ancient
wisdom : " Give me any plague but the plague of the
heart. Give me any eril but an eril of my own creat
ing. Give me any cross which does not take me out
of the ranks of those children of God who are walking
beneath the light of his countenance. Give me any
plague but that plague of sin and passion which creates
a whole world of thought and feeling upon which God's
blessing cannot be called down." EspeciaUy ought ev
ery young man or woman to say, " Give me any plague
but the plague of the heart Do anything you wiU
with me but fasten upon my young life an eril tendency
or ricious habit which shall perpetuate iteelf and cast
a dark shadow over aU the bright coming years." And
everybody should repeat, " Save me from the plague
of the heart. Let God make what he wiU of me, or
appoint any sharpness of disciphne, so long as in every
event I can seek his benediction, so long as I have a
good conscience to sustain me."

WELLS OF BACA.
September 28, 1879.
IVho passing through the valley of Baca make it a -weU.
Psalm Ixxxiv. 6.
WHAT is the outward fact behind this picture of
the Psalmist ? A little circle of sand, or else
a long stony depression, treeless, verdureless, waterless,
panting and scorching beneath the blazing rays of an
Oriental sun. Treeless, verdureless, because waterless.
The valley of Baca ! The valley of weeping ! One of
the hundred arid spots which dot the wilderness south
of Jerusalem ! To this spot enterprise and benevolence
come. They scoop up the sand. They dig down to the
perpetual springs. Then you have an ever flowing well,
— the chief blessing in the desert. Soon the palms
send up their feathery shade. Green things cover the
yellow sand. The Arab pitches his tent, and pastures
his flocks, and pursues his simple husbandry. Por death
you have life; for desolation beauty; for solitude the
pleasant voices of women and children.
Such an event leaves a permanent record in the an
nals of primitive races. Across the vast space of forty
centuries it is remembered that Isaac dug a well at
Beersheba, and that Jacob left to his children one at
Sychar as a precious legacy. In our day the French, in
the sterile country south of Algiers, have sent down
Artesian weUs. And as the water came gushing forth,

438 WELLS OF BACA.
the Bedouins heaped blessings upon the workmen. And
soon around these new diamonds of the desert peaceful
villages gathered. You see, then, what an immense
physical change and benefit the single line " who pass
ing through the valley of Baca make it a well "de
scribes, and what a striking moral symbol it may
become. What is the lesson which David makes the symbol
teach ? The necessity and value of moral and spiritual
well-digging; that, if we are to go from strength to
strength, we must have the power, and the disposition,
and the tendency, to go beneath what is hard, sterUe,
and desert-like in the facts of our living to the spiritoal
meaning and discipline beneath them; that, if life is
to have any sweetness and worth, we must carry about
with us that sunny Christian temper which transforms
all burdens, all worriments, and all strifes. That we
are poor and miserable, if we have not a faith which looks
beyond pain, or disappointment, or grief, or any of the
other trials which make life seem at times only a vale
of tears. Just this is what we need in the private expe
rience. Par be it from me to say or intimate that
human life, as a whole, can be symbolized truly by a
desert. 1 believe no such thing. Most of us walk for
the larger part of our mortal round in green valleys and
fertile plains, — unspeakably pleasant, full of comfort,
full of harmony, full of beautiful and tender relations.
Yet we have our valleys of Baca. We have our hard
experiences. Sometimes we come face to face with
cruel facts of disease, of adversity, of misapprehension,
of loneliness. Or if we escape the more striking burdens,
then our life in its monotony, in this very want of any
thing remarkable to do or bear, wearies us. Nothing

WELLS OF BACA. 439
comes which seems to demand any great faith or heroism,
or spiritual resources ; each day is so common, so un
eventful, so like the last, and so much the pattern and
mould of future days, that our life in its easiness
becomes almost tiresome. How often we see lives
which have in them all the elements of goodness made
wellnigh valleys of weeping, because they that live them
will brood over some inexplicable stripe of darkness
which has fallen athwart the general brightness ! How
sometimes we see men and women, who have a whole
world of happiness, left them, grow unduly sad and
morbid, because of some heavy bereavement, which
neither you, nor 1, nor anybody with only mortal ken,
can fully understand! How many fail to find any moral
incitement, any spiritual lessons, any deep wisdom, in
the common round, in the plodding business, in the stag
nant home life ! These are the arid spots we all find.
These are the desert valleys we all have to pass through
to reach any spiritual Jerusalem. Nobody's life is made
so that it shall always be clear of pain or grief, or solitude,
or monotony. Do you ask, " Why ?" Who can teU ?
What we need is to be able to dig wells. The great
blessing is to know how to go beneath what for the time
being may be the stony or bitter facts of our personal
life, and find their spiritual meaning and use. That is
what we all need, this divining power, — this ever pres
ent capacity, amid all discipline, to hear a voice speaking
to the moral nature, and to see, amid every maze, the
road which leads up to noble Christian manhood, — this
prophet's power to smite the rock, tha.t out of it may
flow water of life.
To dig wells is what we need in social relations.
What can be more inexpressibly dreary than social life.

440 WEIXS OF BACA.
if it be only a scene of selfish scrambling, or of injustice
and impurity ? What stony desert can be more repul
sive toan toat human life, which, amid aU toe needs,
joys, sorrows, affections, and hopes aboot it, is caring
only for itself, — to gatoer aU the comforte, to occupy
aU the places, to enjoy aU toe pleasures, to amass aU
toe wealto, — let come what wfll of toe rest? What
Sahara, burning beneato toe rays of an unclouded sun,
more blasted tiian toat heart which is fnU of hard preju
dices and bitter grudges, which does not know bow to for
give and forget, which makes baste to repay an injury,
which prides itself in toe toought toat it is a good
hater? AU toe discomfort of human relations comes
out of tois temper of mind, — out of mortal selfishness
and bitterness. We need to find some better way of
walking wito our neighbors.
The art of wise and noble liring, toe truest use of
religion, is found in moral weU-digging ; — toat is, in
the tendency and power to discern beneato this outward
something better toan itself ; toe tendency and power
to discern, through faito and spiritoal apprehension, in
toe dullest routine of Ufe, in ite heavy sorrows, in ite
selfish relations, sometoing more toan monotony, or
grief, or self-seeking, — even trust, tenderness, and
wisdom, and so ever-flowing fountains of spiritoal life,
making all our discipline sweet, fruitful, and uniting.
Blessed is toe man who can dig wells in toe vaUey of
Baca! Blessed he who bas toe sensitive dirining-rod
to point beneato toe strata of our daily necessities to
inexhaustible moral founteins 1 Blessed he who can
pour streams of love and good will torongh aU toe
channels made dry and barren by human selfishness!
There is no otoer art which pays so large a dividend
of character for ourselves, or oi comfort for otoers-

WELLS OF BACA. 441
He who has it goes from strength to strength. All
paths, bright or gloomy, for him lead up. He has the
magician's wand. The hut becomes a palace. Life's
common paths all go through Eden. Each man or
woman is a child of God. The text is but a symbol.
Certainly. But it is a symbol of what is profoundly
needful and eminently practical in your life and mine.
Is it not true that the power of moral well-digging is
the greatest of blessings? Let us inquire. Here are
two homes. One is full of disorder, ill temper, and
divisions, — and so of bad training and influence. In
the other all goes on smoothly. There is no friction,
no collision, but in their place mutual love and for
bearance, — and so you have a home where souls grow
truer and tenderer. What now makes the difference ?
Not the houses these dwell in ; for they are alike.
Not the comforts ; they are equal. Not the burdens ;
they are similar. But because in one love and patience
have dug beneath the sameness of home life, and found
the divine reason why God sets the solitary in families,
and not in hermit cells.
Two boys go out from quiet country homes to the
city's bustle and enterprise. From the same school and
ehurch. From the same neighborhood society, and the
same scenes of tranquil beauty. From similar influences,
so far as we can see, at home and abroad. And one
goes from strength to strength. An honest boy, he be
comes an honest man. A merchant prince always, if
not in the great business he builds up, or the great
wealth he achieves, certainly in his integrity without a
spot. The waves of temptation may swell around him,
but they do not touch the ermine of his character.
The other goes down and not up. From the beginning

442 WELLS OF BACA.
he tekes every mean advantage. He sails every voyage
as closely as the law wiU aUow to toe rocks and shoals
of dishonest practices. All his life long be is growing
more selfish, more unprincipled, and so less deserving
of your respect, — rich possibly in everything but good
works. You in vain seek toe cause of tois difference in
outward circumstances. It does not originate toere.
Honest men aud knaves have come out of aU ranks and
all conditions of experience. He who holds fast to bis
integrity has gone below that poor surface sagacity,
which says the end of living is selfish advancement,
and reached the eternal wisdom, which declares toat toe
end of liring is character.
A great affliction comes to one man. It makes him
downcast, gloomy, almost morose. Elasticity is taken
out of him. To him life seems hardly worth living.
He does not see why he of aU men should have so heavy
a burden to bear. Trial does not make him stronger, as
we Uke to think, but weaker. It not so much refines
his character as clogs his actirity and destroys his use
fulness. An equal burden comes to another. In every
manifestation of life you trace toe refining influence.
The dross seems to be all burnt out of him, and notoing
but pure gold left. In toe future the selfish and eartoly
considerations shaU have no such power as in toe past
You can only explain these diverse resulte by under-
stending that one has gone below the external fact of
loss and found infinite wisdom to rest upon, — and the
other has not. These illustrations do not come from
far. They are drawn put of toe stock of our common
experience. All about us are men and women who,
from a discipline in all essentials similar, have won
the most divergent spiritoal qualities ; — weakness and
strength, — doubt and trust, — petolance and patience, —

WELLS OF BACA. 443
knavery and rectitude, — malevolence and benevolence.
What we have to say to these varying results from the
same or similar influences is this. All unsatisfactory
character is the consequence of a too constant regard
for what is on the surface of life. All valuable char
acter is the result largely of a process of spiritual deep
ening. They go from strength to strength who dig
wells in the valley of Baca. They build up strong and
saintly characters, who make their pains, their grief, and
their loneliness the occasions for searching more deeply
into the reality of things;
To pass through valleys of Baca is a necessary part
of the human lot. To die as well as to be born, to suf
fer as well as to enjoy, to be disappointed as well as to
succeed, appears to be in the scheme of things. At
any rate no one has yet finished his career without
sooner or later experiencing both sides, the dark and
the bright, of human experience. So we shall have to
accept the appointment, — valleys of Baca ! valleys of
weeping ! painful bodies ! broken hopes ! solitary homes !
poverty ! exile ! — just as it shall come in that mighty
plan or counsel we call God's Providence. We have
no power to change that. What we can do is to dig
wfeUs. We can go from the apparent to the real ; from
the physical fact to the spiritual use. Life can be deep
ened till it drinks at the never failing fountains.
When Abraham, passing through the valley, dug a
weU, at which after forty centuries the desert wanderer
yet quenches his thirst, he conferred a lasting blessing.
But when that same Abraham, going beneath the arid
and shallow beliefs of his day, found and handed down
to aU times and races a faith in the one living God, he
conferred a blessing in whose presence the other fades
into insignificance. For really to dig a weU, to get to

444 WELLS OF BACA
toe spiritoal essence of thii^, is toe greatest and most
sacred of mortal achievements.
Nowhere did Jesus more profoundly stete toe end of
his word and work than in toat wonderful conversation
with toe woman of Samaria. " The water toat I shaU
give him shaU be iu bim a weU of water springing up
unto everlasting life." So — as toe great teacher saw
it and teugbt it — Christianity is not simply toe creed
we accept, or toe covenant we profess, or toe ritoal we
observe. It is toe spring of eternal life and truto whicb
it opens in our own hearte; toe moral principles it
strengtoens until toey have power to guide and control
us; toe spiritoal faith wito which it fills us untfl it
quickens and inspires us. That is, it is what truto was
to Abraham, what it was to Darid, what it was to Jesus,
what it is to every good man, what aU truto truly re
ceived must be, — a weU of water springing up into
everlasting Ufe, in what else might be a desert of
selfish and ignoble hopes, making character rich and
fruitful.

BUT.
April 4, 1880.
Naaman, captain of the host of the King of Syria, was a great
man wilh his master, and honorable, because by him the Lord had given
deliverance unto Syria ; he was also a mighty man invcdcr, — BUT he
was a leper. — 2 KtsGS v. 1.
A WONDERFUL picture of great prosperity, dark
ened by a single shadow ! Rendered too, as aU
Bible pictores are, without a wasted stroke I Here was
one who seemed to have everything earth could give, —
courage and mUitery skUl to rank him with toe fore
most, good fortune to make his courage and skill his
country's deliverance. Favorite of a monarch ! idol of
the people ! you can readily supply all the narrative
omite. You see bim riding proudly through the streets
of Damascus, — heads bowing in reverence, shoute fiU
ing toe air. You can follow him to the court, and
behold him sitting on the right band of power. On
that green emerald, which toe plain of Abana and
Pharpar was, you can almost restore his palaces, his
gardens, and his equipages. AU these things Naaman
had, — all that ambition could hope for.
Bttt ! There was one limitetion. That most terrible
of diseases, the curse of the ancient East, leprosy, had
fastened upon him. What now were aU earthly gifts
worto? What proud rictory, or the favor of a mon
arch, or the praise of men, or multiphed luxuries ? A
great man and honorable, — but — a leper. Brightest

446 BUT.
sunshine in total eclipse ! I can recoUect bow tois story
of a lifetime, compressed into a verse, struck me even in
my boyhood.
Yet, after all, except in toe extremeness of ite reverse,
was the experience of Naaman so very different from the
course of otoer Uves ? Is toere not a " but" in every lot ?
A hmitation? Sometoing which darkens toe Ught?
Something which sobers toe joy ? Something which, if
it does not make Uving a burden or fuU of sorrow, cer
tainly does teach us tbat God has put into toe most
fortonate lot otoer elemente and graver toan simple
gratification of our wishes, or toe perfect accomplish
ment of our plans ? We talk as toough toe clouds were
ouly with toe poor, toe sick, and toe unfortunate ; toe
sunshine with everybody else. No doubt we think so.
Perhaps, however, if we could go into toe bomes of tbe
rich, or if we could look into toe hearte of toe prosper
ous, or if we could know aU toe tooughte of the strong
and rigorous, we should find tbe " but " aU toe same.
We should leai-n, possibly to our surprise, that few people
get through Ufe without seeing both sides of it, toe dark
and toe bright. It was the remark of a person of wide
experience and keen observation, that the rarest thing
in the world is a man or woman in possession of abso
lute health. People might appear on casual observation
perfectiy weU. But look deeper. There may be some
inherited trouble, or a weak joint or limb, or some vitel
organ has given way under the strain of too heavy and
too constant toil And even when toey think toem
selves to be well, just as likely as not the next montii
or the next year shows them toat toey are mistaken.
That is, in respect to toe health and vigor of toe
physical frame, limitation is toe rule ratoer toan toe
exception.

BUT. 447
Suppose now we pass from the physical to the moral
frame, and use the story of Naaman as a figure to ex
press the spiritual condition of men and women. What
is the real deficiency in the character of these ? Have
they no genuine spiritual prosperity ? Are they in no
proper sense morally great and honorable ? Do you
find them quite destitute of good qualities, — so that
there are no elements whatever in them of a better
life ? In short, is the record of the life lived about us,
by our friends, by our acquaintances, by our neighbors,
simply a painful and unsatisfactory, if not shameful
record ? Of course not. Life in town or hamlet in
which such moral destitution is would be unendurable.
But in fact the average man or woman has a thousand
good qualities. He may have, despite his faults, much
moral earnestness, and make considerable progress in
self-control and self-culture. He may, and probably
will, do a great deal of good in the world. It were a
libel upon God and experience to doubt it. All whole
sale talk about human depravity has its foundation in
pure theory. It may furnish material on which to build
a dogma. But as a practical statement it falls power
less. Men look into their own hearts, or they observe
the lives of others. They know that no such entire
moral destitution exists. Nay, you may come into
contact with the worst speciinens of character which
the life around you has to furnish. To your astonish
ment, sometimes you will find in these untrustworthy,
coarse, and passionate characters qualities to like, qual
ities even to respect. So when you stand by their open
graves, without any hypocrisy, and without any hiding
of their great faults, there are pleasant things to re
member and kindly words to say.
Entire destitution of good is therefore rarely the

448 BUT.
moral difficulty with human beings. There are a great
many men and women everywhere who are good and
honorable, and full of honest purpose. There are very
few men and women of whom you can affirm absolute
lack of good. The difficulty is the limitation, — the
weak spot in the armor, — the bosom error or sin.
The trouble is the selfish streak, the worldly stain, the
grasping disposition, the untruthful habit, the passion
ate temper, the base appetite, the unforgiving and un-
f orgetting mind, the cruel prejudice ; — something which
is wrong amid much which is right ; — something which
is a species of moral leprosy that eats into good char
acter and good purpose, as rust eats into the fine steel
and takes away its brightness and its keen edge. That
is what is lamentable and depressing in average human
character. Not that there is nothing to love and re
spect, — But ! But ! ! We all know what weaknesses,
what errors, what wrongful feelings and habits of life,
are expressed by that dubious " but." You do not
have to look far off to see that aU this is true. Here
is one who is not in the very texture of his soul upright.
There are such in every community, — men and women
whose desires are more vigorous than their consciences.
At first you do not notice their fault. They appear to
be well intentioned and friendly ; and they are. But as
toey go on in life the moral stress comes, and their
inherent weakness makes itself manifest. As the in
dulgences they crave are found to be hard to get hon
estly, the unstable integrity gives way entirely. They
prey unblushingly upon their neighbor. This is one
specimen of character ; — good with a fatal limitation ;
— good with a " but."
Take another common example. You say of a man
that he is his own worst enemy. What do you mean ?

BUT. 449
This. That when be is himself be is full of toe milk of
human kindness. That when he is under the dominion
of bis better part be is a good neighbor, a good friend,
a good husband and fatoer. But he is very often not
himself, and not under toe dominion of bis better part.
Often he is subject to a base and degrading appetite.
Then he is of no use but to make miserable toose who
are nearest to him. This is anotoer common specimen
of character : a good and honorable man, but — a leper.
And what are toe goodness, and toe honorableness, and
even the attractiveness worth, when toere is no self-
control behind toem ? These bote, toese moral limite-
tions in human character, are wellnigh innumerable.
We meet toem everywhere. One man is of such a
jealous disposition, so suspicious of your motives, so on
toe lookout for injury, so prompt to resent, toat aU
intereourse wito him is like walking on toe edge of a
volcano. Another is so coarse and vulgar in toought
and speech, he so lards his conversation with strange
oaths, toat bis very presence is an offence to pure and
reverent feeling. Anotoer is so a creatare of this world,
so engrossed by toe cares and pleasures of it. toat what
we caU toe higher life of man has no meaning to bim.
Anotoer loves money so much, and devotes himself so
entirely to toe winning of it, and toe amassing of it, toat
bis sympathies cool and bis generosity dies. StiU an
other has such a passionate temper, toat crossing bis
wUl is Uke encountering a wild beast.
These and countiess otoers of a different stamp are
in toe main good and honorable men and women. They
have a great many qualities which we Uke and respect.
In some aspecte toeir characters have real moral dig
nity. When you get on toe right side, it is pleasant to
walk with them. Still, toey have toeir Umitetions, their
39

450 BUT.
weaknesses. When we speak of toem in the most chari
table way, we come to a place where we have to say
" but." Is not toat the very thing we often are obliged
to say of characters which are in the main very noble ?
Generous, — but. Honest, — but. Pure, — but. On the
one side, great winning qualities; quaUties which are full
of usefulness; qualities which get, and deserve to get,
our sincere respect. On the otoer side, toe fault, the
limitation, the quality which we do not like to talk about,
toe quality which narrows toe field of usefulness and
spoils the good example. This is toe simple portraitore
of how much Ufe everywhere !
Whoever desires to establish for himself a great and
trustwortoy character must fasten his attention first
upon the " but," and devote his efforte to the removal
of his moral limitation. Amid all that is good in him,
he must consider most what is not good, what in fact is
neither helpful nor respectable. We are apt to pursue
an opposite course. We count up our virtoes ; not per
haps in set form, but in fact. Here are truto and
honor ! Here are pure thoughts and speech I Here are
lips which never slander, and feet which never stray in
forbidden paths ! Great virtues these ! Will toey not
cover up our one little fault, our one venial sin, so that
it shall not be counted against us, but be blotted out
forever from the Book of Remembrance?
Observe now tbat we do not reason in this way about
anything else. You examine your ship whicb you are
about to send forth on a long voyage. You do not count
up her sound timbers. No : you seek for the worm-eaten
plank, or the defective spar, or toe untrustwortoy rope
or sail, and replace these things which are weak by what
you know to be strong. Then you feel toat you have

BUT. 451
done yonr duiy, and tbat you can honestly send forth tbe
ship and ite brave crew to enconnter the perils of toe
deep. You go out into yonr orchard with pruning-knife
and saw, to see what yon can do to promote a good crop.
Ineritebly you look for toe dead boughs and tbe super
fluous branches ; that is, for such malformation or sncb
redundance as make for weakness and not for strengto.
Yon summon your doctor. He does not ask you where
you are weU, but where you are sick. He seeks to find
out what is the real cause of this pain or this languor,
or this irritation. Now that in everything of human
concern but character wise men pay such attention to
the "but," — to the imperfection, — of itself suggeste
that it may be weU to do tbe same with character
also. Well and wise, let ns add, not simply because it is
toe way men act in other matters of importence, but
because so doing we are on tbe high road to self-knowl
edge; and we do not really get any trustworthy self-
knowledge simply by counting up our good quMities.
In many cases tbe virtoes whereof we boast are hardly
our own. They come to us not so much because we
have consciously striven to possess them as because we
were bom in a Christian land, or they are ours through
the shaping influence of an education which we could
not direct, or they have been cast for us in tbe moulds
of public opinion. For these qualities, common to our
age and race, we are scarcely to be credited- Knowing
them alone, we do not know tbe indiridual hue and
tendency of our lives-
But our fault is apt to be our personal possession, —
that which we have cherished. It is the very quality
which differentiates ns from other people. Yon caU a
man a miser. Yon do not mean tbat that is aU the

452 BUT.
moral quality he has : that he may not be honest and
pure, or a great many other things which are creditable.
But his personal stamp is miser. The quality he has
cherished is love of money. This moral limitation is
the most intensely personal thing about hira. It is what
people will remember long after he is dead, remember
when his virtues are clean forgotten. Just so we remem
ber Peter's fickleness and Martha's worldliness and
Thomas's doubt.
Not only is the '' but " — the fault — apt to be in a pe
culiar sense a personal quality, but it is a quality which
is pretty sure to work, if not more powerfully, certainly
more noticeably than all the rest. So long as the
stream keeps in its appointed channels, it flows on and
on, a mighty force no doubt for good. Still you hardly
notice it. But when it begins to fret its banks, it cuts
and cuts with ever increasing rapidity, until, all barriers
swept away, it pours a devastating flood over rich fields
and peaceful homes. So is it with a fault. Unnoticed,
left to work out its proper results, ofttimes it destroys
all the banks virtue has raised, and floods the character
with evil. It is this corrupting, this corroding tendency
and power of all marked faults, at which we pause with
an ominous " but," which make it imperative tiiat we
should carefully watch and sternly repress them. If a
fault stood unrelated to the general character, if it was
like a blemish or a knot in your board which will not
spread, it might be of less consequence. But how often
does a fault stand thus unrelated ? Did you ever know
a man steadily to indulge in any gross appetites and not
grow base in more ways than one ? One of the most
remarkable romances ever written is " The Scarlet Let
ter." And one of the most striking chapters in it is
that which depicts the steady moral deterioration of a

BUT. 453
truly good man under the thirst for revenge. We say
that a chain is as strong as its weakest link. We can
say, with perhaps equal truth, that in the long run char
acter is as strong as the fault it cherishes. The greatest
reason, therefore, why we should stop and consider the
" but," at which our neighbors shake their heads, is that
all the while it is tugging at our heart strings to drag
us down to its own level.
Naaman was a great man, and honorable, but he was
a leper. He had everything, and, alas ! he had nothing.
His only hope was to wash in some Jordan and be clean.
It is so in the moral life. One bad quality may in the
end make nugatory a score of good ones. If you and I
are permitting some perilous " but " to limit the good
in us, if we are putting prejudice in the place of moral
judgment, unforgiving passions in the place of Christian
charity, suspicious jealousy in the place of kindly trust,
dishonest desires in the place of absolute integrity, a
base appetite in the place of virtuous self-control, any
thing wrong in the place of . something right, depend
upon it we are in a bad way. We cannot attend to that
"but" too soon. For in actual life it is not any unreal
state of general depravity, but a very real, and in a
comparative sense possibly a very small, personal fault,
which drags men and women down to a poor and un
worthy state. Something which we in our blindness
view only as a trifling limitation, not as a moral peril, —
only a " but " in an otherwise commendable life.

BEAUTY FOR ASHES.
June 8, 1883.
Beauty for ashes. — Isala.h ixi. 3.
MANY years since my eye happened to fall upon a
monarch of the woods, — a lordly pine, — lying
prone on the ground. A little while ago I passed the
place again. Where the great wreck had been were a
few little heaps of dust. To these had the massive trunk
and the giant branches resolved themselves. Such sights
are common enough, yet in thoughtful moods such sights
are impressive. To dust and ashes all material things
are hastening. The forests grow and fall, and moulder.
The everlasting hills, as we call them, are slowly wasting.
The noblest things of man's device disintegrate. If we
wait long enough they will bury themselves in their own
ruin. It did not. require therefore any great fancy in the old
Hebrew to find in ashes the appropriate symbol of life's
heavy pains, of life's bitter disappointments, of life's
solemn separations, and especially of life's inevitable
end. All around him were sights and experiences which
suggested such symbolism. And each generation and
each race, as it comes upon the stage, finds something
in human discipline which makes the type not inapt.
Life passes on, and we pass on. We leave behind us in
our march the ashes of how many good hopes, noble
plans, pleasant friendships, and sacred relations.

BEAUTY FOR ASHES. 455
Take the day dreams of the bright boy, or the beautiful
tender visions of the thoughtful girl. What a thing life
is going to be to them ! How grand, how attractive,
how successful, how encircled with pleasant objects and
interests ! In a certain sense these dreams are fulfilled.
In a certain other sense they are never fulfilled. If the
hopes be pure and the purposes full of moral vigor, then
they are fulfilled in a character growing all the time
manly, womanly, truthful, brave, and loving. But as
for any material fulfilment, how few of us reach mid
life, and do not look back upon the ashes of many a
fond expectation !
Then certainly there are harsher experiences, which
the Hebrew symbol aptly typifies. We form friendships.
Nothing seems so good. We think they will last as
long as life lasts. They do not last. They come to an
untimely end, from separation, or misapprehension, or
alienation. Or they burn low in the socket for want of
toe fuel of common studies, common interests, and com
mon aspirations. So true is this, that that sturdy
moralist, old Samuel Johnson, says that he who does
not make new friends will soon have no friends.
The strong man, full of courage, full of will, having
many to depend on him, has his great plans and reason
able enterprises. And somehow plan and enterprise
crumble before his eyes ; — and he has to content him
self with humble ways and petty results.
Assuredly there are failures harder to bear, and harder
to explain, than any of these we have mentioned. How
bitter to watch the sure failure of physical vigor, — to ex
change health for disease, — power for powerlessness, —
a frame whose every motion was an exhilaration for one
peopled with pains that will not depart, — this beau
tiful world in which to wander at will for toe four

456 BEAUTY FOE ASHES.
walls of a chamber from which there can be no wan
dering !
What grief to know that some winsome face we shall
no more see, — that some pleasant voice, sweeter to our
ears than softest strain of flute, we shall no more hear,
— that there is a vacant place in the household forever,
like some great strong tower fallen out of the city's wall !
These things are. I do not exaggerate their importance.
Nobody less. I look with contempt upon the question
whether life is worth the living. Life is very good as the
Eternal Goodness stamped it. It has more pleasures
than pains, more opportunities than failures. And even
the pains and the failures, honestly accepted, come to
have a goodness and use we dreamed not of. I do not
exaggerate. But I recognize that those grand old
Hebrew poets had a firm grip upon reality ; that when
they said we have eaten ashes like bread, they described
in a figure something actual and universal. Yes ; with
all of us some hope, some plan, some friendship, some
thing very real to us and precious, burns down to white
ashes. That is to say, the experiences which disappoint
us, which baffle us, which grieve us, are in life, and can
not be put out of it, any more than breathing, or sleep
ing, or the pulsation of the blood can be put out of
it. And we have to face them. The only question
is, How?
It is interesting' to see how the poet-prophet, as it
were by one leap of the imagination, rises to the high
est truth, "Beauty for ashes." Not desolation, not
barrenness, but beauty. As the tender verdure and
wondrous growth of the outward worid spring out of
the dust of old fertility, so fresh spiritual excellence
may rise out of our mouldering plans and buried joys.

BEAUTY FOE ASHES. 457
There are many ways in which toe heart receives ite
deep disappointments. Perhaps toe natoral way is by
rebellion. The instinct of toe heart is to resist even tbe
ineriteble. It feels toat it must wrench open toe doors
of fate to bring back toe vanished satisfaction. It wUl
not accept toe fatal law which robs it of what it values
beyond price. It would repeal and nullify the very
course of natore, if toat is to bring toe blankness of
deato where fulness of affection has been.
Hardly does tois overstate. Often, I am sure, men
and women, confronting a great calamity, say, in toeir
hearts if not in words, toey cannot have it so; they
wiU not bear it Possibly this rebellion against the
unavoidable iU is essential in a nature toat has a wiU,
whicli is real and personal, even if finite and limited.
Po^bly, too, toe possession of such a stobborn will,
whicb for the time being introduces into the bosom a
sort of spiritual warfare, is what enables trouble to make
fixed and noble impressions upon us. Much like this
sings toe poet : —
" He foi^ht bis doubts and gathered strength;
He would not have his judgment blind,
He faced the spectres of the mind.
And laid them : thus he came at length
" To find a stronger faith his own."
In most hearte fooUsh strife soon gives place to sub
mission. It may be brave and tearless, or mute and
despairing. At any rate, it is not vain and fruitless
resistance. It recognizes that to beat toe head or the
heart against tbe adamantine waUs of the ineriteble is
chUdish as weU as useless. So toere is submission.
One sometimes thinks that most people get very littie
fartoer toan this. They discern not toe higher good

458 BEAUTY FOE ASHES.
which should come through the lower grief. To their
blind eyes the silver lining of the cloud is hidden ; and
it does not break with blessings on their heads. They
have simply by sheer mental vigor lifted themselves out
of impotent struggling to that stoicism in which they
can suffer and be strong. They dream of no larger
blessing to come ; and they get none.
It is a great step upward when we pass from fruitless
complaints to resignation. For what is resignation?
The laying down our wills and taking up a better will ;
the admission then to our hearts that, whetoer we can
see it or not, and whether we can understand it or not,
there may be an explanation to the cloud-side and the
storm-side of life. Slowly disappointment comes to be
seen as something more than a broken hope, and grief
as something higher than mere endurance of suffering.
Dimly we see " That God which ever lives and loves,
One God, one law, one element.
And one f ar-ofE divine event,
To which the whole creation moves."
Our burden may not drop off, as did Christian's at
the foot of the cross. But if we have to keep it on our
shoulders we have at least learned that burden-bearing
is included in the good counsel of the good God ; that
the burden itself is not like a leaden weight, but rather
like the rough nugget of the miner, which is seamed
through all its rocky bulk with veins of purest gold.
RebeUion! Submission! Resignation! These are aU
natural, and perhaps necessary spiritual moods or con
ditions. But neither is the ultimate. See how Isaiah
states it : " To give unto them that mourn beauty for .

BEAUTY FOE ASHES. 459
ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise
for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called trees
of righteousness, the planting of the' Lord." Trans
formation, — the change of material ill into spiritual
good, the purchase by physical losses of inward virtues,
the finding in character our sure recompense for mor
tal shipwrecks, — can we stop short of these results ?
Or, stopping, are we ripe scholars in the school of
adversity ?
What is the beauty which comes out of ashes ? The
beauty, at any rate, of seeing things as they are. If
life goes on without any friction and without any disap
pearance of outward good, we come to feel that all the
worth of living is centred in what we possess and enjoy.
Many a one, nominally believing in spiritual verities,
who would feel insulted to be denied the Christian
name, is essentially pagan in frame of mind. The
kingdom of heaven longed for, to be purchased by all
we have, is not within. It is not faith, truth, and love.
It is without. It is meat and drink. It is found in
strength of body, in fulness of granary, in abundance
of enjoyment, and in these alone. The rude shock
which takes the health out of the bones, or makes the
wisdom of the wise to be foolishness, or does anything
to break up the smooto flow of the outward experience,
certainly lets in light to the soul. The need of some
qualities over which time and change have no power
must now be recognized. If there has been any pro
found study of life's deeper meanings, faith, truth, pu
rity, tenderness, take their true place as the legitimate
nobility in the soul's kingdom.
The beauty, again, of coming into more considerate
and kindly relations with our fellow men. "I know,"
said a clear-headed man of another, " that sorrow has

460 BEAUTY FOE ASHES.
ploughed his heart. For he was selfish j and is generous ;
he was indifferent to his fellows, and is interested in
them ; he was harsh, and is tender." The remark was
profound. You see the truth of it tested constantly on
a large scale. The neighborhood which is altogether
prosperous, having no burdens, no sickness, and no loss,
is likely to grow hard, critical, selfish, superciUous. But
our neighbors' troubles open our hearts, quicken our
sympathies, make us, in short, come into genuine hu
man relations with them. A certain beauty of tender
ness and mutual helpfulness, unknown before, enters
unbidden into this little circle of tried hearts, until one
asks, " What would become of this world if the sun
always shone, and to what spiritual shore should we
sail or drift if we had only favorable breezes ? " The
questions are pertinent. Of course adversity as well as
prosperity can be perverted. But there is a subtle al
chemy in losses rightly used. And in well ordered lives
the beauty of gentle thoughts and considerate ways,
which springs out of the ashes of our cherished plans
and hopes, is something wondrous fair and good. And
until we find such beauty from ashes we have not fath
omed the Divine purpose in life.
In a word, transformation of character is the pro
foundest result of the dark side of life, and its only
adequate explanation. Can you tell just why good men
and true often fail in all their plans and enterprises,
and, as the Psalmist expressed it, eat ashes ? You may
reply, that a little more carefulness or a little more
judgment on their part would have changed all this.
Not always, not always.
Can you say what good purpose is in that experience
by which a strong and useful man becomes a cripple or
a confirmed invalid, and his life embodied pain ? Again

BEAUTY FOR ASHES. 461
you answer, " A little more prudence would have averted
this." And again we reply, "Not always, not always."
The actual truth is, that in the presence of failure, of
disease, of broken friendships, of desolated homes, reason
is baffled. No doubt there is a sufficient explanation
in toe nature of things ; but we are not large enough
to grasp it. In toeory grief looks to us all wrong ; and
any kind of real loss just so much needless deduction
from tiie sum of our happiness. But to go on with no
explanation is wellnigh intolerable ; and it is hardly '
satisfying merely to admit that toe whole experience is
in a stronger and presumably wiser hand than ours.
The sufficient explanation never comes, until we coin
our self-denials and sacrifices, our great pains and bitter
partings, into better Christian characters, — that is, until
we win beauty from ashes.
We say Jesus was a man of sorrows and acquainted
wito grief. He was. I often ponder these words and
the facts behind the words. I say to myself, " Could
Jesus have been the master of souls he was and is, with
out such an experience ? Could he have known as he
did what was in man ? Could he have felt all his ten
der charity towards human weakness ? Could he have
given himself up to the truth with such absolute self-
surrender, unless he had fatoomed by practical expe
rience the meaning of those mystic words, ' beauty for
ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garmente of
praise for the spirit of heaviness ' ? " Reverently I
answer, " He could not." The Scriptures mean some
thing when they declare that he was made perfect
through suffering. And Paul could not have been Paul,
or Luther Luther, or Channing Channing, or any great
and good man what he is, if there were no burdens to

462 BEAUTY FOR ASHES.
bear, — if all the obstacles were swept away, as we sweep
the leaves of autumn from our well kept paths.
" Beauty for ashes." That is truth in the natoral
kingdom. All the verdure with which the world clothes
itself — the upspringing grass, the opening wealth of
foliage, the gorgeousness of blossom, the bounty of
fruitage — comes in some sort from the dust and ashes
of each last year's growth. That is truth in the spirit
ual kingdom. Every leaf which drops from the tree of
our prosperity, every bough that moulders, feeds, or
should feed, the rising fortunes of the soul, and make
the soul a tree of righteousness planted by the Lord.

TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
September 17, 1893.
And the tongs thereof . . . shall be of pure gold.
Exodus xxv. 38.
THESE words occur in the description of the sacred
objects contained in the most Holy Place. What
thought, if any, do they suggest ? This : that there are
stages in man's development when he has to worship God
through rich material forms. He can do no otherwise.
A few, indeed, in every age can find expression for their
devout feelings in fitly chosen words. Some even rise
higher, and learn that the best way to serve the Eternal
Goodness is by a life which to the core is true, pure, and
kindly. As for the rest, they require something striking,
gorgeous, appealing to eye anfi ear, and stimulating to
the imagination. This clearly was the state of the Jew
in the earUer periods of his history. His worship was
a spectacle. Every object on which the eye rested
gleamed with gold, — the altar, the mercy seat, tiie
table of testimony. The priests were clad in purple
and fine Unen, and gUstened with jewels. Thus all the
appointments, though to our taste somewhat barbaric,
were as superb and impressive as the means and art of
the tribes could make them. We cannot doubt that
they were adapted to the time and people, and that they
did do something — much — to lift these out of the
coarseness and narrowness of their ordinary thought to

464 TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
some dim perception of their relation to Him whose eyes
are too pure to behold iniquity. The natural, and, as
the history of all ancient races shows, the necessary re
sult of what we may call external and sensuous worship
is richness, cost. These poor folks might not be able
to clothe devotions in appropriate language. Their lives
might not be a very good and acceptable offering. At
any rate, they would not bring to their God that which
cost them nothing.
We may go a step farther. Not only did the costli
ness of the gift in some sort measure the zeal of the
givers ; but that zeal was most clearly manifested in the
things that were humblest, least perceptible, and least
dignified, in uses. The altar, which stood in the sight
of all the people, must be enriched with gold. That
of course. The mercy seat, — mystic type of the ever
present and ever gracious Lord, — nothing that wealth
or art could give could be too much for that. But that
the insignificant things, the things which had no majestic
part to play, should be of pure gold, — this more than
the greater things shows how worshipful after their
light these people were. As I read the account I am im
pressed as a friend was when he visited a celebrated
cathedral. The massive tower, the tall spire, the grace
ful pinnacles, the clustered pillars, the lofty arches, the
many-hued windows, — all, he said, filled him with ad
miration. But when, peering in dark nooks and corners,
he found lovely carvings, which perhaps not one visitor
in ten thousand ever saw, he understood what love,
what zeal, what religious fidelity, had been put into the
work. We have passed largely out of the era of sensuous
worship. Not indeed that external rites and forms have

TONGS OF PURE GOLD. 465
passed away. For so long as man -is a complex being,
made up of body and soul, of the seen and the unseen, —
and so long as what we see and hear travels by untrace
able roads to the invisible within us, — we cannot alto
gether dispense with external religion. But more and
more we are recognizing that the purpose of all religion
worthy the name is to shape the man, to make his real
self true, pure, and full of love ; that is, to fulfil in the
most genuine way the purpose of God in bringing him
into being.
Admit this. All the same we must have the tongs
of pure gold. Or, to state it in the language of prose,
we must see to it that the small acts of our life quite
as much as the large ones conform to highest spiritual
standards. For one obvious reason. The great mass
of men have little else to which they can apply moral
and spiritual principles, — little else by which they can
manifest a disposition to serve God and to be faithful
to the truth. Constantly recurring acts of toil with no
greatness either of dimension or quality, — little obliga
tions, so limited in scope that they neither stir the blood
nor inspire the soul, — all this levelness, all this monot
ony, all this cutting up of life into petty fragments, with
little or no admixture of heroic or even striking elements,
is what makes up the account of myriads of lives. Cer
tainly this is altogether true of the lot of what we call
the unfavored classes. Probably to a far greater degree
than we appreciate, it is true also of the lot of what we
so grandly term the favored classes. Take, the day
laborers, on the land, in shops and factories. How is
their life made up ? Of constant acts of toil, stroke upon
stroke, week in, week out, illumined now and then by
gleams of pleasure, and made sweet and pure by homely
30

466 TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
household affection. Consider the way life comes to a
mother with a large family and moderate means. There
is household work, to keep the bome neat and well
ordered ; sewing that the children may be clothed, cook
ing that they may be fed. And all this goes on, not
simply from sun to sun, but from year to year. Nor
am I of the opinion that this feature of experience is
confined to a few classes. Largely it affects all. The
merchant has vast and complex transactions. Yet the
petty details of buying and selling, of book-keeping, of
collections and payments, how many and how engrossing
they are ! The physician has his great hours when he
wrestles with disease and is the victor. But perhaps he
too has times when his whole life seems a ceaseless rep
etition. The lawyer takes honest pride in the thorough
research, the legal acumen, the force of argument, which
he brings to bear upon his great cases. Yet I venture to
think that sometimes he tires of the whole thing, — tires
of precedents, tires of controversy. Even if you could be
that which so many crave to be, the head of the nation,
all would not be grand and majestic. All would not be
of national and international import. Possibly you
would be quite as much struck by the littleness of your
duties as their largeness. There would be hours lost
in fruitless interviews, days wasted in tririal questions
about small offices, great portions of valuable time given
to the reading and approring of petty private bills.
Do we imply then tiiat the usual experience of the
average man or woman cannot be lifted to the plane of
genuine spiritual worth? This is the last thing any
thoughtful person would say. But to do it we must
make the tongs of pure gold. We must put great virtoe
into small deeds. We must make the monotony of life
lustrous by a disposition which has the richness in it

TONGS OF PURE GOLD. 467
of a just and holy soul. It is fidelity, it is sincerity,
it is pureness, it is love, — not large field, not narrow
field, — which gives any life worth and dignity. Sweet
George Herbert packs the whole lesson into six familiar
lines : — " A servant with this clause
Makes drudgery divine ;
Who sweeps a room, as for thy laws.
Makes that and the action fine.
" This is the famous stone
That tui^eth all to gold."
The good we do in the world, the brightness and hap
piness which we awaken in human hearts, the elevation
of thought and feeling which we promote in others, de
pend much more upon having the tongs of pure gold
than the great altar or the beautiful gate of the temple.
Tliat is, the noble fashion with which we perform
ordinary duties, the fine flavor which goes into words
and acts, otherwise of little importance, — the purity
and sweetness of our life on its common level, — these
are the things which enable us to exercise an influence,
not always noticed, but inevitably powerful for good, and
enduring. We are not apt to think so. Our idea is,
that if we could do something grand, something which
would benefit a whole community, possibly save a state, —
if we could be a Washington, or a Lincoln, or a Florence
Nightingale, or a great benefactor like unto them, — that
would pay. But not one in a thousand of us has in him
the stuff out of which to make a public benefactor. And
if we had, not. one in a thousand ever has the oppor
tunity. And when such opportunities do come, too
often they come in times of pain and grief and stress
of public danger, and the chance seems dearly pur-

468 TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
chased. But we all can live ordinary lives. In fact, we
have to do so. And the worth of those lives to others,
their helpfulness to the world, is settled by the amount
of the fine gold of pureness, of truth, of kindliness, we
put into conduct. What is the one common relation of
life ? The family relation. We are all members of a
home. Now a good home is not a brilliant phenom
enon. It does not attract attention as a flaming comet
would. But a good happy home is not only a well-spring
of pleasure, but a well-spring of nobility. It sends out
men and women that are of use. But what makes a
home good? Speech, conduct, which are not simply
gilded, but gold all through. Lives whose quiet current
is full of gentleness, of friendliness, of gladness to do
and bear. We look. At first we say, " This is noth
ing remarkable. " We look again. Then we cry, " What
so wonderful ! " Here the commonest routine takes on
sweetness and dignity, and compels happiness to come
and dwell among men.
Call to mind a quite different aspect of life. A man
is a great manufacturer, or a great merchant, or he suc
cessfully cultivates his broad acres. Certainly it is a
benefit, indeed it is essential, that the mill should pour
forth its great tide of fabrics of cotton and wool, of iron
and brass ; that this wonderful process of distribution
should go on in our warehouses ; that the earth under
skilful husbandry should yield its increase. But the
more we contemplate these material benefits, the more
impersonal they look. The man loses his individuality.
He seems but a cog in the wheel, — at most a single
wheel in a great mass of machinery, in which his little
movement is merged and almost lost. Let now his per
sonality be full of integrity. Let his walk among men
be just, kind, and considerate. That is, let his conduct

TONGS OF PURE GOLD. 469
inevitably gravitate toward what is right, high-minded.
Then he will exercise personal force, and for good. It
will not be the power which comes from the magnitude
of his transactions, or from his skUl in some one branch
of material activity. It wiU be personal power, the in
herent power, for good which he has, because on the
ordinary level of life he has moral dignity and sweet
ness. This is the point to be insisted upon, — the ex
traordinary worth not only to ourselves, but to others,
of our usual speech and deeds, so be that their quality
is fine enough.
What is the effect upon the man himself of what we
may call the minor details of living ? The very great
est. Our daily talk, our common acts, things that we
do not rate, high, perhaps count to be trivial, quite as
much as anything else shape character. As a rule,
people do not leap into excellence of any sort. Gener
ally they reach it by slow gradations. I admit that
there are apparent, possibly real exceptions to this state
ment ; that there are people who seem to change from
bad to good as it were in the twinkling of an eye. Such
examples may be real. Certainly they are rare. Some
body has said that integrity, like confidence, is a plant of
slow growth. Well, how does it grow ? By cultivation.
Telling the truth, dealing justly, are not, if we are to
judge by the ways of large bodies of people, absolutely
natural qualities. You cultivate them in your child;
and you cultivate them through words so trivial, acts so
trifling, and scenes so ordinary, that often they leave no
trace on the memory. But rectitude becomes a compo
nent part of character. You can no more take it out
of the character than you can take the blue out of a fair
sky. It is the same with all other virtues. Pureness,

470 TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
gentleness, the unselfish mind, the liberal heart, are the
golden glories wrought out through a good use of homely
experience. Neither the sturdy nor the gracious qualities
grow up as the Eastern magician is said to produce trees,
sowing his seed, covering it with a tent, and then in a
moment of time displaying the plant full grown. They
grow rather as does the oak. At first it is a tiny stalk.
Then all unseen the wholesome influences of air and
earth and moisture feed it. Slowly its trunk adds ring
to ring, and throws out its great boughs, and spreads
its innumerable branches.
If you look a moment, you will see that this method
of character building is according to the nature of things.
When the old Hebrew was constructing his great altar,
and the mercy seat, and the golden candlestick, of course
he builded well. They were the obvious things. Friend
and stranger knew all about them. Simple national
pride might have directed his course. It might have
had little reverence in it and cultivated little. But
when he made the inconspicuous things used in worship
of pure gold, they were mute witness to his loving fidel
ity, and the very thoroughness of his acts must have
cultivated the rude spirit of devoutness which was in
him. Read your Bible. You will find that it was
through just such processes that Jesus became the great
teacher. He went down to Nazareth, says Luke, and
was subject to his father and mother. From twelve to
thirty years we literally know nothing of him but that
he wrought at his father's bench, and performed tbe
obscure duties of an obscure station. Yet it is signifi
cantly added that be "increased in wisdom and stature,
and in favor with God and man." It is just so in our
human life. Under some mighty impetus men's minds
and men's souls sometimes do almost miraculous things,

TONGS OF PURE GOLD. 471
just as the body under great excitement lifts unheard
of weights, though when the excitement dies away it is
no stronger. But one treads the paths of an ordinary
life, keeps calm amid its worries and perplexities, does
not permit petty wrongs and injuries to ruffle his tem
per, nor its many temptations to harden his heart or
undermine his integrity. Such a way of receiving life
is not accidental. It implies steady government. There
is a plain application of thought and conscience, yes, of
real Christianity, to the details of living. There can be
but one result. The monotony of life, its trivialities
even, elevate character. For nobody can put the fine
gold of pure purpose into daily conduct, and not be the
better for it.
We can, indeed, press this point too far. To assert
that the great hours of life have no influence on char
acter would not only be untrue, but absurd. The effect
upon mind and heart of sudden prosperity and of unknown
griefs is patent. Great occasions sometimes lift men
out of themselves. The timid become heroes, the self
ish generous, the sluggish take on unexpected activity.
Nor is this change necessarily temporary. Occasionally
a new man seems to be the outcome. But one thing
may be said of these great experiences of life, whether
they be fruitful of good or the reverse. They are not
likely to pass by unperceived. They do not slip away
without our notice, as do the waters of the brook beside
which we sit and dream.
Now the opposite is apt to be true of the small hours
and experiences. We take little account of them. They
glide on in ceaseless succession, simply undirected. Yet
as they come and go they make mark upon mark, and
construct or reconstruct character, — and few consider. .

472 TONGS OF PURE GOLD.
It is as when a, tempest loosens and sends down an
avalanche of earth and stone into the valley. It fastens
the attention of all eyes ; but for centuries dew and mist
and gentle rain have accomplished mightier results, lay
ing bare the granite peaks, and making deep and fertile
the intervale, and only the wise take it to heart. This
is the danger of our routine life, — that it is uncared
for, — that it is a ship sailing on without rudder or pUot.
The sweet-tempered become peevish ; the generous cov
etous; the gentle-mannered and pure-minded boy is
transformed into the coarse man, whose speech offends
your taste and insults your moral sense ; — and nobody
can tell just how or when or why it all happened. The
process was long. It was not a plunge over a precipice.
It was a descent down innumerable steps. These did
not drop into a sea of pitch and become at once defiled.
They just touched pitch again and again, — a thousand
times, and the work was quite as thoroughly done. That
is, they were the results of not making even trivial speech
and trifling conduct golden. As with the rices, so with
the virtues. They grow gradually. They travel slowly
along the trodden paths.
For every reason, therefore, because in every life the
small things are in the majority, — because most of the
good we do in the world must be done through little
opportunities, — because it is largely the daUy routine
which shapes character, — and, finally, because what we
overlook, and suffer to work their way in us for ill or
good, are the ordinary experiences, — we must see to it
that even the tongs are of pure gold. To that ceaseless
monotony which every life largely is, we must apply
considerateness, high purpose, steady repression of eril,
and as steady encouragement of good. You cannot make
the monotony of your lawn green and beautiful except

TONGS OF PURE GOLD. 473
by applying to it perpetual vigUance. It pays as weU,
it pays better, to do all this for your character.
Of old, we used to select as the great optical power
the telescope, searching the vast spaces of the starry
world. To-day perhaps we should choose the micro
scope, unveiling the wondrous uses of infinitesimal being.
What is Christian culture but the application of those
vastest spiritual powers, faith and faithfulness, to the
modest detaUs of living ? DetaUs which wiU be sure to
escape our notice unless we keep our eye single, and our
experience in every nook and cranny, as weU as its open
courts, fuU of light.

SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
Peeached on the Seventt-fifth Anniversary and Reconsecea-
TioN OP THE First Independent Christ's Chuech, Baltimore,
Maetland, October 29, 1893.
'We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth, and build the
house that was builded these •many years ago. — Ezra v. 11.
TO-DAY this language is literally fulfilled. These
servants of the God of heaven and earth with joy
and reverence rededicate to religion and the uses of a
Liberal Christian faith the house which was builded
these many years ago. Seventy-five years have passed
since Rev. Dr. James Freeman of King's Chapel
preached in this church its dedication sermon. For
more than a third of a century he had been in fact,
though not in name, a pronounced Unitarian ; and his
society, in consonance with his convictions and their
own, had materially changed their ritual that the man
they revered, loved, and admired might conscientiously
remain their minister. One year later Rev. Dr. Wil
liam Ellery Channing delivered in this place what has
always been known by the name of " the Baltimore Ser
mon." It was spoken on tbe occasion of the ordination
of Rev. Jared Sparks, afterwards so honorably known in
the realm of historical research. It more than any
other one cause produced what has so far proved to be
the permanent separation into two parts of the great
Congregationalist body. That Dr. Channing did not
desire this division is certain. What he believed to be

SERMON AT BALTIMORE. 475
most wise and most likely to promote the sway of pure
Christianity was that large tolerance which could per
mit all to remain in the common fold, and with absolute
freedom speak the truth as they found it written in the
Bible, in the universe, and on the tablets of the human
heart. But whatever its author wished, or thought to be wise,
the Baltimore sermon was the last in a long chain of
causes which created the Unitarian denomination. The
student can indeed trace its roots back almost to tbe
first years of colonial history. The antiquarian can
point out in the last century ministers who worshipped
God after the manner men call heresy, and celebrated
men not a few, like John Adams and Thomas Jefferson,
who followed in their footsteps. But the period of crys
tallization had not then come. As surely, therefore,
as the followers of Jesus were first called Christians at
Antioch, so they that held to the strict unity of God,
the real nobility of human nature, and the inward and
spiritual character of true salvation, were called Uni
tarians at Baltimore. If, therefore, we have any struc
ture which may properly be called a memorial buUding,
it is the very one in which we are now gathered.
Why did the Unitarian denomination come into
being ? What did it seek to do ? Or of what use has
it been in the past ? One thing is clear. The fathers
of our faith did not wish to destroy the spiritual house
in which their souls had been reared, but to rebuUd it
and more according to the pattern by which Jesus had
built it these many years ago. They would remove
the unsightly excrescences with which time had de
faced it. They would make wide its gates, that all
who desired might enter. They would fill its courts

476 SERMON AT BALTIMOBE.
wito a gracious hospitality to attract all tme hearte.
R^toration, not destruction, was what toey desired
and sought. So at toe outset toe Unitarian move
ment was largely of the nature of a protest ; — a
protest on the one hand against every form of spiritual
bondage ; a demand toat every human being sbould be
permitted, under the guidance of his own reason and
conscience, to search for toe truto witoout the restraint
of traditional bonds, and witoout toe fear of ecclesias
tical penalties ; — a protest on toe otoer hand against
certain prevailing doctrines, sncb as toe trinity, total
deprarity, election, — doctrines which were held to be
harsh, unreasonable, and not sosteined by toe Scriptures,
There was a special reason in toe condition of toe
times for tois protest in behalf of spiritoal freedom.
Early Congregationalism did not make ite church cove
nants doctrinal. It demanded of ite members at any
rate, and we suspect largely also of ite ministers, only a
true Christian experience and character. Unqu^tion-
ably toese early fathers were in substance Calviniste.
God's sovereignty, man's deprarity, toe arbitrary divine
choice of toe few to be saved and toe rest to be damned,
the endless torment of those to whom toe terms of sal
vation were not avaUable, — these dogmas toey beUeved
with a terrible sincerity. But they did not put them
into their church covenants. Read toe simple compact
adopted in 1629 by toe First Chureb of Salem: "We
covenant wito toe Lord and one wito anotoer, and do
bind ourselves in the presence of God, to walk togetoer
in all His ways, according as He is pleased to reveal
Himself unto us in His blessed word of truto."
Study the covenant of the First Church, Boston, as
it was framed in 1630 by Rev. Jobn Wilson and bis
celebrated parishioner. Governor John Wintorop. The

SERMON AT BALTIMORE. 477
light reveals it engraven on the glass as it shines through
the great east window of the present place of worship :
"We, whose names are hereunder written, being by His
most wise and good Providence brought together into
this part of America, in the Bay of Massachusetts, and
desirous to unite ourselves in one Congregation or
Church, under the Lord Jesus Christ, our Head, in such
sort as becometh all those whom He hath redeemed
and sanctified to Himself, do hereby solemnly and re
ligiously (as in His most Holy Presence) promise and
bind ourselves to walk in all our ways according to the
rule of the Gospel, and in sincere conformity to His
Holy Ordinances, in mutual love and respect each to the
other, so near as God shall give us grace."
We repeat, that no one doubts that tbe writers of
these covenants were sincere, and very likely stiff and
narrow Calvinists. But they wrote better than they
knew. Their covenants had in them the element of
elasticity. It was possible for men to accept them and
grow. Ministers and peoples might and did differ, and
walk together. No better proof is needed than the fact
that the very churches on which these early covenants
are to-day proudly blazoned are Unitarian. But forty
years before the settlement of Dr. Freeman, say in
1740, there grew up a disposition to narrow the old
compacts, to define them, to give them special doctrinal
meaning, — to change them, in short, from covenants to
creeds. This change seems to have been owing largely
to the influence of that great, sincere man, with his aw
ful convictions about God and His creatures, Jonathan
Edwards. This disposition to narrow and define grew
more and more strong down to the time of Dr. Chan
ning; and as it grew, divisions rose in churches and
between churches. It became wellnigh impossible for

478 SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
Arminians and Calvinists, Unitarians and Trinitarians,
Rationalists and Traditionalists, however sincere and
earnest, and however truly disciples of Jesus, to walk
together. The first use of the Unitarian movement was as an
embodied protest against this narrowing tendency. It
strove to make the Church of Christ broad enough to
include all his people. It was a voice crying out against
everything tbat puts the human mind under bonds, or
inflicts upon progress pains and penalties. The effi
ciency of this protest can hardly be doubted. The last
seventy-five years have been years of increasing toler
ance and enlarging charity. Men are not likely in our
day to come into absolute intellectoal union. For a long
time opinions will be many and sects not a few. But
he is blind to the lessons of tiie bom* who does not see
that the time is close at hand when all will gladly
admit that he is a true child of God who seeks to do
the will of the Eternal and to walk in equity and love
with his fellow men.
Early Unitarianism was not only a protest against
spiritual bondage. Equally it was a protest against dog
mas which it held to be irrational, cruel, and unscrip-
toral. It does not seem necessary to state afresh toe
special points of a controversy which in one form or
another has been waged ever since Christianity was.
They can hardly be stated better than they were in this
place three quarters of a century ago. What does
seem wise to affirm is the genuine use, the unspeakable
value, of that seventy-five years' protest. All the world
has not flocked into our theological camp. That is not
the way most change. They alter their thoughte and
feelings far more than their outward position and rela
tions. They stand in the same place, but they them-

SERMON AT BALTIMORE. 479
selves are not the same. So it has happened that on
all the points at issue a modifying and softening process
has been going on, and is likely to continue to go on.
The creeds may read the same, but men translate them
differently. Who thinks of God, whether in his unity
or trinity, as sitting a sovereign on his throne, and from
the beginning electing some to glory and some to shame ?
And who does not rather think of Him as the Eternal
Father, in whose sight all souls are precious ? Who looks
upon man, incomplete and sinful as he is, yet heir of all
the ages, as a total spiritual ruin ? What keeps Jesus in
our remembrance ? That he purchases for us heaven ?
Or that he is himself the grandest of personalities, the
truth bearer, the quickener and inspirer ? To noble
men and women does salvation mean simply entrance
of the soul into a place, however beatific, or rather the
entrance of the divine life into the soul ? And, espe
cially, how many who are themselves loyal to the old
standards feel that a literal acceptance of them is
essential to a true Christian experience ? In every
direction there has been a vast change, and always
toward sweetness and light, always toward rationality
and freedom. So vast has this change been, that we
are in constant danger of doing gross injustice when
ever we apply the authoritative definitions of a not very
distant past to present conditions of religious thought
One of our own prophets has spoken of the Uni
tarian protests as " pale negations." The words are
scantly just. Certainly when those negations were first
uttered, they were full of warmth and color. They had
all the force of the unspoken affirmations which were be
hind them. On every field of influence, theology, philan
thropy, literature, history, they have wrought mightily.
Were Unitarianism as a separate school of thought to

480 SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
die to-morrow, its work would not die. Man would be
freer. Opinions would be gentler and more rational.
Step now from the past into the present. To-day
what use has the world for Unitarianism ? When
spiritual liberty has been so largely achieved, and the
most irrational doctrines have been forced to clothe
themselves in the garments of reason, what real task is
set for Liberal Christians to do ? Still the same in pur
pose if different in details ; — to rebuild the spiritoal
house after a larger fashion ; to fill it with the power of
a Christian faith and the comfort of a Christian home ;
to make it the refuge of many souls who cannot find in
the old either shelter or sweetness. Plainly Unitarian
ism has turned, and more and more is torning, toward
the work of construction. This is the stint which its
own needs and the needs of the world appoint, and
which it cannot shun either with safety or honor.
This constructive tendency has worked and must
continue to work in two ways, — within, without. Con
sider for a moment this tendency as it refers to the
intellectual and spiritual upbuilding of the denomination
itself. No religious denomination can permanently re
main simply a protest. It must pass on to an affirmative
position and belief. And this process of internal construc
tion was to be carried through by a company of religionists,
the first article of whose charter was soul freedom, the
absolute right of every human being to investigate and
decide highest questions under the guidance of his own
reason, conscience, and spiritual vision. Others might
enlighten ; nobody could enslave. No convocation, no
synod, no conference, no association, had the right or
the power to put so much as one bond on the soul, un
less it chose to wear it. Under this broad charter of

SERMON AT BALTIMORE. 481
spiritual Uberty we have lived for seventy-five years. The
most sacred subjects of human inquiry — God, human
nature, Jesus, the Bible, the future life, what constitutes
real salvation — have all been submitted without let or
hindrance to the individual, that he might for himself
divide the true from the false, the permanent from the
transient. We wUl not say that in our history there has
been no infringement of the perfect law of liberty. In
the fairest green lawn there are weeds. Across the
bluest sky wreaths of vapor float. So among us, in
the white heat of controversy over questions of mighty
import, occasionally the rights of the individual soul
may have been forgotten. What we can say is, with
the passage of the years, the infringement, the chain,
has been swept away, while unhampered spiritual free
dom has gone forward to assured victory. To-day every
one of our churches and every member in every church
is absolutely free. What has been the result ? Con
fusion ? Anarchy ? The separation of our people into
individual entities, with no cohesion, no unity of feeling,
and no sympathy of opinion, — so that no comparison
will apply to us but the drifting sands of the desert?
Is this our experience and our tendency ? Not at all.
More and more we are coming together. There is no
Christian body, however strong its ecclesiastical organ
ization and however precise its theological statements,
which is in more substantial union on all the great
topics of religious thought and faith than that one which
grants neither to organization nor creed power over the
individual soul. If to-day there were no other use for
Unitarianism than to vindicate the safety and the worth
of absolute spiritual freedom, there would be ample
cause for its continued existence.
Turn now from construction as an internal and
31

482 SERMON 4T BALTIMOEE.
spiritual necessity to construction as an external yet
sacred duty, and then ask whether, amid the actual
conditions of modern life, Unitarianism has npt a
present use and worth. What is one of the most sim
ple and patent of the social facts of to-day ? This : that
every third person you meet does not go to church.
He does npt hear sermons ; he does not frequent meet>
ings; he is not knit into social religious relations of any
kipd. That is, in respect to the deepest part of him, the
enduring part of him, he stands alone. In his inner
experience he is, destitute of that subtle but powerful
influence which in every other department of life
strengtiiens and inspires to great achievements. With
some far more than this, and far worse than this, is
true. They hardly think moral and spiritual thoughts.
In their consideration of what they propose to be or do,
they scarcely take into account what rises above the
requirements of their work-day or play-day life.
Out of what does, this exceptional condition of
things grow ? For it is exceptional. In all otoer
genuine interests the natural instinct of mankind is to
come together, not to fly apart. A great deal of this
carelessness about the spiritual side of experience, may
we not sometimes say, a great deal of this unconscious
ness that there is a spiritual side of experience, is the
result of matei'ial engrossment. This is a swift, moring
age. It tasks and monopolizes the powers. It leaves
little leisure, and often little vitality, justly to weigh
interests which, if eternal, certainly are unseen. No
doubt Unitarianism, which has been a voice crying in
the wilderness, protesting against the things which per
plex and the things which seem to be born of unreason,
has found souls full of doubt concerning the popukr
creeds and confirmed them therein. StiU more of this

SEEMON AT BALTIMORE. 483
unsettiing process is due to the critical work of honest
scholars of other faiths, quite as much as our own, who
have brought to the common mind new views of tbe
history, the authenticity, and the inerrancy of ^the books
of the Old and New Testaments. More stUl of this
divorce of men from social religion must be laid at the
door of science, which has not indeed discredited re
ligion, and which in the end will place religion on a
firmer basis. But at the outset it gives religion such
height, such breadth, such width of application, that the
old categories of theology cannot contain it. But be the
cause what it may, and let the accountability rest where
it will, nobody who has attentively studied the facts of
life in city and village can count the pictore of men's
divorce from social religion an exaggerated one. Nor
will thoughtful people look upon this divorce, however
natural and for the time however needful, with any
thing but regret. There are those who in their moral
and spiritual experience can walk alone and not suffer
loss. But they are few.
Construction, or reconstruction, seems therefore to
be the manifest duty of all religious bodies. Of the old,
that, so far as honesty will permit, they may modify
their standards to meet the needs of the broader minds
that otherwise must cut loose from them. Far more,
construction is the duty of those who can frankly accept
the results of the scholar's study and the philosopher's
research. None too soon have we recognized that the
use God has for us now is to gather in those who are
scattered abroad. None too earnestly have we Unitari
ans accepted the duty to lay bare the real foundations
of hope and trust, — to show that knowledge and faith,
unsparing criticism and devoutest religion, clearest
science and highest spirituality, can walk together,

484 SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
ought to walk togetoer, must walk together, it toere
is to be any lasting security for that life which is
bigher toan toe things we see and handle.
In ite beginning Unitarianism was largely a protest
against spu-itual bondage and unreason in religion. It
did not so much seek to build a new edifice as to repair
and improve the old one. Wito tiie passage of toe
yeai-s the necessity came to it to buUd iteelf up, and to
help build otoers up, in a positive and rational faito.
And, so long as there are toose to whose deeper life it
can best minister, it must continue to be a constructor.
But toe whole duty of a religious body has not been per
formed when it bas sought to correct theological error,
or indeed when it has ti-ained itseU and trained otoers
up to sound inteUectual views of God and bis truth.
Beyond and above toese there is a bigher duty. That
duty is to extract from the trutos whicb it affirms that
warm, earnest, winning, and inspiring reUgion which is
their proper fruit We may prophesy toat in the futore
far more than in the past this is the very use to which
God will put the Unitarian denomination. The days of
controversy over the old seem to be largely over. Partly
because the convictions of men have greatly changed.
Partiy because most people are putting less stress on
creeds and more on Christian experience and character.
Even the latest conclusions of critic and scientist are
slowly but surely winning their way to acceptance in
most Orthodox quarters. But what is not settled, and
what needs to be settied, is what effect the new
thought will have on the inner life of man ; and how it
shall touch and invigorate those unseen, mysterious
emotions and hopes out of which the higher life of man
grows. Has Unitarianism to-day any nobler mission,

SEBMOK AT BALTDIOEE. 485
can it have, than to transform these new thoughte,
which are exercising all minds, into a religion which
gball alike satisfy tbe intellect, warm tbe heart, and
purify the conduct?
Let us be just to the old form of religion- Practi
cally it has always risen above ite intellectual lim
itations. It bas led multitudes to pure and honest
lives, brought strength to tempted sonls, comfort to
tried and suffering ones, and in every age has bad ite
sainte and heroes. But with ite theories of God's pur
pose and man's nature and history, and the relation
between tbe two, has it always been easy to keep out of
this religion the selfish clement ? In ruder periods and
among ruder people religion was sometimes frankly
offered, and as frankly accepted, because it purchased
heaven. Even in nobler stetemente of faith — and cer-
teinly with each generation tbey are nobler — do not the
lower thoughte of deliverance from outward pains and
penalties mingle wito tbe bigher hopes of inward and
spiritual gains and advantages, as indncemente to get
and keep religion ? Nay, do not the underlying con
ceptions of what salvation really is, and which to some
extent are beneath new statemente as well as old ones,
compel us to think of religion sometimes, not only as
deliverer from sin, but as the servant of the Lord, who
closes the gates of woe and opens tbe portel of eternal
blessedness ?
But whatever may be a just estimate of tbe real
quality and tendency of tbe religions sentiment and
faith, as tbey have existed and wrought in the past, it
is clear tbat tbe age is cherishing new thoughts upon
highest subjecte, and that they are getting entrance into
many pnlpits, and finding many sympathetic hearers.
So it is certain tbat in the future such thoughte are to

486 SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
have a large acceptance. Religion wiU not change in
its essentials ; but it must stand in new relations aud
derive ite sustenance from new, if not larger, concep
tions of tbe Great Souree of aU, and of His laws. Con
sider tbe mental and spiritoal attitode of the modem
man. There is no subject so high, or so sacred, toat
he does not grapple wiih it and seek to achieve fresh
conclusions. The whole toeological scenery, if we may
use toe figure, has been transformed. To bim God is
not a dread sovereign, who of His own good pleasure
appoints this one to bliss and that one to woe. You
do not even express toe whole truto when you caU Him
tbe Heavenly Fatoer who cares for aU His chUdren.
In bis toought God is equaUy toe eternal energy, toe
serene wisdom, which has created and forever susteins
a divine order whicb carries forward aU, and helps aU,
and hinders none. He cannot say man is a spiritoal
wreck, that can be restored only by miraculous inter
vention. That is not the way toe present looks to him.
That is not the way he reads the story of the past
Man is an incomplete and erring creatiire ; but he is on
the road up from greater incompleteness and a deeper
moral blindness. Earth and heaven, time and eternity,
are but terms which express toe unending opportunity
of the human soul ; the conditions under which it learns
to know by pleasure, by pain, toe wise and the good, and
to cleave to them. Jesus was not here to save men
from the resulte of their sins. Not for that did he live
his wondrous life or speak his wondrous words. He
sought to fill them with that abundant spiritual life
which casts out death ; to save toem fi^om sin iteelf by
surrounding them, and as it were satorating toeir souls,
wito a spiritual atmosphere in which sinful desires die.
To the reverent mind heaven here, heaven toere, is

SEBMOX AT BALTIMOBIL 48T
prinrarilj potitf of heart, holine^ (tf fife, love enbraeing
all oar Mud; and heQ is eom^ a^^le, 38 4siae por-
pi^e, is an unloving beart
This in eveiT direction there bas been an exuHmous
diange in man's riews nptm sacred sabjeelB. Terr few
whose (^nions and feelings are not more or less sSeebed
by this trend of thoo^t. And to a large extent toese
¦riews faavB come to stay ; and every year is to widrai toe
sphere of thar influence. If rdi^on cannot Hve side
by side with them, and get ncHiri^iment mit ox th^n,
toen it win lose its place as guide and inspirer ef life and
conduct AssiiTedly it is fhe duty of some one to make
it dear to sincere qpies&oners, toat faito in God and
puF^t serriee of Him^ disrapleship of JesiK and genuine
following of Wm — that is, real re]^(Hi— aze peife^y
consistent with a ^ad acceptance (tf aU the xaels of
eritidsm and sdence. Qf wbom is it more deariy toe
dofy than of tot^e who are free to receive tmth, who
rejoice to receive tznfli, eome from what quartex- it
mav? "nie i^^oln^s of the Uniterian moronait in
the luture must be largely measured by ite abiliiy to
traomnote ojonioiis into Mto, conri<^ons into derot^
sraitiments, rationafity into spiritnal rdigicm, and fresh
light about our lelalioiis to God and his universe into
nobler performance (tf di^.
Sevenij-£ve years have rolled away ^ee fee eariy
Unitarians rdncianfly left the old fold and went forth
to fulfil their mi^on in a world whicb was loato to
rec^vetoem. B is fitting that, met in ihe very hmMing
in wMch it maybe said that American Unitarianfem
had ite birto fero^ we shoold give a Se^ng haK-honr,
not simply to its outward annals, bnt to ite inward
experience and ite life work. It is wefl that we sbould

488 SERMON AT BALTIMORE.
look witoin and ask for what bas it stood, what bas it
attempted to do, and wito what spirit and purpose it
contemplates toe inteUectual and spiritual world, where
everything seems to be in flux and nothing permanent
save that great law of dirine order and growto which
is <»rrying us aU forward to larger knowledge and
higher life. There is nothing saddening in this retro
spect. We have not acMJomplisbed aU toe sanguine
dreamed. We have not be(3ome in outward proportions
one of toe great secte; but we have made a healtoy
growth, and have gatoered in many souls who could
have found elsewhere neither refuge nor home. Better
yet, we have saUed out boldly on the broad ocean of
truto and have not made shipwreck. To-day we stand
iace to face with toe progress of the age, read aU toe
critics can say, bear aU toe message proud science has
to speak, and know that real reUgion has lost nothing ;
that God is stiU God, only more steadfast in His ways
than men had toought ; that man is man, but wito more
of God's image in him toan toe creeds have acknowl
edged ; toat Jesus ia stiU master of souls, because be
is toe same quickening and inspiring influence toat be
was when be walked Jemsalem's streete or stood by
GaUlee's shore.
We look outeide our own borders and take fresh
courage. Surely toe teachers of reUgion are broader
and more tolerant than toey were of old. Mind and
soul are entering into that freedom which our fatoers
won for toe body poUtic a century ago. Yes : toe spirit
ual house is rapidly rebuUding and on a more generous
plan. Honest men may not see it Narrow men may
close toeir eyes against the sight AU toe same, the
noble walls are steadUy rising ; and toe gates are made
broad, and in a better futnre wUl be open night and day ;

SERMON AT BALTIMORE. 489
SO that every one who desires to know God's will and
do it, to love God's chUdren and serve them, to be a
disciple of Jesus by partaking of his spirit, may enter
in and find none to molest. We look forward to another
seventy-five years, which few of us shall see in the flesh.
What increase of knowledge, what elevation of faith,
what enlargement of charity, what ennobling of daily
life, the prophetic eye rejoices in vision to behold !

THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE.
Januaky 7, 1894.
Believe me for the very works' sake. — John xiv. 11.
A YEAR ago I read Mommsen's History of Ancient
Rome. His aUusions to the period of its early
kings greatly impressed me. Of that period we have
absolutely no authentic history. So far as the story
is handed down in writing, it is hopelessly legendary
and mythical. Are we then destitute of all trustworthy
information ? By no means. We learn, he says, what
we know, not from historical tradition, but by means
of inference from the institotions known to have existed
soon after. The structure of society, the laws of tho
state, the religious customs, the family relation, art,
architecture, — all these, which we find fully formed
and in action when first trustworthy annals came to be,
do testify of a civilization and development governing
and unfolding ere trustworthy annals were. We believe
and know much of those far distant times, not on ac
count of the record, but for the sake of the works, which
abide. It is like the transformations of our planet. No
account of these has been handed down. None could
be. But in every tilted layer of rock, in every petrifac
tion of tree or animal, the geologist reads the sure story.
What is true of Roman history might be true of any
other history. It is supposable that in some remote
future all annals of our own country prior to the adop-

THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE. 491
tion of the Constitotion in 1789 might be lost. Yet I
can conceive of an acute scholar, like our historian,
pointing out to the curious reader three thousand years
hence what varied influences the Puritan, the Cavalier,
the Huguenot, poured into our common life, and how
careful study, with little or no printed eridence, might
put the long struggle with the savage, the successful
uprising of the Revolution, and the great argument by
whicli a loose confederacy became a nation, among well
ascertained facts. All this would be possible, because
every unknown past leaves behind works which Uve and
act in a known present, and reveal the quality of that
past. Why should we not apply this historic principle to
Jesus's Ufe ? That is, why should we not use his own
language with a wide and permanent application ? Sure
I am, that, if we could get at the core and heart of the
faith and reverence of Christendom to-day, we should
find that these qualities do not rest simply upon the fact
that four short biographies of Jesus were written centu
ries ago. Such reverence and faith rest rather on the
ineffaceable consciousness of mankind, that Jesus has
written his Ufe and power in fair and noble characters
upon more than eighteen hundred years of human
experience ; and that he is doing the same thing to-day,
and here, and everywhere. Stating it in Gospel phrase,
men believe iu him and submit their Uves to his influence
for his works' sake. Manuscripts may be altered, or
the history and formation of them may be concealed by
the mists of a deep antiquity. But moral and spiritoal
force and truth, put into the life of the race, abide, and
testify of their source and giver.
Tliis historic principle — for it has certainly become

492 THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE.
that — has peculiar worth and helpfulness in our own
time. We live in a period of questioning. Doubt has
in many minds risen to the elevation of an august
virtue. There are those who would put after every
statement of Christian history an interrogation point.
Certainly I cannot in any fulness agree with this ex
treme unbeUef. Sometimes it seems as irrational as
the wildest credulity, and to demand of Christian annals
what it would demand of nothing else. When the last
historical inquiry shall have been made, and the last
word of criticism spoken, I suspect that we shall be
compelled to believe as much as this : that the Gospels
were written by persons who had an intimate connec
tion with the planting of Christianity ; that what they
wrote they wrote from honest conriction ; and finaUy,
and most important, that what they wrote unconsciously
reveals a character larger, loftier, and more spiritoal
than their own.
Suppose now that we entertain all toe questions, con
sider all the doubts, put the interrogation point wherever
an objector desires, and as often as he desires it. Have
we lost Jesus ? Has that influence, so strong and ten
der, so attractive and inspiring, taken its final de
parture ? Certainly not. Real works last. Genuine
spiritual principles and influences are enduring bless
ings. Some of the interesting details of that great
career, as the historian says of Roman annals, may pass
away. But the main stress and power of the life cannot
pass away. It has become one of the forces in the
moral universe. It is this reality of the Christ that has
given him a permanent place in human interest. Great
changes of opinion come with the years. Just criticisms
in time are universally accepted. So the outward form
is in flux. But no change affects the sway of a life

THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE. 493
which is genuine, and which communicates enduring
spiritual help and inspiration. Men doubt theories;
they believe facts.
What did Jesus give the world to be a perpetual wit
ness that he once lived, and that he was worthy of the
love and reverence with which men have remembered
him ? Let us say, first, an ideal life. An ideal life so
embedded in human consciousness that men cannot
away with it. No matter now about the biographies ;
no matter about the traditions ; no matter what you
believe or do not believe of these. As much as this is
certain. In the earliest Christian years of which there
is a sure record, a new and higher conception of holy
living meets you. The true man, it says, is he who is
one in heart and purpose with that infinite greatness
we call the Heavenly Father. The true man is he who
within is pure and just. The true man is he who in
his secret soul loves his fellow man. In this concep
tion, all goodness is first inward, afterward outward ;
first of the heart, then of the hand and the conduct. It
is a fresh and lofty conception. It did not simply ex
press the spiritual standards of its own time. The
Jewish thought of acceptable living was to pay tithes of
mint, anise, and cummin, and to hold fast to the tradi
tions of the elders. It was hopelessly external. This
conception could not have come from the Roman, —
whose virtue even meant courage, endurance, whose
very morality put on the Stoic garb, whose religion was
prudent and earthly. It could not have come from the
Greek, — in his best estate beauty-loring and pleasure-
loving, and who in later days had sunk into doubt and
voluptuousness. Neither could it have come from the
earUer Christians themselves ; for neither they nor we
have been able to reach up to that great pattern of
divinest life.

494 THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE.
The conception of true life presented to toe world in
the first Christian ages demands a great soul. It bears
witness that a son of God taught and lived this imper
ishable moral ideal. There is no other adequate expla
nation. In all other departments of life this is the way
we have to deal with the works which an unknown past
hands down. I go out into the desert which skirts
Palestine. I reach the oasis where Palmyra stood.
Around me, beautiful even in ruins, are the remains of
temple and palace. Do I need to be told that the rude
Arab, who pitches his black tent and feeds his flock
beneath their shadows, did not rear them ? Do not
the works — these magnificent structures, that neither
man's violence nor the waste of centuries have been able
utterly to destroy — bear their own witness? Though
there were not preserved a line of history, sbould we
not know that once a lordlier race here lived and
wrought ? Even so the spiritual work rooted in man's
life testifies of the worker.
Consider the immortality which cleaves to toe teach
ings of the New Testament. Here are those wonderful
parableSj which have delighted and instructed sixty gen
erations of the old and young. Read the parables of
the Prodigal Son and of the Good Samaritan. How
fresh and interesting toey are ! How applicable to the
errors, needs, and duties of man to-day ! No frost of
age rests upon them. I doubt whether our own genera
tion, with all its progress in science, in art, and in litera
ture, can write one which wUl last half as long. Here
is the Sermon on the Mount. It ie a whole volume on
ethics and religion, compressed into a dozen pages. Not
a verse would we spare. How seriously yet how pithily
it unfolds the whole philosophy and duty of true prayer !

THE POWER OF JISUS' T.TFK 495
What modesty it would add to fee grace of (diarity!
Wito what clearness it states and Ulustrates toe suprem
acy of toe heavenly over toe earthly treasure I To toe
mwardness and depto of toe be^r life in man, each
Beatitode bears ite own separate witoess. No doubt a
hundred toousand sermons have been written upon tois
first recorded sermon. A hundred toousand more may
be. Yer toe fountain wiU be unexhausted. And where
shaU we find profounder ^impses of man's divinest
life than in toe words of tbat Gospel of John, wfaicdi
Edmund Sears calls '¦ toe Heart (tf Christ " ?
Some one says now, toat we are not sure of toe au-
toorship (tf toe four Gospels, toat we do not know
whetoer toey were written thirty or seventy years after
toe supposed deatb of Jesus, toat we cannot teU wito
certainty even whetoer toeir original garb was Hebrew
or Greek. We are sorry if this be eo. NaturaUy
enough, we like to be sure even of unimportant details.
Bnt toe great teacher is toere. He who spake as God
gave bim wisdom bas written his mark on every page.
Had but one of toe great PhUippics of Demostoenes
<X)me down to us, and with no certain history attached,
sbould we not know toat in Greece's extremity toere
spake an orator at whose feet toe lovers of eloqaen(^
might wisely sit ? We read toe drama of " The Jf er-
chant of Tenice." Tery Utile writtrai history tells of
ite antoor. Not a tento part of what it records of some
worthless sy(Mpbant. Bnt how foU toe testimony of
his works! The knowledge of toe human heart, of its
springs of ai^on, (tf ite deep fountains (tf human joy
and sorrow, are all written toere in feir large characters.
I read my Bible, and I know toat J^ms walked wito
God ; tbat toe volume of truto and duty was to him an
open book; toat bis words were li^t and life; toat

496 THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE.
he must have spoken with authority, and not as the
scribes. Reflect upon the vast impulse which Christianity has
been in human history. Reflect not the less upon the
blessing it has been in the private life of men, — quicken
ing their faith, comforting them in sorrow, and lead
ing uncounted multitudes out of the fleshly life up to
the ways of the spirit. All this is of common observa
tion. For eighteen centuries this word, this life, has
been a force in the personal experience, and a force in
the great common life of humanity, — a stream of
energy forever flowing, forever unexhausted. No one
can look beneath the surface of human annals and not
find it.
Then we search for the beginning of this world wide
inspiration, of this world inclusive movement. What do
we find ? This. In a little despised province of Rome,
probably in a despised town of this despised prorince,
far away from the centres of power, a great word was
spoken. The mighty of this world had but little respect
for it. They withstood and hated it. Kings and rulers
turned a deaf ear to it. Great ecclesiastical systems,
strong in their organization, strong in traditional rev
erence, stood in its way. Even the light unbelief of the
time, which was robbing so many of serious trust, did
not furnish a congenial atmosphere in which to blossom
and bear fruit. But in three centuries the new truth —
nominally at any rate — conquered the world. Men's
ways of thinking, their rules of action, their best hopes
for this world or the next, their dreams of a progress
yet to be, their very laws, — all that makes up the
basis and the texture of civilization, felt and feels ite
potent influence.

THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE. 497
We aU know what may be said, and said truly. There
bad been a long and varied preparation, Roman conquest
bad melted into one countless and warring principaUties,
so tbat the whole world was open to the great-hearted
missionary of the tmth. The old faiths, the old rituals,
were losing toeir power. Minds and hearte were grow
ing more bospiteble to tbe fresh message whicb had in
it rati(mality plus life- All this no doubt is true. But
in this statement one thing is lacking, — a towering per
sonality, a soul charged wito truth and sympathy, a
mind and heart to be the media through which the
dirine life should flow into man's life. Even in mate
rial intereste, great advances always demand great
prophets. One does not believe that Bismarck united
Germany as the watehmaker gatoers into a perfect
chronometer the scattered wheels and springs. But
neither watch nor empire could dispense with toe mas
ter band. Much more do spiritoal advances require
prophets. Luther did not create the Reformation, but
it would have lagged without hino. John Wesley was
not the whole of Methodism, but all the same it waited
for his coming. So tbe world before Jesus's day had
been all unconsciously preparing for a great fresh influx
of spiritual life. But it waited for a mighty personality,
a soul in whom God's spirit dwelt, — in whom was a
knowledge of the tmth, a love of man, and a bright
rision of a nobler futore. And it found aU in the
prophet of Galilee; and his works, seen in a better
civilization, and seen in a truer form of religion, and
seen in purer lives, bear witness of him. Men believe
in him and cherish bis influence, not simply because of
what is written, but because his own wonderful person
ality has poured itself without stint into toe world's
Ufe. 32

498 THE POWEB OF JESUS' LIFE.
More and more I am disposed to exalt personaUty.
The final law in all well ordered life is the principle of
truth which expresses the love and wisdom of Him who
created us. That of course. But never does a prin
ciple of truto come home with such power as when it is
incarnated in Uving exceUence. Take a simple iUustra
tion. One praises in abstra(^ terms heroic self-sacrifi(%.
AU he says is true. Yet perchance your heart does not
bum within you, and you are not stirred to noble imite-
tion. Replace now the abstraction by an actual exampla
TeU the story of one who bas risked aU, and lost aU, to
save anotoer. Tbe virtoe takes on reaUty. Tbe frost
around toe beart melte. The fountains of the great
deeps of sympatoy are broken up. You admire, yon
reverence, you imitete.
In a large way, toe remembrance of Jesus does toe
same thing, — changes mere assent into earnest acscept-
ance. That remembrance may have been connected
with mistaken conrictions. Nevertoeless, toe disposition
of good and wise men to keep bis memory green is an
eminently healtoy tendency. It proposes to bring men
into contect with a personality which has in aU toe
Christian yeara proved to be fuU of spiritoal powers.
One can hardly estimate the loss to the race, and to the
indiridual, if in all the Christian centuries we could have
excluded enthusiasm for Jesus's personality, and replaced
it by a cool and sensible acceptance of truto, in which
there was not one beart throb.
What we need is more heart throbs. To exclude from
our lives the greatest example is to rob us of motive
power. That wondrous life bas filled the Christian ages
with ite work. It has flooded toe Christian conscious
ness with its ideal of holy liring. What most of us need
is not more knowledge, but more warmto, more zeal, a

THE POWER OF JESUS' LIFE. 499
clearer conviction of the reality and worth of the better
life. We get this warmth, we get this enthusiasm, we
get this vision of a diviner life, to no little degree from
the example of the saints, and especially from that ex
ample which has led so many souls into higher paths
and itself lighted the way.

THE END.

YALE UNIVERSITY

a39002 Q02550359b