Western Characters Part 16

L. E. L.

But the family of the pioneer consisted of girls as well as boys; and though the former were never so carefully educated as the latter, they were seldom allowed to go wholly untaught.

The more modern system, which separates the s.e.xes while infants, and never suffers them to come together again until they are "marriageable,"

was not then introduced; and we think it would have been no great misfortune to the country had it remained in Spain, whence it would seem to have been imported. Children of both s.e.xes were intended to grow up together--to be educated in company--at least until they have reached the points where their paths naturally diverge, for thus only can they be most useful to each other, in the duties, trials, and struggles, of after life. The artificial refinement which teaches a little girl that a boy is something to be dreaded--a sort of beast of prey--before she recognises any difference, save in dress, can never benefit her at best; for by-and-by she will discover the falsehood: the very instincts of her nature would unveil it, did she learn it in no other way: and as action and reaction are equal, the rebound may cause her to entertain opinions altogether too favorable to those whom she has so foolishly been taught to fear.

Nor is the effect of such a system likely to be any better upon the other s.e.x: for it is a.s.sociation with females (as early as possible, too, all the better), which softens, humanizes, graces, and adorns the masculine character. The boy who has been denied such a.s.sociation--the incidents to whose education have made him shy, as so many are, even of little girls--is apt to grow up morose and selfish, ill-tempered, and worse mannered. When the impulses of his developing nature finally force him into female society, he goes unprepared, and comes away without profit: his ease degenerates into familiarity, his conversation is, at best, but washy sentimentalism, and the a.s.sociation, until the acc.u.mulated rust of youth is worn away, is of very doubtful benefit to both parties. Indeed, parents who thus govern and educate their children, can find no justification for the practice, until they can first so alter the course of Nature, as to establish the law, that each family shall be composed altogether of girls, or shall consist exclusively of boys!

But these modern refinements had not obtained currency, at the period of which we are writing; nor was any such nonsense the motive to the introduction of female teachers. But one of the lessons learned by observation of the domestic circle, and particularly of the influence of the mother over her children, was the principle, that a woman can teach males of a certain age quite as well as a man, and _females much better_; and that, since the school-teacher stands, for the time in the place of the parent, a _mistress_ was far more desirable, especially for the girls, than a _master_. Hence, the latter had exercised his vocation in the west, but a few years, before he was followed by the former.

New England was the great nursery of this cla.s.s, as it was of so many others, transplanted beyond the Alleghenies. Emigration, and the enticements and casualties of a seafaring life--drawing the men into their appropriate channels of enterprise and adventure, had there reduced their number below that of the women--thus remitting many of the latter, to other than the usual and natural occupations of "the s.e.x."

Matrimony became a remote possibility to large numbers--attention to household matters gave place to various kinds of light labor--and, since they were not likely to have progeny of their own to rear, many resorted to the teaching of children belonging to others. Idleness was a rare vice; and New England girls--to their honor be it spoken--have seldom resembled "the lilies of the field," in aught, save the fairness of their complexions! They have never displayed much squeamishness--about work: and if they could not benefit the rising generation in a maternal, were willing to make themselves useful in a tutorial capacity. The people of that enlightened section, have always possessed the learning necessary to appreciate, and the philanthropy implied in the wish to dispel, the benighted ignorance of all other quarters of the world; and thus a competent number of them have ever been found willing to give up the comforts of home, for the benefit of the "barbarous west."

The schoolmistress, then, generally came from the "cradle" of intelligence, as well as "of liberty," beyond the Hudson; and, in the true spirit of benevolence, she carried her blessings (herself the greatest) across the mountain barrier, to bestow them, _gratis_, upon the spiritually and materially needy, in the valley of the Mississippi.

Her vocation, or, as it would now be called, her "mission" was to teach an impulse not only given by her education, but belonging to her nature.

She had a const.i.tutional tendency toward it--indeed, a genius for it; like that which impels one to painting, another to sculpture--this to a learned profession, that to a mechanical trade. And so perfectly was she adapted to it, that "the ignorant people of the west" not recognising her "divine appointment," were often at a loss to conjecture, who, or whether anybody, could have taught _her_!

For that same "ignorant," and too often, ungrateful people, she was full of tender pity--the yearning of the single-hearted missionary, for the welfare of his flock. _They_ were steeped in darkness, but _she_ carried the light--nay, she _was_ the light! and with a benignity, often evinced by self-sacrifice--she poured it graciously over the land--

"Heaven doth with us, as we with torches do: Not light them for themselves; for if our virtues Did not go forth of us, 't were all alike As if we had them not."

For the good of the race, or of any (male) individual, she would immolate herself, even upon the altar of Hymen; and, since the number, who were to be benefited by such self-devotement, was small in New England, but large in the west, she did well to seek a field for her benign dedication, beyond the Alleghenies! Honor to the all-daring self-denial, which brought to the forlorn bachelor of the west, a companion in his labors, a solace in his afflictions, and a mother to his children!

Her name was invariably Grace, Charity, or Prudence; and, if names had been always descriptive of the personal qualities of those who bore them, she would have been ent.i.tled to all three.

In the early ages of the world, names were, or, at least, were supposed to be, fair exponents of the personal characters of those, upon whom they were bestowed. But, _then_, the qualities must be manifested, before the name could be earned, so that all who had never distinguished themselves, in some way, were said to be "nameless." In more modern times, however, an improvement upon this system was introduced: the character was antic.i.p.ated, and parents called their children what they _wished_ them to be, in the hope that they would grow to the standard thus imposed. And it is no doubt, true, that names thus bestowed had much influence in the development of character--on the same principle, upon which the boards, to which Indian women lash their infants soon after birth, have much to do with the erect carriage of the mature savage. Such an appellation is a perpetual memento of parental counsels--a subst.i.tute for barren precept--an endless exhortation to Grace, Charity, or Prudence.

I do not mean, that calling a boy Cicero will certainly make him an orator, or that all Jeremiahs are necessarily prophets; nor is it improbable, that the same peculiarities in the parents, which dictate these expressive names, may direct the characters of the children, by controlling their education; but it is unquestionable, that the characteristics, and even the fortunes of the man, are frequently daguerreotyped by a name given in infancy. There is not a little wisdom in the advice of Sterne to G.o.dfathers--not "to Nicodemus a man into nothing."--"Harsh names," says D'Israeli, the elder, "will have, in spite of all our philosophy, a painful and ludicrous effect on our ears and our a.s.sociations; it is vexatious, that the softness of delicious vowels, or the ruggedness of inexorable consonants, should at all be connected with a man's happiness, or even have an influence on his fortune."

"That which we call a rose, By any other name would smell as sweet;"

but this does not touch the question, whether, if it had not smelt as sweet we would not have given it some other name. The celebrated demagogue, Wilkes, is reported to have said, that, "without knowing the comparative merits of the two poets, we would have no hesitation in preferring John Dryden to Elkanah Settle, _from the names only_." And the reason of this truth is to be found in the fact, that our impressions of both men and things depend upon a.s.sociations, often beyond our penetration to detect--a.s.sociations with which _sound_, depending on hidden laws, has quite as much to do, as _sense_.

Among those who have carried the custom of picturesque or expressive naming, to an extent bordering on the ridiculous, were the hard-headed champions of the true church-militant, the English puritans--as Hume, the bigoted old Tory, rather ill-naturedly testifies! And the puritans of _New_ England--whatever advancing intelligence may have made them in the present--were, for a long time, faithful representatives of the oddities, as well as of the virtues, of their fathers.

And, accordingly, we find the schoolmistress--being a descendant of the Jason's-crew, who landed from the Argo-Mayflower, usually bearing a name thus significant, and manifesting, even at her age, traits of character justifying the compellation. What that age precisely _was_, could not always be known; indeed, a lady's age is generally among indeterminate things; and it has, very properly, come to be considered ungallant, if not impertinent, to be curious upon so delicate a subject. A man has no more right to know how many years a woman has, than how many skirts she wears; and, if he have any anxiety about the matter, in either case, his eyes must be the only questioners. The principle upon which the women themselves proceed, in growing old, seems to be parallel to the law of gravitation: when a stone, for example, is thrown into the air the higher it goes the slower it travels; and the momentum toward Heaven, given to a woman at her birth, appears to decrease in about the same ratio.

We will not be so ungallant, then, as to inquire too curiously into the age of the schoolmistress; but, without disparagement to her youthfulness, we may be allowed to conjecture that, in order to fit her so well for the duties of her responsible station (and incline her to undertake such labors), a goodly number of years must needs have been required. Yet she bore time well; for, unless married in the meanwhile, at thirty, she was as youthful in manners, as at eighteen.

But this is not surprising: for, even as early as her twelfth year, she had much the appearance of a mature woman--something like that noticed in young quakers, by Clarkson[79]--and her figure belonged to that rugged type, which is adapted to bear, unscathed, more than the ravages of time. She was never above the medium height, for the rigid rule of economy seemed to apply to flesh and blood, as to all other things pertaining to her race; at all events, material had not been wasted in giving her extra longitude--at the ends. Between the extremities, it might be different--for she was generally very long-waisted. But this might be accounted for in the process of _flattening out_: for like her compeer, the schoolmaster, she had much more breadth than thickness. She was somewhat angular, of course, and rather bony; but this was only the natural correspondence, between the external development, and the mental and moral organization. Her eyes were usually blue, and, to speak with accuracy, a little cold and grayish, in their expression--like the sky on a bleak morning in Autumn. Her forehead was very high and prominent, having, indeed, an _exposed_ look, like a shelterless knoll in an open prairie: but, not content with this, though the hair above it was often thin, she usually dragged the latter forcibly back, as if to increase the alt.i.tude of the former, by extending the skin. Her mouth was of that cla.s.s called "primped," but was filled with teeth of respectable dimensions.

Her arms were long, and, indeed, a little skinny, and she swung them very freely when she walked; while hands, of no insignificant size, dangled at the extremities, as if the joints of her wrists were insecure. She had large feet, too, and in walking her toes were a.s.siduously turned out. She had, however, almost always one very great attraction--a fine, clear, healthy complexion--and the only blemishes upon this, that I have ever observed, were a little _red_ on the tip of her nose and on the points of her cheek-bones, and a good deal of _down_ on her upper lip.

In manners and bearing, she was brisk, prim, and sometimes a little "fidgety," as if she was conscious of sitting on a dusty chair; and she had a way of searching nervously for her pocket, as if to find a handkerchief with which to brush it off. She was a very fast walker, and an equally rapid talker--taking usually very short steps, as if afraid of splitting economical skirts, but using very long words, as if entertaining no such apprehension about her throat. Her gait was too rapid to be graceful, and her voice too sharp to be musical; but she was quite unconscious of these imperfections, especially of the latter: for at church--I beg pardon of her enlightened ancestors! I should say at "_meeting_"--her notes of praise were heard high over all the tumult of primitive singing; and, with her chin thrown out, and her shoulders drawn back, she looked, as well as sounded, the impersonation of _melody_, as contra-distinguished from _harmony_!

But postponing, for the present, our consideration of her qualifications as a teacher, we find that her characteristics were still more respectable and valuable as a private member of society. And in this relation, her most prominent trait, like that of her brother teacher, was her stainless piety. In this respect, if in no other, women are always more sincere and single-hearted than men--perhaps because the distribution of social duties gives her less temptation to hypocrisy--and even the worldly, strong-minded, and self-reliant daughter of the church-hating Puritan-Zion, displayed a tendency toward genuine religious feeling.[80]

But in our subject, this was not a mere bias, but a constant, unflagging sentiment, an everyday manifestation. She was as warm in the cause of religion on one day as upon another, in small things as in great--as zealous in the repression of all unbecoming and unG.o.dly levity, as in the eradication of positive vice. Life was too solemn a thing with her to admit of thoughtless amus.e.m.e.nts--it was entirely a state of probation, not to be enjoyed in itself, or for itself, but purgatorial, remedial, and preparatory. She hated all devices of pleasure as her ancestors did the abominations of popery. A fiddle she could tolerate only in the shape of a ba.s.s-viol; and dancing, if practised at all, must be called "calisthenics." The drama was to her an invention of the Enemy of Souls--and if she ever saw a play, it must be at a _museum_, and not within the walls of that temple of Baal, the theatre. None but "serious"

conversation was allowable, and a hearty laugh was the expression of a spirit ripe for the destination of unforgiven sinners.

Errors in religion were too tremendous to be tolerated for a moment, and the form (or rather anti-form) of worship handed down by her fathers, had cost too much blood and crime to be oppugned. She thought Barebones's the only G.o.dly parliament that ever sat, and did not hate Hume half so much for his infidelity, as for his ridicule of the roundheads. Her list of martyrs was made up of the intruders ousted by Charles's "Act of Conformity," and her catalogue of saints was headed by the witch-boilers of Ma.s.sachusetts Bay. She abhorred the memory of all _popish_ persecutions, and knew no difference between catholic and cannibal. Her running calendar of living saints were born "to inherit the earth," and heaven, too: they possessed a monopoly of all truth, an unlimited "indulgence" to enforce conformity, and, in their zeal, an infallible safeguard against the commission of error. She had no patience with those who could not "see the truth;" and he who reviled the puritan mode of worship, was "worse than the infidel." The only argument she ever used with such, was the _argumentum ad hominem_, which saves the trouble of conviction by "giving over to hardness of heart."

New England was, to her, the land of Goshen--whither G.o.d's people had been led by G.o.d's hand--"the land of the patriarchs, where it rains righteousness"[81]--and all the adjacent country was a land of Egyptian darkness.

She was commendably prudent in her personal deportment: being thoroughly pure and circ.u.mspect herself, she could forgive no thoughtless imprudence in her sister-woman: but she well-understood metaphysical distinctions, and was tolerant, if not liberal, to marriageable men.

These she could hope to reform at some future time: and she had, moreover, a just idea of the weakness of man's nature. But being a woman, and a staid and sober-minded woman, she could never understand the power of temptation upon her own s.e.x, or the commonest impulses of high spirits. Perhaps she was a little deficient in charity: but, as we have seen, it was chiefly toward her female friends, and since none can bear severe judgment more safely than woman, her austerity did little harm.

But she sincerely regretted what she could never palliate; she hated not the guilty, though she could not forgive the sin; and no one was more easily melted to tears by the faults, and particularly by the _follies_, of the world. Wickedness is a very melancholy thing, but it is to be punished as well as lamented: and like the unfortunate governor who was forced to condemn his own son, she wept while she p.r.o.nounced judgment.

But earthly sorrow, by her, was given only to earthly faults: violations of simple good morals, crimes against heavenly creeds and forms (or rather _the_ form) of worship, claimed no tear. Her blood rose to fever-heat at the mention of an unbeliever, and she would as soon have wept for the errors of the fallen angels, as for those of anti-Robinsonians.

But though thus rigid and austere, I never heard that she was at all disinclined to being courted: especially if it gave her any prospect of being able to make herself useful as a wife, either to herself, her husband, or her country. She understood the art of rearing and managing children, in her capacity as a teacher: she was thus peculiarly well-fitted for matrimonial duties, and was unwilling that the world should lose the benefit of her talents. But the man who courted her must do so in the most sober, staid, and regulated spirit, for it was seldom any unmixed romance about "love and nonsense," which moved _her_ to the sacrifice: if she entertained notions of that sort, they were such only as could find a place in her well-balanced mind, and, above all, were the subject of no raptures or transports of delight. If she indulged any enthusiasm, in view of the approaching change, it was in the prospect of endless shirt-making, and in calculations about how cheaply (not how happily) she could enable her husband to live. She had no squeamish delicacy about allowing the world to know the scope and meaning of her arrangements, and all her friends partic.i.p.ated in her visions of comfort and economy. False modesty was no part of her nature--and her sentiment could be reduced to an algebraic formula--excluding the "unknown quant.i.ties" usually represented by the letters _b_, _c_, and _d_: meaning "bliss," "cottages," and "devotion."

Yet, though she cared little for poetry, and seldom understood the images of fancy, she was not averse to a modic.u.m of scandal in moments of relaxation: for the faults of others were the ill.u.s.trations of her prudent maxims, and the thoughtlessness of a sister was the best possible text for a moral homily. The tense rigidity of her character, too, sometimes required a little unbending, and she had, therefore, no special aversion to an occasional surrept.i.tious novel. But this she would indulge only in private; for in her mind, the worst quality of transgression was its bad example; and she never failed, in public, to condemn all such things with becoming and virtuous severity. Nor must this apparent inconsistency be construed to her disadvantage; for her strong mind and well-fortified morals, could withstand safely what would have corrupted a large majority of those around her; and it was meet, that one whose "mission" it was to reform, should thoroughly understand the enemy against which she battled. And these things never unfavorably affected her life and manners, for she was as prudent in her deportment (ill-natured people say _prudish_) as if some ancestress of hers had been deceived, and left in the family a tradition of man's perfidy and woman's frailty.

She was careful, then, of three things--her clothes, her money, and her reputation: and, to do her justice, the last was as spotless as the first, and as much prized as the second, and that is saying a good deal, both for its purity and estimation. Neat, economical, and prudent, were, indeed, the three capital adjectives of her vocabulary, and to deserve them was her eleventh commandment.

With one exception, these were the texts of all her homilies, and the exception was, unluckily, one which admitted of much more argument.

It was the history of the puritans. But upon this subject, she was as dexterous a special pleader as Neale, and as skilful in giving a false coloring to facts, as D'Aubigne. But she had the advantage of these worthies in that her declamation was quite honest: she had been taught sincerely and heartily to believe all she a.s.serted. She was of the opinion that but two respectable ships had been set afloat since the world began: one of which was Noah's ark, and the other the Mayflower.

She believed that no people had ever endured such persecutions as the puritans, and was especially eloquent upon the subject of "New England's Blarney-stone," the Rock of Plymouth.

Indeed, according to the creed of her people, historical and religious, this is the only piece of granite in the whole world "worth speaking of;" and geologists have sadly wasted their time in travelling over the world in search of the records of creation, when a full epitome of everything deserving to be known, existed in so small a s.p.a.ce! All the other rocks of the earth sink into insignificance, and "hide their diminished heads," when compared to this mighty stone! The Rock of Leucas, from which the amorous Lesbian maid cast herself disconsolate into the sea, is a mere pile of dirt: the Tarpeian, whence the Law went forth to the whole world for so many centuries, is not fit to be mentioned in the same day: the Rock of Cashel, itself, is but the subject of profane Milesian oaths; and the Ledge of Plymouth is the real "Rock of Ages!" It is well that every people should have something to adore, especially if that "something" belongs exclusively to themselves.

It elevates their self-respect: and, for this object, even historical fictions may be forgiven.

But, as we have intimated, in the course of time the schoolmistress became a married woman; and as she gathered experience, she gradually learned that New England is not the whole "moral vineyard," and that one might be more profitably employed than in disputing about questionable points of history. New duties devolved upon her, and new responsibilities rained fast. Instead of teaching the children of other people, she now raised children for other people to teach. New sources of pride were found in these, and in her husband and his prosperity. She discovered that she could be religious without bigotry, modest without prudery, and economical without meanness: and, profiting by the lessons thus learned, she subsided into a true, faithful, and respectable matron, thus, at last, fulfilling her genuine "mission."

FOOTNOTES:

[79] Author of the Life of William Penn, whose accuracy has lately been questioned.

[80] By this form of expression, which may seem awkward, I mean to convey this idea: That consistency of character would seem to preclude any heartfelt reverence in the descendant of those whose piety was manifested more in the _hatred of earthly_, than in _the love of heavenly_, things.

[81] The language of a precious pamphlet, even now in circulation in the west.

X.