USA > Illinois > Illinois in the fifties; or, A decade of development, 1851-1860 > Part 6
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One of the chief village functionaries was the squire, or justice of the peace, and his office was not infre- quently the arena where the neighborhood pettifoggers fought their wordy battles. One of the last named was a very large, corpulent, round-faced man of few words, spoken in a heavy voice, who always seemed to think that his avoirdupois and solemnity would and should carry verdicts his way. That he was frequently disap- pointed, goes without saying.
The heavyweight had his antipode in another local pettifogger, a tall, lean, raw-boned man, with long legs and arms, a hooked nose, and angular features. He
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Some Village Pettifoggers
was fluent in speech, vehement in manner and his words were not infrequently acrid and bitter.
A third pettifogger, who sometimes appeared in the justice's court, seemed in his youth to have been im- pressed with the idea that long hair was an unfailing mark of genius and consequently he allowed his un- certain-hued, tangled locks to grow till they nearly reached his shoulders, and this when short-cropped hair was the fashion. This man was anything but fluent. His words seemed to come with much labor and, as if to make up for this, he was in the habit of violently "shaking his mane" when speaking.
Another specimen of the neighborhood pettifogger class was absolutely unique. He was by far the home- liest man I ever saw. Indeed, he was more than homely ; he was repulsively ugly. His eyes were very large and seemed to be half out of their sockets. His nose was abnormally small and his lower jaw protruded far be- yond its fellow. The skin on his face was rough and mottled. In a word his countenance was hideous. His protruding eyeballs secured for him the nickname "Pop-Eye". It was said this man could not read a word, yet he was well informed, and in native wisdom and homely wit was almost a modern Esop.
I shall never forget one case in which this man figured. One of the village merchants found it necessary to sue for an unpaid bill a patron who was a relative of this unattractive pettifogger and who, very naturally, em- ployed his kinsman in the defense. Associated with him was the lean, fluent pettifogger above described. The prosecution was put in the hands of a young man in the village, who had just completed his law studies, and who had to assist him an old, experienced lawyer
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"A Pair of Jims"
from the county seat. It so happened that the first name of both the pettifoggers was James, familiarly abbreviated to "Jim". A number of times during the trial, the old lawyer facetiously referred to the oppos- ing counsel as a "pair of Jims" -- and a "pair" they certainly were! But for this bit of sarcastic pleasantry at their expense, the pair were destined to get more than even. The merchant's claim was just, the whole course pursued by the defendant was reprehensible and his daughter on the witness stand undoubtedly perjured herself, though this may have been unwittingly. Yet it soon became apparent that the tide was against the prosecution, who, in a fit of desperation, put the young attorney (the chief prosecutor) on the witness stand where he testified that the young woman had sworn to a lie. As might have been predicted, this turned out to be a boomerang for the prosecution, and when one of the "pair of Jims", he of the big eyes and repulsive features, got up to speak, he literally impaled the young · attorney; and in the course of his eloquent appeal said that history had repeated itself, that in his zeal Abra- ham (the old, experienced attorney) had offered up the young man (the youthful attorney). This application of a well-known scriptural incident was so apt and in point, that the jury found for the defendant, very much to the regret and disappointment of the merchant. That the old lawyer was chagrined and the young one deeply mortified hardly needs to be stated.
CHAPTER IX.
AN OLD-TIME WATER MILL.
I hear the clatter that jars its walls, And the rushing water's sound, And I see the black floats rise and fall As the wheel goes slowly round. -Thomas Dunn English.
In my boyhood days I was never happier than when seated astride a horse with a sack of wheat or shelled corn under me and the bridle rein in hand, I started on the road that led to the watermill on Shoal Creek, two miles distant from the village. This mill was owned by a man named Seaver and was of a type very common two generations ago-a gristmill and a saw- mill under the same roof. Let us in imagination pay this old mill a visit, say on a June morning when all nature is alive and in the prime of its beauty.
The building is a erude structure with the main floor on a level with the bank of the creek, having in one end an up-and-down saw which is slowly eating its way through a log in an endeavor to transform it into lum- ber, and in the other end a pair of stones is with equal deliberation transforming shelled corn into meal. A dam across the ereek makes a sufficient head of water to turn the wheels; one an undershot, horizontal wheel, with a erank on one end of its axle, communicates an up-and- down motion to the saw; the other, a rude prototype of the turbine, is at the lower end of an upright shaft and at the bottom of a deep, barrel-like frame of strong
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Brown's Mill on Shoal Creek, Bond County. Patronized by the author in his youth. (Courtesy Dr. D. R. Wilkins)
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Rude But Not Inefficient
boards, into which the water is admitted to set in mo- tion the wheel whose axle extends to the main story and causes the upper millstone to revolve and erush the grain between it and the lower stone, which remains stationary.
The machinery about the mill is erude and substan- tially all of wood, mainly ash, oak and hickory. There are wooden axles, wooden eogs, wooden pinions, wooden shafts, wooden levers; a wooden frame for the saw, and a wooden carriage to move the log against the teeth of the saw, during its up-and-down motion. Lard is the lubricant used to prevent friction between the parts in motion. But despite the efforts at lubrication a great deal of friction occurred. And, as though the parts involved experienced great pain, there was no end of ear-splitting complaint-creaking of a kind that resem- bled groans, sighs and cries of anguish. Throughout the whole of its structure the old mill shook and trem- bled like a man afflicted with palsy.
Yonder is slowly coming a great log behind a heavy, strong cart drawn by several yokes of panting oxen. The wheels of the cart are ten feet high and its felloes, spokes, hubs and axle strong and durable in proportion. Heavy log chains and a screw and lever attachment afford mechanical means for lifting up one end of the log and securing it under the strong axle, while the other drags on the ground.
Turning from the means and appliances used for mov- ing sawlogs, a farmer is seen approaching and in his wagon are sundry sacks of wheat and shelled corn. The sacks and their contents are put in charge of the miller, the oxen unhitched from the wagon and allowed to browse, while the farmer, who seems to have some of the
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Going to Mill
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tastes of Izaak Walton, decides to try his luck fishing for perch and sunfish in the swift-running millrace. A stout young hickory, growing on the banks of the creek, makes a convenient fishing pole; and a spade borrowed from the miller turns up the earth, made rich by rotting sawdust, and reveals the needed supply of fish-worms for bait.
Next comes a bare-headed, freckled-faced, ten-year- old boy, astride a sack of corn on an old, sway-backed horse, as slow and patient as long service and a natu- rally good disposition ean make a faithful domestie ani- mal. The boy is green and diffident and the miller is gruff and harsh of speech. But coming to mill is one of the boy's few opportunities for getting away from the tedium of the farm, so he gladly faces the stern countenance and severe manner of the miller for the privilege of "going to mill". Henry Clay in his boy- hood, it is said, went to mill in the same way and so frequently that he came to be known as "the mill boy of the slashes". While waiting for his grist the boy's time was his own, and with the old roan securely tied, he could do what he wished. The rude machinery he enjoyed seeing. The mechanism by which circular mo- tion became converted into horizontal or perpendicular motion, and vice versa, were unfailing sources of inter- est. Just above the mill was the millpond, with its deep water that served all the men and boys who were expert swimmers as a place to bathe and swim. Down · the creek below the mill was shallow water for those who were not swimmers. At one edge of the millpond and fastened by a chain to an exposed root was a canoe made from a great elm log. Overhanging the opposite bank were young willows, with their drooping branches
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The "Suck-Hole"
dipping their fresh young leaves in the water. A little back from the water's edge was the great white truuk of a sycamore, that above spread out its branches upon which were immense broad leaves. The lower portion of the trunk was hollow and, beginning at the ground at one side of the tree, was an opening that a man could walk into. Below the mill was the bridge aeross which the main stage road led eastward from the village. This bridge was made wholly of wood, for as yet iron and stone were not used in this new loeality in the building of such structures. Farther down the creek was the mysterious "suck-hole", wherein three men and two boys had been drowned, all of whom were good swim- mers. And near this spot of evil repute the creek made a sudden turn and, after flowing at a right angle to its former course for a time, doubled back, and having reached the line of its former channel, again flowed south. The loop thus formed was known as " Horseshoe Bend", and among the early settlers was a well-known landmark.
At the lower end of the bend was a great drift run- ning out into the stream, and made up of debris of all kinds-logs, brush, fence rails, pieces of boards, eorn- stalks, bunches of loose straw, and in fact nearly every object that sometime before had floated down in the freshet, all lodged against a great, uprooted tree that had been eanght and anchored by some obstruction in the middle of the stream. A most fit harbor was this drift for certain forms of reptilian life. Watersnakes found a eongenial home in its interspaces. Snapping turtles erawled up on the logs, sunned themselves, and at the approach of supposed danger, suddenly dived into the water with a noisy plunk. From the intrica-
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Had Nine Lives
cies of the drift, great bull frogs made the bottom re- sound with their deep bass.
But the miller has had time to grind the farmer- fisherman's grain and that of the bare-footed boy of promise, as well. Both man and boy come up the bank to the mill with a string of fish in their hands. Each of these is impaled on a stick that after passing under the gills of the fish is run out at its mouth. Fortu- nately, save one, the fish are all lifeless. The exception is a channel cat which, like its namesake, had nine lives and notwithstanding its tortures, flounced its tail vig- orously in earnest protest. The man's grist was ready and the miller, having taken out his toll, put the re- mainder in the wagon behind the oxen. Strange to say, three times as many sacks were needed for the products of the wheat as were required to bring that cereal to the mill. The increase was not in quantity, but quality. Where there had been only wheat, there now was flour, bran, and shorts. The timid boy's grist was ready too, though little cared he had the whole day been taken in grinding his one saek of corn; for the old mill and all about it were of perennial interest to him. It is now not far from midday and the sun is warm, indeed, al- most hot. In the back yard of the house in which the miller lives is a famous well at which for many years the thirst of man and beast had been quenched. It is within the yard fence and just off the main traveled road from whenee it is in plain sight and upon which a stranger is seen approaching on horseback. The well was walled up with rock taken from a nearby hill-side, and over its top was a curb of rough, warped boards. Projecting from one side of the curb is the crank which turns the windlass, about which wound the rope and
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The "Old-Oaken Bucket"
chain attached to the well bucket. To empty any water that might be in the bueket is the work of a moment. Then dropping it over the well and pressing your hand on the windlass, as a sort of brake, you let the rope unwind and soon the bucket reaches the water at the bottom.
A few turns of the crank and the bucket is at the surface, where it is lifted to the edge of the curb and balanced while man, boy and stranger put their lips to its margin and slake their thirst; and to each and all of these this seems like the neetar of the gods. Man, boy and stranger are hot and thirsty and are alike in blissful ignorance of disease germs and parasites. Mean- while, oxen, horse and sway-backed roan have satisfied their thirst at the trough, and with driver and riders in their places and started on the road to the village, they soon reach the foot of the hill that led up the side of Shoal Creek bluff. The hill was long, steep and far and wide was known as Hackberry Hill, taking its name from a large tree of that name that for long stood about half way up its ascent. This tree finally went down in a wind storm and all that now remained of it was its ragged stump.
What a history Hackberry Hill could have revealed had it only been gifted with the power of speech! How many teamsters had stopped at its brow to "lock" the wagon by seeuring one wheel with the lock-chain! How many drivers had stopped at its foot to give their teams a rest, before attempting to climb its steep sides! After heavy rains, how great the number of wheels that had mired down in its soft, red clay! How many people in vehicles had shuddered at starting down its steep declivity ! More than one harness had given way, more
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The Pioneer
than one neckyoke had broken, more than one life had gone out in attempting the drive down Hackberry Hill. Upon its brow, at the roadside, was a mound upon which sturdy young hickories were growing, and beneath which a number of Indian braves were buried. Driving or riding past this mound at night more than one youth- ful traveler had felt a strange, indescribable feeling under his hat, akin to one's hair rising on end. Tor- tured with less gruesome feelings the more mature passer-by had his thoughts revert to the pioneers, when
"Around their huts the wily Indian crept, His shaft as sudden as the serpent's sting, And many a weary mother, as she slept, Was startled by the war-whoop's dismal ring, The hiss of arrow and the twang of string, Or the fierce tumult of the savage horde,
4 Beneath the wood in their wild jargoning; And many a cabin by the torch was lowered,
And many a father's blood around his altar poured.
"Death came in many forms,-the vengeful snake Unloosed its venom with unerring aim,
The burly blackbear loitered in the brake,
And nightly to the hill the panther came, And stealthily outstretched its agile frame, To watch and seize the unresisting prey; Aye, there were perils more than tongue can name,
That compassed these old foresters,-yet they
With souls of flint, toiled on, thro' all that twilight gray."
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CHAPTER X.
SCHOOLS, SCHOLARS AND TEACHERS.
Beside yon struggling fence that skirts the way, With blossom'd furze unprofitable way,
There in his noisy mansion skilled to rule,
The village master taught his little school. . .
-Goldsmith. Said the master to the youth, We have come in search of truth. -Whittier.
Seraphs share with thee knowledge. ... -- Schiller.
My first recollection is of a prairie home and a two- story, unpainted frame house where I first saw the light of day. Hard by was the cabin where my older broth- ers and sisters were born, and to the west was the al- most boundless extent of Looking Glass prairie, a ver- itable wilderness of blue-stem (prairie grass).
.In the fall of 1848, my father and his neighbors real- izing that their children were in need of educational advantages, and, no schoolhouse being near, decided to improvise one. Following out this idea they concluded to utilize the old cabin that stood in my father's or- chard. Accordingly the neighbors got busy and a log schoolhouse was the result.
At the middle of one side was a door that swung on wooden hinges, fastened with a wooden latch and had the proverbial latch-string hanging on the outside. A very large chimney, made of sticks and clay, occupied
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A Make-Shift School House
the greater part of one end of the structure, and a log cut out of the other end and a row of window panes set edge to edge in the opening, made a long window opposite the fireplace. Thus was this log schoolhouse given the three essentials of heat, light and ingress and egress.
But how about seats and desks? This need the rude workman promptly supplied. Immediately under the window large auger holes were bored, in these strong oak pegs were driven and on them was placed a long, wide, unplaned board. In the rounded sides of slabs other large auger holes were bored and other strong pegs driven which served for legs when the slabs, now transformed into seats, were turned with their flattened surfaces uppermost. Several of these slab seats were placed along the walls and others in the center of the room. The "master" (teacher) occupied a split-bot- tom chair and in front of him was a candle-stand. This teacher was an Irishman who bore the famous name O'Conner, and like Goldsmith, his gifted countryman, he played the flute. This was the first instrumental music I ever heard, and no orchestra that I have since listened to has charmed my ears as did the simple tones of O'Conner's flute.
O'Conner was a lame man who walked with a crutch under one arm and a cane in his free hand. From some cause the growth of one leg and foot had been arrested in childhood and the affected member was only about half the size and length of the other. His little foot and short leg dangling at the side of the other when he walked, was always a curious sight to my eyes.
Of long winter evenings, when all would be seated before a huge wood fire, my mother sewing or knitting,
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Pioneer Log School House. (Courtesy Mrs. C. J. Hayes, Urbana, Ill.)
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Slab-Seat with Diagram for Playing Game of Fox and Geese. (Courtesy Mrs. C. J. Hayes, Urbana, Ill.)
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Pioncer Hospitality
my father with book in hand making himself comfort- able after a day out in the cold winter weather, my sisters engaged with their lessons, the cat contentedly purring on the hearth, and last, but not least, the teacher in "done-up" white shirt and "store-clothes", had the place of honor, his cruteh beside him and his short leg hanging from the chair, and a little time be- fore all went to bed, maybe, would begin playing some old melody on his flute, then and there I realized that Paradise had come to me.
In its way the lame Irishman's school was popular and pupils came to it from far and near, some of them young men six feet tall. Those of the latter who lived at a distance were occasionally weatherbound, and in such emergencies would seek and find shelter under my father's always hospitable roof. Think of it! Only two rooms in which father, mother and five children, ranging from a babe in arms to a girl just budding into womanhood, and yet room was found for the teacher who boarded with us! Then, when a hard storm came unexpectedly, room was somehow, somewhere, found for one, perhaps two and possibly three addi- tional human beings in those already overcrowded two rooms, situated away out on the wind-swept, storm- visited prairie.
O'Conner's was the first school I attended, and the first day a new, blue-backed Webster's Spelling Book was placed in my hands and opened at the page where * were several perpendicular rows of the twenty-six let- ters of the alphabet. To prevent soiling the book a thumb-paper was given me. This was a piece of square paper, folded on itself several times and inserted be- tween my thumb and the page. The first thing a child
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Foolscap and Goosequills
was taught was its letters and I remember with what trepidation I walked up to the teacher and stood before him, while with peneil or pen-knife he pointed out and named the various letters of the alphabet.
In due time the winter of 1848-9 came to an end, as likewise did O'Conner's term of school. In the early spring we moved to the near-by village from whence a little later my father started on his long journey to California. Here another log building, the disearded residence of one of my uncles, was the schoolhouse where I went to school the following summer and win- ter. The lady teacher of the summer school is yet alive and a ripe octogenarian. My teacher in the winter term, a young lawyer, died last year lacking but little of becoming a centenarian.
One of the hardest things for children of my genera- tion to master, was penmanship. Steel pens had not yet been introduced into general use and one of the duties of the teacher was, with his pen-knife, to fashion pens for his pupils from goosequills. Every pupil was expected to bring goosequills from his home, as nearly everyone kept geese from whose wings quills could be plucked at any time. No little of the ink in use in that day was made by dissolving copperas in water in which oak bark had been soaked. The tannin in the bark com- bining with the sulphate of iron (copperas) produeed a beautiful black ink. At the village store foolscap paper conld always be purchased. This was in size about eight inches by fourteen, was ruled and generally of a blue tinge. Upon the first line of one of these sheets the teacher would write a "copy" for the pupil to imitate.
The schools of that era were what were known as
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The First "Free" Schools
subscription schools, and each parent or patron paid for what schooling was furnished. When a school was contemplated the community was canvassed with a view to getting as many "scholars" as possible. A "scholar", in the sense used, was a certain specified number of days which the teacher agreed to teach one pupil for a stated price. Sometimes a man with, say four ehil- dren, would subscribe two scholars and divide the time among all four, some assisting at home while the others were in school, thus alternating study and work.
The subscription school had one drawback-the very poor man could not pay the price and consequently his children suffered the consequences. However, after a time the subscription school was succeeded by what was popularly known as the free school. This in Illinois occurred in 1855 when an aet was placed on the statute book providing that all school expenses should be raised by general taxation. Since that date no child in Illi- nois has remained from school because his parents were unable to pay tuition. When this law was first enaeted its enthusiastic sponsors seemed to think the millen- nium would come after it had been in operation for a time. It was believed that ignorance, poverty and crime would be banished from the State. That it has had very much to do in making education more general. no one can question. That there is less poverty than there would otherwise have been, is perhaps true. As to its effect in reducing crime, that is questionable. At all events, it without doubt enabled many deserving boys and girls to get an education and occupy a higher plane in life.
Some years before the enactment of the free-school law some of the leading citizens became ambitions' to
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"He-Yo-Bouse Her Up"
have an Academy in the village, and to further this a generously-disposed resident donated a piece of ground as a site for the structure. Later plans were made for a two-story frame building; the lumber was hauled to the ground and the carpenters got the frame in readi- ness, after a good deal of time spent in sawing, boring holes, mortising, making tennons, and strong oak pins. Then a day was set for the raising, in which every able- bodied citizen was expected to bear a part and work with a will.
A sturdy man with a stentorian voice, a loeal Metho- dist exhorter, was chosen foreman, and when everything was ready-when ropes, tackle and pulleys were in place and every man at his post-the foreman stepped a few paces aside, and in a vehement manner and loud voice gave the command : "He-yo-bouse her up!" "He- yo-bouse her up!" At each command, those at the ropes gave a strong, concerted pull and in due time a given portion of the frame was in the air where an agile man, having mounted the swaying beam, drove home several wooden pins and thus secured it in place. This was followed by one and another part of the frame of the building, till finally every post, every beam, every joist and every brace found its intended location.
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