“ Certainly the winters of New England began earlier and were more severe than they have seemed at a later period. After the fervid heat of summer has become subdued by the progressive changes of the season, no atmosphere could be clearer, purer, more exhilarating than the prevailing tone of our October days, and this kindly influence, as if by way of preparing the human frame for the gradual approach of winter, generally extends, with occasional stormy intermissions, through November, and often very far into the frosty domain of December itself. And such snow-storms as we once endured! ”

“ It is pleasant to think of the groups that in the olden time clustered around them; charming people, whom we know by tradition, and who are remembered by many associations.
The house possesses various other apartments of size and pretension, and has answered well the needs of the successive generations that have occupied it, not only as a spacious and commodious abode, but one sufficiently elegant to satisfy the advancing standards of taste and refinement. ”

“ I recall, with vivid recollection, the figure of one of these worthies who called himself an “Independent,” as he proceeded to meeting on a Sunday: his high cocked hat, his flowing, black curled locks,—more in the cavalier than the Puritan fashion; his long blue cloak over his clerical gown, his bands, his knee-breeches,—objected to by a fastidious young lady, as “short pantaloons,”—his square shoe-buckles, and his ponderous cane. His person was somewhat short and thick, whence “lewd fellows of the baser sort” sometimes irreverently called him the “The Jack of Clubs.” ”

“ But, half a generation before, the town had been one of the 134 most flourishing and wealthy in New England, and to the counting-houses of its principal merchants young men resorted, even from the capital of the State, to learn the art and practice of business. Those who filled the several learned professions were persons of the highest eminence in their several callings,—drawing pupils around them who afterwards, and on wider fields of action, attained great names and some of whom occupied the loftiest civil positions in the land. ”

“ In maritime towns, at a season of the year when there is no inducement for them to wander into the fields, boys who have nothing else to do, on play-days, are very apt to lounge, more or less, on the wharves and in the Market Place. When quite a youngster, I witnessed a scene on the spot last named, the incidents of which are as vivid in my memory as at the moment when they occurred, more than half a century ago. ”

“ The better feelings of our nature were, I think, deeper, than when scattered over a wide but thin social surface; just as the water in a well is more concentrated, than if diffused in the basin of a pond. ”

“ I know not how it is, but suppose it to be the expected revelation of incidents, as in the plot of a novel, which draws crowds together, in most uncomfortable contiguity in a courtroom, whenever a culprit, especially one of more than usually notorious antecedents, is put upon his trial. While most of the old-fashioned lawyers of the Essex Bar were more than respectable for professional acquisitions and legal skill, there were persons among them of distinguished ability 84 and character; and real eloquence seldom fails to prove peculiarly fascinating to youthful hearers. ”

“ Sometimes, New England has been spoken of as devoid of the elements of romance; but perhaps this idea may be owing to the fact, that the means of presenting a different aspect of the case have not been sufficiently investigated. A similar impression has prevailed in respect to Roman history and literature, whether fabulous or otherwise; and the fathers of New England, at least, have been thought to have exhibited some of the traits, especially the simplicity and severity of character, which distinguished those more ancient worthies, whose names and deeds have been so long famous. ”

“ Stories in the country, especially those involving any extraordinary incidents, sometimes fly faster than in town, and accordingly these young rebels forewarned, no doubt, of the peril in prospect, prepared themselves, as well as they could, to resist the more formidable invasion presently to be expected. Before daylight, one morning, the mustered force of some twenty men, variously armed, led by the valiant sheriff’s officer, cautiously drew near the premises, in the hope of catching the culprits asleep. ”

“ The town in which we lived was one of the very oldest of the New England settlements. Its situation is uncommonly beautiful, upon a slope descending from a moderately elevated ridge towards the bank of a noble river, which of late years has furnished more motive power to various manufacturing establishments in the towns and villages, which have sprung up on its borders, than any other stream in the world. ”

“ The bewildered chaise-maker hastened home to examine his paper anew; and it appeared, on inquiry, that the account of his decease was printed only in his own copy; a gloomy jest, which was soon much relished by the community.
Indeed, the town became for a time a noted place for the publication of standard works, and books of various descriptions. It was here that the well-known Mr. Edmund M. Blunt, who subsequently removed to the city of New York, published his valuable and famous “American Coast Pilot,” and, afterwards, the no less useful “Practical Navigator.” ”

“ I could recall not a few instances in which, under the impulse of political resentment, passion got the better of judgment. One day, the marshal of the United States, in his cocked hat and with other official insignia, entered the tavern I have mentioned, in quest of a fugitive from justice. He inquired of a person whom he met in the public apartment, if he had lately seen one Captain E——, who, it seems, on some supposed provocation, had only thrown a custom-house officer into the dock in one of our eastern harbors. ”

“ The citizens of the old town were pretty thorough Puritans, by inheritance and inclination, at the middle of the last century. But the minister of the First Church was, in his day, a gentleman noted for his liberal tastes and accomplishments. He had a picture painted on a broad panel over the fire-place of his library, representing himself and several others of the cloth sitting around a table, in the full canonicals of wig, gown, and band, before each a foaming mug of ale, and each supplied with a tobacco pipe from which rolled volumes of narcotic fumes. ”

“ But to the veritable story of “Old Grouse in the Gun-room.” It seems, according to the narrative of Mrs. Johnson, that the 150 family of Mr. Featherston were seated at the tea-table, at the close of a chilly day, a bright fire blazing on the hearth, and the servants, as usual, being in attendance. On a sudden, a tremendous crash was heard in a distant part of the ancient mansion, followed by a succession of wails of the most lugubrious and unearthly character, which reverberated through the echoing passage-ways of the house. ”

“ But the Revolutionary War exhausted the fortunes of many prosperous men of the day; and the story is told of one very rich merchant, who could drive in his own carriage several days’ journey—when such a journey over difficult roads was hardly so much as could be accomplished by “the hollow, pampered jades of Asia,”—and sleep in his own house every night. ”

“ In fact, the son of an extremely poor Vermont farmer became, by his own energy and integrity, the possessor of a competent fortune, which enabled him, with 40 views far surpassing the immediate claims of this transitory world, to build a church and to establish a flourishing educational institution, destined long, I trust, to dispense infinite blessings to future generations. ”

“ In the early days of the colony, these phenomena were not uncommon, and are said to have been of no little power in this part of New England. Uncle Richard described the recent one as rumbling under the frozen ground leading to his barns, as if a line of heavily-loaded wagons had rolled over it. Being something of a philosopher, and better educated than usual at the time, he explained the cause of such physical occurrences to us young ones.
“The fact is,” he said, “the water in certain parts of the earth becomes intensely heated and lets off a quantity of steam of amazing expansive power. ”

“ With the exception of some failure of physical powers, towards the close of his life, he retained these admirable characteristics and accomplishments to the end of his more than ninety years. He always preached in gown and bands, with black gloves upon his hands, his nether limbs encased in small-clothes and silk stockings, until in later life he adopted the prevailing mode. We always knew when he intended to preach, because through several intervening yards and gardens we could see from our house the light in his study, at a distance, of a Saturday night. ”

“ Then came the pinch—we as little children had to flee to the woods to get something to sustain life—no schools, no meetings—nothing but hunger and despair. I lived with my Father until I was twenty-one years old. ”

“ So, at 6 first, in the days of the declining trade of the town, they said the obstruction to its commerce was owing to the sand-bar at the mouth of the river. But the bar had been there from time immemorial; and though it is true that modern-built vessels, with their cargoes, could not pass that barrier, as ships of lesser tonnage were formerly accustomed to do, yet the main cause for this decay of business was to be found in the growth of the capital of the State, and the greater facilities for the transaction of business which exist in larger than in smaller places. ”

“ I linger somewhat longer and lovingly upon this preliminary part of whatever story I may have to tell, because I am aware of nothing in the literature of New England which furnishes precisely similar reminiscences, and because pictures of past manners, if truthfully portrayed, can hardly fail to be both interesting and useful. We heard plentiful stories, in our youth, of a higher style of living in colonial days, of coaches kept by the upper class of citizens ”

“ His recent contributions to that excellent periodical, “The New England Historical and Genealogical Register,” which has become of inestimable value, as a collection of facts illustrative of early New England history and biography, have given great pleasure to multitudes of readers,—especially his vivid and graphic descriptions of certain ancient and storied mansions in Boston and Cambridge, and of their former inhabitants. Let us hope that researches of such abundant interest and value will soon claim and gain a still larger share of the public attention in a collected form. ”

“ A constable had appeared with an execution against one of the young Lowes, in the matter of a claim which he disputed as unjust; but without giving the peace-officer opportunity to discharge his duty, he was driven from the ground by the trio, in mortal terror of his life. The execution of the process was then undertaken by a somewhat fantastic country deputy sheriff; who was ordered off as he attempted to approach the parties in defence, and between them and the officer there was a good deal of raillery, which had an important bearing upon the final result of the trial. ”

“ Imagine a lonely country-house, a quiet 151 and well-ordered family seated at their evening meal, after dark, of a somewhat gloomy day, the apartment imperfectly lighted by the glowing fire, and according to such conveniences for the purpose as old times ordinarily afforded ”

“ When I was a little over twenty-one I got me a wife—we was both Poor—three knifes, three forks, three teacups, three chairs, a poor bed—hardly could we keep house. But our courage was good—my wife always standing by me, through all my trouble and trials—shoulder to shoulder—heart & hand, from the day of our marriage until the day of her Death. No man never had a better wife than I had—always kind to the Poor and to all her relations. ”

“ Indeed, about the same period, while I was a student at a famous Academy not many miles distant from our own home, the English teacher, an orthodox clergyman of high repute, who cultivated a few acres of land at the place where he lived on the outskirts of the town, invited a few of the pupils, myself in the number, to assist him in making hay, one play-afternoon. ”