USA > Indiana > Early Indiana trials: and sketches. Reminiscences > Part 41
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THE RUSHVILLE AND SHELBYVILLE, running through the counties of Shelby and Rush, twenty miles ; connecting at Shelbyville with the railroads centering there.
THE RICHMOND, NEWCASTLE AND CHICAGO, running from Rich- mond to Logansport, through the counties of Wayne, Henry, Madison,
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Tipton, Howard and Cass, 110 miles; connecting at Richmond, with roads to Dayton and Cincinnati ; at Logansport, with the canal and the Wabash Valley Road, and intermediately with roads running directly to Indianapolis.
THE PITTSBURG, FORT WAYNE AND CHICAGO, enters the State in the county ot' Allen, runs through the counties of Allen, Whitley, Kosciusko, Marshall, Starke, Laporte, Porter and Lake, 160 miles.
THE LAPORTE AND PLYMOUTH, runs through the counties of La- porte, St. Joseph and Marshall, thirty miles; and connects with the Northern Indiana Road at Laporte.
THE WABASH VALLEY, from Toledo to St. Louis, enters the State in the county of Allen, and runs through the counties of Allen, Huntington, Wabash, Miami, Cass, Carrol, Tippecanoe, Fountain and Warren, 175 miles.
By the foregoing, which is believed to be substantially correct it will be seen that there are six hundred and fifty miles of railroads, running through thirty counties, that connect directly in the central Union Passenger depot at the capital : and other twelve hundred and nine miles, running through thirty six counties connecting with these railroads, showing that we have eighteen hundred and fifty miles of railroads, giving facilities to sixty-six counties, leaving twenty-five counties to be yet supplied by roads in process of construction or con- templation. These are the counties of Posey, Warrick, Perry, Dubois, Spencer, Pike, Crawford, Harrison, Brown, Switzerland, Ohio, Fay- ette, Union, Jay, Blackford, Grant, Wells, Adams, De Kalb, Noble, Steuben, Lagrange, Fulton, Jasper and Benton ; and of these the coun- ties of Posey, Warrick, Perry, Spencer, Harrison, Crawford, Switzer- land and Ohio, lie on the Ohio River.
The following roads are in process of construction and are more or less advanced. The Indiana and Illinois Central, connecting the cap- itals of these States by a direct line, running through the counties of Marion, Hendricks, Putnam and Parke, sixty-five miles. This will be an important road when completed, to the central railroads, as well as to the capitals of these States.
The Evansville, Indianapolis and Cleveland Straight Line running through the counties of Vanderburg, Warrick, Gibson, Pike, Davies, Greene, Owen, Morgan, and Marion, one hundred and fifty five miles. This road when completed must prove very important to the railroad systems of the center, as well as to the capital, and the city of Evans- ville.
The Junction running through the counties of Union, Fayette, Rush, Shelby, Hancock, and Marion, eighty miles to the capital. This road
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will be important, especially to the country through which it runs, one of the best in the State.
The Cincinnati, Union and Fort Wayne running through the coun- ties of Randolph, Jay, Adams, and Allen, sixty-five miles. This road is designed to form a connecting link between the railroads centering at Union, with those running into Forte Wayne, and as such must become important, as it runs through a fine country.
The Marion and Mississinawa Valley, running through the counties of Randolph, Delaware, Grant, Wabash and Miami, ninety miles. This road is intended as a connecting link between the roads centering at Union, and those intersecting at Peru, and must prove a good line, as besides its through business, its local freights will be heavy, the Mis- sissinawa Valley being highly productive.
The Fort Wayne, Winchester and Richmond. The line of this road runs through the counties of Wayne, Randolph, Jay, Wells and Allen, one hundred miles, and is designed to be a direet line from Fort Wayne to Cincinnati. When completed it will be a valuable road to the coun- try through which it runs, and must do considerable through business.
The Fort Wayne and Southern, running from Fort Wayne through the counties of Allen, Wells, Blackford, Delaware, Henry, Rush, Jennings, Jefferson, Scott, and Clarke, two hundred and twenty-five miles. The design of the projectors of this line was, to connect Fort Wayne with the city of Louisville, running through the county seats of the tier of counties named to Jeffersonville, and there tunneling the Ohio river to Louisville. The work of grading has been for some time in progress on the south end of the road.
Companies have been associated under our general laws to con- struct other projected roads, but the change of times, the stringency of money matters, and the great difficulty of making negotiations, have, at least for the time being, suspended operations upon them, perhaps to be resumed at a more propitious time, as it is said that railroads are like
" Freedom's battles once begun, Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son, Though baffled oft, are ever won."
I have said enough to show that the railroads of Indiana must, for all time, be closely identified with the prosperity of her citizens, and that there must ever be reciprocal relations between their interests and those of the State, requiring liberality and diligence in all that con- cerns their relations.
It may not be improper here to give the instructions of Judge McLean to the jury, in a recent case in the Circuit Court of the Uni-
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ted States, involving the liability of a railroad company for injuries to a passenger, by the overturning of the cars, running over an ox at night, unseen by the engineer. The judge said : "The proof of no want of diligence and care lies on the railroad company ; that the acci- dent being proved is prima facie evidence of negligence; that the company were bound to know that their roads and running machinery were in good repair ; that the utmost care and caution are required of the railroad company running cars, to excuse accidents ; that every one, who has any thing to do with the running of trains, must be at his proper place, faithfully and diligently doing his duty, with every possible care to insure the safety of passengers, or the company will be liable for accidents ; that every person that travels in the cars must, necessarily, run some risk, as the company are not insurers against all sorts of accidents, under all circumstances, but are bound to the high- est degree of diligence and care possible ; that if the ox that threw the cars off the track, could have been seen, and guarded against by the utmost foresight and care on the part of the engineer, it was negli- gence on his part not to do so ; but if no human prudence, or care, could have avoided the accident, the railroad company will, be excused."
At a time in the history of the country when the public mind is much agitated about new sections of the West, as the better selection for settlement and cultivation ; when the vast regions, extending west of the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains, and still further to the Pacific Ocean, are being explored by the hardy and industrious emi- grants from the Eastern States, as well as from foreign countries, with a view to settlement, we may be excused for directing the eye of such emigrants to our State, as affording greater advantages for the cultiva- tion of the soil, than can be realized in any section of country, west or north of the Mississippi. The soil of the State, in fertility is equal to that of any other section of the Valley. The State lies much nearer to the great markets of the world, than the country west of the Mis- sissippi-and the cost of transporting the products is consequently much less. The State is a finely-timbered country, well watered with living springs and running streams. Owing to the fact, that the best part of the State lies south of the great thoroughfare of travel from the East to the West, and that until recently we have had no railroads running across the south part of the State, our lands have not advanced in price with the North, and at this time may be bought for settlement lower than lands of like quality in Kansas, Nebraska, Minnesota, Iowa, or Wisconsin, with infinitely greater advantages for settlement.
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ELIAS HICKS.
IN Jericho, Long Island, in the year 1812, there stood a very plain two-story frame house; a door and two small windows below, three windows above, three windows in the end, one chimney, a frame kitchen with one door, two windows below, and two above, one chimney. This I learned when I was there, was the residenee of Elias Hicks, the sup- posed founder of that seet of the society of Quakers or Friends, known to the country as Hicksites, as distinguished from the other seet in the division ealled Orthodox. The religious society of Quakers, or Friends as they called themselves. arose in England, under the preaching of George Fox, a man of solemn piety, and great power as a preacher ; like all reformers, his zeal knew no bounds. He took no pay, but looked for his reward alone to his Maker, with a religious confidence and conrage that disarmed persecution, and even martyrdom at the stake of all their terrors. The seet withdrew from the established church of England and the other seets, and formed a society of their own. They entirely discarded the priesthood, and all the church forms of worship, of other sects; they believed in a direct intercourse between the spirit of God and the spirit of men, and rejected as of man, all preparatory studies, written sermons, and forms of pulpit theology, and worship. They believed that man could not preach acceptably, but as the spirit moved, gave ideas and words, and prompted the discourse; and then women, as well as men, were authorized to preach. They wholly denied that the preacher could take pay for his pulpit serviees, but held that his reward was to be sought and obtained from his Divine master, as he passed through life, and at the end of his existence in another and better world. They repudiated wars, and personal vio- lence, as anti-christian, they allowed no steeples on their church build- ings. The men and women sat on separate sides of the meeting-houses, and transacted business with closed doors between them, having sepa- rate clerks, and separate records. Their dress was uniformly plain, the men wore drab-colored coats, with round breasts, and stand-up col- lars, broad-brimmed hats, and white neck-eloths. The women wore plain dresses and bonnets, perfectly alike, as if all were made of the same material, over the same block. The interior structure of the meeting-house consisted of plain benches, the last three or four, gra- dually rising to what they call the gallery, where the preachers and elders are seated. As they increase in spirit, they take seats nearer and nearer, until at length, after a long life of consistent piety, they feel authorized to aseend the gallery, and preach as the spirit moves them, whether men or women. Their meetings often sit quiet, not a
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word spoken, not a sound to break the stillness, until at length, it clo- ses by the shaking of hands, of two of the elders in the gallery. They nse no musical instruments, they never sing, they do not hold that preaching is an essential part of worship. They silently, and quietly turn the mind from the world, and commune in the spirit with the Almighty. I have been frequently assured by my Quaker friends, that the most precious meetings they ever had were held in silence. They use no priest or clergyman, in solemnizing their marriages. The whole ceremony is performed by the persons being married. The first step is what is called passing meeting; at one time that ceremony was gone through three times, in several months, as I have witnessed it, but in more modern times they let one answer the purpose. This ocenrs on a week-day meeting, with closed doors between the men and women. The intended husband, takes the intended wife by the hand, in the women's end of the house ; they rise. He first speaks, with " Friends permission, Divine approbation, I intend marriage with Elizabeth John- son." The lady responds, " Friends permission, Divine approbation, I intend marriage with James Simpson ; " they then pass through the folding doors into the men's end, when the same ceremony is gone through, in the same words. A committee of men and women, is then appointed to attend at the house after the wedding, and see that all things are conducted orderly ; musie and dancing are prohibited.
The wedding day arrives ; the meeting sits together to witness the ceremony. The intended arise, and if there is no objection, the gen- tleman says ; " In the presence of the Lord, and of this assembly, I take Elizabeth Johnson to be my wife, and promise, through Divine assistance, to be unto her a kind, and affectionate husband, until death separates us." The lady repeats the same, promising to be a kind and affectionate wife, till death. A certificate of the marriage is then signed by the parties, the elders, and overseers of the meeting, and recorded by the clerk.
The address of the Quakers, like their dress, is plain-thee and thon to a single person, and you to a number of persons. Their graveyards present the same plainness; no monuments, tombs, vaults, are seen there-a small, rough, head and foot stone mark the graves of the rich and the poor alike, with the initials of the name roughly cut upon the headstone. They care for their own poor, as a charge upon their meeting. Some times their preachers are of that class-still none the less esteemed. There is no seet of people on earthi of more industry, or of greater integrity, or honesty-their word is their bond. Avoid- ing the extravaganees, fashions, and speculations of the times, they seldom inenr debts beyond their immediate means; they move quietly
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and comfortably through life, and pass to their graves without cere- mony or parade.
From London this sect spread over Great Britain and North Amer- ica, including the United States and Canada. William Penn, the founder of Philadelphia, and at one time Governor of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, was the great leader of the Society of Friends in the United States. Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love, was the seat of their first meetings. In my youthful days I frequently heard their great preachers-John Simpson, Henry Hull, Jesse Kersey, Hannah Kirkbride, James Simpson, John Comly, Amos Hillhorn, Elias Hicks, Charles Shoemaker, Charles Osborn, Edward Hicks, Richard Mott. Their doctrines were strictly trinitarian, so far as I was capable of judging, and so remained up to the division of the society - which commencing about religious doctrines, finally led to disputes in relation to discipline and government. The dissension spread throughout the whole church, and affected even the relations of private life. It arrayed two distinct and separate parties in the society, known as " Hicksites " and "Orthodox," both of them highly respectable in point of numbers as well as character. The Hicksites contended that they were the true Friends ; and the Orthodox insisted that they were the followers of George Fox and William Penn, and that the Hicksites were seced- ers from the original society. The Orthodox based their religious belief upon John x : 30, and kindred passages of Scripture; while Elias Hicks, and his cousin Edward Hicks, with that division of the sect, based their religious belief upon John xiv: 28, and kindred Scriptural passages.
Elias Hicks, the subject of this sketch, received but a common English education. His mind was of a very high order. As a preacher he was plain, distinct, powerful, sublime, warming and melt- ing his hearers like the sun at noonday-his mission, he said, was that of love. His subject was often founded upon the Scriptural declaration, "God is love." When he came West, in 1828, at the age of eighty years, he preached one of his great sermons in Wayne county. He looked venerable, and old - like the ripe sheaf, ready for the harvest. His locks white, his eyes sunken, his cheeks fur- rowed, his chin projecting, his stop feeble and slow ; still he seemed filled with what he said his mission was - love to the whole human race. He returned to his home, at Jericho, Long Island, and on the 14th day of February, 1830, breathed his last, was interred there, in Friends' burying-ground, without parade or ceremony, and lies sleep- ing in his grave, with a small rough stone at his head, with the letters E. H. rudely cut upon it.
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TOTAL ABSTINENCE.
TOTAL ABSTINENCE.
THE evening of the 25th day of February, 1842, at the Hall of the House of Representatives at Washington City, had been desig- nated as the time and place for the meeting of the United States Total Abstinence Society. It was late before my business would per- mit me to go over from my room. I found the Hall filled with Mem- bers of Congress and citizens. The meeting was organized, and the opening speech made by Gov. Briggs, of Massachusetts. Dr. Sewall, of Washington City, a brother-in-law of Rufus Choate, followed, and exhibited his drawing of the human stomach under the different stages of intemperance to the death of the victim by delirium tre- mens. Gov. Gilmer, of Virginia, Thomas F. Marshall, of Kentucky, and Gov. Wise, of Virginia, each addressed the assembly in thrilling speeches. It was a night long to be remembered by all who were present. The engraved pictures of the stomach of the drunkard, by Dr. Sewall, presented an argument in favor of total abstinence from every intoxicating drink, more conclusive than any thing I had ever seen or witnessed. I give, for the benefit of the reader, extracts from the speeches of these distinguished men, on that highly important subject, that will be read with deep interest.
EXTRACT FROM THE SPEECH OF GOV. BRIGGS.
" The master-vice, which was checked by the first vigorous action of the old societies, again broke out in all its fury. The votaries of Bacchus began to jeer their temperance neighbors with the cry of reac- tion. If ardent spirits were not drank, excesses in the use of other intoxicating liquors could not be charged as violations of the pledge. Most of those societies, though established in good faith, and though for a while they succeeded in arousing the public mind to a sense of danger, have lost their efficiency, and many of them have fallen into decay. Among them the old Congressional Society, which struggled hard for existence, under the touic influence of all sorts of stimulants, not called by the name of alcohol, at length died of that very intem- perance which it was instituted to prevent. How could it have been otherwise ? Who could reasonably hope for the success of a temper- ance society which held the pledge in one hand and a bottle of cham- pagne in the other? How could they succeed? For, while they denounced 'raging strong drink ' as an enemy, they welcomed the mocker as a friend. And what a friend to the cause of temperance ! Alcohol is the intoxicating, poisonous ingredient which makes ardent
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spirits so destructive to the human system; and yet, the wines in common use, to say nothing of the unhealthy drugs which are mixed up in them, contain from one quarter to one-half the quantity of alcohol that is found in brandy. It was wine which inflamed the pas- sions of Philip's mad son, and made him strike the dagger into the heart of his best friend. The same liquor produced that last debauch which suddenly put an end to his existence, in the morning of his days, and amid the splendor of his triumphs. It is wine which, in the graphic language of Holy Writ, brings to those who tarry at its banquets, ' wo, and sorrow, and contentions, and babbling, and redness of eyes, and wounds without a cause.' It is wine which, in a more pure and unadulterated form than it is found among us, covers modern France with the desolation of drunkenness, and fills bright Italy with tears.
" Mr. Delevan, the enlightened and indomitable friend of this cause, says that, in a conversation with the King of the French on this sub- ject, the King told him, with emphasis, 'the drunkenness of France is on wine.' The prevalence of this vice in that country is confirmed by our own countryman, I. F. Cooper, from his own observation of its existence. The Rev. Dr. Ilewitt, of Connecticut, who visited France for the purpose of learning the real facts in relation to this matter, says : ' We have heard it affirmed that France is a wine-drinking, but still a temperate country. The latter is entirely false. The common people there are burnt up with wine, and look exactly like the cider- brandy drinkers of Connecticut, and the New England rum drinkers of Massachusetts.'
" Mr. Greenough, our distinguished fellow-citizen, now in Florence, in a letter to Mr. Delevan, says : 'The use of wine in Italy produces most of the bad effects of ardent spirits as misused in our country, and is, perhaps, as being more gradual in its operation, more insidi- ous. Several of the most eminent of the medical men are notoriously opposed to its use, and declare it a poison.' After stating other facts, he says : ' When I add to this, that every severe winter destroys hundreds of the aged, infants, and females, for the want of proper lodging and clothing, you may form some idea of its probable influ- ence on their thrift and health.' Lord Acton, Supreme Judge of Rome, informed Mr. Delevan, ' that all, or nearly all, the crime of that city originated in the use of wine.' The evidences of the injurious effects of wine upon the higher classes of society in our own country, are too numerous and too melancholy to require a recital here. If the opulent and the fashionable, against the warning of the past and
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the expostulation of reason, continue to use it as they have used it, hereafter many a noble genius will be brought low, and many, many a heart will be pierced with sorrow."
DR. SEWALL'S REMARKS.
" Mr. President : in seconding the resolution just offered, I beg leave to make a few remarks in support of the sentiments which it contains, and principally with a view to explain the design of the enlarged drawings of the drunkard's stomach which are before you this evening. While, sir, the effects of alcoholic drinks upon the moral and intellectual character of man have been always perpetually pressed upon the consideration of the public, and their evil conse- quences presented in a thousand lights, and illustrated by a thousand examples, their effects upon the physical constitution have been passed over in silence, or only slightly touched. In order to render this subject the more obvious and impressive, and to bring it up to the position which I am sure it should occupy, and especially that it may speak to the eye as well as the ear, I have, by the aid of an artist, delineated on canvas some of the principal effects of alcohol upon the stomach, as they have fallen under my professional observations and dissections-effects which invariably follow, to a greater or less extent, the habitual use of this narcotic poison. I have selected the stomach for the purpose, not because the other organs remain unin- fluenced by its use (for this is not the fact), but because it is here that alcohol makes its first and strongest impression; because the healthy condition of this organ, and the due performance of its func- tions, are indispensable to the healthy performance of every other function ; and because, too, the stomach, by the great law of sympathy, is closely connected with every other part of the system. When the stomach is poisoned, every other part feels the impression ; when this organ suffers, every other organ sympathizes and suffers with it. But before I enter upon the pathology of drunkenness, I must ask your attention, for a few moments, to the anatomy and physiology of the digestive organs."
Here the Doctor gave a brief description of the digestive apparatus, explained the object of its functions, and the manner in which they are performed. During this part of the lecture, the dependence of all the other functions of the body upon that of digestion, and the necessity of preserving the stomach unimpaired, was clearly and forc- ibly illustrated. The Doctor then proceeded as follows :
" Upon this canvas you have eight different representations of the human stomach, delineating the principal morbid changes produced
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upon the organ by the use of alcoholic drinks, in the various stages and degrees of inebriation, from that of the temperate drinker down to the lowest and last stage of debauchery and ruin. The stomach, as here delineated, is of its natural form, but enlarged to about nine times its natural capacity. It is represented as distended to its full dimensions, and then cut open by a transverse incision, so that the internal surface of the organ is exposed to view. In the first figure you have represented the inner surface of the healthy stomach, which' will serve as a standard of comparison. Every deviation from this, therefore, is to be regarded as a departure from the healthy state of the organ. "The Doctor then gave a particular description of the stomach of the temperate drinker, and explained the cause of the change of color of the inner surface of the organ, and of the enlarged condition of its blood-vessels. He then took up, successively, the stomach of the confirmed drunkard, the ulcerated stomach of the drunk- ard, the stomach of the drunkard after a debauch, the scirrhus stomach of the drunkard, the scirrhus and cancerous stomach of the drunkard, and, finally, the stomach of the drunkard who dies of delirium tremens, each of which was delineated on the canvas. But this important and most interesting part of his description was not fully reported, because the substance of it is already published in his " Pathology of Drunk- enness, illustrated by plates, in a letter addressed to Edward C. Delevan, Esq."
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