Henry Hiram Riley

“ There is a philosophy that underlies the dignity of Longbow, the humor of Turtle, the rough sincerity of Aunt Sonora, the stormy and eccentric eloquence of Bigelow. Do you not think so?
Puddleford was like a thousand other new settlements—it had its green state to pass through; and Puddleford's pioneers were like other pioneers—rough, honest, hardy, strong in common sense, but weak in the books. It was not a perfect organization, packed beforehand with men fitted to all the stations of life, like Hooker and his band. ”

“ Custom, habit, society, immemorial usage, hang no dead-weights upon the young and ambitious. All start from the same line, the prize is aloft in full view, and he who first reaches it creates his own precedence.
If there is no past to hallow and chasten the people of a new country, no permanent present to hold them to one spot, so in one sense there is no future. There is no locality that is adorned and beautified for coming years—no spot designated to become venerable to posterity—no tree nursed and protected in memory of him who planted it—no ground consecrated for the burial of the dead. ”

“ There were no startling events to disturb any person's serenity—no rise or fall of stocks—no fires—no crashes in business—no downfall of pride—no bustle in the streets about the latest news—no nothing. The world moved on as monotonous as the tick-tick of a clock.
The gray of each morning was first heralded by a famous rooster, which I had imported from the east. He blew his clarion voice at about four, and I used to lie and hear its echoes wander away off through the streets of Puddleford, until they finally expired in the wilderness. ”

“ This class do not, by any means, constitute the backbone of New England. The enterprise that breaks through her mountains, upheaves her valleys, and sends the iron horse on its way—creates the roar of machinery that reverberates among her hills—grasps with, and battles for, the public questions of the day—pours a tide of life and energy into everything around—which makes itself felt through the long arms of commerce in every part of the world, and whose touch electrifies every mart—this enterprise is born, and quickened, and sustained somewhere else. ”

“ Knots of soldiers gathered about the tavern, and made a circle for the music to practise, preparatory to the great come-off. Then came the good old continental tunes that were full of fight, played by old fifers and drummers that had been through the wars; men who made a solemn and earnest thing of martial music—who reverenced it as the sacred voice of liberty, not to be trifled with, who thought of Bunker Hill until the tears started from their eyes. Those old airs, that used to echo among the mountains of New England—where are they? ”

“ They must be reached through the pulpit by such means as will reach them. Of what importance is a nice theological distinction with them? Of what force a labored pulpit disquisition? They have great vices and strong virtues. Their vices must be smitten and scattered with a sledge-hammer; they are not to be played with in a flourish of rhetoric. Just such a human tornado as Bigelow is the man for the place; he may commit some mischief, but he will leave behind him a purer moral atmosphere and a serener sky.
Society, in such a place as Puddleford, is cultivated very much like its soil. ”

“ There was a vast deal of happiness in Puddleford. I do not now remember one nervous woman in the place. Think of that. If refinement brings its joys, it often covers a delicate, sensitive nature; but there was nobody delicate or sensitive at Puddleford; nobody went into fits because a rat crossed the floor, or a spider swung itself down in their way. The evening air was never too damp, nor the morning sun too oppressive. Labor made the people hardy, and an over-taxed brain hatched no bugbears. ”

“ There warn't any houzens, nor any roads to travel on, nor no white folks but Venison Styles, and some other hunters who are gone away now; nor anything to live on; and nothin' to be heard nights but the varmints screamin'," said Mrs. Brown, laying down her knitting-work, and shoving up her spectacles with a convulsive twitch, for she was getting eloquent. "There warn't a pound of meat for fifty miles round—no pork for love nor money—and so we cut down a place, and built a log shanty, and liv'd on deer meat, for deers were as thick as hops all over." ”

“ If New England is slow and methodical, she is strong. She moves in close phalanx upon any public question or duty. The very bonds of habit which pervade all, and all alike, concentrate and intensify her action. Her people act in a mass towards one point. They strike through organizations which are gigantic and reverend with age. The Church gathers the energies and means of the benevolent. Public opinion is harmonious about public ends. And this very fixedness of society enables its members to push forward with a unity and strength almost omnipotent. ”

“ He always grew serious as the great militia muster drew on. He went away off by himself, into the chamber, where he could be alone with the spirits of his forefathers, and burnished up his sword, shook out the dust from his regimentals—warned his children to stand out of the way—and looked ferociously at his wife. He knew he was Major Boles, and he knew every other respectable man knew it.
But Major-General Peabody was the greatest general I ever saw. When a boy, I looked upon him as a very blood-thirsty man, and nothing would have induced me to go near him. ”

“ Her solemn mountains, lone lakes—her rushing streams, that dart like arrows from her precipices—the roar of her cataracts, amid her rugged gorges—her long and tranquil reaches of valley—the cold, solemn, and quiet pictures of Nature that she mingles and groups on her canvas, give soul and spirit to the people who are nursed upon her soil; and they, too, grow gigantic, like the objects around them—patriotism, integrity, firmness, germinate and become athletic in such fastnesses: Liberty last expires upon the mountains. ”

“ And then there are the hills, and streams, and waterfalls, that shed their music through our boyish souls, until they became a part of our very existence. No man ever lived who entirely forgot these things, suppressed though they might be by the cares and anxieties of maturer years. And no circumstance so likely to bring them all up, glowing afresh, as a removal to a new country. Of course, no one was attached to Puddleford, as a locality, any more than the wandering Arab is attached to the particular spot where he pitches his tent and feeds his camels. ”

“ I cannot attempt to describe the Puddleford of to-day. Ike Turtle is old and gray, but his children hold high positions in society and state. Some of them have Ike's thorny, sharp genius, but toned down by education and cultivation into method and power. Squire Longbow totters around on his staff, tries over his old cases with anybody who will listen to him, repeats his decisions of fifteen years ago, quotes Ike's jokes, and sums up all the testimony for the fortieth time to his weary listeners. ”

“ The pioneer severs all connection between himself and the past when he enters upon his work. I have already remarked that Puddleford had no past. He breaks all local ties, and snaps in twain the golden threads that link him to his home. The caravan that winds away from the old hearth-stone, where the first kiss was imprinted, the first prayer offered, where the winter cricket sang as the tempest roared without, and devotes itself to a wilderness, leaves behind what can never be found again. ”

“ Reader, there are mental pictures in the wilderness, as vivid as any in nature. They are the pictures of the past. They haunt the pioneer by day and by night. They go with him over the fields—sit down with him by the streams—linger around his evening hearth, and rise up in his dreams.
I was born in New England. The village was very old, and had received and discharged generations of men. Some two centuries ago, a troop of iron-sided old pilgrims, full of theology and man's rights, an offshoot of a larger body, with their pastor at their head, founded the place, and gave it tone and direction. ”

“ Squire Longbow was very sincere in his position which he had so confidently taken. He had been so long a magistrate, and "head man" of Puddleford, and he had been so closely identified with its public affairs, that he felt himself always in court, and every personal insult was construed by him into a contempt. Turtle humored the weakness of the old man, when his dignity was in jeopardy, and on this occasion he felt no alarm, for he knew that the fine would never be collected. Turtle owed the Squire more fines already than he was worth. ”

“ A dark, gloomy hall—an enormous fireplace, extending across the whole end of a room—a quaint pair of andirons, which run up very high and prim, and turn back like a hook, with a dog's head growling on each tip. There are strange pictures on the walls, which have been preserved in memory of the past—Moses leading the Children of Israel through the Wilderness—Samson slaying the Lion—David cutting off the head of Goliath—stern shadows of the men who used to study them—not very remarkable works of art, but vivid outlines of the scenes themselves. ”

“ Puddleford was, of course, in confusion; men, women, and children turned out with kettles and pans, into the "bush;" and one would have supposed, from the clouds of smoke that rolled over the tops of the trees, that a tribe of gypsies had camped there. The girls, dressed in linsey-woolsey, were boisterous; the boys, uproarious; and a whole army of dogs, full of the spirit of the occasion, stormed around, barking at every deer track, and tore all the rotten logs in pieces. ”

“ Puddleford prospered, nevertheless. Every man was right upon the question of civil and religious liberty. Each person brought this law with him, written on his soul; and, however clumsily he might give it expression, the law was there, and he could not rid himself of it any more than he could throw off his nature. If Longbow administered the details of jurisprudence awkwardly, Longbow was, after all, right in leading principles. If Longbow at times trampled down technicalities, the community, on the average, did not suffer. ”

“ Perhaps the reader is disposed to smile at my description of a Puddleford tea-party. Perhaps he thinks the ingenuousness of Aunt Sonora, the free-and-easy humor of Ike Turtle, the peevish jealousy of Mrs. Bird, are the fruit simply of what he terms "western vulgarity." Don't be too fast, my friend. You belong, perhaps, to a society that wears a mask—made up, nevertheless, of "envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness." ”

“ Sometimes, a keen, frosty night would be succeeded by a still, sunny day, when the eaves pattered their sleepy music, and the cows strayed away into the forest, as though they smelt approaching spring—when the cats flew out of the house, and chased each other up into the trees, and the dog went away by himself, wandering along the river-banks for reasons known only to himself. ”

“ Then came a long, warm, still rain—and the frogs shouted to each other their melancholy music—and the grass and the roots that were soaking in the marshes sent out their sweetness—the bud began to swell on the willow—the geese gathered in a procession, with some pompous gander at its head, and marched to the river—and the barn-yard fowls climbed up into trees, on top of the sheds and stacks, and cackled, and crowed, and clucked, and chatted together, like so many guests at a party. ”

“ Ike Turtle used to say, "'twas fun to stand and take the fire of fools;" but Squire Longbow's dignity was so profound, that he never permitted himself to know that there was really any war going on.
Society in the country, among the farmers, was quite another thing. Puddleford village had a country, and village pride looked down upon it, just as it does in larger places. The amusements and frolics of the country were more simple and hearty. In the winter, husking-bees, apple-parings, and house-warmings were held every week at some of the farm-houses. ”

“ If we are disposed to smile at the rusticity of a Puddleford church, may we not with equal reason become serious over the overgrown refinement of many another? May not something be learned in the very contrast which is thus afforded? ”

“ I called his attention to the oak over which he shed a tear, and by degrees drew him along to the time when the axe and the plough would change the whole face of the country around us into hamlets, green pastures, and waving fields of grain. The old man looked solemn. The subject was not pleasant to him—he heaved a sigh, and said, finally, "'Tis all the same! 'tis all the same with me! I shall be under the ground then! I don't wanter live to see it."
He rallied, and went on—"They've enymost spilt it now. When I was young, I could see a deer a mile away—no underbrush to shade my rifle. ”

“ I will premise by saying that it is expected that persons who are on their feet during these visitations, give up their time and means to those who are not. There is a nobleness of soul in a western community in this respect that does honor to human nature. A village is one great family—every member must be provided for—old grudges are, for the time, buried.
I have now a very vivid remembrance of seeing Sile Bates, one bright October morning, walking through the main street of Puddleford, at the pace of a funeral procession, his old winter overcoat on, and a faded shawl tied about his cheeks. ”

“ I recollected what hosts came thronging in, on all sides, roaring like a tempest, and how they piled themselves upon the top of each other upon the boughs like swarming bees—and how all night the trees bent and cracked with the crowded population, who seemed continually treading upon each other's toes, and tumbling each other's beds—and how, when the day dawned, they all dissolved, and winged their way to the plains, and the troubled city was as silent as fallen Babylon.
I like the pigeon. He has a business-way, and a way of minding his own business. He is always doing something. ”

“ Longbow created a great chasm in society. The "settlement" was so small, that the loss of any one was severely felt. In small places, every person has a great deal of individuality—in large, only here and there is one distinguished from "the crowd." Mrs. Longbow was certainly fortunate in one respect, if she was unfortunate in another. If the physicians of Puddleford hastened her end, its population have not forgotten her, nor her many virtues. ”