Early Western Travels, 1748-1846, Volume XII Part 4

_Sunday, 30th._--I accompanied Mr. Morse to the splendid Presbyterian church of the eloquent Dr. Romaine,[149] whose prayers are the most appropriate in manner and matter, and whose sermons are, with the exception of Dr. Storton's, superior to any I have heard in America. On this day, the appearance of this large city is most orderly and christian-like. This laudable change is attributed to Sunday-schools.

All places of wors.h.i.+p are thronged. How unlike Was.h.i.+ngton city! Mr.

Morse states that not only in New York, but in all the east, a religious feeling generally pervades the people.

_May 1st._--Pa.s.sed over to Brooklyn, a beautiful gay-looking village of great extent in Long Island, in quest of my old friend, and western fellow-traveller, Mr. Wheeler, whom I found three miles from the city, living on a hired farm of about 30 acres of arable land, and six in wood, or rather cedar, on which is a beautiful house, to which I was warmly welcomed. It consists of six small rooms and piazzas on each side, standing in an orchard fronting the public road, which, for four miles, is like one continued suburban village all the way from New York.

The farm cost, two {410} years ago, without a house or well, 3,500 dollars, and the house and well have since cost 1,500 dollars. Mr.

Wheeler has hired this situation for one year only, at the rent of 300 dollars, ten dollars an acre, all poor and long-exhausted land, insomuch that nothing can be raised without manure, which is bought at one dollar per load, and hauled three miles.

Land, thus situated, is expected to be devoted to raising garden-stuff, or to be occupied only as a suburban retreat. The mere farmer can scarcely live out of it, even if it is his own, unless he cultivates vegetables, and carries his milk to New York market, in small quant.i.ties, daily. Those who have lived here eighteen or twenty years, on their own estates, have only just lived, saved nothing, and been always their own servants. Mr. Wheeler has three servants, one black man, and a white man and woman. The white man has 100 dollars a-year; the black man ten dollars a month; and the woman five dollars and board, working from sun-rise to dark.

_2nd._--After dinner, Mr. Wheeler ordered out of the plough into the carriage, his pair of handsome greys, when, with the ladies, we drove to the beautiful neighbouring villages of New-town, Flus.h.i.+ng, and Jamaica, at the latter of which is the residence of Rufus King, Esq. a house by no means equal to those of the village squires of England, yet very inviting. Perhaps no where, {411} except in the vicinity of London and Bath, can a more attractive ride of twenty miles be found; the whole distance of road, from the city, seeming one continued village of new and handsome farm-houses, with either a pleasure-garden, or green pasture, or orchard, or all of them, in front of almost every house, any of which may be bought, boards being up, _For sale, this farm_. But the land, in every direction, is poor, except where superior and expensive management exists. Every thing is sold from the land, which might make manure and enrich it. The leaves of the forest trees now begin to appear. The spring is late, yet the orchards are in full bloom. The frost was severe last night.

Though he has three servants, Mr. Wheeler cleans his own boots. They would not absolutely refuse, but would do it reluctantly, and feel disgraced by the act; yet two of them are good servants. A black servant lately broke into the cellar and dairy of Mr. Wheeler, and stole all the bread and meat he could find; he is now in gaol. About two years ago, in great rage with his sister, he caught hold of her head, and endeavoured, with an axe, to chop it off; but not being able to get it into a fit place, he chopped off two of her fingers, and nailed them on the door-post!

_4th._--I made, on horseback, the tour of York island, about ten miles in length and two in breadth. On one side is the n.o.ble Hudson, or great North River, and on the other, the East River {412} and h.e.l.l-gate, and the beautiful villages of Manhattan, Haarlem, and Greenwich. All the road from the city, to the extremity of, and beyond the isle, is adorned, on both sides, with the country-seats and pleasure-grounds of rich citizens, who, like those of London, every morning and evening drive to and fro in great numbers. Perhaps no city in the world is so happily situated as that of New York, standing on this island, with the sea to the south, and these majestic rivers, from one to two miles wide, on the north and east, the banks of which are very high, and for twelve miles crowned with mansions. The houses on the roads, thus leading through the isle to the city, have each from five to ten acres of green pasture, park, or pleasure-gardens, which renders them more rural, though less splendid than those on the roads leading to London. I saw from fifty to 100 convicts, heavily ironed, forming a new road for the state; receiving no pay nor s.h.i.+rts, but only food.

I visited the supreme court, and inquired for Messrs. Emmett and Sampson, but saw not these celebrated refugees.[150]

Mr. Wheeler agreed to purchase a quant.i.ty of seed corn from a neighbour, which was to be picked, but much of it came in rotten. Mr. W. returned the rotten part, and begged other corn to be sent in its place. "No, send it all back! that is not the way we deal here;" in great rage, {413} said the farmer, "you may do so in your country, but not here."

_5th._--Bade farewell to Long Island, and my much esteemed friends, the Wheelers, who pressingly invited me to stay longer. I renewed my invitation to them to come and make Whitehall their home, when, if ever, they came to England.

I quitted New York, for Philadelphia, at ten this morning. Left a history of Somersham for Mr. F. Morse of Newhaven.

Visited one of the packet-s.h.i.+ps, the _James Monroe_, the most complete I ever saw; every birth is a state room. For forty guineas, it transports pa.s.sengers to Liverpool in high style. All are fed luxuriously.

_6th._--At six this morning, I left Borden town, on the Delaware, where are the ruins of Joseph Bonaparte's house, about to be rebuilt. Sixty men are employed already. The estate, consisting of 300 acres, all poor land, is now laying out into pleasure-grounds, and park, enclosed with a fine fence; it cost five dollars an acre. Joseph came hither, it is said, with ten millions of dollars from the Spanish treasury.

I reached the City of Philadelphia at ten this morning, just twenty-eight days after I left it, since which time I have travelled about 2,000 miles, and rested eleven days.

_Sunday, 7th._--I was present when Dr Storton, {414} administered the rites of baptism to a large, respectable auditory. He is rather pompous in his expressions, and theatrical in his action and manner, but certainly an accomplished man. He has said that there is no preaching talent in America but what is imported; but this is not strictly true.

_11th._ I wrote the following epistle to Mr. Day, of St. Ives in England, by the s.h.i.+p Electra, bound for London.

_May 11, 1820._

Dear Sir,

At this distance of time and place, the recollection of you is replete with all that is good and pleasant to me; while the esteem and regard always professed and felt for you demand, at least, one epistle, as a thing not to be withheld. I should have had great pleasure in your correspondence, but it is now too late, as my duties here are nearly at an end, and by the time this reaches you, I hope, under the guidance of gracious Providence, that the compa.s.s, in unison with my heart, will be pointing me towards my own home and country.

The inducements to emigrate, and the facilities of living here, are neither so great nor so many as I wished and expected to find them.

The majority of those who come are without capital and above useful labour. Of this kind seem our friends ---- and ----, and others known to you, whose {415} prospects are, I a.s.sure you, very shadowy. I speak impartially. Even capital, I believe, can any where be better employed than here. And as to labourers, there are more than can be paid. By the late report of this city, it appeared that 11,000 within these walls were in a state of unemployed pauperism; while in one prison only, are 600 thieves and incendiaries, the natural fruits of increasing poverty.

Land, generally, is not property in this country, because there is infinitely more than enough; the surplus, therefore, is worth nothing. What is already in cultivation by hired hands lessens, rather than augments capital. Even potatoes, you know, cannot be produced from one without the agency of the other. The markets are all glutted, and without foreign demand, a surplus produce is not desirable, because unsaleable and perishable.

All travel is restless labour, and "vanity and vexation of spirit."

Its idea was once so supremely fascinating to my ambition, that I thought I never could have enough of it, and therefore wished myself doomed to perpetual travel. I have my wish, or something like it, and it disappoints me. During the last two years I have indeed found "no continuing city;" it is well if I seek and find one to come. I fly from city to city, from town to town, state to state, climate to climate, with the velocity of an eagle. I have frigid and tropical lat.i.tudes, polar cold and equinoxial heat, wintry desolation, {416} and the summery foliage of oranges and myrtles, all in the short s.p.a.ce of one week, or less. For although this beautiful city of William Penn lies in an Egyptian lat.i.tude, winter has not long been over; whereas, it never enters the city of Charleston, which I have just quitted, where

"Blossoms and fruits and flowers together rise, And all the year in rich confusion lies."

The male youth generally of this, and other cities, are remarkably polished, sprightly and prepossessing in their exterior; being of tall and slender figures, and looking free and easy, without any thing like levity, for each puts on all the airs, manners, actions, and opinions of men, with his _first_ pair of breeches, and expects to be treated as a man. But ringlets decorate the faces of both s.e.xes, and in other respects all are dandies, male and female! The young ladies generally are not so handsome as the males; though beauty is not rare amongst them. A woman's duties and province are, I think, yet undiscovered. She is here, that is, in all sections south of the Delaware, a little divinity, to whom all must bend, give place, and pay idle homage; her tyranny is great, her influence unbounded. Her lover, or husband, is outwardly her slave; but as a wife, mother, mistress, she must yield to my unequalled countrywomen. Youth here, is of very short duration; all soon look old; and "all the days of the years of this vain life," soon come to an end. Religion and duty seem but little understood, {417} and less regarded, except it be to ascertain how little of either may suffice. Paley's Moral Philosophy has been, perhaps, the text book of the educated, who are very numerous; yet but few live and die practical philosophers. Death is little dreaded, and often, as in duelling, voluntarily embraced. Two selfish G.o.ds, Pleasure and Gain, enslave the Americans. The sc.u.m of all the earth is drifted here.

As this is sent off about a month after my other, and will be my last letter from this country, I wish you to inform my good father, if living, and Mr. Ingle, of my present refuge and intended return, and a.s.sure them of my best regards. My beloved child, who, by-the-bye, would become in part your ward if I returned no more, is very precious in my sight; if you knew her, I should beg you to p.r.o.nounce a father's blessing on her; but it comes to her on every western breeze. When I can, I will teach her to esteem you, and perpetuate, what is of little value, the disinterested and most sincere friends.h.i.+p of,

Dear Sir, Your very obedient servant, W. FAUX.

_11th._--Mistrust and suspicion are general in Philadelphia. The cause is a general disregard or violation of duty. Two respectable quakers would not suffer Mr. ---- to owe them eight {418} dollars for a day or two, though guaranteed by a second person, who, for any thing they knew, might be respectable; so they took out two pieces of muslin to reduce the bill down to the funds in hand. "Notwithstanding this guarantee,"

said the quaker, "I will, and must have the thing squared." The representative of my friend then paid the complete balance. I was present at this transaction, and feeling both pained and amused, began to speculate upon it, and to consider what could have generated this general suspicion and distrust. It is the common effect of some cause.

What cause? A general violation or neglect of some prominent duties, not directly guarded by the laws, but the observance of which is indispensable to the good of mankind every where. Culpability of this kind, in not doing to others as we would be done by, does more injury to the world than all the thieves and incendiaries put together; because the consequence in one case is particular, in the other illimitable. If I act justly towards my neighbour, I confer both temporal and moral good on him and on myself. But it stops not here: he learns thereby its value, and acts in like manner towards others. On the other hand, if I violate my duty to him, he retaliates not only on me, but on others indiscriminately. He thinks he has been honest and unsuspicious long enough, and bids adieu to rect.i.tude perhaps for ever.

Last month at Dover, Delaware, Squire Loper {419} received sentence of the court for pa.s.sing forged notes, knowing them to be so. He had been in the commission of the peace for 20 years, and received the forged notes from a gang convicted before him of forgery. The notes had remained in his hands ever since. A month ago, he desired a gentleman, a neighbour of his going to Philadelphia, to buy him some iron, and meeting the gentleman privately, gave him fifty dollars, saying, "Take notice it is a fifty dollar note," and gave it him carefully wrapped in paper. When the bearer offered it for the iron, it was discovered to be one of the forged notes, well known to have been offered by the gang before. The gentleman had some difficulty in keeping out of the Penitentiary. On proving himself not to be a party concerned, and promising to bring the Squire forward, he was released. The Squire admitted the note to be forged, and said, he gave it to his friend only in joke. On being arrested, he was treated with great liberality, but he acted haughtily and foolishly. On his trial he would not employ counsel nor set up any defence; but in a cool, sneering manner said, that the note was given in joke, and the court might do as they would. He was sentenced to six months' solitary confinement, thirty-nine lashes, and never after to pa.s.s out of his own house in Dover without the letter F, a foot long in scarlet, on his back, on pain of another six months'

confinement and thirty-nine stripes. But so great was the {420} public pity for him, in court and out, both with judge and jury, that the prison door was left open for him in hope that he would escape and quit the neighbourhood for ever. He did escape into the town only, and came back to prison voluntarily, where no such chance is again to be afforded him.

At night, I went to the black church, where the black minister shewed much uncultivated talent. After sermon they began singing merrily, and continued, without stopping, one hour, till they became exhausted and breathless. "Oh! come to Zion, come!" "Hallelujah, &c." And then, "O won't you have my lovely bleeding _Jasus_," a thousand times repeated in full thundering chorus to the tune of "Fol de rol." While all the time they were clapping hands, shouting, and jumping, and exclaiming, "Ah Lord! Good Lord! Give me _Jasus_! Amen." At half-past ten this meeting broke up. For an hour it seemed like Bedlam let loose. At the close, one female said, striking the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of two male friends, "We had a happy time of it."

_16th._--Last week, in the state of Delaware, the High Sheriff had to perform the duty of Jack Ketch, and hang his own nephew, for the murder of his _own_ mother, the Sheriff's sister. The youth killed her by striking her with a club on the temple. In the same neighbourhood and the same week another youth was sent to gaol for poisoning his uncle, a rich old gentleman, who being childless, had {421} taken this nephew into the house and made him heir to all; but the youth being impatient, went to a druggist for a.r.s.enic, which he said was to kill the rats, that every night kept his uncle from sleeping. He mixed a portion of it in a gla.s.s of apple-toddy and gave it to his uncle, but in so large a portion that it began to operate immediately, on which the old man said, "You have given me something to do me harm." The youth denied it, but the old man grew rapidly sick, and feeling conscious that he was poisoned and should die before the distant doctor could arrive, got out the will in favor of the ungrateful youth, and having burnt it, died soon after.

A short time ago, the friends of a murderer, under sentence of death in Pennsylvania, conspired together to procure a pardon from the governor, by threats and intimidation. Their plan was to get the governor into a room to themselves, and offer him his own life for the pardon of Lieut.

Smith, the convict, who had cohabited with Mrs. Carson, and taken possession of her house and property, during the absence of her husband, Captain Carson. When the latter returned and demanded his wife and property, he was shot dead in his own house by Smith. The governor had intelligence of the plot, and seized the conspirators before they could carry their design into effect.

_Sunday, 21st._--Quitted Philadelphia on board the steam-boat. A gentleman, Lieut. Skinner, of {422} the United States' navy, from the Franklin, just arrived from Gibraltar, states, that the sailors, on settling accounts, will go on sh.o.r.e and spend the balance, several hundred dollars, in two or three days, lavis.h.i.+ng from 100 to 200 dollars a-day, until all is gone, when they re-enter. So indifferent are they to the use and value of money, that they give it away, and suffer any person to plunder them with impunity. The cause, says he, of this indifference and insane extravagance, is to be found in the strictness and severity of the discipline on board, where money is of no use to them.

_Duelling._--So frequent were these meetings between the officers of the United States' navy and the British garrison, that the governor felt compelled to interfere, in order to save life, as one or two duels occurred daily, originating in the most foolish disputes.

The parties met always on neutral ground. For any expression uttered by one officer of the 64th regiment, a general challenge was sent by the officers of the United States' navy to the regiment; wis.h.i.+ng to include _all_, from the colonel down to the lowest in rank.

Two young Americans, of New York, at Gibraltar, met in consequence of a trifling dispute. The offending party fired three times without hitting, while his opponent fired every time into the air, begging the other to apologize, saying, "If I take aim I shall kill you, but I can stand all your {423} fires." This concession was, however, obstinately refused; on which the seconds stepped forward, and said to the party who had acted so generously, "Sir, you must fire in your own defence!" Both again charged, and Sands, the aggressor, fell dead. The survivor was arrested, but acquitted with honour; being told by his commander, that if he had not acted thus, he would not have received him again into the service.

The young reprobate who fell, was a cla.s.sical scholar, of fine person and great mental accomplishments, but ripe for perdition.

_22nd._--I reached Was.h.i.+ngton city, now emptied of the wise men, and which, after quitting Philadelphia, seems mean, indeed, both morally and physically. All the bogs and swamps, in and round the city, are now full of melody, from the big, bellowing bull frog, down to the little singing mosquito, while rotting carcases and other nuisances perfume the warm southern breezes.

A lady, in a letter to Mr. Thomas Coote, from New Orleans, states that eighteen American pirates under sentence of death, in the jail of that city, have many friends, much intent upon effecting a rescue, by forcing the prison, which is strongly guarded by the military. Every night almost, for this purpose, mobs collect around it and set fire to distant parts of the city, in order to divert the attention of the guards from the prison. Great alarm exists on the subject, and it is feared, {424} that on the day of execution, much blood will be spilt.

One hundred sail of slave-s.h.i.+ps, full of slaves, appeared in sight, one day, during this spring, off the coast of Africa. Several of them were fast sailing vessels, built, owned, and manned by the free citizens of free America. Some were chased and taken by the British and American navy. This trade is now considered to be more extensive than ever.

_30th._--Visited Mr. Dunn, who states that the small red squirrel, of this state, is seen to seize and castrate, in a moment, the large grey squirrel, which greatly fears and always flies at the sight of the former.

Are those English people who are now in America happier than they were in England? I will take upon me to p.r.o.nounce, that in the aggregate, they are not. Happiness and misery are not mere localities, for as G.o.d is the father of all, the earth is his and the fulness thereof; his frowns or smiles are not bounded by geographical lines and lat.i.tudes; the whole human family are under his wise economy. G.o.d's management is always right. He can blast prosperity and bless disappointment, so as to keep it from disappointing; thus bringing good out of evil, light out of darkness, blessings out of curses, and curses out of blessings.

Blessings unblessed are curses in disguise, and adversity blessed is a blessing. We need his blessing {425} upon every thing, even on his blessings. I am sometimes disposed to think that the blessings of American liberty are unblessed.

Mr. Elliott deems universal suffrage, as it exists in America, an universal evil, because the worst and meanest of mankind, who are the most numerous every where, are enabled to exert an overwhelming influence over the good and the honourable. Every man here is a segment of the government. Mean and evil men seek to represent their like. A good man cannot descend to the mean mode of popularity; he cannot bribe with whiskey; he cannot promise what is evil to perform; and therefore but few good men are in the government. Antipathy to Englishmen, and whatever they suggest, is general and nearly national.

For the following very interesting, original, and last letter of a distinguished, yet unfortunate artist, I am indebted to an old philosophical friend, whose well-judged opinions of and extensive acquaintance with men and things, make his sentiments precious and almost oracular. Let him here receive my thanks for the many pleasant hours which I spent in his company, and for the rich materials of thinking gathered from him.

_Was.h.i.+ngton, September 5th, 1820._

Dear Sir,

I embrace the opportunity of writing to you by the favour of Mrs.

Orris. I enclose a letter received {426} from the celebrated _Francis Guy_, landscape painter, who lately died at New York. He was at the head of his profession in this country, and perhaps in the world. He was born near Keswick, in c.u.mberland, England. I knew him well, and esteemed him highly, as well for his virtues as his talents. In this letter, (which I believe was the last he wrote, it being dated only a few days before his death) you will know the opinion of many artists, who have left their country to seek for food and fame in this, and see how they are rewarded for the exercise of their talents in this great republic of North America.