CHAPTER V.
HE CHOOSES A PROFESSION.
"Here let us breathe, and happily introduce a course of learning, and ingenious studies."—Shakspeare.
"The whole world cannot again prick out five such, take each one in his vein."—Idem.
Having thus completed his classical studies, and come off, as we have seen, with the customary academic honors, the next subject of consideration at the domestic fireside was the choice of a profession. His parents were not only conscientious people, but sincerely religious, and really desirous of doing good. They would, therefore, have preferred making him a clergyman, had he given evidence of piety. But such was not the fact. He was truly amiable in his disposition, of grave and quiet manners, and of sound morality. Still, they could not think of thrusting their son into the sacerdotal office, as is oftentimes the practice with regard to younger sons in foreign parts, merely as a trade to get a living by, while the head only is engaged in the work, and the heart has neither part nor lot in the matter. Some other profession was therefore necessary; and as his good parents were religiously opposed to the quarrelsome profession of the law, the choice was necessarily directed to that of medicine. In the sequel it will be seen, that, let people be ever so conscientious, they are obnoxious to great errors in the education of their children, and equally liable with others to err in the selection of that walk of life, or profession, for which they are least adapted by character or capacity.
But to proceed. Law and divinity being out of the question, it was resolved, in family council, that Daniel should become a disciple of Galen, and acquire the art of compounding simples, and healing the various diseases which flesh is heir to. He was accordingly entered in the office of an eminent medical gentleman, in one of the most beautiful cities which adorn the banks of the majestic Hudson. I will not be so particular as to name the place, lest other towns should be moved to jealousy. Each of the seven cities that contended for the honor of giving birth to Homer, was as well off as though each was actually entitled to it—whereas, had the point been settled, six of them would not have been worth living in; rent-free. There is another reason for not being too particular. Although, unlike Byron, I have no fear of being taken for the hero of my own tale, yet were I to bring matters too near their homes, but too many of the real characters of my narrative might be identified. Suffice it, then, to say of the location—Ilium fuit!
Immediately after his induction into the office of his Æsculapian Mentor, Daniel becameDoctor Wheelwright—and through all the subsequent vicissitudes of his life, and all the changes of his pursuits, and they have neither been few nor unimportant, the title has adhered to him until this day.
I have already said that his personal appearance was good, a circumstance which of course was not at all to his disadvantage. His first business in his new station, was the selection of a genteel boarding-house, the purchase of a new and fashionable suit of clothes, and a snuff-box. Ever partial to the society of ladies, he was assiduous in his efforts to cultivate their acquaintance, especially of those among them who were of a literary turn. Chief of the female literati of the town, was a lady of no certain age, but of great pretensions, whose hose were deeplyazure. With her he became quite intimate, and she found his services particularly convenient, in sending to the circulating library for books, and in other respects in which it was found he could render himself useful; and he in turn was never more truly happy than when obeying the behests of a blue of such celebrity. These preliminary arrangements occupied about three or four months of the first year, during which he could of course have but little time to attend to his books. He did, however, make a beginning; but mental application was no easier now, than when in college, and he had moreover succeeded in forming acquaintances in a larger and more attractive circle than was to be found within and about the college walls. It required the greater portions of his mornings to keep alive these acquaintances; and every body knows it is no time for hard study after a hearty dinner—of which, particularly if it were good, few were more fond than "Doctor Wheelwright." Thus the first year found him scarcely at the close of the first chapter of Cheselden's Anatomy.
An attendance upon the lectures of some regular medical college was of course essential to a thorough professional education, and his father had now become ambitious of doing the best for a son upon whom he began to look as a young man of high promise. Every where he was now spoken of as "young Doctor Wheelwright;" and there was something gratifying to a parent's ear in that. He was therefore sent to New-York to hear the instructive eloquence of Hosack; the wise and prudent counsels of Post; to press into his goblet the grapes of wisdom clustering around the tongue of Mitchill; and to acquire the principles of surgery from the lips, and the skilful use of the knife from the untrembling hand, of Mott. Tickets were procured for all the regular courses of the college lectures, all of which were attended without intermission, and most of them slept over without compunction. The truth is, that neither medical authors, nor medical orations had any congeniality with his feelings. His love for science could not conquer his aversion to the dissecting-room, and he greatly preferred taking care of the body as he found it, to the labor of ascertaining how it was made;—he liked well to have the springs and wheels of his own frame in easy and accurate motion, but cared not to examine the delicate structure of the complicated machinery. The consequence was, that when not in the lecture-room his time was occupied—not with his books, but in lion-hunting. He visited the theatre when Cooper, and Pritchard, and Mrs. Darley, were in their glory; lounged frequent hours in the museums; and was the first to run after every new attraction placarded at the corners. He was greatly taken with the agility of an Armenian girl, upon the wire and slack-rope, who was in truth a second Fenella in the sprightliness of her nimble exhibitions. Day Francis, the conjuror, was his admiration. He was delighted with Rannie, the old ventriloquist, and the first in America; and Potter, the late sable and celebrated professor of legerdemain, in slight-of-hand, he thought actually excelled Doctor Mott himself.
At the close of the term he returned to the country, and resumed Cheselden. But he yet preferred the society of the ladies—accompanying them in their morning walks, and at their evening parties. And with them all he was a favorite—of a particular description. Full of good nature—easy and accommodating in his disposition, ever ready to oblige, when any of the fair were in distress for a beau, he could always be had, and even felt honored to be called upon such service, when it was not desirable to take such a liberty with gallants of a different cast and temperament. Especially were his services of value at parties, where exigencies of a particular description were likely to occur—as, when some not very popular damsel lived at the farthermost end of the town; or in such other undefinable cases as might result in the danger of some forlorn maidens being left, after the whips and blanc-manges were disposed of, to perform the homeward pilgrimage on foot and alone—as the girl went to get married.
But the beau and the student are different animals; and at the close of the second year, the young doctor had only half completed Cheselden's article on Osteology. It began now to be evident that at this rate he would never become an M.D., easily as this honor is obtained; and it was equally doubtful whether the most complaisant censors of a medical society, would, at the end of three years, admit him to practice. The distinguished medical gentleman with whom he was attempting to play the student, saw that if Harvey had not discovered the theory of the circulation of the blood, Doctor Wheelwright certainly would never have made it, and he hinted to his pupil in as delicate a manner as possible, that even if he had been cut out by nature for a physician, he had been spoiled in the making up. My friend was by this time quite of the same opinion himself; and he thereupon quitted the profession, with no more medical knowledge than the art of mixing suitable portions of salts and senna for children, and the preparation of cough-drops, by compounding the syrup of squills with paregoric and balsam of honey in equal proportions—which mixture, by the way, is the best prescription to be found in the Vade Mecum of any physician in Christendom—from Sir Astley Cooper down to Hahnnemann, of all medical humbugs the chief. Would that Daniel Wheelwright were the only person who has trifled away the misapplied money of industrious and misjudging parents!
CHAPTER VI.
HOW HE BECAME A MERCHANT—AND THE RESULT.
"——Now I play a merchant's part,And venture madly on a desperate mart."—Shakspeare.
"——Now I play a merchant's part,And venture madly on a desperate mart."—Shakspeare.
"——Now I play a merchant's part,
And venture madly on a desperate mart."—Shakspeare.
"A man whom Fortune hath cruelly scratched."—Idem.
Having thus "thrown physic to the dogs," the next important subject of consideration was the choice of some new occupation or pursuit, not of a professional character. His mother's project of making him a clergyman had been previously rejected, as stated in a former chapter. The decision might have been otherwise had the lot of our hero been cast in England, where the minor clergy of the establishment purchase their sermons already written to their hands, if they are able, or copy them from the moral essays of Doctor Johnson, or the more devotional writings of Hannah More, according to their tastes and feelings, if they are not. But such easy methods of pulpit preparation are not tolerated in this country, unless in respect of the youngest ecclesiastics; and even they are compelled to be exceedingly chary in the use even of the printed skeletons to be found in most Episcopal libraries—not venturing to let their people know of the existence of such "helps," much less that they are in the habit of cutting out their sermons by such patterns. Moreover, as for the preaching of other men's sermons outright, the Americans are such a reading people, that the detection of borrowed "thunder," is almost certain to follow its use. An instance in point was then fresh in the public mind, in which one of the most eloquent and popular pulpit orators in the land, had been arraigned before an ecclesiastical tribunal, on the charge of appropriatingad libitumto his own use and the behoof of his congregation the works of Barrow and Jeremy Taylor, Flavel and Massillon, Toplady and Tillotson. True, the depredator was endowed with powers of eloquence worthy of the great masters whose sermons he had the good taste to prefer to his own—delivering their breathing thoughts and burning words, with a deep-toned solemnity, and a splendor of elocution, which thrilled the bosoms, and alternately charmed the minds, and melted the hearts, of his devotional hearers. But the disguise of manner was not sufficient. There were those of his congregation who had read and remembered the works with which he was making so free; and although they were by no means the losers by the substitution of the kindling periods of the sound old divines for his own, yet the late Rev. Mr. Hooper soon found himself under the discipline of his clerical superiors. Shut out, therefore, from the pulpit, my friend Wheelwright had turned his attention to medicine, as being in his apprehension the next easiest of the learned professions; and now that he had relinquished the healing art, because he possessed neither the industry nor the capacity for acquiring it, some other method of earning a subsistence seemed to be necessary. Should it be the law? His resolution would have deserted him at the thought of mastering even the elementary treatises of Blackstone, and the sight of an ordinary law library would have appalled him. But employment he must have. He had cultivated a taste for style, and ease, and luxury, which it would require no inconsiderable means to indulge. He desired to cut a figure in the world, and to make money that he might do so; and he was anxious withal to select that occupation with which he might personally be the least occupied—in which he might indulge his inactive propensities with the least corporeal exertion—and by which he might realize the greatest profit. After duly weighing matters, therefore, and balancing the various considerations that occurred, with all appropriate gravity, he determined to engage in merchandise—a branch of business for which of all men he possessed the least possible fitness. His worthy parents, moreover, were thereunto consenting. Fond and unhappy people! They had never read the splendid philippic of Burke against the mercantile character, in which the indignant senator denounced the members of that enterprising occupation as having no altar but their counter, no Bible but their leger, and no God but their gold! Nor, (being neither prophets nor descendants of prophets,) could they foresee that another Burke was soon to illuminate this occidental hemisphere, by the blaze of his genius,—embodying in his own person half the wisdom of the whole nation of Rhode Island,—who should revive and indorse the dictum of the florid British rhetorician, and fix upon the name of the American merchant as fact, the fancy sketch first drawn by a brilliant but libellous imagination! Had it been otherwise, I am sure my friend would have been spared the toils and perplexities incident alike to the mercantile calling, whether dealing in foreign commerce by millions, or vending tape and buckram by the yard in Chatham-street or Albany.
But it was written that Daniel was to be a merchant; and an opportunity was soon presented for purchasing the odds and ends of a fashionable fancy and jobbing concern in Albany. His father, moreover, who had by this time accumulated a snug property by his own honest calling—who knew little of the perils of the mercantile business, and still less of the skill and attention necessary for its successful prosecution, consented in an evil hour to become his indorser. The chief clerk of the concern, a young man by the name of John Smith, was continued in the establishment; new goods were bought in New-York in most enterprising quantities; and although both old and new were purchased at no small disadvantage, yet a plausible exterior, and a fair credit, enabled Mr. Wheelwright to drive a brisk, and, as he no doubt honestly thought, a thriving business. It was indeed true that the return of every six months found him somewhat deeper in debt. He was obliged to fill up the blanks in the notes which his kind parent had indorsed in advance, and by the quantity, for larger and yet larger sums, and occasionally to ask the name of some other friend, "just for form's sake," under that of his father. But his faithful clerk assured him that his capital was increasing, as the books would show, and that every thing was going on swimmingly. He took lodgings at the Tontine, like a gentleman of means; was free and liberal in his expenditures; invited his friends often to suppers of game and oysters, which invitations were but too often accepted;—and as he knew nothing of his own business, but continued to repose all confidence in his chief clerk—taking his assurances that all was well,—he supposed it was so, and began to fancy that he was actually becoming rich. It had ever been a common saying in his mouth, that "the world owed him a living," and he now verily believed that he had taken the wave of fortune at its flood, and was floating along triumphantly upon the spring-tide of wealth. Nor was he undeceived until the disclosure was too late for the salvation of his credit. His notes began to come round too fast to be promptly "lifted;" and just at the moment when a portion of his increased capital would have been exceedingly convenient, greatly to his surprise he was unable to find even that with which he had commenced. The consequence was frequent visits from the notary; and his indorsers began occasionally to receive an unceremonious call from those officious legal gentlemen, Messrs. John Doe and Richard Roe.
At this stage of his unpromising mercantile career, the approaching catastrophe was hastened by a very grievous and untoward event. After having despatched a duck and a dozen of oysters at Bement's, he had scarcely composed himself to sleep before he was aroused by an alarm of fire, and astounded by the vociferations of a watchman under the window, who thundered in his ears that it was his own store that was now illuminating the venerable Dutch capital! Not an article escaped the ravages of "the devouring element," to quote the newspaper account of the following morning; and what was more melancholy still, his faithful clerk, who always slept in the store, was for the moment supposed to have perished in the flames! Morning came, however, and lo! Mr. John Smith, junior, was seen to emerge from the portal of a house, the fame whereof was no better than it should have been—it being none other than one of those places of which the wise man would have said, "the dead are there," and "the guests in the depths of hell."
The residue of this section of Mr. Wheelwright's biography is soon told. With the flames of his store, were his fortunes for the time being extinguished; and his father soon afterward found himself to be as destitute of property as when he first entered the valley of the Mohawk, with only an adz, a pod-auger, and an axe upon his shoulder. The trusty clerk soon afterward sickened, even unto death, and in his last moments disclosed various delinquencies which had hastened his employer's ruin;—for all of which he was readily forgiven by the really kind-hearted man whom he had so deeply wronged, and from his penitence it is to be hoped he was also forgiven by Him against whom he had yet more grievously sinned.
The merchants of New-York are proverbially liberal to unfortunate debtors; the tale of Mr. Wheelwright's misfortunes excited their lively sympathies; and they generously released him from all those obligations which neither he nor his indorsers could pay. And thus amid the frowns of adversity ended the mercantile career of the subject of this memoir.
CHAPTER VII.
HOW FORTUNE AGAIN SMILED, AND THEN FROWNED UPON HIM.
"——Fortune is merry,And in this mood will give us any thing."—Shakspeare.
"——Fortune is merry,And in this mood will give us any thing."—Shakspeare.
"——Fortune is merry,
And in this mood will give us any thing."—Shakspeare.
"Full oft 'tis seen our mere defectsProve our commodities."—Idem.
"Full oft 'tis seen our mere defectsProve our commodities."—Idem.
"Full oft 'tis seen our mere defects
Prove our commodities."—Idem.
"——A motley company,Blacklegs, and thieves, and would-be gentlemen."—Idem.
"——A motley company,Blacklegs, and thieves, and would-be gentlemen."—Idem.
"——A motley company,
Blacklegs, and thieves, and would-be gentlemen."—Idem.
"The lottery of my destiny bars me the right of voluntary choosing."—Idem.
The succeeding stage in the life of my hero and friend, was marked by no very striking or extraordinary event; but the incidents attending it were nevertheless quite characteristic of his varying fortunes. It so happened that in adjusting the results of his mercantile experiment, Mr. Wheelwright became possessed of a questionable claim upon the government, for property said to have been destroyed by the enemy on the northern frontier, during the late war with Great Britain. It came into his hands by way of satisfaction for a debt due from a country merchant; and although the chances were as twenty to one, either that it had already been paid, or that it had no existence in equity, or that even if ever so just, like the claim for Amy Dardin's celebrated blood-horse, the period of two generations would be consumed in petitioning for relief, yet he determined forthwith to proceed to the federal capital, and prosecute his suit before the august majesty of the people in congress assembled. What with boats taken by General Wilkinson for the public service, in his memorable descent of the St. Lawrence,—for the purpose, among other things, of celebrating Christmas in Montreal—a festival, by the way, which an obstinate enemy would not allow him to keep there,—and buildings so effectually destroyed during an irruption of the British across the lines, that their sites have never been discovered to this day,—all duly set forth in the papers with which he was furnished,—Mr. Wheelwright presented a claim, respectable in amount, which was referred to the proper committee of the "collective wisdom." The hawk-eyed Whittlesey was not then its chairman. In process of time, therefore, the committee reported in his favor; and, in the end, to the astonishment of every body, he succeeded in obtaining it! How, or by what artful appliances, he became thus successful,—and that, too, during the first session,—I have never been clearly informed. It was, however, a winter of great activity and excitement at Washington. A distinguished "military chieftain," flushed with the pride of victory, and crowned with Indian laurels, had suddenly appeared in the capital, to defend himself against charges preferred by the legislative authorities of the nation,—authorities, which he openly derided, and threatened to beard in their own council-chambers;—and it is not unlikely that while some of the members were engaged in studying the arts of self-defence, and others holding with both hands upon the ears that had been openly threatened, the bill for the liquidation and payment of Mr. Wheelwright's claims, was passed in the alarm and confusion, without observation. It is not impossible, moreover, that as the claimant had resided at Albany, and as the Albanian tactics had not then been introduced into Washington, he might have tried his hand at some of those ingenious devices, of the successful operation of which he had been the silent witness in the pure and incorruptible capital of the empire state.
Be all these matters, however, as they may, it is certain that he succeeded in his application beyond the most sanguine expectations alike of himself and his friends. Thus far, therefore, all was well; a brighter prospect seemed to dawn upon his fortunes; and all would probably have continued well, had he turned his back upon the capital the day after receiving the auditor's warrant upon the treasury, and hastened home. But the President's levees were about opening for the season; and two or three of those most insufferable of all coxcombs, theattachésof foreign embassies,—whisking their dandy rattans and sporting finely curled mustachoes;—who, to his unsophisticated observation, appeared to be men of far greater importance than their less-pretending diplomatic masters,—and who not unfrequently shared oysters with him during the day at Laturno's, and canvass-backs and champagne at O'Neal's by night,—persuaded him to remain a few weeks longer,—not much to the advantage of his exchequer, as may well be supposed. Still, as he was not a gambler, and was withal a moral man, no great inroad upon his purse would have resulted from a few entertainments thus bestowed upon his sponging acquaintances,—who, as he really supposed, were reversing the order of the obligation, by the light and flashy touches they gave him of high life in Europe,—relating, with great particularity, their adventures in France,—dining with the Dukes of Chartres and Angouleme, and attending the opera with the Duke of Berry and the Countess de Chausel,—visiting Rome with the grand Duke of Tuscany, and flirting with the Countess Guiccioli, in the absence of Lord Byron,—engaged in the chase with the Percies of Northumberland, or at Almack's, with the Marchioness of Conyngham,—all of which apocryphal incidents and adventures my simple-minded friend received as sober verity, and felt himself exceedingly edified thereby.
The result was, that Wheelwright whiled away the whole winter in Washington; and it was a marvel, that what between the mid-day dissipation at Laturno's—that unhallowed den in the base of the capitol, which has proved the grave of so many reputations,—and the suppers at Brown's and O'Neal's, he did not quite use himself up. But he escaped in those respects; and notwithstanding his natural indifference to public and intellectual matters, he actually became not a little interested in the great debates on the Seminole war, and the conduct of the commander who had conducted it according to law "as he understood it."
It was during these interesting proceedings that Mr. Wheelwright most unluckily formed two other acquaintances, in the persons of a clever and plausible lottery-broker at Washington, the author of the celebrated parody of "Hail to the Chief," beginning—
"All hail to Ben Tyler, who sells all the prizes," &c.
"All hail to Ben Tyler, who sells all the prizes," &c.
and the chief manager of the memorable Washington Monument Lottery. Both were acute, and the manager no less plausible than the vender;—and the easy good nature of Mr. Wheelwright, who was not a little credulous withal, pointed him out as a person whose pockets would not be of difficult access. It is not necessary to descend minutely into particulars in this place. Suffice it to say, that the next ensuing scheme of the lottery promised a capital prize of one hundred thousand dollars, besides one of thirty thousand, another of twenty, with the customary lots of smaller ones; and as my hero had yet a lingering attachment to "circles," he was very soon persuaded to mount upon the wheel of Fortune. Every body has heard of the honest Hibernian, who, in order to ensure the highest prize, determined to purchase the whole lottery; and although Mr. Wheelwright did not exactly form the same resolve, yet he understood enough of the doctrine of chances, to know, that the more tickets he possessed, the greater his number of chances of obtaining the splendid capital he was seeking,—he stopped not to reflect that the odds were two to one against him for any thing, even the smallest prize, and twenty-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine to one against him for the great prize, besides the discount of fifteen per centum on the whole.
Forgetting these trifling drawbacks, therefore, he invested the whole of his revenues in the aforesaid lottery; and from that day until the drawing thereof, he lived upon the brightest hopes. The golden shower of the heathen poets, in which Jove once descended, was but a little sprinkle, in comparison with the river of that precious metal, soon to flow into his coffers. But alas! the goddess, being blind, not only failed to discern his peculiar claims upon her regard, but was cheated herself! A shrewd Virginian dreamed the ticket which drew the hundred thousand dollars, into his own pocket; the manager failed, and thereby turned all the prizes into blanks;—and Mr. Daniel Wheelwright found himself flat on his back, at the bottom of the wheel, when he least anticipated such a downfall. He was therefore, on his return to New-York, again in the condition of Bob Logic, "with pockets to let"—or perchance of the poor Yankee, who complained, not without reason, that with him there were fiveoutsto onein, viz:outof money, andoutof clothes;outat the heels, andoutat the toes; Out of credit, andindebt!
CHAPTER VIII.
HOW AN HONEST MAN MAY GET INTO LIMBO.
"And as for the Bastile,—the terror is in the word.—Make the most of it you can, said I to myself, the Bastile is but another word for a tower;—and a tower is but another word for a house you can't get out of."—Sterne.
A stranger in New-York, and even many of its younger citizens, would hardly suppose, from the present appearance of the handsome Ionic temple standing directly east of the City Hall, for what "base uses" that classic edifice was originally built, or for what ignoble purposes it was kept, until within a few years back. Although it may now be justly considered one of the most correct and pleasing specimens of architecture in the union, yet, until the recent transformation of its outward form and proportions, it was one of the most unsightly of buildings. It was not, however, of republican origin—having been erected early in the reign of his late most excellent Majesty, King George the Third, as a place of confinement for such of his refractory subjects as either could not, or would not, pay their debts. And it is no great credit to his Majesty's successors in the government, that it should not have been appropriated to some other use at a much earlier day. Long did the citizens of New-York petition for its removal or destruction, but in vain,—until, "in the course of human events," the public service demanded an additional edifice as a depository for its records. A change from the Bœotian to the Ionic order, and its conversion to a more humane purpose, were then determined upon, not only for the public convenience, but from motives of economy. One of the patriotic members of the city government, distinguished for his enterprise, and his public spirit, undertook the job, and gave to the ancient walls of unhewn stone their existing "form and pressure;"—at an amount, too, not much exceeding, probably, twice the cost of two new buildings of the same dimensions.
Architecture is one of the crowning glories of a city; and nothing more strongly indicates the cultivation of a people, than refinement in this beautiful department of science. "Order is the first law of nature," and the utter disregard hitherto paid to all established orders of architecture in this country, is one reason, probably, that we have become such a disorderly people. The taste of the Greeks in the arts has contributed more to their glory than their deeds in arms. The chisel of Phidias carved for him a name of more true renown, than the sword did for Alexander; and the name of Sir Christopher Wren will live as long in English history as the Duke of Wellington's. Every patriotic Gothamite, therefore, should rejoice at each successive indication of an improvement in architectural taste amongst us. Who knows but the beauty of the new commercial exchange that is to be, will cause gladness to those who wept alike over the ugliness and the destruction of the old! Who knows but that a grinning populace will one day displace the lions grinning from the gutters at the eaves of the new stone church in Duane-street! And who knows but that in process of time, American architects will be found who shall understand the difference between the Composite and the Corinthian, and that a long sperm candle was never intended as a model for a Doric column!
The simple-minded reader who imagines that every narrative, biographical or historical, should read straight on, like Robinson Crusoe, or a speech of Colonel Crockett, may suppose that a digression like this in which I have just indulged, must be wholly irrelevant, in the life of an humble and unpretending individual like Daniel Wheelwright,—but he will soon discover his mistake—with which preliminary flourish, the order of my history is resumed.
It was some four or five years before the change in thedon-jonjust indicated, that the humble writer hereof was informed by a special messenger, that there was "a gentleman in distress" at the debtor's prison, who desired to see him. Not for the instant recollecting any friend who was just then in need of house-room at the public expense, the writer was entirely at a loss to imagine who could have requested the interview. But aside from the dictates of humanity, in a country where every Shylock has a right to imprison such of his debtors as may have become too poor to pay in any thing but flesh, it is always wise to answer summonses of this description, since there is no telling whose turn may come next. And besides, if your friend in the bilboes has brought himself thither by his own imprudence, there is a chance that you may have the consolation of seeing him come out a wiser man than he went in.
No time was lost, therefore, in repairing to the sombre and substantial mansion already described. It was during the latter days of the venerable "Poppy Lownds," as the worthy old jailer was called, who for so long a succession of years had presided over the internal police of the prison. He was a kind-hearted old gentleman; and amidst all the storms and vicissitudes of party, was never removed from office during his life-time—for the good reason, probably, among others, that the venerable officer had grown so lusty in his place, that it was impossible to remove him out of it, without removing a portion of the prison walls also. Be that, however, as it may, the writer found Poppy Lownds sitting in his big oaken arm-chair, dozing in some pleasing reverie, like a Turk over his sherbet after dinner, or "as calm and quiet as a summer's morning," to quote a favorite metaphor of the day, in regard to the guiding spirit of an often-killed but still living and breathing "monster." As the writer entered his apartment, he took a long pipe from his mouth with the most easy deliberation, while the last whiff from the aromatic Virginia weed curled upward in an azure cloud, and mingled with the vapor which had preceded it.
Having made known the cause of my visit, in answer to the inquiry as to the inmate of his establishment who had despatched the messenger, Poppy Lownds assured me that the "distressed gentleman" was a good-looking stranger, with an indifferent wardrobe, and rather out-at-the-elbows like,—destitute of money, and somewhat in want of a dinner,—but one of the easiest and best-natured prisoners ever committed to his charge, since the evacuation by the British troops, in November, 1783;—an event, by the way, which General Morton will not live long enough to forget, although on every cold and drizzling return of the anniversary, his brigade for three generations past have heartily wished that it had taken place in June, or almost not at all!
The scowling turnkey was thereupon summoned, and the writer was conducted through one dark passage and another, secured by bolts and bars enough to have ensured the safe keeping of Baron Trenck, or a second Ethan Allen. At length, ascending a flight of stairs, he was ushered into an apartment, connected with several others, the communicating doors between which were opened for the day, containing sundry sorry groups of inmates, with long beards, and patches upon both elbows, some of whom were eating the soup just received from that excellent charity, the Humane Society—while others were playing at all fours, with cards looking as old and dirty as though first used by the Moabites. Others, again, were engaged at domino; and others still busied in scoring the walls with their pen-knives, or whittling shingles as they whistled for want of thought. These latter were Yankees of course; but an air of idleness and indifference pervaded the apartments, which almost begets a yawn in the remembrance.
When the good Vicar of Wakefield was sent to prison by the villany of Thornhill, he expected on his entrance to find nothing but lamentations and various sounds of misery; but it was very different. The prisoners seemed all employed in one common design—that of forgetting thought in merriment or clamor. My own disappointment was equally great on the occasion I am relating—although there was less of clamor, probably, than that encountered by the Vicar—owing, most likely, to the lassitude incident to a fervid sun in July. But in all other respects, the prison scene depicted by Goldsmith one hundred years ago, would have answered very well for New-York in 1821—albeit we discerned not among them the shrewd features of a Jenkinson, and heard nothing of the cosmogony either of Sanchoniathon or Manetho.
Among them all, however, there was not a countenance that could be recognized, and the writer began to flatter himself that he had been called by mistake. It was not so. Turning to a strongly grated window in another direction, whom should he see but his quondam friend Doctor Wheelwright—as sound asleep as though in attendance upon a lecture on the circulation of the blood, in the Medical College! On awaking him from his slumber, he appeared neither surprised nor chagrined at the interview. "The iron had not entered intohissoul," whatever might have been the case with others—as may be inferred from the following brief dialogue, in which my friend bore his part with all imaginablenon-chalance:—
"Ah, doctor, is this you?"
"How are you? Why shouldn't it be?"
"But pray how came you here?"
"Like most other honest people, for that matter—because I couldn't help it. But it's all come of a mistake."
"Why, they have not mistaken you for another man, have they?"
"I can't say exactly that; but I made a mistake in going into the lottery trade."
"Then you didn't draw the high prize, eh?"
"No: but I came plaguey nigh it though—three more of the figures would have given me two of them."
"Indeed! you made the mistake in selecting the tickets, then? All you wanted was the right numbers!"
"Exactly so: but it's no use to cry over spilt milk, you know; and besides, that fellow the manager has failed, so that it's all blanks and no prizes, and I am as well off as others. But if I could dream as well as that Mr. Clark did, with his eyes open, in Richmond, I should like to go into Yates & M'Intyre's next scheme. It's well enough to have honest managers, you know."
"Very true, friend Wheelwright; but even then, it is the last 'way to wealth,' in my opinion, that any sensible man would take—on calculation."
"Yes: but then it's well enough to be in luck's way,arnt it?"
It will readily have been perceived from the language and bearing of Wheelwright, that his spirits were far less depressed than his circumstances. Indeed he was as cheerful and as full of good nature as ever,—indifferent as to the past,—not much troubled at the present,—and yet unconcerned and full of hope for the future.
On making the necessary inquiry into the state of his affairs, it appeared that, not having a superabundance of visible means for his support, his landlord, on hearing that he had missed drawing the high prize, had very unkindly seized upon his clothes for his board, and shut him up so that he could earn nothing to pay the balance. But, so that it is a part of the contract that in default of the payment of a debt, the delinquent promises to go to jail, it is all right. The wisdom of sending him there, is another matter, which there is not time now to discuss, and we proceed. My friend's object in sending for me, was merely to obtain the means of procuring "a little something to eat," since his only food for the week preceding had been given him by one of the prisoners—a venerable man, with snow-white hair, who had been an inmate of the prison upward of thirty years, and who, to the day of his death, refused to leave the prison, although the creditors who had imprisoned him, had long since paid the debt of nature. If deeds of charity, or the voice of mercy, or the requirements of business, have in former days called any of the readers of these pages to the old prison, they will remember this ancient prisoner. The old man had perhaps read the pathetic tale in the school-books, of the aged prisoner released from the Bastile, and he cared not to return to a world by which he was unknown, or had long since been forgotten. If, perchance, any of those whom he had once taken by the hand, were yet on the stage, their chariot-wheels might roll too fast to enable them to recognize the poor old man by whose early patronage they had been enabled to purchase their equipage. He therefore preferred the cold victuals of his prison-house, to the cold charities of the world.
Wheelwright had already taken the preliminary steps to procure relief under the insolvent law. He should soon be discharged from jail "by order of the honorable Richard Riker;"—and as "the world owed him a living," he was quite confident of doing well enough yet.
All that was necessary for his comfort was of course done for him, and at the time appointed, he was discharged from prison in due course of law—free from debt—and the wide world all before him where to choose. His clothes were redeemed from the landlord; and setting his face northward, he departed, in the first steamboat, for the ancient city of Albany, and to revisit the scenes of his youth in the valley of the Mohawk.
CHAPTER IX.
AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL.
"Who can speak broader than he who has no house to put his head in?"—Shakspeare.
"With darkness circled, and an ambient cloud."
Nearly a year elapsed after his release from the olddon-jon, before I was enabled again to rejoice in a meeting with my friend Wheelwright; and our interview happened on this wise: Passing by, or rather crossing, the foot of Courtland-street, one bright morning in May, I observed a group of laborers occupied in placing some articles of heavy iron-machinery on board of an Albany sloop—the General Trotter, I believe, commanded by Capt. Keeler—a veteran navigator of the Hudson. And whom should I discover among these men, giving directions with an authoritative air, and actually bending his own back to the work, but the veritable Doctor Daniel Wheelwright! It was indeed no less a personage. From the previous character and habits of my friend, the reader may judge of my surprise at beholding him thus engaged—laboring, too, as though his work was made easy by the good will with which he was performing it. Having exchanged salutations, mingled with expressions of surprise at finding him thus employed, and inquired upon what new enterprise he was bent—
"Why havn't you hearn?" was his response.
"No," was the laconic reply.
"What? not of the launch of the 'Lady-of-the-Lake,' on Lake George?"
"Ah—let me see—yes: I think I have seen a paragraph respecting it, in the Sandy Hill newspaper. But pray what haveyouto do with that?"
"To do with it? Why every thing. I am the agent of the concern. I have made up the company, and built the boat. The engine has gone up the river, and I am now shipping the last of the machinery.—[Come, bear a hand there, boys—what are you about?] Have you ever been to Lake George? If you want to see a touch of the grand and glorious, I guess you'll find it there. The hills is sublime; and the lake so clear that you can see the stars in it when it's cloudy."
"Indeed! And you then are to be wedded to the Lady-of-the-Lake?"
"And a beautiful thing she is, too. We shall have all the travel of the grand tower through the lake to Montreal, and mean to have the boat ready to take the first travellers from the Springs after the fourth of July."
"And you are really looking up in the world again?"
"To be sure I be. I always told you that the world owed me a living, and I believe I have at last struck upon the right track to find it. [Come, bear a hand there, boys—Why don't you take hold of that shackle-bar, Tom?"]
Saying which he applied his own shoulder to a huge cog-wheel, with the alacrity, if not the power, of another Hercules.
I was alike surprised and gratified with this apparent change in the Doctor's circumstances, as also at the unwonted industry and energy he was now putting forth. It seemed as though by some rare chance, my esteemed and hitherto unfortunate friend had at length become associated in an enterprise for which he might be found very competent, and which might one day prove valuable—at least to him, if not to the stockholders. He was moreover taking hold of the work himself like one who had at last been taught by the "sweet uses of adversity," that a man is not always certain of obtaining a living by his wits, unless the labors of his own hands are superadded. Fashionable travelling during the summer months, was even then extensive; it was increasing from year to year—and was sure to continue increasing, with the augmentation of the national wealth and population. The unsurpassed attractions of that region—the lake—its bright waters—its enchanting islands—its course of winding beauty—and its stupendous mountains—glorious in their height, their wildness, and their desolation,—would soon become more generally known, and must inevitably command the attention of all travellers of taste, whenever it should appear that its surface might be traversed by a steamboat in a few hours, from the ruins of Fort William Henry at one extremity, to those of Ticonderoga at the other. Wishing the Doctor a good morning, therefore, and all possible success in his new undertaking,—in which he was evidently sustained by the strongest hope and the most undoubting confidence,—we parted for that time—not, however, without a promise on the part of my friend, proffered of his own accord,—as had been the case at sundry times before,—that he would shortly remit the amount of several small advances which it had fortunately been from time to time in my power to make, for the purpose of occasionally rescuing him from his oft-returning pecuniary tribulations.
The machinery all arrived safe, and in good condition, at the head of the lake, and the boat was actually completed, under the charge of Dr. Wheelwright. The good people of the little borough of Caldwell rejoiced in the brightening prospects of their village, and actually began to calculate how soon they might be able to repaint their houses, and substitute nine by seven window glass for the old hats and petticoats which, in the progress of their poverty, had been stuffed into the broken casements.
Arrangements were making for the first trip down the lake, and among the fairy islands apparently floating like emeralds upon its bosom; and but a few days more were to elapse before all things were to be in readiness. Meantime, however, before the captain and crew had been shipped, and in order that accident might not happen to the fair Lady-of-the-Lake, or danger come nigh her, Mr. Wheelwright slept on board himself, like a prudent guardian of the property confided to his charge.
The last memorable night on which he thus slept on board, was remarkably clear and beautiful. All was silent and sublime among the lofty mountains in which the peaceful lake lay deeply embosomed. A grateful coolness pervaded the atmosphere, and no sounds disturbed the general repose, after the night-hawk and whip-poor-will had ceased their vesper-melodies, save the distant hootings of the owl on the mountain-side, or the occasional crash of a dried limb of a tree, over which the prowling wolf, or perchance some heavier tenant of the forest, was bounding. The stars hung pendent and sparkling like diamonds from a canopy of "living sapphires," and were reflected back with vivid brilliance from the dark surface of the waters.
A poet could not have gone to bed on such a night, and amid such a scene of gloomy grandeur as this. But the agent of the Lady-of-the-Lake was not distinguished for enthusiasm of that sort, and he turned into his berth—having no oyster-supper to eat—at a very early hour, and betook himself to dreaming—not "of antres vast and desarts idle,"—or of what is sublime and glorious in creation,—but of piston-rods and safety-valves—pence and passengers. But his repose was disturbed in a manner alike unexpected and unwelcome; by a catastrophe, too, which had well-nigh deprived the world of the farther services of Mr. Wheelwright, and his biographer of the pleasing duty of extending these memoirs beyond the present chapter. In plain terms, at about half-past twelve o'clock he was awakened by a choking sensation, and sprang upon his feet, already half suffocated by smoke. The awful truth of the cause was literallyflashingaround him upon all sides. The Lady-of-the-Lake—the first of the fair upon whom he had ever in fact bestowed his affections—was not only on fire, but the flames had already made such progress in the work of destruction as at once to preclude the hope of extinguishing them. From the cabin windows, the appearance rendered it certain that the whole structure was wrapped in a sheet of flame. In the next instant, the fire burst through the dividing partition of the cabins, obliging our hero to fly in his night-gown, with his inexpressibles under his arm. Thus, coatless and bootless, he leaped on shore, when delay a second longer would have effectually prevented his ever recounting the tale.
What a moment, and what a spectacle for a lover of the "sublime and beautiful!" Could Burke have visited such a scene of mingled magnificence, and grandeur, and terror, what a vivid illustration would he not have added to his inimitable treatise upon that subject! Let the reader picture the scene to himself. There, at the dark hour of midnight, among the ruins of Fort William Henry and Fort George, stood Daniel Wheelwright, alone, like Marius amid the ruins of Carthage,—in puris naturalibus; as the insurgent Shays fled on horseback, and in a snow-storm, from the face of General Lincoln—and looking for all the world like a forked radish, as Shakspeare says of Justice Shallow. But albeit ludicrous in his own plight and position, there was nothing of that character in the scene around him, or in his own contemplations. The fire raged with amazing fury and power,—stimulated to madness as it were, by the pitch, and tar, and dried timbers, and other combustible materials used in the constriction of the boat. The lurid flames ascended to a great height,—the smoke rolled upward in majestic volumes, while the light, red as the flames of Ætna, streamed across the lake, gilding the crumbling battlements of the old fort, flushing the face of the waters, and tinging the mountain sides to their very crests. The night-bird screamed with terror, and the beasts of prey fled in wild affright into the deep and visible darkness beyond.
This is truly a gloomy place for a lone person to stand in of a dark night—particularly if he has a touch of superstition. There have been fierce conflicts on this spot—sieges, and battles, and fearful massacres. Here have the Briton, and the Gaul, and the painted savage, mingled in the dread fight,—steed rushing upon steed, hands clenched in hands with grappling vigor, while the climbing fire, and the clashing steel, and eyes flashing with maddened fury, and the appalling war-whoop of the Indian, have all combined in adding terror to "the rough frowns of war." Here "hath mailed Mars sat on his altar up to his ears in blood," smiling grimly at the music of echoing cannons, the shrill trump, and all the rude din of arms, until, like the waters of Egypt, the lake became red as the crimson flowers that blossom upon its margin.[1]And if at "the witching hour of night," the unquiet ghosts of murdered sinnersdostalk forth to re-visit earth by the pale glimpses of the moon, the slaughter of Fort William Henry might have furnished a goodly number of shadowy companions for the hero of a tale which is no fiction. But I am not aware that any of them came forth to add to the troubles of that memorable night, or divert his mind from what must then have been the absorbing subject of his contemplations. Still, if they had had any desire of mustering for a midnight review, or for a goblin-dance, they lost the best opportunity, probably, that will again occur for ages;—since another such illumination of the beautiful esplanade in front of the old fortress where the massacre took place, and where the skeleton platoons would of course have mustered, will never again be presented—at least not until another Doctor Wheelwright shall build and watch over the fortunes of another Lady-of-the-Lake.
In the course of an hour, the beautiful vessel was burned to the water's edge; when the weight of the massive iron machinery, rendered white and malleable by the intenseness of the heat, carried down the hull to the bottom, and the waters closed over it, sissing and boiling for a moment, as when a stream of lava runs burning into the embrace of the ocean. The illumination being thus extinguished, darkness once more brooded over the mountains, the face of the deep, and the fortunes of Mr. Daniel Wheelwright—of whom, for the present, we must take leave, even while thus he stands, as Sir John Moore lies under the walls of Corunna—"alone in his glory"—surveying