Quabbin; the story of a small town with outlooks upon Puritan life

Front matter

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?1>144',

CORNELL - UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. QUABBIN I

II. Through the Village 1 1

Chapter I

Among the memories of childhood, — next after the impressions of a mother's brooding love, and of the home wherein the new unit of humanity first becomes conscious of being the centre of a universe, — the most indelible is the visual line that encircles his birthplace, with the perspectives that stretch out to it. To the Quabbin boy the boldly marked sky-line on the ridges of hills that shut in the valley under its blue roof was the boundary of the known world. Strangers must have looked upon the little village with compassion; but for the natives it was cheerful ; they knew no other. In the small houses there was no luxury surely, but no lack of wholesome food or seasonable raiment. There were schools for six months in the year, and sermons twice every Sunday, — Sahbaday it was in the vernacular.

News brought by the county paper was seldom more than two weeks old ; and authoritative expositions of public affairs were given at the tavern and the post-office by persons who had actually seen New York, and who spoke of Boston with an air of familiarity.

The valley and neighborhood have not essentially changed in the hundred and sixty years since their first settlement ; for the natural features are too marked to be affected by the superficial touches of man. Ploughs and axes do not disturb the eternal basis of landscape ; and a few houses more, or a few trees less, do not matter.

The hill that rises south of the village was once covered with great oaks and chestnuts which had sheltered Indian hunters. The red men called the hill Great Quabbin, and the name belonged to the district as well. Year after year the white settlers waged war upon the venerable trees : instead of being a patriarchal forest to be cherished, it was a piece of stubborn "woods" to be cleared away. By and by lines of ^fence, like geometric diagrams, were traced on the hill's broad shoulders, enclosing sage-green pastures, sparsely tufted with wood-fern and huckleberry bushes, and known by all boys of the village to be rosy with strawberries every summer.

It was a Delectable Mountain for children, even after the majestic trees were felled. The ascent was easy; for a primitive road, partly grass-grown, led to the table-land at the summit, where were two small, decaying farmhouses, since destroyed. To one looking back when half-way up, the village below, nestling under shade-trees on both sides of the river, had a soft and almost unreal beauty ; but as one climbed, it sank out of sight under the swelling buttress of the hill. The upper region was alpine in its cool serenity, its airy pastures, sparkling brook, and broad horizon. Sixty miles away rose a grand mountain, pyramidal and blue, — a melting vapory blue that one expected to see blown away ; while in the opposite direction was grouped a confused and retreating mass of hills, seen beyond the golden mist of the Connecticut valley.

It was a delight to take deep draughts of the exhilarating air, to watch the thin, spectral wreaths of smoke rising from distant houses, to count afar the many steeples, mere glimmering white lances, and to seek out the purply-gray forms of well-known mountains around. No voices, nor hum of machinery, nor ring of hammer were heard from the valley. The only sounds that broke the stillness were the occasional lowing of cattle, the murmur of brooks, and the light, silvery strokes of the meeting-house clock. The bell had a tender, harmonious tone, full of solemn suggestion, associated with an austere worship and with funerals, but never with weddings or public rejoicings. Earth was beautiful in remoteness, and heaven near. The mountain lifted an imaginative child toward infinity, and he clung to it as if conscious of the desperate whirl of the globe through space.

Opposite, behind the village, rose the lesser northern hill (Ram Mountain), a somewhat irregular but beautiful cone of granite, jagged here and there with projecting edges of rock, and at that time thinly covered with soil. Once there were thick bushes and dwarfish trees on its sides, and plumes of tall pines were set jauntily on its crest ; but it was ravaged and stripped by choppers, and left with scarred forehead, and dreary, naked flanks. When clad in green, the hill had been stately and joyous, but in its bereavement was shame-faced and dispirited. Still, it had a placid look for the meeting-house at its foot, and its rugged mass made an effective background for the white steeple.

The hill on the east side of the villag-e, known as Little Quabbin, was rather too far away to have much part in the landscape. However, it did its best in delaying the morning sun, in upholding the north end of summer rainbows, and in sending back reflections from its massy ledges at sunset.

Quabbin is at its best in summer, in its rich vesture of green. The numerous springs and the dewy air keep the pastures and meadows fresh, while the shade-trees in streets and gardens, the adjacent forests, and the scattered wild growths (from hazel or alder bushes to vigorous oaks and chestnuts), are so luxuriant and widespread that it is difficult to find a clear vista in any direction. The main roads, it must be confessed, would be dull, if it were not for the outlooks upon hills and farms ; but there are many by-ways, exquisite as the dreamy idyls of Corot. One road by the western side of Ram Mountain, after passing a beautiful slope of farming-land, leads into a young forest where there is a flecked shade even at midday, and a sense of coolness, with a fresh, cheery smell, that is partly earthy, and partly leafy. The road meanders under the living arch among countless (and nameless) bushes and wild flowers, and appears to consist of a faintly worn path for a horse, two dim wheel-tracks, and intervening lines of tufted grass, which is often tall enough to brush the axle-trees. After reaching the open " front yard " of a small house two or three miles beyond, it comes to an end.

Another road, around the northern end of Little Quabbin, passes along the fringe of woods that hangs upon the mountain side ; and the visitor finds himself in a long, winding, arched way, dim as a cathedral aisle.

but with glimpses of warm sunlight reflected from the fertile lands that lie just outside of the screen of white birches on his left. What artist or photographer could give an idea of the strong yet grateful contrast between the green gloom on the one hand, and the flickering splendors that come to him through tender birch leaves and vellum-cased branches on the other ?

The three hills, standing at different angles, shut in the village, which partly rests on the rounded bases of two of them, while the river, which is the life of the valley, glides in swift curves at their feet.

The banks of Swift River have been sadly maltreated. Once, near the cove, above the dam, a belt of young pine-trees, uniform, softly rounded, and velvety green, followed the stream and the cove in many a coil ; and, below the dam, there were at intervals thickets of alders, water-maples, shad-bushes, willow clumps, with myriads of lithe red shoots, wild-grape vines, tangled clematis, and the " swamp pink," parent of the garden azalea. But the meandering belt of pines fell under the axe long ago ; and in its place sprang up white birches, as if to make a fringe on the naked border ; while, little by little, the banks down stream were cleared of the " brush " that yielded no income except to children and poets. Many of the shrubs that crowded the wet margins, such as the blushing, sweet-scented azaleas, and the shad-bushes that wore fresh bridal veils every May, became only memories. Utility had its way, and this part of the river's edge was for years like an eyelid without lashes.

There is a pretty reach of still water near the cove, full, black, and lustrous. On one side is a meadow with a few hickory-trees ; on the other, the high bank

6 QUABBIAT

covered with young birches. On a windless afternoon might be seen a boat, with children rowing, its_ stem silently cutting through reflections of leafy sprays, of slender white trunks, leaning at all angles, and of sunny clouds in distant blue below.

In early times the whole region was dripping with springs, and shaggy with vegetation ; and even to-day, such is the struggle for existence, there are few trim lawns or meadows of grass free from the intrusion of coarser species. The leafy robes of the hills trailed on the lowlands ; while bushes, briers, ferns, or brakes filled the fence-corners and road-sides, and bordered the water-courses.

A mile above the centre was the north village, grouped around another dam, and at some distance beyond was a lake, framed in sombre hills. Its margin was surrounded by such trees as burn with richest colors in autumn ; so that from the uplands, after the first light frost, the distant sheen of water appeared in a setting of crimson, yellow, gold-brown, and dark red ; and, coming nearer, one would say that the trees were standing in the water's edge and admiring themselves in the mirror.

There was a good view from a farmhouse on the side of the eastern hill (Little Quabbin), or, better, from the hill-top, looking westward. This view embraced the cove, the river winding through meadows, the village, tufted with maples and elms, the white spire standing out from the northern hill, and the broad expanse of the southern hill, which dominates the region. The traveller who has seen something of the Old World finds that the tranquil beauty of this scene lingers in memory, and will not be overlain. Something must be allowed for early associations, but the image of this landscape remains clear. It needs only to have been celebrated in song or famous in story. Quabbin is not famous.

The meeting-house of the village formerly stood sidewise to the road in a green space, flanked by rows of horse-sheds, some of them decrepit, and all unpainted. In its first estate it was of a dingy sulphur color, and without a steeple ; but its oaken frame and trussed roof were made to endure. Later, a steeple was set astride the roof ; the building was painted white, furnished with green (outside) blinds, and turned with its end to the street. The vane, of sheet metal, gilded, was cut in form of a man, the head cleaving the wind, and the legs extended for rudder. As it turned with a sharp cry on the rod which pierced its body, it needed but little aid from the imagination of a boy to become the image of some sinner transfixed in air, and held aloft to swing in lingering pain.

In later days the boys found, in the cob-webbed and dusty space below the belfry, a long-forgotteu cask of ball cartridges, which had been kept, according to law, to be ready for an emergency that never happened. The paper covers were rotten, and the powder decomposed; and it was great fun to drop the leaden ounce-balls from the belfry railing, and then find them flattened and hot upon the stone steps below.

The pulpit within was high, approached by flights of stairs, and above it was hung a sounding-board, in shape like an extinguisher. It was often a matter of wonder as to what would happen to the minister if the chain should break ; but the boys were assured by the thought that "The Lord is mindful of his own."

The pews were square, each family being enclosed as in a pen,, all facing inwards. The uncushioned wooden seats were hinged, and were raised as people stood up during prayer, to fall with a multitudinous clatter when the prayer ended. There was a gallery on three sides, the part facing the pulpit being occupied by the choir.

A century earlier it was the custom in New England to " seat the meeting ; " that is, to assign seats to the town's people according to their rank, as magistrates, elders, deacons, college-bred men, land-owners, mechanics, and laborers. In Quabbin each head of a family owned the pew he occupied, paying an annual tax thereon to the parish. The best places in the meeting-house belonged to those who had the money to pay for them.

The sheds adjoining the meeting-house were for the shelter of the "teams" of the country people; and in summer, when the windows were open, the services were frequently enlivened (for restless boys) by the stamping, whinnying, and squealing of lonesome or flypestered horses. The village schoolhouse was next beyond the eastern sheds, and behind them was the hillside burying-ground.

The boy of Quabbin who returns to his native town a man of sixty does not walk alone through the street. People of the old time meet and accost him, or nod to him from their wonted places. He knows every figure and face, and the color and cut of their clothes. His youth comes back, and he sees his playfellows become bridegrooms, then fathers of families, then patriarchs, ■ — the same beings passing through the successive changes of a lifetime while he looks, — and he, meanwhile, able to recall any phase of their career at will.

He sees, with the eye of memory, sunburnt and grizzled men in blue frocks leaning at the posts of the' blacksmith's open door, while within, by the lurid light, sinewy arms turn the glowing horseshoe, and showers of golden fire fly at each strenuous blow. The names of those grizzled men have long been chiselled on tombstones, but there they are by the smithy, and the man of sixty, once more a boy, knows them well. Others he sees driving ox-teams with logs for the saw-mill, men and oxen alike calmly chewing the cud, while long whips are waved encouragingly, and "Haw, Buck!" or "Gee, Bright! " enlivens the slow procession.

Another, from a former generation, comes in a heavy wagon, thorough-braced and well spattered with ancient mud. His wife sits by him, in camlet cloak and scoop bonnet, and they are bound for the store. In the box behind the seat they have a basket of eggs, a "fourmeal " cheese, and a firkin of butter, to be exchanged for tea, molasses, and other " boughten " goods. Another, younger and livelier, is whirling by in a buggy, showing off his trotting-horse. The animal is not groomed to a satin gloss, and, in fact, is rough in coat, and perhaps tangled in mane and tail ; but his great haunches work powerfully, and his feet appear to be all the time in the air, reaching ahead. He "gets over the ground," and often sends a dash of gravel back at his keen and tricky driver.

If it is Sunday, our friend of sixty years sees groups of men and youths whom he knew long ago, loitering upon the meeting-house steps, all visibly uncomfortable in holiday clothes, discussing the affairs of town and church ; the bachelors, with eyes in ambush, demurely watching the in-coraing maids. Some of the ungodly lO QUABBIN

and disreputable are haunting the dilapidated and windyold tavern across the green. He knows these pariahs, though they have long lain in nameless graves.

As the Quabbin boy of sixty continues his rounds, other faces, long forgotten, are projected in memory's camera. All of them belong to people who were once h's townsmen. One brilliant man, after many vicissitudes, was a banker, and heaped up wealth, which his prodigal son in after years was to waste. His brother, the man with studious, meditative countenance, was a physician. That beautiful youth, the banker's nephew, after a successful beginning, and with the haven of love in sight, returned to Quabbin to die ; while his betrothed, white as a lily, drooped under the weeds of eternal widowhood. This gentleman with gold spectacles went from the principal "store" of Quabbin, and set up in Boston an establishment whose name is a household word and a synonyme of honor. That boon companion, whose talk was illustrated with oaths, dissipated an ample fortune, and laughed away with merry curses his friends and reputation. Another, with dazed and vacant look, lost the savings of a lifetime by trusting. them to a stock operator, who posed as a Christian philanthropist.

The plainly dressed man, he with devout expression and "looks commercing with the skies," was a mill-worker, whose soul was so full of ■ the love of God that men felt holier and stronger for the touch of his hand, or the sound of his voice. Neither wealthy nor learned nor eloquent, he had inexhaustible riches, celestial knowledge, and the pentecostal gift of tongues. At least one spot in the bleak hillside is holy ground.

THROUGH THE VILLAGE II

Chapter II Through The Village

Time is busy in levelling hills, abrading garden terraces, flattening grave-mounds, and abasing old families. The gulf between the rich and poor may continue as absolute as that between Dives and Lazarus ; but the traditional prominence of old families, if not already a thing of the past, is departing, along with gracious memories, and with much that used to inspire admiration and deference. In a village like Quabbin there is little at this day to render one old house more venerable than another, but sixty years ago there were differences not to be explained by value or picturesqueness. More was thought of intangible qualities and associations, such as cluster about the homes of beloved men and scenes of historic interest. A few houses in the village had an indefinable charm for those who remembered their former • occupants. There is one in a commanding position near the cross-roads which is venerable in slow decay, and out of relations with modern neighbors. Two ancient elms tower over the grounds, and are seen afar. One of the patriots who fought at Bunker's Hill built the house, then considered a mansion. His wife, the descendant of a Huguenot family, had three sons by a former marriage ; and these, in their maturity, were the only persons in Quabbin that could, in the strict sense, be called gentlemen. The bright old lady long survived her husband, and made a striking picture as she moved about in her wheeled-chair, accompanied by one of her sons, a grave and stately man, who lived with her. Another son built a dwelling nearer the meeting-house. It appeared to be the dream of some inspired carpenter, a dream of wooden pilasters, wreaths, and scrolls, with a fretwork balustrade of wheel patterns upon the eaves, and an arched and decorated gateway, all in glittering white. Hillside terraces at the rear, with flower-beds and fruit-trees, were to youthful eyes like the hanging gardens of Babylon. The owner, with his tropical complexion of pale orange, his gold-rimmed spectacles, and his distinguished manners, in which dignity, courtesy, and kindness had equal share, was a wonderful person in Quabbin sixty years ago. For he had actually sailed around the world ; his cheeks had acquired their rich color in China, where he had been a tea-merchant ; the bronze idols and the great vases that adorned his rooms had come from farthest East. Besides, he knew European capitals, and, along with his well-earned wealth, he had brought to the village an aroma from spice-lands, a knowledge of the world, and the grand air that so becomes a travelled man.

The third of the brothers, a manufacturer, built a fine house, but with less ornament, on a knoll not far distant. All three could have been presented with credit at any court. They spoke the language of the educated world ; but, along with their somewhat ceremonious manners, they had a sense of what was due to others, especially to humble neighbors ; and as they were public-spirited, just, and generous, they were

THROUGH THE VILLAGE 1 3

* respected and loved. No one envied them their good fortune — a rare experience, whether in Quabbin or elsewhere.

The sombre old house with its two elms connected the village with the by-gone days of the colony ; and the little old lady, while she lived, was a link with the great world, as her family was justly distinguished. But there may not be a living descendant of her three sons, and few of the present inhabitants know even the names of the men who first gave distinction to Quabbin.

What views the three original proprietors had in regard to religion, letters, schools, or art, it would be difficult now to say. They "went to meeting," apparently as a duty, and they took a modest part in town affairs ; but between them and the town's people there must have been little intimacy. The general dulness in their time must have been impenetrable. They owned the water-power, which was the source of the town's prosperity and their own, but they sold it to two brothers who were born in one of the old farmhouses which once stood on the top of the southern hill. These latter were shrewd, able, and honorable men, but were less courtly, and reputed to be less generous, than their predecessors.

They were for a long time the great men of the town, until a third family, which had Jong ruled the north village, acquired a paramount interest in the property.

The principal store of the town is remembered chiefly by its permanent odor, in which there were suggestions of dried codfish, pickled mackerel, spices, snuff, plug tobacco, molasses, and new rum, re-enforced in cold weather by the evaporation of tobacco juice upon a hot stove, and the occasional whiff of a pipe. The" store-" keeper was quiet and shrewd, and knew the cumulative power of compound interest. A farmer who had fallen behind-hand could get a continuance of supplies, including the indispensable jug, by giving a mortgage upon his land, — a backward step which was seldom retrieved,— so that in the course of years the storekeeper's roofs might have been measured by acres. He was not in the least dishonest, but he worked frankly for his own interest ; and it must not be forgotten that, in transactions with customers who are habitually fuddled and confused, a clear-headed man has all the advantage. Farms were exchanged for rum or cider-brandy, with shabbiness, degradation, and family misery thrown in. As the use of spirits was universal, a dealer incurred no obloquy, nor injury to his social standing.

There were other storekeepers, although they sold no spirits. One of them did a snug business, though noted for a scrimping nicety in weights and measures, and for a keen lookout after fractions. People were not overjoyed to see a fig torn in halves in case of over weight, — that a fig was bitten in such an emergency was a slander, — - nor to pay invariably thirteen cents for twelve and a half ; yet the proprietor once, in a glow of virtuous pride, referred to the substantial sum realized in a year from this salutary rule of retaining the half-cents in making change.

The perplexities of the currency in olden times were manifold. Though the present decimal coinage had been long established by law, the custom of reckoning by shillings, six to the dollar, was well nigh universal in Massachusetts. At the same time, a large part of the silver coins in use consisted of Mexican dollars,

THROUGH THE VILLAGE 15

halves, quarters, eighths, and sixteenths, all bearing the pillared arms of Spain; and between these coins and the traditional but imaginary " shillings " there was a rare confusion, demanding a mastery of vulgar fractions which only " Colburn's Mental Arithmetic" could give. A Mexican eighth was worth I2j^ cents, but it was always called a " ninepence," that being its value in the traditional "shilling "of 16^ cents. A Mexican sixteenth, 6^ cents, was called a "four-pence ha'penny.",^ Prices of goods were marked in shillings ; e. g., "two-and-three-pence" in place of 37^^ cents, four shiUings in place of 66^ cents, five shillings for 83 J^ cents, etc. The constant multiplication of the fractional tags insensibly drew from the public, and sensibly added to the dealer's till. It was in comparatively recent times that the Mexican coins were driven out, and that the custom of reckoning by shillings fell into disuse.

In this store, conducted on such sound financial principles, an Exalted Personage in the government of the United States received his first mercantile training, and began his successful career. In the sketches of his life, published during the campaign prior to his election, it is a matter of regret that the lonely place of his apprenticeship was overlooked. It was a misfortune for Quabbin.

Some sixty years ago the old tavern opposite the meeting-house having "run down," a new one of three stories was built in the centre, at the cross-roads. There was a daily stage-route from the county town to Boston, and a four-horse coach, announced by a far-echoing horn, came thundering down the hill road in the early morning, and discharged its passengers at the taveri> for breakfast. There were few travellers who put up there, except the stage passengers. The chief revenue was from the bar. The sound of the toddy-stick was often heard, even in the street. It was a rhythmical roll, and each bar-keeper prided himself upon his special tattoo. Farmers coming to mill or shop, especially in winter, stopped there with their teams, the shivering animals being often forgotten while they drank hot toddy by the bar-room fire. The stable was haunted by day, and the bar-rooru by night, by shady and mysterious creatures, willing drudges for food and drams. To one coming from the fresh air without, the breath of that fiery bar-room was overpowering. The odors of the hostlers' boots, redolent of fish-oil and tallow, and of buffalo-robes and horse-blankets, the latter reminiscent of equine ammonia, almost got the better of the all-pervading fumes of spirits and tobacco. Clay pipes for "cut plug" were much in favor, though some reckless spendthrifts, at times, smoked principe cigars at three cents each.

This was the exchange for rustic wit, the focus of hate for parsons and deacons, and of ridicule for the new-fangled temperance society. The walls were adorned with placards of stage-routes, woodcuts of enormous stallions in prancing attitudes, and notices of sheriffs' sales, — the land or the stock of some deceased or ruined farmer to be offered at "public vendue." The country people gave the word nearly the French sound, vandue. No one then used the term auction.

The Masonic Hall at the cross-roads was deserted. The lodge never met, and the room was used at times for a private school. Boys used to set up the Semitic

THROUGH THE VILLAGE 17

pillars, and to speculate upon the mysteries of the craft. The affair of Morgan, believed to have been murdered " out in York State " for exposing the secret rites, was then recent and blood-curdling. Public opinion was overwhelmingly against the order.

Chapter III

The territory of Quabbin comprises little more than the winding valley and the various slopes and tributaries that lead to it, with the hills already described; and it will be seen that there could have been but few large spaces for cultivation. Some half-dozen of the farms became long ago rich in grass and grain ; but in spite of the labors of generations in reclaiming bogs and clearing fields of stones, the area of productive land does not appear to have greatly extended.

Generally a couple of towering elms stood near each farmhouse of the better class, and not far away were apple-trees in squares. Clumps of lilacs grew by the front door and by the edge of the garden ; while along the neighboring road were rows of balloon-topped maples. Each homestead became conspicuous in the landscape, since the American elm has a stately grace that belongs to no other tree in northern latitudes.

The farms lying without the valley were and still are poor ; their plain lands sometimes bore thin crops of rye, and then, lying fallow, were overrun with mullein ;^ their undrained meadows were cold and wet, and in-

' At the gctte of what had been Chateaubriand's house in Paris, many years ago, there was a large mullein in blossom, evidently regarded with admiration dS a rare plant.

fested with " poison ivy " and skunk cabbage ; their hillsides rough and stony ; their pastures gray and brown, or "run to bushes." The neighborhood roads were crooked, hilly, and stony or sandy.

The houses of prosperous farmers were neat and comfortable, though invariably plain ; but those of the poorer sort were miserable. They were generally of one story, always of wood, clapboarded, rarely painted, and dusky with weather-stain. Nature's gray is picturesque ; so are dirt and rags, in the eyes of artists ; but a dwelling that is gray or dingy with neglect, and rifted or " chinky " with dilapidation, is no more comfprtable for being in harmony with a low-toned landscape.

In those times the chief feature of every farmhouse was the central chimney, which was large and square, having a fireplace on three of its sides in as many rooms, the largest being in the kitchen, as the common living-room was called. On that face of the chimney also was the opening into the cavernous brick oven, a "notion" which the Pilgrims may have brought over from Holland. Few such chimneys are now in existence ; and the universal use of stoves, both for warmth and for cooking, has made the brick ovens and the vast fireplaces, with crane, pot-hooks, and trammels, things of the past.