Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast Part 48

[286] Ma.s.sachusetts Files.

[287] Heath then commanded at Providence: he was ordered to meet Rochambeau on his arrival, and extend any a.s.sistance in his power.

[288] The manner and matter of his reception of Mr. Adams were equally those of gentleman and king. Contrast him with the Prince Regent, and his remark to the French ex-minister, Calonne, during his father's sudden illness, in 1801: "Savez-vous, Monsieur de Calonne, que mon pere est aussi fou que jamais?" (Do you know, Monsieur de Calonne, that my father is as crazy as ever?) Thackeray could not do him justice.

[289] The fellow-prisoner of Count Christian Deux-Ponts was an Irishman, named Lynch, who belonged also to Rochambeau's army. Fearful that his nationality might be discovered, he begged the count to be on his guard.

When at table, and heated with wine, the secret was divulged by the count; but Nelson, as Segur relates, pretended not to have heard it.

[290] That of Major Galvan, who pistoled himself on account of unrequited love.

[291] Rally, Auvergne! here is the enemy!

[Ill.u.s.tration: GRAVES ON THE BLUFF, FORT ROAD.]

CHAPTER XXV.

NEWPORT CEMETERIES.

"Come, my spade. There is no ancient gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers; they hold up Adam's profession."--SHAKSPEARE.

a.s.suming the looker-on to be free from all qualms on the subject of grave-yard a.s.sociations, I invite him to loiter with me awhile among the tombstones of buried Newport. As we thread the streets of the town, sign-boards or door-plates inform us who are the occupants; and in pursuing the narrow paths of the burial-place, the tablets set up denote, not only the final residences, but symbolize the dread of the world's forgetfulness, of those who sleep there. The a.n.a.logy might still be pursued, as it was an old custom to inscribe the occupation and birthplace upon a memorial stone. Here is one I found in the old ground adjoining Rhode Island Cemetery:

Here lyeth the Body of Roger Baster Bachelor Block mackr Aged 66 yeres He Dyed 23 Day of Aprel 1687 He was one of the Fi rst Beginers of a Chv rch of Christ obsrving ------ Of the 7th Day Sab bath of THE LORD IN NE AND BEGAN 23D IS 1671

The grave-yards are the first green spots. Dandelions, b.u.t.tercups, and daisies blossom earliest there. The almost imperceptible shading-off of winter into spring is signaled by tufts of freshly springing gra.s.s on the sunny side of a grave-stone; the birds build betimes among the tree-branches of the cemetery. Your grave-maker is always a merry fellow, who cares no more for carved cross-bones than for the clay-pipes so artistically crossed in shop-windows.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

I found many stones dating from 1726 to 1800, but even these had become much defaced by time. Where freestone slabs had been used, the inscriptions were either illegible or quite obliterated. Some of the older slate stones had been painted to protect them from the weather.

The city takes commendable care of the grounds; yet I could not help thinking that a little money might be well spent in renewing the fading inscriptions. Throughout the inclosure the pious chisel of some "Old Mortality" is painfully in request.

In a retired part of the ground I found two horizontal slabs--one of white, the other red, freestone--lying side by side over man and wife. I transcribed the epitaph of the wife, as the more characteristic:

HERE LYETH THE BODY OF HARTE GARDE THE WIFE OF IOHN GARDE MERCHANT WHO DEPARTED THIS THE 16 DAY OF SEPTEMBER AN DOM 1660 AGED 55 YEARS.

Another slate stone contained the singular inscription given in the engraving; and still another was lettered:

In Memory Of Mrs. Elizabeth Lintu rn widow for many years a noted midwife She departed this life October 23d 1758 In the 63d year of her age.

In the old Common Burying-ground is the following plaint:

Here doth Simon Parrett lye Whose wrongs did for justice cry But none could haue And now the Graue Keeps him from Inivrie Who Departed this life The 23 Day of May 1718 Aged 84 years.

Farewell Street, by which you approach the princ.i.p.al cemetery of Newport, is not ill-named. The ground, a generally level area, permits the eye to roam over the whole region of graves. Glimpses of the bay and of the islands dispersed so picturesquely about it harmonize with the calm of the place. Sails drift noiselessly by, and the fragrance of evergreens and of eglantine perfumes the air. There was breeze enough to bring the strains of martial music from the fort even here.

It is stated, I know not how authoritatively, that the Hessians, whose hospital was close at hand, defaced many stones here by altering the inscriptions. Here is buried William Ellery,[292] one of the signers of the Declaration. On the day of his death he rose as usual, dressed, and seated himself in the old flag-bottomed chair which he had sat in for more than half a century. Here he remained reading a volume of Cicero in Latin until his physician, who had dropped in, perceived that he could scarcely raise his eyelids to look at him. The doctor found his pulse gone. After giving him a little wine and water, Dr. W---- told him his pulse beat stronger. "Oh, yes, doctor, I have a charming pulse,"

expressing at the same time his conviction that his life was nearly ended, and his thankfulness that he was to pa.s.s away free from sickness or pain. He at last consented to be placed upright in bed, so that he might continue reading. He died thus without attracting the notice of his attendants, like a man who becomes drowsy and falls asleep, sitting in the same posture, with the book under his chin. Here is also the tomb of Governor Cranston, and the gray stone slab with typical skull and cross-bones, on which is graven the name of William Jefferay, said to have been one of Charles Stuart's judges. Among other specimens of grave-yard literature is the inscription to Christopher Ellery: "The Human Form respected for its honesty, and known for fifty-three years by the appellation of Christopher Ellery, began to dissolve in the month of February, 1789."

There is not so much quaintness in the epitaphs here as in the old Puritan grave-yards of Boston and Salem; less even of stateliness, of pomp, and of human pride than is usual. I missed the Latin, the blazonry, and the sounding detail of public service so often seen spread over every inch of crumbling old tombstones. The grotesque emblems of skull, cross-bones, and hour-gla.s.s--bugbears to frighten children--change in a generation or two to weeping-willows, urns, and winged cherubs. These are in turn discarded for sculptured types of angels, lambs, doves, and lilies; of broken columns and chaplets. This departure from the horrible for the beautiful is not matter for regret.

In these symbols we get all the religion of the place, and Death is robbed of half his repulsiveness.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PERRY'S MONUMENT.[293]]

On a gra.s.sy knoll in Rhode Island Cemetery the visitor sees the granite obelisk, erected by the State to the memory of the victorious young captain who, at twenty-seven, gained imperishable renown. Ardent, chivalrous, and brave, Perry showed the true inspiration of battle in taking his flag to a ship still able to fight. His laconic dispatch, "We have met the enemy, and they are ours," is modestly exultant. The marble tablet of the monument's east face has the words,

OLIVER HAZARD PERRY.

At the Age of Twenty-seven Years, He Achieved The Victory of Lake Erie, September 10, 1813.

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLIVER HAZARD PERRY.]

Within the neat iron fence that surrounds the monument are also the graves of Perry's widow, Elizabeth Champlin, and of his eldest son, Christopher Grant Perry, with the fresher one of Rev. Francis Vinton, whose wife was a daughter of the naval hero. From this spot the bay and all ancient Newport are visible. Another monument in the cemetery is in memory of General Isaac Ingalls Stevens, "dead on the field of honor."

A prevailing ingredient of Newport society in the olden days was, doubtless, the Quaker element. As the religious asylum of New England, it alike received Jew and Gentile, Quaker and Anabaptist, followers of the Church of England and of Rome. Its complexion at the beginning of the eighteenth century might be in harmony with religious freedom, though little h.o.m.ogeneous; and although there was plenty of toleration, its religious character has been vaunted overmuch. It commands a pa.s.sing thought that all these human components intermingling and a.s.similating in the active duties of life, separate in death. Their burial must be distinct.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRIENDS' MEETING-HOUSE.]

The Quaker-meeting has contributed to our vocabulary a synonym for dullness. Old England and New were in accord in persecuting the sect. It is related of a number under sentence of banishment to America, that soldiers from the Tower carried them on board the ships, the Friends refusing to walk and the sailors to hoist them on board. In the year 1662 Hannah Wright came from Long Island, several hundred miles to the "b.l.o.o.d.y town of Boston," into the court, and warned the magistrates to spill no more innocent blood. They were at first abashed by the solemn fervor of their accuser, until Rawson, the secretary, exclaimed, "What!

Shall we be baffled by such a one as this? Come, let us drink a dram."

The sufferings of the Friends in New England were heightened, no doubt, by the zeal of some to embrace martyrdom, who, in giving way to the promptings of religious fanaticism, outraged public decency, and shamed the name of modesty in woman. Deborah Wilson went through the streets of Salem naked as she came into the world, for which she was well whipped.

Two other Quaker women, says Mather, were whipped in Boston, "who came as stark naked as ever they were born into our public a.s.semblies." This exhibition was meant to be a sign of religious nakedness in others; but the Puritans preferred to consider it an offense against good morals, and not a G.o.diva-like penance for the general sinfulness.[294]

[Ill.u.s.tration: GEORGE FOX.]

The Society of Friends is the youngest of the four surviving societies which date from the Reformation, and is, without doubt, the sternest protest against the ceremonial religion of Rome. George Fox, who preached at Newport,[295] was the son of a Leicestershire weaver, beginning his public a.s.sertion of religious sentiments at the age of twenty-two. The pillory sometimes served him for a pulpit. He once preached with such power to the populace that they rescued him "in a tumultuous manner," setting a clergy-man who had been instrumental in his punishment upon the same pillory.

Pagan superst.i.tion having originated most of the names bestowed by custom on the days and months, the Friends ignore them, subst.i.tuting in their place "first day" and "first month," "second day" and "second month" for those occurring at the beginning of our calendar. The Society does not sanction appeals by its members to courts of law, but refers disputes to arbitration, a practice well worthy imitation.

George Fox mentions in his "Journal" his interview in England with Simon Bradstreet and Rev. John Norton, the agents whom Ma.s.sachusetts had sent over in answer to the command of Charles II. Says Fox, "We had several discourses with them concerning their murdering our friends, but they were ashamed to stand to their b.l.o.o.d.y actions. I asked Simon Bradstreet, one of the New England magistrates, whether he had not an hand in putting to death these four whom they hanged for being Quakers? He confessed he had. I then demanded of him and his a.s.sociates then present if they acknowledged themselves subject to the laws of England? They said they did. I then said by what law do you put our friends to death?

They answered, By the same law as the Jesuits were put to death in England. I then asked if those Friends were Jesuits? They said nay.

Then, said I, ye have murdered them."[296]

The first Quakers came to Rhode Island in 1656. Roger Williams, in his "George Fox digged out of his Burrowes," shows that tolerance did not go so far with him as the Quaker fashion of wearing the hair long and flowing. Speaking of one he met who accosted him with the salutation, "Fear the Lord G.o.d," Williams says he retorted, "What G.o.d dost thou mean--a ruffian's G.o.d?" Through Fox's preaching some of Cromwell's soldiers became converted, and would not fight. He lies in the old London burying-ground of Bunhill Fields, among the Dissenters.

The objection of the sect to sepulchral stones leaves little to be remarked of the Quaker burying-ground in Newport.[297] Notwithstanding the non-resistant principles of the Friends, it stands in strong light that Nathaniel Greene, a Quaker, and Oliver Hazard Perry, the descendant of a Quaker, were conspicuous figures in two of our wars. Few innovations have appeared in the manners, customs, or dress of the followers of George Fox.[298] Their broad-brims, sober garb, and sedate carriage, their "thee" and "thou," may still occasionally be seen and heard in Newport streets.

Newport contains several widely scattered burial-places, some of them hardly more in appearance than family groups of graves. Not all exhibit the care bestowed upon such as are more prominently before the public eye. The little Clifton cemetery, at the head of Golden Hill Street, was in a wretched plight. A crazy wooden paling afforded little or no protection from intrusion. But there was no incentive to linger among its few corroded monuments and acc.u.mulated rubbish. Here are buried the Wantons, of whom Edward, the ancestor of the name in Newport, fled from Scituate, Ma.s.sachusetts, during the Quaker persecutions.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHARLES LEE.]

When Washington was at Cambridge, besieging Boston, he sent Charles Lee to look after "those of Rhode Island" who were still for King George.

Lee administered to the Tories who would take it an oath as whimsical as characteristic. He knew the fondness of these old royalists for old wine, good dinners, and fine raiment. They were required to swear fidelity to the Whig cause "by their hope of present ease and comfort, as well as the dread hereafter." Colonel Wanton refused the oath, and was, I presume, of those whom Lee had taken to Providence with the threat of forwarding them to the American camp.