Truro, Massachusetts

“ The Truro fishermen, like the rest, laid by{369} their harpoons, and melted up their mackerel leads for bullets. From one village of twenty-three houses, twenty-eight men gave up their lives for liberty. In religion, too, Truro had the courage of her convictions, building the first Methodist meeting-house on the Cape, the second in New England. The cardinal temptation of Cape Cod is Sunday fishing, and Truro righteousness was never put more sharply to the pinch than in 1834, when a prodigious school of blackfish appeared off Great Hollow one autumnal Sabbath morning. ”

“ In that year, with the assistance of his wife, Catherine Fisher, daughter of William Fulpitt of Truro, to whom he was married in February 1821, and who brought him a handsome fortune, he set up in Truro on his own account as a maltster and hop-dealer, and built himself a house in Pydar Street. ”

“ As the afternoon wore on to tea-time, we came into Truro, along a broad and surprisingly well-kept237 highway. But never a sight was there of the city until we had reached the hillside, where its outskirts of villas straggle into the country, detached and semi-detached, with lawns and flower-beds and gravel-paths, ah! so neat and clean-swept, all of them bearing the most high-falutin’ names. Truro is folded away from distant sight, in between the hills, where the Fal ceases its navigable course.
Truro is admirably situated, but the city does not do justice to its site. ”

“ The name "Truro" is thought to be derived either from Tru-ru, the three streets, or Tre-rhiw, the village on the slope (of the river) . There is a general impression that Truro is on the river Fal, but the truth is that the triangular piece of land on which the city stands, is washed on the east by the river Allen, and on the west by the Kenwyn. Between these two streams lies modern Truro, with its stately cathedral rising high above [Pg 20] the houses that surround it. Truro's most eminent son, Samuel Foote, was born in 1720 at the town house of his father's family, the Footes of Lambesso. ”

“ Acadian French once lived here, but the real settlement of Truro dates from a few years after the “Expulsion.”
Truro is a very pleasant inland town in which to spend a vacation. There is beautiful and romantic country on every hand, with excellent roads. The fishing round about is fair; the hunting, in season, excellent. There are many interesting places within easy reach, both by road and rail; and the town offers a pleasant social life that is very enjoyable for those who like to summer in a country town where comfort and some variety in life may be had. ”

“ TRURO, a city, municipal borough, and port of Cornwall, England, is situated on a kind of peninsula formed by the rivers Allen and Kenwyn, which below the town unite with a branch of Falmouth harbour called Truro creek or river. Truro is 300 miles south-west of London by the Great Western Railway, and 11 north of Falmouth, to which there is a branch line. The town is regularly built, chiefly of granite, with spacious streets, through the principal of which there flows a stream of water. ”

“ I know no place at which an Englishman may drop down suddenly among a pleasanter circle of acquaintance, or find himself with a more clever set of men, than he can do at Boston. I confess that in this respect I think that but few towns are at present more fortunately circumstanced than the capital of the Bay State, as Massachusetts is called, and that very few towns make a better use of their advantages. Boston has a right to be proud of what it has done for the world of letters. ”

“ Some say that the piskies still haunt the woods and fields around Trefronick, but that they only show themselves to children and grown-ups of simple, trusting nature. Anyhow, those that wish to try to see them may reach the place where the lost child was spirited away in an hour and a half's walk from Truro, Cornwall's cathedral city, which is at the head of one of the most beautiful rivers in the world.
The trip from Truro down the Truro river and the Fal to Falmouth at any time of the year is a pleasurable experience that can never be forgotten. Truro is an ideal centre for South Cornwall. ”

“ Truro was the town in which many of the local gentry spent the winter. This custom of the counties, if it made for insularity rather than a cosmopolitan culture, has given many of our old market-places, round the square of which the commodious homes were built, an air of quiet dignity. The gentry themselves, old people at their cards and supper-parties, young people at their routs and balls, must have found it more enjoyable—all friends and neighbours and very often connections—than the present-day fashion of a dip into the whirlpool of London. ”

“ Not that I should not rejoice to have you and Brown or C. sitting there also. I am not sure that C. really wishes to go now; and as I go simply for the medicine of it, I should not think it worth the while to notify him when I am about to take my bitters. Since I began this, or within five minutes, I have begun to think that I will start for Truro next Saturday morning, the 30th. I do not know at what 255 hour the packet leaves Boston, nor exactly what kind of accommodation I shall find at Truro. ”

“ These dimensions are adequate for a noble city, for a city to contain a million of inhabitants. It is impossible to state with accuracy the actual population of Washington, for it fluctuates exceedingly. The place is very full during Congress, and very empty during the recess. By which I mean it to be understood that those streets, which are blessed with houses, are full when Congress meets. I do not think that Congress makes much difference to Massachusetts Avenue. I believe that the city never contains as many as eighty thousand, and that its permanent residents are less than sixty thousand. ”

“ In the time of the Civil War Truro was garrisoned for the King, but in 1646, after a fierce engagement between the Royalists under Sir Ralph Hopton and Cromwell's forces under Sir Thomas Fairfax, a treaty was signed at Tresillian River Bridge (a pretty place which we had passed last night, about three miles outside the town on the St. Austell road) , by which Truro was surrendered quietly to the Parliament.
The Grammar School, where many eminent men had been educated, was founded in 1549. ”

“ Federal law, and indeed the original constitution, plainly declare that fugitive slaves shall be given up by the free-soil States. Massachusetts proclaims herself to be specially a federal, law-loving State. But every man in Massachusetts knows that no judge, no sheriff, no magistrate, no policeman in that State would at this time, or then, when that civil war was beginning, have lent a hand in any way to the rendition of a fugitive slave. ”

“ It is here in Truro, on the staircase of the museum in Pydar Street: a burly figure in scarlet, with a face that tries to be fierce but cannot hide its tenderness and humour. This is Sir Bevill Grenville’s giant henchman, who [125] fought at his master’s side at Stratton and Lansdowne, and taught the children to ride and shoot.
A fine road leads from Truro to Falmouth, through hilly but beautiful country; by pine-woods, and distant views, and the green flats of the estuary, and a valley full of trees. ”

“ And it may here be remarked that large as is the State of New York, and great as is its population, its Senate is less numerous than that of many other States. In Massachusetts, for instance, there are forty senators, though the population of Massachusetts is barely one third that of New York. In Virginia there are fifty senators, whereas the free population is not one third of that of New York. As a consequence the Senate of New York is said to be filled with men of a higher class than are generally found in the Senates of other States. ”

“ All the region between Fredericksburg and Richmond seems not only almost uninhabited now, but always to have been so,—at least to the eye familiar with New-England farms and villages. But one must forget the thriving and energetic North when he enters a country stamped with the dark seal of slavery. Large and fertile Virginia, with eight times the area of Massachusetts, scarcely equals in population that barren little State. The result is, that, where Southern State pride sees prosperous settlements, the travelling Yankee discovers little more than uncultivated wastes. ”

“ This town appears to have been a place of some consequence even prior to the Conquest, and, 45according to Leland, once possessed a Castle, and enjoyed many privileges. Truro has returned members to Parliament since the reign of Edward I.: the right of election, however, like most other Boroughs in this county, is confided to the privileged few: the Mayor and others of the Corporation, to the number of 18 or 20, are the only voters. ”

“ In no other city is there a population so mixed and cosmopolitan in their modes of life. And yet in no other city that I have seen are there such strong and ever-visible characteristics of the social and political bearings of the nation to which it belongs. New York appears to me as infinitely more American than Boston, Chicago, or Washington. It has no peculiar attribute of its own, as have those three cities; Boston in its literature and accomplished intelligence, Chicago in its internal trade, and Washington in its congressional and State politics. ”

“ Indeed, one who has seen every house in Truro will be surprised to hear of the number of the inhabitants, but perhaps five hundred of the men and boys of this small town were then abroad on their fishing-grounds. Only a few men stay at home to till the sand or watch for blackfish. The farmers are fishermen-farmers and understand better ploughing the sea than the land. They do not disturb their sands much, though there is a plenty of sea-weed in the creeks, to say nothing of blackfish occasionally rotting on the shore. ”

“ There is something of the magniloquence of the French style,—of the liberty, equality, and fraternity mode of eloquence,—in the preambles of most of these constitutions, which, but for their success, would have seemed to have prophesied loudly of failure. Those of New York and Pennsylvania are the least so, and that of Massachusetts by far the most violently magniloquent. They generally commence by thanking God for the present civil and religious liberty of the people, and by declaring that all men are born free and equal. ”

“ We went up the Truro, which is beautiful,—something like the Tamar, but almost finer, though not so bold as Pentillie Castle and Cothele,—winding between banks entirely wooded with stunted oak, and full of numberless creeks. The prettiest are King Harry’s Ferry and a spot near Tregothnan (Lord [212] Falmouth’s) , where there is a beautiful little boat-house, quite in the woods, and on the river, at the point where the Tregony separates from the Truro. Albert said the position of this boat-house put him in mind of Tell’s Chapel in Switzerland. ”

“ Do you suppose that that Massachusetts which is now doing these things- which hesitates to crown these men, some of whose lawyers, and even judges, perchance, may be driven to take refuge in some poor quibble, that they may not wholly outrage their instinctive sense of justice- do you suppose that she is anything but base and servile? that she is the champion of liberty? ”

“ And at this time his class of small farmers made perhaps more than half the population in any one of the Cape towns except those, like Truro, where practically every man in the community “went to sea”—simple, industrious creatures, who lived comfortably by another standard than ours, and were not unmindful of larger interests than their own. ”

“ At Truro, as late as 1774, the house of a Whig doctor was attacked, and many still refused to employ him; a parson, for receiving a number of prominent Whigs, was admonished by some of his parishioners. At Barnstable the parties had their headquarters in rival taverns; and at Sturgis’s, where Whigs met every evening to comment on the news, the discussion, running high between moderates and radicals, sometimes slopped over into action. ”

“ Austell in Cornwall, getting up evidence on mining customs in the duchy, and in April 1832 settled at Truro, where he practised as solicitor for many years, and played an active part as a liberal in local politics. ”

“ The inhabitants of Concord are not prepared to stand by one of their own bridges, but talk only of taking up a position on the highlands beyond the Yellowstone River. Our Buttricks and Davises and Hosmers are retreating thither, and I fear that they will leave no Lexington Common between them and the enemy. There is not one slave in Nebraska; there are perhaps a million slaves in Massachusetts. ”

“ Truro—Stellarton (Pictou) —Antigonish—Guysboro—Mulgrave—Canso—Arichat.
The "sights" of Truro may be compassed in half a day. They include the natural forest park called for Queen Victoria, and the Government Farm of 220 acres. The recreation woods, of which the town is quite justly vain, are beyond the outskirts. Except for the laying of walks, the building of rustic spans and climbing stairways, man has intruded little of his handiwork in this shrine of trees and hurrying brooks. ”

“ Ho, then, people of the Bay State,—men, women, and children; children, women, and men, scattered friends of the friendless, wheresoever ye inhabit,—if habitations ye have, as such friends have not always,—along the sea-beat border of Old Essex and the Puritan Landing, and up beyond sight of the sea-cloud, among the inland hills, where the sun rises and sets upon the dry land, in that vale of the Connecticut, too fair for human content and too fertile for virtuous industry,—where deepens the haughtiest of earth's streams, on its seaward way, proud with the pride of old Massachusetts. ”

“ What is he to the lovers of flowers in Massachusetts? If named after a man, it must be a man of flowers. Rhode Island may as well name the flowers after her governors as New York. Name your canals and railroads after Clinton, if you please, but his name is not associated with flowers.
The buckbean grows in Conant's meadow. Lambkill is out. I remember with what delight I used to discover this flower in dewy mornings. All things in this world must be seen with the morning dew on them, must be seen with youthful, early opened, hopeful eyes. ”