Comic History of the United States Part 13

It is said that Franklin at once took hold of the great Archimedean lever, and jerked it early and late in the interests of freedom.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE PRINTER'S TOWEL.]

It is claimed that Franklin, at this time, invented the deadly weapon known as the printer's towel. He found that a common crash towel could be saturated with glue, mola.s.ses, antimony, concentrated lye, and roller-composition, and that after a few years of time and perspiration it would harden so that "A Constant Reader" or "Veritas" could be stabbed with it and die soon.

Many believe that Franklin's other scientific experiments were productive of more lasting benefit to mankind than this, but I do not agree with them.

His paper was called the _New England Courant_. It was edited jointly by James and Benjamin Franklin, and was started to supply a long-felt want.

Benjamin edited it a part of the time, and James a part of the time. The idea of having two editors was not for the purpose of giving volume to the editorial page, but it was necessary for one to run the paper while the other was in jail.

In those days you could not sa.s.s the king, and then, when the king came in the office the next day and stopped his paper and took out his ad., put it off on "our informant" and go right along with the paper. You had to go to jail, while your subscribers wondered why their paper did not come, and the paste soured in the tin dippers in the sanctum, and the circus pa.s.sed by on the other side.

How many of us to-day, fellow-journalists, would be willing to stay in jail while the lawn festival and the kangaroo came and went? Who of all our company would go to a prison-cell for the cause of freedom while a double-column ad. of sixteen aggregated circuses, and eleven congresses of ferocious beasts, fierce and fragrant from their native lair, went by us?

At the age of seventeen Ben got disgusted with his brother, and went to Philadelphia and New York, where he got a chance to "sub" for a few weeks and then got a regular "sit."

Franklin was a good printer, and finally got to be a foreman. He made an excellent foreman, sitting by the hour in the composing-room and spitting on the stove, while he cussed the make-up and press-work of the other papers. Then he would go into the editorial rooms and scare the editors to death with a wild shriek for more copy.

He knew just how to conduct himself as a foreman so that strangers would think he owned the paper.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRANKLIN AS FOREMAN.]

In 1730, at the age of twenty-four, Franklin married, and established the _Pennsylvania Gazette_. He was then regarded as a great man, and almost every one took his paper.

Franklin grew to be a great journalist, and spelled hard words with great fluency. He never tried to be a humorist in any of his newspaper work, and everybody respected him.

Along about 1746 he began to study the habits and construction of lightning, and inserted a local in his paper in which he said that he would be obliged to any of his readers who might notice any new or odd specimens of lightning, if they would send them in to the _Gazette_ office for examination.

Every time there was a thunderstorm Franklin would tell the foreman to edit the paper, and, armed with a string and an old door-key, he would go out on the hills and get enough lightning for a mess.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRANKLIN EXPERIMENTING WITH LIGHTNING.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRANKLIN VISITING GEORGE III.]

In 1753 Franklin was made postmaster of the Colonies. He made a good Postmaster-General, and people say there were fewer mistakes in distributing their mail then than there have ever been since. If a man mailed a letter in those days, old Ben Franklin saw that it went to where it was addressed.

Franklin frequently went over to England in those days, partly on business and partly to shock the king. He liked to go to the castle with his breeches tucked in his boots, figuratively speaking, and attract a great deal of attention.

It looked odd to the English, of course, to see him come into the royal presence, and, leaning his wet umbrella up against the throne, ask the king, "How's trade?"

Franklin never put on any frills, but he was not afraid of a crowned head. He used to say, frequently, that a king to him was no more than a seven-spot.

He did his best to prevent the Revolutionary War, but he couldn't do it.

Patrick Henry had said that the war was inevitable, and had given it permission to come, and it came.

He also went to Paris, and got acquainted with a few crowned heads there. They thought a good deal of him in Paris, and offered him a corner lot if he would build there and start a paper. They also promised him the county printing; but he said, No, he would have to go back to America or his wife might get uneasy about him. Franklin wrote "Poor Richard's Almanac" in 1732 to 1757, and it was republished in England.

Franklin little thought, when he went to the throne-room in his leather riding-clothes and hung his hat on the throne, that he was inaugurating a custom of wearing groom clothes which would in these days be so popular among the English.

Dr. Franklin entered Philadelphia eating a loaf of bread and carrying a loaf under each arm, pa.s.sing beneath the window of the girl to whom he afterwards gave his hand in marriage.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRANKLIN ENTERING PHILADELPHIA.]

Nearly everybody in America, except Dr. Mary Walker, was once a poor boy.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE CRITICAL PERIOD.

Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold on the 10th of May led two small companies to Ticonderoga, a strong fortress tremendously fortified, and with its name also across the front door. Ethan Allen, a brave Vermonter born in Connecticut, entered the sally-port, and was shot at by a guard whose musket failed to report. Allen entered and demanded the surrender of the fortress.

"By whose authority?" asked the commandant.

"By the authority of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress,"

said Allen, brandishing his naked sword at a great rate.

"Very well," said the officer: "if you put it on those grounds, all right, if you will excuse the appearance of things. We were just cleaning up, and everything is by the heels here."

"Never mind," said Allen, who was the soul of politeness. "We put on no frills at home, and so we are ready to take things as we find them."

The Americans therefore got a large amount of munitions of war, both here and at Crown Point.

General Washington was now appointed commander-in-chief of all the troops at the second session of the Continental Congress. On his arrival at Boston there were only fourteen thousand men. He took command under the historic elm at Cambridge. He was dressed in a blue broadcloth coat with flaps and revers of same, trimmed with large beautiful b.u.t.tons. He also wore buff small-clothes, with openings at the sides where pockets are now put in, but at that time given up to s.p.a.ce. They were made in such a way as to prevent the naked eye from discovering at once whether he was in advance or retreat. He also wore silk stockings and a c.o.c.ked hat.

The lines of Dryden starting off "Mark his majestic fabric" were suggested by his appearance and general style. He always dressed well and rode a good horse, but at Valley Forge frosted his feet severely, and could have drawn a pension, "but no," said he, "I can still work at light employment, like being President, and so I will not ask for a pension."

Each soldier had less than nine cartridges, but Washington managed to keep General Gage penned up in Boston, and, as Gage knew very few people there, it was a dull winter for him.

The boys of Boston had built snow hills on the Common, and used to slide down them to the ice below, but the British soldiers tore down their coasting-places and broke up the ice on the pond.

They stood it a long time, rebuilding their playground as often as it was torn down, until the spirit of American freedom could endure it no longer. They then organized a committee consisting of eight boys who were noted for their great philosophical research, and with Charles Sumner Muzzy, the eloquent savant from Milk Street, as chairman, the committee started for General Gage's head-quarters, to confer with him regarding the matter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: INTELLECTUAL TRIUMPH OF THE YOUTH OF BOSTON OVER GENERAL GAGE.]

In the picture Mr. Muzzy is seen addressing General Gage. The boy in the centre with the colored gla.s.ses is Marco Bozzaris Cobb, who discovered and first brought into use the idea of putting New Orleans mola.s.ses into Boston brown bread. To the left of Mr. Cobb is Mr. Jehoab Nye, who afterwards became the Rev. Jehoab Nye and worked with heart and voice for over eight of the best years of his life against the immorality of the codfish-ball, before he learned of its true relations towards society.

Above and between these two stands Whomsoever J. Opper, who wrote "How to make the Garden Pay" and "What Responsible Person will see that my Grave is kept green?" In the background we see the tall form of Wherewithal G. Lumpy, who introduced the Pompadour hair-cut into Ma.s.sachusetts and grew up to be a great man with enlarged joints but restricted ideas.

Charles Sumner Muzzy addressed General Gage at some length, somewhat to the surprise of Gage, who admitted in a few well-chosen words that the committee was right, and that if he had his way about it there should be no more trouble.

Charles was followed by Marco Bozzaris Cobb, who spoke briefly of the boon of liberty, closing as follows: "We point with pride, sir, to the love of freedom, which is about the only excitement we have. We love our country, sir, whether we love anything else much or not. The distant wanderer of American birth, sir, pines for his country. 'Oh, give me back,' he goes on to say, 'my own fair land across the bright blue sea, the land of beauty and of worth, the bright land of the free, where tyrant foot hath never trod, nor bigot forged a chain. Oh, would that I were safely back in that bright land again!'"

Mr. Wherewithal G. Lumpy said he had hardly expected to be called upon, and so had not prepared himself, but this occasion forcibly brought to his mind the words also of the poet, "Our country stands," said he, "with outstretched hands appealing to her boys; from them must flow her weal or woe, her anguish or her joys. A ship she rides on human tides which rise and sink anon: each giant wave may prove her grave, or bear her n.o.bly on. The friends of right, with armor bright, a valiant Christian band, through G.o.d her aid may yet be made, a blessing to our land."