USA > Ohio > Hamilton County > Cincinnati > The Cincinnati miscellany, or, Antiquities of the West, and pioneer history and general and local statistics, Volume I > Part 22
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I have not time this week to give a view of all the features of this establishment, which I see plainly is destined to accomplish, not only all that its benevolent projectors contemplated to do for the destitute, but may effect good, in other respects which I supposed never entered into their calculations.' The feature I shall present to-day is the relief of the poor by the supply of wood, and employment to those who are suffering for the want of both. And the manner in which the society operates is as ju- dicious as the object is important. A man des- titute of employment applies for work. His name is entered on a register kept for the pur- pose, with his occupation or profession, where he has one. He isset to work at wages so low, as not to tempt any person, who can get work in the community at large ; and as soon as any more profitable employment out of the yard is found by himself, or by his employers for him, he leaves the premises to make room for fresh hands. If he has a wife, who would like to do washing, or a boy or a girl whom he is disposed to hire out, they are entered on the books, ac cordingly, and, as soon as possible,provided with places.
There are many persons in straitened circum- stances willing to buy wood in small quantities, who are not able to buy a load at a time, and are put to all manner of inconveniences, and loss of time, which to poor, as well as rich, is loss of money, to make shifts for supplies of this article. To such individuals, this wood-yard offers any quantity, from ten cents to a dollar's worth, which they can carry in their arms, or on a wheelbarrow, without losing time in get- ting it sawed or split or incur the risk of buying wood, some part of which they cannot use in small stoves, or if they buy half a cord it is de- livered to them of the best quality, sawed and split, taken into their yards, and piled up, all at less expense, as well as to greater convenience
than they could get it at any other place. Nor is this all. They are protected by the company arrangements, from being exposed to a rise in the price of wood, to which they are usually subject in the ordinary mode of supply. It is hardly necessary to say that those who get but a dime's worth, get as much wood for their money proportionally, as those who lay out a dollar, or five dollars for the article.
This system, it will be perceived, helps the poor by enabling them to help themselves .- Present employment is afforded, until more profi- table business can be obtained, and numbers are thus enabled to find business, who could not have obtained it through any other medium .- By way of illustration of this subject, three hands, after sawing wood, at fifty cents a day, weredirected to situations of attending masons at a dollar per day, and they have now men saw. ing wood, fitted for other employment, who know not where to get it, and who will be taken to more profitable business, as soon as their qualifi- cations become known to those who need their services elsewhere.
Next week I shall exhibit another important feature of this company's operations.
Temperance Statistics.
In examining some old newspapers for other purposes, my eye rested on the annexed article with all the deep feeling of personal interest.
From the Genius of Temperance.
The following is as instructive as it is remar- kable. We have it from a source we consider authentic.
In the year 1813, the first company of Wash- ington Guards of Philadelphia, commanded, by Capt. Condy Raguet, marched to defend the shores of the Delaware from the English. The company numbered 130 men divided in messes of 6 and 7 men each. It so happened that one mess of seven men drank none of their rations of spirits or other articles. They were in camp seven months and when the peace took place, the company was disbanded. Seventeen years afterwards a call, was made for assembling the survivors of the company, and it was found that 33 were living, and 7 of that number were the mess that drank no liquor, when in camp; 5 of them were present at the meeting, and letters were read from two others stating their reasons for not being at the meeting; one resided in Cincinnati, and the other in some other part of Ohio. No other mess could number more than two living members.
The gentleman who gave me this information is one or the mess of seven spoken of, and every word may be relied upon as fact. I am acquain- ted with some of the members and I believe the whole number is now living. After the meeting held three years ago, a pamphlet was published giving a history of the company, services, &c., &c., which I believe may be obtained from C. Raguet, T. H. S.
Philadelphia, July 3, 1833.
Of the individuals besides myself, composing this mess I can only recollect three, namely
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Thomas I. Wharton, now an eminent member ( of the Philadelphia bar, James Correy, Cashier successively of the United States Branch, and the Merchant's and Manufacturer's Banks of Pittsburgh, of the Bank of North America. in Philadelphia; and now of the Planter's Bank of Tennessee, at Nashville; and Thomas A. Mar- shall, formerly, perhaps still of Marcus Hook, Pa., all of whom are yet living, as I believe the whole mess to be. If Mr. Wharton, to whom I shall send a copy of this article, can afford me the desired information, whether they be all living, I do not doubt he will do so. With the exception of Mr. Correy and myself, if living, they reside probably in and near Philadelphia. It is not often seven men shall start together in the race of human life, and push on for fifty-two years, as these seven have done, without one or more giving out. before they have reached that . distance in the course.
Robert Burns and Lord Byron.
I have seen Robert Burns laid in his grave, and I have seen George Gordon Byron borne to his; of both I wish to speak, and my words shall be spoken with honesty and freedom. They were great, though unequal heirs of fame; the fortunes of their birth were widely dissimilar; yet in their passions and in their genius, they approach- ed to a closer resemblance; their careers were short and glorious, and they both perished in the summer of life, and in all the splendour of a reputation more likely to increase than dimin- ish. One was a peasant, and the other was a peer; but nature is a great leveller, and makes amends for the injuries of fortune by the rich- ness of her benefactions; the genius of Burns raised him to a level with the nobles of the land ; by nature, if not by birth, he was the peer of Byron. I knew one, and I have seen both; I have hearkened to words from their lips, and ad- mired the labours of their pens, and I am now, and likely to remain, under the influence of their magic songs. They rose by the force of their genius, and they fell by the strength of their passions; one wrote from a love and the other from a scorn of mankind; and they both sang of the emotions of their own hearts with a vehemence and an originality which few have equalled, and none surely have surpassed. But it is less my wish to draw the characters of those extraordinary men than to write what I remem- ber of them; and I will say nothing that I know not to be true, and little but what I saw my- self.
and heard the bard repeat his Tam O'Shanter. He was tall and of a manly make, his brow broad and high, and his voice varied with the character of his inimitable tale ; yet through all its variations it was melody iteelf. He was of great personal strength, and proud too of dis- playing it; and I have seen him lift a load with case, which few ordinary men would have wil- lingly undertaken. The first time I ever saw Byron was in the House of Lords, soon after the publication of Childe Harold. He stood up in his place on the opposition side, and made a speech on the subject of Catholic freedom. His voice was low, and I heard him but by fits, and when I say he was witty and sarcastic, I judge as much from the involuntary mirth of the benches as from what I heard with my own ears. His voice had not the full and manly melody of the voice of Burns; nor had he equal vigour . of form, nor the same open expanse of forehead. But his face was finely formed, and was im- pressed with a more delicate vigour than that of the peasant poet. He had a singular conforma- tion of ear, the lower lobe, instead of being pendulous, grew down and united itself to the cheek and resembled no other ear I ever saw, save that of the Duke of Wellington. His bust by Thorvaldson is feeble and mean; the paint- ing of Phillips is more noble and much more like. Of Burns 1 have never seen aught but a very uninspired resemblance-and I regret it the more, because he had a look worthy of the happiest effort of art; a look beaming with poe- try and eloquence.
The last time I saw Burns in life was on his return from the Brow-well of Solway; he had been ailing all spring, and summer had como without bringing health with it; he had gone away very ill, and he returned worse. He was brought back, I think, in a covered spring-cart. and when he alighted at the foot of the street in which he lived he could scarce stand upright. He reached his own door with difficulty. He stooped much, and there was a visible change in his looks. Some may think it not unimpor- tant to know, that he was at the time dressed in a blue coat with the dress nankeen pantaloons of the volunteers, and that his neck, which was in- clining to be short, caused his hat to turn up behind, in the manner of the shovel hats of the Episcopal clergy. Truth obliges me to add, that he was not fastidious about his dress; and that an officer, curious in personal appearance anıl equipments of his company, might have questioned the military nicety of the poet's clothes and arms. But his colonel was a maker
The first time I ever saw Burns was in Niths- dale. I was then a child, but his looks and his of rhyme, and the poet had to display more char- voice cannot well be forgotten; and while ity for his commander's verse than the other had to exercise when he inspected the clothing and arms of the careless bard. I write this I bchold him as distinctly as I did when I stood at my father's knee,
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From the day of his return home, till the hour [ aliens, and he seems to have been without the of his untimely death, Dumfries was like a be- sieged place. It was known he was dying, and the anxiety, not of the rich and the learned on- ly, but of the mechanics and peasants, exceed- ed all belief. Wherever two or three people stood together, their talk was of Burns and of him alone; they spoke of his history, of his per- son, of his works, of his family, of his fame, and of his untimely and approaching fate, with a warmth and an enthusiasm which will ever en- dear Dumfries to my remembrance. All that he said or was saying-the opinions of the phy- sicians, (and Maxwell was a kind and a skilful one,) were eagerly caught up and reported from street to street, and from house to house.
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Ilis good humor was unruffled, and his wit never forsook him. He looked to one of his fel- · low volunteers with a smile, as he stood by the bed-side with his eyes wet, and said, "John don't let the awkward squad fire over me." He was aware that death was dealing with him ; he ask- ed a lady who visited him, more in sincerity than mirth , what commands she had for the other world-he repressed with a smile the hopes of his friends, and told them he had lived long en- ough. As his life drew near a close, the eager yet decorous solicitnde of his fellow townsmen increased. He was an exciseman it is true-a name odious, from many associations, to his countrymen-but he did his duty meekly and kindly, and repressed rather than encouraged the desire of some of his companions to push the law with severity; he was therefore much be- loved, and the passion of the Scotch for poetry made them regard him as little lower than a spir- it inspired. It is the practice of the young men of Dumfries to meet in the streets during the hours of remission from labour, and by these means I had an opportunity of witnessing the general solicitude of all ranks and of all ages. His differences with them in some important points of human speculations and religious hope were forgotton and forgiven: they thought only of his genius-of the delight his compositions had diffused-and they talked of him with the same awe as of some departing spirit, whose voice was to gladden them no more. His last moments have never been described; he had laid his head quietly on the pillow awaiting dis- solution, when his attendant reminded him of his medicine and held the cup to his lips. He started suddenly up, drained the cup at a gulp, threw his hands before him like a man about to swim, and sprung from head to foot of the bed- fell with his face down, and expired without a groan .
Of the dying moments of Byron we have no very minute nor very distinct account. He per- ished in a foreign land among barbarians or
aid of a determined physician, whose firmness or persuasion might have vanquished his obstin- acy. His aversion to bleeding was an infirmity which he shared with many better regulated minds; for it is no uncommon belief that the first touch of the lancet will charm away the approach of death, and those who believe this are willing to reserve so decisive a spell for a more momentous occasion. He had parted with his native land in no ordinary bitterness of spir- it; and his domestic infelicity had rendered his future peace of mind hopeless -- this was aggra- vated from time to time by the tales or the in- trusion of travellers, by reports injurious to his: character, and by the eager and vulgar avidity with which idle stories were circulated, which exhibited him in weakness or in folly. But there is every reason to believe, that long before his- untimely death his native land was as bright as ever in his fancy, and that his anger conceived against the many for the sins of the few had sub- sided or was subsiding. Of Scotland, and of his Scottish origin, he has boasted in more than one place of his poetry ; he is proud to reincm- ber the land of his mother, and to sing that he is half a Scot by birth, and a whole one in his- heart. Of his great rival in popularity, Sir Wal- ter Scott, he speaks with kindness; and the compliment he has paid him has been earned by the unchangeable admiration of the other .-- Scott has ever spoken of Byron as he has always written, and all those who know him will feel this consistency is characteristic. I must, how- ever, confess, his forgiveness of Mr. Jeffrey was an unlooked-for and unexpected piece of hu- mility and loving kindness, and, as a Scotch- man, I am rather willing to regard it as a presage of early death, and to conclude that the poet was- "fey," and forgave his arch enemy in the spirit of the dying Highlander-"Weel, weel, I for- give him, but God confound you, my twa sons, Duncan and Gilbert, if you forgive him." The criticism with which the Edinburgh Review welcomed the first flight which Byron's muse took, would have crushed and broken any spir- it less dauntless than his own; and for a long while he entertained the horror of a reviewer which a bird of song feels for the presence of the raven. But they smoothed his spirit down,. first by submission, and then by idolatry, and his pride must have been equal to that which made the angels fall if it had refused to be soothed by the obeisance of a reviewer One never for- gets. if he should happen to forgive, an insult or an injury offered in youth-it grows with the growth and strengthens with the strength, and I may reasonably doubt the truth of the poet's song when he sings of his dear Jeffrey. The news of his death came upon London like an
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earthquake; and though the common multitude are ignorant ofliterature or feeling for the high- er flights of poetry, yet they consented to feel by faith, and believed, because the newspapers believed. that one of the brightest lights in the firmament of poesy was extinguished forever .-- With literary men a sense of the public misfor- tune, was mingled, perhaps, with a sense that a giant was removed from their way; and that they had room now to break a lance with an equal, without the fear of being overthrown by his impetuosity and colossal strength. The world of literature is now resigned to lower, but, per- haps, not less presumptuous poetic spirits. But among those who feared him, or envied him, or loved him, there are none who sorrow not for the national loss, and grieve not that Byron fell so soon, and on a foreign shore.
When Burns died I was then young, but I was not insensible that a mind of no common strength had passed from among us. He had caught my fancy, and touched my heart with his songs and poems. I went to see him laid out for the grave; several elderly people were with me. He lay in a plain unadorned coffin, with a linen sheet drawn over his face, and on the bed, and around the body, herbs and flowers were thickly strewn according to the usage of the country. He was wasted by long illness,- but death had not increased the swarthy hue of his face, which was uncommonly dark and deep" ly marked-the dying pang was visible in the lower part, but his broad and open brow was pale and serene, and around it his sable hair lay in masses, slightly vouched with gray, and ineli- ning moreto a wave than a curl. The room where he lay was plain and neat, and the sim- plicity of the poet's humble dwelling pressed the presence of death more closely on the heart than if his bier lad been embellished by vanity and covered with the blazonry of high ancestry and rank. We stood and gazed on him in si- lence for the space of ten minutes-we went, and others succeeded us; there was no rushing and justling though the crowd was great; man followed man as patiently and orderly as if all had been a matter of mutual understanding -not a question was asked-not a whisper was heard. This was several days after his death. It is the custom of Scotland to "wake" the body-not with wild howlings and wilder songs, and much waste of strong drink, like our mercurial neighbors; but in silence or in prayer;superstition says it is unsonsie to leave the corpse alone; so it is never left. I know not who watched by the body of Burns-much it was my wish to share in the honor-but my extreme youth would have made such a request seem foolish, and its rejection would have been certain.
I am to speak of the feelings of another peo- ple, and of the customs of a higher rank, when I speak of laying out the body of Byron for the grave. It was nnnounced from time to time that he was to be exhibited in state, and the progress of the embellishments of the poets' bier was recorded in the pages of an hundred publications. They were at length "completed, and to seperate the curiosity of the poor from the admiration of the rich, the latter were in- dulged with tickets of admission, and a day was set apart for them to go and wonder over the decked room and the emblazoned bier. Peers and peeresses, priests, poets, and politicians, came in gilded chariots and hired hacks to gaze upon the splendor of the funeral preparations, and tosee in how rich and how vain a shroud the body of the immortal had been hid. Those idle trappings in which rank seeks to mark its altitude above the vulgar belonged to the state of the peer rather than to the state of the poet : genius required no such attractions; and all this magnificence served only to divide our regard with the man whose inspired tongue was now silenced forever. Who cared for Lord Byron, the peer, and the privy counsellor, with his cor- onet, and his long descent from princes, on one side, and from heroes on both; and who did not care for George Gordon Byron, the poet, who has charmed us, and will charm our de- scendants with his decp and impassioned verse. The homage was rendered to genius, not surely to rank, for lord can be stamped on any clay, but inspiration can only be impressed on the finest metal.
Of the day on which the multitude were admitted, I know not in what terms to speak- I never surely saw so strange a mixture ofsilent sorrow and of fierce and intractablo curiosity. If one looked on the poet's splendid coffin with deep awe, and thought of the gifted spirit which had lately animated the cold remains, others re- garded the whole as a pageant or a show, got up for the amusement of the idle and the care- less, and criticised the arrangements as those who wished to be rewarded for their time, and who consider that all they condescend to visit, should be according to their own taste. There was a crushing, a trampling, and an impatience as rude and as fierce as I ever witnessed at a theatre, and words of incivility were bandied a- bout, and questions asked with such determina. tion to be answered, that the very mutes, whose business was silence and repose, were obliged to interfere with tongue and hand between the visitors and the dust of the poct. In contem- plation of such a scene many of the trappings which were there on the first day were removed on th's second, and this suspicion of the good sense and d'ecorum of the multitude called forth
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many exclamations of displeasure, as remarka- ble for their warmth as their propriety of lan- guage. By five o'clock the people were cjected, man and woman, and the rich coffin bore tokens of the touch of hundreds of eager fingers-ma- ny of which had not been overclean.
The multitude who accompanied Burns to the grave, went step by step with the chief mourn- ers : they might amount to ten or twelve thous- and. Not a word was heard, and though all could not be near, and many could not see, when the earth closed on their darling poet for- ever, there was no rude impatience shown, no fierce disappointment expressed. It was an im- pressive and mournful sight to see men of all ranks and persuasions and opinions mingling as brothers, and stepping side by side down the streets of Dumfries, with the remains of him who had sang of their loves and joys and domes- tic endearments, with a truth and a tenderness which rone perhaps have since equaled. I could, indeed, have wished the military part of the procession away-for he was buried with militaryhonors -- because I am one of those who love simplicity in all that regards genius. The scarlet and gold: the banners displayed; the measured step, and the military array, with the sound of martial instruments of music, had no share in increasing the solemnity of the burial scene: and had no connexion with the poct .-- I looked on it then, and consider it now as an idle ostentation, a piece of superfluous state, which might have been spared, more especially as his neglected and traduced and insulted spirit had experienced no kindness in the body from those lofty people, who are now proud of being numbered as his coevals and countrymen. His fate has been a reproach to Scotland; but the reproach comes with an ill grace from England. When we can forget Butler's fate -- Otway's loaf-Dryden's old age, and Chatterton's poison cup, we may think that we stand alone in the iniquity of neglecting pre-eminent genius. I found myself at the brink of the poet's grave, into which he was about to descend forever- there was a pause among the mourners, as if loth to part with his remains; and when he was at last lowered, and the first shovelful of earth fell on his coffin lid, I looked up and saw tears on many cheeks where tears were not usual .--- The volunteers justified the fears of their com- rades by three ragged and straggling volleys. The earth was heaped up, the green sod laid over him, and the multitude stood gazing on the grave for some minutes' space, then melted si- Jently away. The day was a fine one; the sun was almost without a cloud, and not a drop of rain fell from dawn to twilight. I notice this, not from my concurrence with the common su- perstition, that "happy is the corse that the rain
falls on," but to confute a pious fraud of a rett- gious Magazine, which made heaven express its wrath at the interment of a profane poet, in thun- der and in lightning and rain. I know not who wrote the story, nor do I wish to know, but its utter falsehood thousands can attest.
A few select friends and admirers followed Byron to the grave; his coronet was borne be- fore him and there were many indications of his rank ; but, save the assembled multitude, no indications of his genius. In, conformity to a singular practice of the great, a long train of their empty carriages followed the mourning coaches: mocking the dead with idle state, and impeding the honester sympathies of the crowd with barren pageantry. Where were the own- ers of those machines of sloth and luxury ; where werethe men of rank among whose dark pedigrees Lord Byron threw the light of his ge- nius, and lent the brows of nobility a halo to which they were strangers? Where were the great Whigs? Where were the illustrious To- ries? Could a mere difference in matters of human belief keep those fastidious persons s- way? But, above all, where were the friends with whom wedlock had united him ? On his des olate corpse no wife looked, and no child shed a tear. I have no wish to set myself up as a judge in domestic infelicities, and I am willing to be- lieve they were separated in such a way as ren- dered conciliation hopeless; but who could stand and look on his pale, manly face, and his dark locks which early sorrows were making thin and gray, without feeling that, gifted as he was, with a soul above the mark of other men, his domestic misfortunes called for our pity as surely as his genius called for our admiratton .--- When the career of Burns was closed, I saw an- other sight; a weeping widow and four helpless sons; they came into the streets in their mourn- ings, and public sympathy was awakened a- fresh; I shall never forget the looks of his boys, and the compassion which they excited. The poet's life had not been without errors, and such errors, too, as a wife is slow in forgiving,- but he was honored then, and is honored now, by the unalienable affection of his wife, and the world repays her prudence and her love by its regard and esteem.
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