Ten Boys from History Part 14

"Bring it to me!" commanded the old lady, and the boy came slowly forward, pin in hand. When he was near enough to reach, Old Ma'am Rand gripped him firmly and pinned him to her dress with the big pin. He struggled so hard that he got away and ran screaming to the end of the room with a piece of the old lady's dress that had been torn in the struggle, hanging on his sleeve.

But evidently he and his teacher were really good friends, for he stayed in her cla.s.s until he was seven years old. Then he went to a preparatory school in Andover, Ma.s.s., and from there to Phillips Academy, also in Andover, where he was prepared for Yale college.

The following is the only letter preserved that was written by him at that early date, from the preparatory school.

"Dear Papa,--I hope you are well and I will thank you if you will send me up some quils. Give my love to mama and _Nancy_ and my little brothers; pleas to kis them for me and send me up some very good paper to write to you.

I have as many blackberries as I want I go and pick them myself.

SAMUEL FINLEY BREESE MORSE YOUR SON.

1799."

Finley was never much interested in his studies, but liked better to read books on whatever subject caught his fancy. "Plutarch's Lives" was one of his favorites, and it gave him the ambition to become famous, although exactly how to achieve his purpose he did not then see. But he kept on reading, and studying and when he was thirteen he wrote a sketch of Demosthenes and sent it to his father, who was so pleased with it that he laid it away among his treasures.

The letters written to him by his father were very different from those written by fathers of today. Here is part of one:

"My dear Son--You do not write to me as often as you ought. In your next you must a.s.sign some reason for this neglect. Possibly I have not received all of your letters. Nothing will improve you in epistolary writing as practice. Take great pains with your letters.

Avoid vulgar phrases. Study to have your ideas pertinent and correct, and clothe them in easy and grammatical dress. Pay attention to your spelling, pointing, the use of capitals, to your handwriting. After a little practice these things will become natural and you will thus acquire a habit of writing correctly and well. General Was.h.i.+ngton was a remarkable instance of what I have now recommended to you. His letters are a perfect model for epistolary writers.... I will show you some of his letters when I have the pleasure of seeing you next vacation and when I shall expect to find you much improved.

Your natural disposition, my dear son, renders it proper for me earnestly to recommend you to attend to one thing at a time. It is impossible that you can do two things well at the same time, and I would therefore never have you attempt it. Never undertake to do what ought not to be done, and then whatever you undertake, endeavor to do it in the best manner.... Steady and undissipated attention to one object is a sure mark of genius, as hurry, bustle and agitation are the never failing symptoms of a weak and frivolous mind. I expect you to read this letter over several times, that you may retain its contents in your memory."

Whether the ten year old boy appreciated this fine letter is open to doubt, but he certainly acted on its advice, for so good was his record for scholars.h.i.+p that when he was only fourteen years old he was ready to leave the preparatory school and become a college student.

A year later, in the fall of 1805 he left home and took the trip to New Haven, where he entered the freshman cla.s.s at Yale. An amusing incident of his early college days is given in this letter. He says:

"We had a new affair here a few days ago. The college cooks were arraigned before a tribunal of the students. We found two of the worst of them guilty of several charges, such as being insolent to the students, not exerting themselves to cook clean for us, in _concealing pies_ which belonged to the students, having suppers at midnight and inviting all their neighbors and friends to sup with them at the expense of the students, and this not once in a while but every night.... The fault is not so much in the food as in the cooking, for our bill-of-fare has been in the following way: Chocolate, coffee and hashed meat every morning, at noon, various; roast beef twice a week, pudding three times, and turkeys and geese on an average once a fortnight; baked beans occasionally; Christmas and other merry days, turkeys, pie and puddings as many as we wish for.... I ought to have added that in future we are to have beefsteaks and toast twice a week, before this the cooks were too lazy to cook them. I will inform you of the result of the affair as soon as it is completed."

Then as now, "eats" formed a vastly important part of boys' life, it seems.

At that time Jeremiah Day was teacher of natural philosophy at Yale, and Prof. Silliman, of chemistry, and to these men young Morse owed much of his later achievement. One day in cla.s.s Prof. Day told his pupils to all join hands while a student touched the pole of an electric battery. At once a shock was felt down the long line of boys.

Morse described it as being like "a slight blow across the shoulders".

This experiment showed the pupils the wonderful speed at which electricity travels. Another day the laboratory was darkened and a current of electricity pa.s.sed through a row of metal blocks placed at a short distance apart, while the boys in awed silence watched the white light flash between the links of the chain and the blocks.

So interested did Finley become in experiments along that line, that when at vacation time he found he could not afford to take the trip home, he was not much disappointed, but spent his time making tests in the laboratory. That his problems were much the same as those of young men of today is shown by this letter to his father. He says:

"I find it impossible to live in college without spending money. At one time a letter is to be paid for, then comes up a great tax from the cla.s.s or society, which keeps me constantly running after money.... The amount of my expenses for the last term was fifteen dollars expended in the following manner:

Postage $ 2.05 Oil .50 Taxes, fines, etc 3.00 Oysters .50 Washbowl .37-1/2 Skillet .33 Axe, $1.33; Catalogues, 12 1.45 Powder and shots 1.12 Cakes, etc. etc. etc. 1.75 Wine, Thanks Day .20 Toll on bridge .15 Grinding axe .08 Museum .25 Poor man .14 Carriage for trunk 1.00 Pitcher .41 Sharpening skates .37-1/2 Circ. Library .25 Post Papers .57 Lent, never to be returned .25 ---------- $14.75 Paid for cutting wood .25 ---------- $15.00"

Surely it would do the college boy of today good to read that list of expenses. It might be a revelation to him.

A postscript to the letter adds, "The students are very fond of raising balloons at present. I will (with your leave) when I return home, make one. They are pleasant sights."

At that time, he was as much interested in drawing as he was in electrical experiments, and could get a remarkable likeness of anyone who would pose for him. As there were no photographs in those days, his portraits were in great demand, and needing money, to help with his expenses he began to paint miniatures to order, his price being five dollars for those painted on ivory, and one dollar for profiles, and he says, "Everybody is ready to engage me at that price."

When his college course was at an end Finley wished to take up painting for a profession, but of this his parents did not approve, so for a short time he was apprenticed to a bookshop-keeper, but was so unhappy that Dr. and Mrs. Morse finally decided to let him become an artist, and when he was nineteen years old he went to Europe with the well-known artist, Was.h.i.+ngton Allston, to study art. In London he met Benjamin West, the famous painter, to whom Morse "a young pilgrim from the United States, modest and gentle, with his foot not yet on the first rung of the ladder of fame" made a great appeal, and West took the youth under his personal supervision, and felt enormous pride in his progress, for Finley's picture of the dying Hercules at the Royal Academy exhibition was named as one of the twelve best among two thousand exhibited, and his cast of Hercules took the gold medal at the Adelphi Society of Fine Arts.

Back again in America after four years abroad, young Morse had years of struggle ahead, but with undaunted courage continued to work, and at last, despite all obstacles won success as an artist. But of that no more in this brief sketch which has to do with the Inventor.

We have seen the child in school, the boy in college, the budding artist in his training, have watched him painting and making electrical experiments with equal enthusiasm, and now he is no longer a boy, but Morse, the man, when on that April day in 1832 we find him on the deck of the packet-s.h.i.+p _Sully_. There, alone with the mighty influences of Nature and his new idea, he is working out the first crude principles of the Telegraph system which in after years was to be such a revolutionizing factor in civilization and commerce.

Came years of struggle against what seemed to be overwhelming obstacles, but Morse was equal to the emergencies of the case and we have one more glimpse of him as the man who succeeded.

After twelve years of hard work to achieve his ends, a bill was pa.s.sed by the Senate appropriating thirty thousand dollars for testing the Morse Telegraph. A young woman, Miss Ellsworth, had the good fortune to carry the news to Mr. Morse, who was so overjoyed that he could scarcely find his voice to thank her. When at last he spoke, it was to promise that she should choose the first message to be sent across the wires of his Telegraph.

A glimpse of his achievement--at its crowning moment of success.

The a.s.sembly room of the United States Supreme Court with one of the Morse Telegraph instruments installed in it. A group of distinguished officers and private individuals, waiting with intense interest to see the invention tested.

With perfect calmness the Inventor took his seat at the instrument, laid his hands on the key-board now familiar to us all, and in the Morse code sent the message chosen by Miss Ellsworth. Slowly--steadily, successfully he wrote the chosen words,--

"WHAT HATH G.o.d WROUGHT"

The message was instantaneously received in Baltimore by a Mr. Vail who did not know beforehand what message was to be sent. He returned it immediately to Was.h.i.+ngton, so that within a single moment those inspired words were flashed back and forth through a circuit of eighty miles.--The Telegraph system had begun to work!

A great American by inheritance, and by achievement, we do Samuel Finley Breese Morse homage, for his ideals are those for which our forefathers gave their lives. When that first message flashed over the wires to Baltimore and back, the Inventor said humbly and reverently, "The message baptizes the Telegraph with the name of its author,--for that author is G.o.d."

DAVID FARRAGUT:

The Boy Mids.h.i.+pman

It was a day in late October, in the year 1812. Down the Delaware River, came slowly sailing the frigate _Ess.e.x_, which was one of a fleet being sent to cruise along the Atlantic coast for the protection of American vessels from their English enemies, for 1812 was the year when the war between England and America was declared, and for this reason.

England had for a long time been at war with France. Any vessel going to or from a French port was liable to be attacked by an English man-of-war, and the English government even claimed the right to search American vessels to see whether any English sailors were on board. And worse than that, many American sailors were accused, and falsely, of being English deserters and were taken from their own vessels and forced to serve on English s.h.i.+ps. All attempts of America to adjust this matter peacefully were refused, and in 1812 America was obliged to declare war against Great Britain, and in consequence a squadron was fitted out to cruise along the Atlantic coast, to protect American vessels from the English.

The _Ess.e.x_ was in command of Captain Porter, and as she was not ready to start when the rest of the fleet did, she sailed alone down the river through the quiet bay, and out into the ocean, and as she sailed, she bore little resemblance to our war vessels of to-day, so clumsily fas.h.i.+oned was she, being made of wood, with only one covered deck, and the open forecastle and quarter-deck above it, and had but two tiers of guns--the largest frigates carried sixty guns, besides a large pivot gun at the bow, and were noted for their speed, though in comparison to modern wars.h.i.+ps they were as a tortoise is to a hare.

Down the river sailed the _Ess.e.x_ to join the sister-vessels of her fleet, with a pennant flying from her masthead, on which were the words, "_Free trade, and sailors' rights_," for both of which, Captain Porter was ready to fight.

On the deck of the _Ess.e.x_ as she swung slowly out to sea, stood Captain Porter, and by his side stood the proudest boy in all America that day, David Farragut, a little mids.h.i.+pman in a s.h.i.+ning uniform which boasted more bra.s.s b.u.t.tons than the years of its wearer's life--for David was only ten years old, and this is how he came to be in such an important position on that October day.

Born on a farm near Knoxville, Tenn., on the fifth of July, in 1801, David Glascow Farragut had a rich inheritance of courage and energy, both from his mother and father--one being a Spaniard who had come to America during the Revolutionary war, through his desire to help the Colonists in their struggle for liberty, the other a brave, energetic young Scotch woman.

The little farm was miles away from any other dwelling place, and around it there was only a wilderness of forest trees, so that little David and his brother were not allowed to go out of sight of the house, because of the wild animals prowling through the woods and the Indians who often lurked near. One day while the father was away hunting, the Indians came and tried to force their way into the house, but brave Elizabeth Farragut was too quick for them, with fierce courage she guarded the entrance to the house--axe in hand--first sending the boys up to a loft under the roof, where they crouched in silence for hours, while the courageous mother kept the Indians at bay, and finally they tired of their fruitless attempt and went away.

When David was seven years old his father was appointed sailing master in the navy, and in consequence the family moved to the plantation on the bank of Lake Pontchartrain near New Orleans, where the father's headquarters were to be. As he was devoted to his children, he generally kept them with him when he was off duty, and many times took them out in his little sail boat on the lake in the fiercest kind of storms, storms so severe that sometimes they could not even get home, but would spend the night on an island, warmly wrapped in a heavy sail, or tucked up under a protecting coverlet of sand. When he was blamed for this, he always answered:

"Now is the time to conquer their fears," and continued to take his boys on such excursions as before.

One day while George Farragut was out on the lake fis.h.i.+ng, he saw an old man in a boat alone and evidently sick.

Pulling alongside of him, Farragut found him unconscious, and towing his boat to sh.o.r.e, carried him to the house, where Elizabeth Farragut nursed him with as tender care as if he had been her father. His disease was yellow fever, and in five days he died, and brave Elizabeth Farragut survived him by only a few days, having caught the disease while nursing him.

A sad day that was for the poor widower who was left with five motherless children to care for, and it is small wonder that he scarcely knew where to turn. While he was still dazed by his burden of grief, a stranger came to the desolate little home on the lake, and asked to see Mr. Farragut. He was Capt. Porter, the son of the old man who had been cared for in his last sickness by the Farraguts, and his son had come to express his grat.i.tude for their kindness, and to offer to adopt one of the boys, as a token of appreciation, if Mr. Farragut was willing to give one up.