Clara Barton

“ The recital of this incident by myself, or some one else, has given rise to the bit of romance cropping out occasionally, in the sketches one sees, that I was a factory girl and earned the money to pay off the mortgage on my father’s farm. I wish the first statement might have been true. Nothing to-day would gratify me more than to know that I had been one of those self-reliant, intelligent, American-born girls like our sweet poetess, Lucy Larcom, and like her had stood before the power looms in the early progress of the manufactories of our 109great and matchless country. ”

“ My four lads soon perceived that I 119was no stranger to their sports or their tricks; that my early education had not been neglected, and that they were not the first boys I had seen. When they found that I was as agile and as strong as themselves, that my throw was as sure and as straight as theirs, and that if they won a game it was because I permitted it, their respect knew no bounds. No courtesy within their knowledge was neglected. Their example was sufficient for the entire school. I have seen no finer type of boys. ”

“ Sometimes, in later years, when I found myself suddenly on a strange horse in a trooper’s saddle, flying for life or liberty in front of pursuit, I blessed the baby lessons of the wild gallops among the beautiful colts.
Various as were the topics of instruction pursued by my youthful teachers, my father had still others. He was “Captain” Stephen Barton, had served as a non-commissioned officer, under General Wayne (Mad Anthony) in the French and Indian Wars on the then Western frontiers. His soldier habits and tastes never left him. ”

“ The entire line of factories above had caught the inspiration, and the French River villages of North Oxford were models of growth and activity.
One sister had married and settled in her home near by, and a wife had come into my eldest brother’s home. Mrs. Larned, the widow to whose assistance my father had gone in her early desolation, had found her children now so well grown as to make it advisable to remove to one of the factory villages, where she became a popular boarding house keeper, and her children operatives in the mill. ”

“ My home instruction was by no means permitted to stand in the way of the “regular school,” which consisted of two terms each year, of three months each. The winter term included not only the large boys and girls, but in reality the young men and young women of the neighborhood. An exceptionally fine teacher often drew the daily attendance of advanced scholars for several miles. ”

“ A very superior article of cloth was made, the operatives almost entirely American, and very largely from families of the neighborhood or surrounding country. Occupations for women were few in those days, and often the school and music teacher, weary of the monotonous life, sought change in the more remunerative loom of the factory. I name this as a matter of history, as the North Oxford Mills were the third, if not the second after Slater, who produced the first spindle and power looms in America, at the risk of his life. ”

“ I was thought to be very young to be allowed to go to a dancing school in a hotel. Dancing at that time was at a very low ebb in good New England society, and besides, there was an active revival taking place in both of the orthodox churches (or rather one a church and the other a society without a church) , and it might not be a wise, nor even a courteous, thing to allow. ”

“ Mr. Jonathan Dana, one of Oxford’s most scholarly men and a teacher of note, commenced the winter school to the south of us. I have no words to describe the value of his instruction, nor the pains he took with his eager pupil. I had been far too thoroughly drilled to require time for the customary classes of the public school, but did require instruction in branches forbidden in their lawful curriculum.
In spite of the labor of a school of sixty pupils of all ages, with no assistant, 99I was permitted to take philosophy, chemistry and elementary Latin—all to be taught outside of school hours. ”

“ My father took me in his carriage with a little dressing case which I dignified 42with the appellation of “trunk”—something I had never owned. It was April—cold and bare. The house and school rooms adjoined, and seemed enormously large. The household was also large. The long family table with the dignified preceptor, my loved and feared teacher at three years, at its head, seemed to me something formidable. There were probably one hundred and fifty pupils daily in the ample school rooms, of which I was perhaps the youngest, except the colonel’s own children. ”

“ I must not be taught to think I could give a thing and still possess it, or its value. A gift must be outright. I must do earnestly all that I did. Each might generously give me back a very small piece, to make in all no more than would have been my share, and I must be made to understand that even this was a favor and not a right. ”

“ The stars were bright, the temptation was too great. I was in my dress in a moment and out. The skates were fastened on firmly, one of the boy’s wool neck “comforters” tied about my waist, to be held by the boy in front. The other two were to stand on either 60side, and at a signal the cavalcade started. Swifter and swifter we went, until at length we reached a spot where the ice had been cracked and was full of sharp edges. These threw me, and the speed with which we were progressing, and the distance before we could quite come to a stop, gave terrific opportunity for cuts and wounded knees. ”

“ Child that I was, I did not know that the surest test of discipline is its absence. ”

“ It is to be remembered at that date there was no homeopathy, no hydropathy, no sanitariums, no Christian Science, nothing but the regular school of allopathic medicine. Medical practitioners, baffled by lack of science, surrounded by ignorance on all such subjects and more or less 85of superstition, struggled manfully on toward the blessed light of the scientific knowledge of to-day, which they have so richly attained. ”

“ By some chance I got a glimpse of the dancing school at the opening, and was seized with a most intense desire to go and learn to dance. With my peculiar characteristics it was necessary for me to want a thing very much before mentioning it; but this overcame me, especially as the cordial teacher took tea with us one evening before going to his school, and spoke very interestingly of his classes. I even went so far as to beg permission to go. The dance was in my very feet. The violin haunted me. “Ladies change” and “all hands round” 66sounded in my ears and woke me from my sleep at night. ”

“ It is very certain that none of us, boys or girls, indulged in 64further smart tricks. Twenty-five years later, when on a visit to the old home, long left, I saw my father, then a grey-haired grandsire, out on the same little pond, fitting the skates carefully to the feet of his little twin granddaughters, holding them up to make their first start in safety, I remembered my wounded knees, and blessed the great Father that progress and change were among the possibilities of His people. ”

“ Bright, rosy-cheeked boys and girls from four to thirteen, with the exception of four lads, as tall and nearly as old as myself. These four boys naturally looked a little curiously at me, as if forming an opinion of how best to dispose of me, as rumor had it that on the preceding summer, not being en rapport with the young lady teacher, they had excluded her from the building and taken possession themselves. ”

“ I must throw a ball or a stone with an under swing like a boy and not a girl, and must make it go where I sent it, and not fall at my feet and foolishly laugh at it. If I would drive a nail, strike it fairly on the head every time, and not split the board. ”

“ I recall no season of dolls, and believe they were never included in my curriculum.
Meantime, I fell heir to my mother’s side saddle, a beautiful piece of workmanship, and with some difficulty learned to adjust myself to it, a rather useless adjustment it seemed to me at the time, which opinion I still entertain.
40These were years of change in the family. My brothers had become of age and were young men of strength, character and enterprise. They had “bought out” as the term went, the two large farms of my father, and commenced business in earnest for themselves. ”

“ The younger, David, from his physical activity and daring, was always selected for any feat of danger to be performed.
These were days when even buildings were “raised by hand.” All the neighborhood was expected to participate 79in a “raising.” Upon one occasion, an uncommonly large barn, with what was then still more uncommon, a cellar beneath, was to be raised. The rafters must be affixed to the ridgepole, and David Barton was assigned to this duty. ”

“ Anticipating the deep, forbidding snows of the winter in New England, we had the custom of celebrating Thanksgiving day by a final party for the season. Even this was cold and had often some traces of snow.
On the present occasion there were but three of us, Martha, Eveline and 92myself. Martha had a fine sorrel trotter, Eveline a spirited single-footer. The day was cold and threatening. Our ride was to Worcester, some ten miles. When about three miles from home, on our return, a blinding snowstorm set in, literally a gale. ”

“ The painter brought his massive white marble slab, ground his own paints, mixed his colors, boiled his oil, calcined his plaster, made his putty and did scores of things that a painter of to-day would not only never think of doing, but would often scarcely know how to do. ”

“ From never having had any playmates, I now found myself one of a very lively body of six—three boys and three girls nearer of an age than would have been probable in the same family. My father had taken charge of the young 54son of a friend—Lovett Stimpson—a fine, robust, intelligent lad of about my age, who lived with us. ”

“ Fowler replied that these characteristics were all indicated; that, however much her friends might suffer from them, she would always suffer more. “They may be apparently outgrown, but the sensitive nature will always remain. She will never 114assert herself for herself—she will suffer wrong first—but for others she will be perfectly fearless.” To my mother’s anxious question, “what shall I do?” he replied, “Throw responsibility upon her. She has all the qualities of a teacher. As soon as her age will permit, give her a school to teach.” ”

“ I was in constant dread of doing something wrong, and one Sunday afternoon I 44was sure I had found my occasion. It was early spring. The tender leaves had put out and with them the buds and half open blossoms of the little cinnamon roses, an unfailing ornamentation of a well kept New England home of that day. The children of the family had gathered in the front yard, admiring the roses and daring to pick each a little bouquet. As I stood holding mine, the heavy door at my back swung open, and there was the colonel, in his long, light dressing gown and slippers, direct from his study. ”

“ Among the animals of the farm was a huge old ram, that doubtless upon some occasion had taught me to respect 15him, and of which I had a mortal fear. My terrors transformed those rising, rolling clouds into a whole heaven full of angry rams, marching down upon me. ”

“ For the present it is enough to say that each one manifested an increasing personal interest in the newcomer, and as soon as developments permitted, set about instructing her in the various directions most in accord with the tastes and pursuits of each. ”

“ The firm of my brothers, S. & D. Barton, had added to their ever increasing business the manufacture of cloth. A factory had been erected and a partnership entered into with Messrs. Paul and Samuel Parsons, two elegant gentlemen among the earlier manufacturers of satinet in this country, and the new factory was known as “The Satinet Mill of North 101Oxford.” ”

“ At length he showed symptoms of fever; the family physician was called, and here commenced a system of medical treatment quite unknown to our physicians of the present day, other than as results of historical research and milestones of scientific advancement.
He was pronounced in a “settled fever,” which must not be “broken up,” and could only be held in check by reducing the strength of the patient. He had “too much blood,” was “too vigorous,” “just the patient for a fever to ‘go hard with,’” it was said. ”