Our country and its people. A historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania., Part 6

Author: Bates, Samuel P. (Samuel Penniman), 1827-1902
Publication date: 1899
Publisher: Boston : W. A. Fergusson
Number of Pages: 1044

USA > Pennsylvania > Crawford County > Our country and its people. A historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania. > Part 6

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"But when all is said. there is hardly one frame of government in the world so ill designed by its first founders that in good hands would not do

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

well enough; and story tells us, the best in ill hands can do nothing that is great and good: witness the Jewish and the Roman States. Governments. like clocks, go from the motion men give them, and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them are they ruined, too. Wherefore gor- ernments rather depend upon men than men upon governments. Let men be good, and the government cannot be bad; if it be ill, they will cure it. But if men be bad, let the government be never so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil to their turn."

"I know some say, let us have good laws, and no matter for the men that execute them: but let them consider that though good laws do well. good men do better; for good laws may want good men, and be abolished or invaded by ill men; but good men will never want for good laws, nor suffer ill ones. 'Tis true, good laws have some awe upon ill ministers; but that is where they have not power to escape or abolish them, and the people are generally wise and good; but a loose and depraved people, which is to the question, love laws and an administration like themselves. That, there- fore, which makes a good constitution must keep it, viz .: inen of wisdom and virtue, qualities that, because they descend not with worldly inheritances, must be carefully propagated by a virtuous education of youth, for which after ages will owe more to the care and prudence of founders, and the successive magistracy, than to their parents for their private patrimonies."

These considerations, which stand as a preface to his frame of gov- ernment, are given to show the temper of mind and heart of Penn. as he entered upon his great work. He seems like one who stands before the door of a royal palace, and is loth to lay his hand upon the knob, whose turn shall give him entrance, for fear his tread should be unsanctified by the grace of Heaven, or lack favor in the eyes of his subjects. For he says in closing his disquisition: "These considerations of the weight of govern- ment, and the nice and varied opinions about it, made it uneasy to me to think of publishing the ensuing frame and conditional laws, foreseeing both the censures they will meet with from men of differing humors and engage- ments, and the occasion they may give of discourse beyond design. But next to the power of necessity, this induced me to a compliance that we have (with reverence to God, and good conscience to men), to the best of our skill contrived and composed the frame and laws of this government, to the great end of all government, viz .: To support in reverence with the

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

people from the abuse of power; that they may be free by their just obedi- ence, and the magistrates honorable for their just administration; for liberty without obedience is confusion, and obedience without liberty is slavery. To carry this evenness is partly owing to the constitution, and partly to the magistracy; where either of these fail, government will be subject to con- fusion; but when both are wanting, it must be totally subverted; then where both meet, the government is like to endure. Which I humbly pray and hope God will please to make the lot of this of Pennsylvania."

In such a temper, and with such a spirit did our great founder approach the work of drawing a frame of government and laws for his proposed community, insignificant in numbers at first, but destined at no distant day to embrace millions. It is not to be wondered at that he felt great solicitude, in view of the future possibilities. With great care and tenderness for the rights and privileges of the individual, he drew the frame or constitution in twenty-four sections, and the body of laws in forty. And who can esti- mate the power for good to this people of the system of government set up by this pious, God-fearing man, every provision of which was a subject of his prayers and tears, and the deep yearnings of a sanctified heart.

The town meeting works the destruction of thrones. Penn's systen was in effect a free Democracy, where the individual was supreme. Had King Charles foreseen, when he gave his charter, what principles of freedom to the individual would be embodied in the government of the new colony, and would be nurtured in the hearts of the oncoming generations, if he had held the purpose of keeping this an obedient and constituent part of his kingdom, he would have withheld his assent to it. as elements were im- planted therein antagonistic to arbitrary, kingly rule. But men sometimes contrive better than they know, and so did Charles.

When finished, the frame of government was published, and was sent out accompanied with a description of the country, and special care was taken that these should reach the members of the society of Friends. Many of the letters written home to friends in England, by those who had settled in the country years before, were curious and amusing, and well calculated to excite a desire to emigrate. Two years before this, Mahlon Stacy wrote an account of the country, which the people of our day would scarcely be able to match. "I have seen," he says, "orchards laden with fruit to admir- ation; their very limbs torn to pieces with weight, most delicious to the taste,

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

and lovely to behold. I have seen an apple tree, from a pippin-kernel, yield a barrel of curious cider, and peaches in such plenty that some people took their carts a-peach gathering. I could not but smile at the conceit of it; they are very delicious fruit, and hang almost like our onions that are tied on ropes. I have seen and know this summer forty bushels of bold wheat from one bushel sown. From May to Michaelmas great store of very good wild fruit, as strawberries, cranberries and hurtleberries, which are like onr bilberries in England, only far sweeter; the cranberries, much like cherries for color and bigness, which may be kept till fruit comes again; an excellent sauce is made of them for venison, turkeys and other great fowl, and they are better to make tarts of than either gooseberries or cherries; we have them brought to our houses by the Indians in great plenty. My brother, Robert, had as many cherries this year as would have loaded several carts. As for venison and fowls, we have great plenty; we have brought home to our countries by the Indians seven or eight fat bucks in a day. We went into the river to catch herrings, after the Indian fashion. We could have filled a three-bushel sack of as good large herrings as I ever saw. And as to beef and pork, here is a great plenty of it, and good sheep. The common grass of the country feeds beef very fat. Indeed, the country, take it as a wilderness, is a brave country."

If the denizens of England were to accept this description as a true picture of the productions and possibilities of the New World, they might well conclude with this writer that, "for a wilderness," it was a "brave country," and we can well understand why they flocked to the new El Dorado. But lest any might be tempted to go without sufficient consider- ation, Penn issued a pronunciamento, urging every one who contemplated going thither to consider well the inconveniences of the voyage, and the labor and privation required of emigrants to a wilderness country, "that so none may move rashly, or from a fickle, but from a solid mind, having above all things an eye to the providence of God in the disposing of themselves."

And that there should be no misunderstanding in regard to the rights of property, Penn drew up "Certain Conditions and Concessions," before leaving England, which he circulated freely, touching the laying out of roads and highways, the plats of towns, the settling communities on ten-thousand- acre tracts, so that friends and relatives might be together; declaring that the woods, rivers, quarries and mines are the exclusive property of those on

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

whose purchases they are found; for the allotments of servants; that the Indians shall be treated justly: the Indian's fur shall be sold in open market; that the Indian shall be treated as a citizen, and that no man shall leave the province without giving three weeks' public notice, posted in the market place, that all claims for indebtedness might be liquidated. These and many other matters of like tenor form the subject of these remarkable concessions, all tending to show the solicitude of Penn for the interests of his colonists, and that none should say that he deceived or overreached them in the sale of his lands. He foresaw the liability that the natives would be under to be deceived and cheated by the crafty and designing, being entirely unskilled in judging of the values of things. He accordingly devotes a large proportion of the matter of these concessions to secure and defend the rights of the ignorant natives.

If it was possible to make a human being conform to the rights and privileges of civilized society, and make him truly an enlightened citizen, Penn's treatment of the Indian was calculated to make him so. He accepted the natives as his own people, as citizens in every important particular, and as destined to an immortal inheritance. He wrote to them, "There is a great God and power that hath made the world and all things therein, to whom you, and I, and all people owe their being and well-being; and to whom you and I must one day give an account for all that we do in the world. This great God hath written His law in our hearts by which we are taught and commanded to love and help and do good to one another. Now the great God hath been pleased to make me concerned in your part of the world, and the king of the country where I live hath given me a great province therein; but I desire to enjoy it with your love and consent that we may always live together as neighbors and friends; else what would the great God do to us, who hath made us not to devour and destroy one another, but to live soberly and kindly together in the world? Now, I would have you well observe that I am very sensible of the unkindness and injustice that have been too much exercised towards you by the people of these parts of the world, who sought themselves, and to make great advantages by you rather than to be examples of goodness and patience unto you, which I hear hath been a matter of trouble to you, and caused great grudges and animosities, sometimes to the shedding of blood, which hath made the great God angry. But I am not such a man, as is well known

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

in my country. I have great love and regard toward you, and desire to gain your love and friendship by a kind, just and peaceable life, and the people I send are of the same mind and shall in all things behave themselves accordingly: and if in anything any shall offend you, or your people, you shall have a full and speedy satisfaction for the same by an equal number of just men on both sides, that by no means you may have just occasion of being offended against them. I shall shortly come to you myself, at which time we may more largely and freely confer and discourse of these matters. In the meantime, I have sent my commissioners to treat with you about land, and form a league of peace. Let me desire you to be kind to them and their people, and receive these tokens and presents which I have sent you, as a testimony of my good will to you. and my resolution to live justly, peaceably, and friendly with you."

Such was the mild and gentle attitude in which Penn came to the natives. Had the Indian character been capable of being broken and changed, so as to have adopted the careful and laborious habits which Europeans possess, the ahorigines might have been assimilated, and become a constituent part of the population. Such was the expectation of Penn. They could have become citizens, as every other foreign race have. But the Indian could no more be tamed than the wild partridge of the woods. Fishing and hunting were his occupation, and if any work or drudgery was to be done, it was shifted to women, as being beneath the dignity of the free savage of the forest. Two hundred and fifty years of intercourse with European civilization and customs have not in the least changed his nature. He is essentially the savage still, as he was on the day when Columbus first met him four hundred years ago.

. But this fact does not change the aspect in which we should view the pious and noble intents of Penn, and they must ever be regarded with admiration as indicative of his loving and merciful purposes. He not only provided that they should be treated as human beings, on principles of justice and mercy, but he was particular to point out to his commissioners the manners which should be preserved in their presence. "Be tender of offending the Indians, and let them know that you come to sit down lovingly among them. Let my letter and conditions be read in. their own tongue, that they may see we have their good in our eye. Be grave. They love not to be smiled on." 4

CHAPTER V.

CONTROVERSY OVER THE BOUNDS OF THE COLONY.

T HE Colony of Pennsylvania was one of the last to be settled, yet scarcely had a century elapsed before it had outstripped in popula- tion all the others, and stood at the head of the thirteen which linked together in the patriotic struggle for independence. The census of 1800 shows a white population for Pennsylvania of 586,095; New York, 557,731: Virginia, 514,280: Massachusetts, 416,393; North Carolina, 337,764; Con- necticut, 244,721; Maryland, 216,326; South Carolina, 196,255; New Jersey, 194,325; New Hampshire, 182,998; Kentucky, 179,873; Vermont, 153,908; Maine, 150,901; Georgia, 102,261; Tennessee, 91,709; Rhode Island, 05,438; Delaware, 49,852; Ohio. 48,028: Indiana, 5,343; Missis- sippi. 5.179.

The growth of the province was something remarkable, and caused Penn to say, in a spirit of exultation unusual to him, "I must, without vanity say, I have led the greatest colony in America that ever any man did upon a private credit." Bancroft very justly observes, "There is noth- ing in the history of the human race like the confidence which the simple virtues and institutions of William Penn inspired. The progress of his province was more rapid than that of New England. In August, 1683, Philadelphia consisted of three or four little cottages. The conies were yet undisturbed in their hereditary burrows. The deer fearlessly bounded past blazed trees, unconscious of foreboded streets; the stranger that wandered from the river bank was lost in thickets of interminable forests; and two years afterward the place contained about six hundred houses, and the school-master and the printing press had begun their work. In three years from its foundation Philadelphia had gained more than New York had done in half a century. It was not long till Philadelphia led all the cities of America in population."

Though Penn felt a just pride in the growth of his colony, the fertility of the soil, and the mild and salubrious nature of the climate. yet he was

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OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

not without deep anxiety about the establishment of the boundaries of his province. Language could not by any possibility be made more exact and definite than that employed by Charles II. in perfecting the great charter. That there might be no question as to its place on the face of the earth, lines of latitude and longitude from which there could be no variableness nor shadow of changing, were made to encompass it. The sun in his course. and the stars themselves were made to stand sentinels. Commencing at the beginning of the 40th parallel of north latitude, it was to extend to the beginning of the 43rd, and from the Delaware River, which was to form the eastern boundary, westward along these parallels five degrees of longitude, the western bound being such a meridian when ascertained by actual survey. It would seem that nothing could be more distinct and definite, absolutely incapable of varying, not dependent upon a monument subject to removal, or disintegration by time, but dependent upon the heavenly bodies, whose · places change not from generation to generation, and from age to age.

Penn was undoubtedly solicitous to have the southern boundary of his province the beginning of the 40th parallel, in order that he might have free access to the ocean by the Delaware Bay and River, as this would give him his only port of entry, which he could not be sure of if the two shores of this river were in the absolute possession of others. Besides, considerable settlements had already been made along the south bank, which were known as the three lower counties originally a part of Pennsylvania, now the State of Delaware. These three counties had been granted by King Charles to his brother James, Duke of York. Intent upon having an open waterway to the ocean. Penn bought these three counties from the Duke, and secured a firm title duly recorded in the English office.

Believing now that he had his title as secure as human foresight and legal forms could make it, he sent his cousin, William Markham, with three ship-loads, to take possession of his province. But the ink was scarcely dry upon the parchment which recorded the gift before the whisperings of counter claims were heard, and had all the claims that were subsequently made been verified he would have had scarcely a moiety left on which to have planted his own family. Markham, who, as Lieutenant Governor, was to take possession and commence surveys, had hardly shaken the salt spray from his locks before he was visited at Chester by Lord Baltimore, from Maryland. who presented his claim to all that country.

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

The royal .gifts of land in the New World in the early days of settle- ment were lavish beyond comparison, the one overlapping another in the most lawless manner, the object seemingly being to secure the settlement of the country. There were no reliable maps of the continent, and the royal secretaries had little conception of the lands they were describing when they drew the royal charters.

No one in England at this time seemed to have any conception of the width or extent of the continent. The shores of the Gulf of Mexico had been observed, and Balboa, ascending the mountain chain which skirts the narrow neck of land that joins North with South America, had beheld the vast expanse of peaceful waters which he named the Pacific, and it would seem that the popular belief was that the continent as it extended northward was comparatively narrow, and that when the royal gifts were made to extend from ocean to ocean. there was no conception that they stretched away three thousand miles.

On the 20th of June, 1632, just fifty years before Penn had received the charter for his province, the King had granted to Lord Baltimore a charter for Maryland, named for Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV., and wife of Charles I., bounded by the ocean, the 40° of north latitude, the meridian of the western fountain of the Potomac, the river Potomac from its source to its mouth, and a line drawn east from Watkin's Point to the ocean, the place of beginning, on the thirty-eighth parallel. This territory was given to him, his heirs and assigns, on the payment of a yearly rental of two Indian arrows.

Lord Baltimore exhibited to Governor Markham his claim, and to convince the Governor that his claim was valid, he made an observation of the heavens, which showed the latitude of Chester to be twelve miles south of the 41º north to which he claimed. Should this claim be allowed, the whole of the south shore of Delaware Bay and River, and hence the entire control of the navigation to the ocean bed, the three lower counties which Penn had bought from the Duke of York, now the State of Delaware, the sites of the cities of Philadelphia, York, Chambersburg, Gettysburg, indeed the whole tier of southern counties would have been cut off from Pennsyl- vania. As it will be seen, the allowance of this claim would have swallowed all the settlements that had been made for three-quarters of a century, all the wonderful emigration and growth which had now set in, including the

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

great city which Penn had projected with so much satisfaction and cherished with his pains and prayers, the fairest section of his territory, and more than all, the way of navigation to the sea.

Markham, on his part, exhibited the great charter of Penn, which ex- plicitly provides that the southern boundary shall be "the beginning of the 40th degree of north latitude. But this would have included the city of Baltimore, and even as far south as the District of Columbia, embracing all the growth of Maryland for half a century, and would have left for Mary- land a modicum of land east of the Potomac and south of the 39th degree north along either shore of the lower Chesapeake, an area about equal to the present State of Delaware. This Lord Baltimore regarded as an un- endurable hardship, and as his charter antedated that of Penn by fifty years. he held that the charter of the latter was invalidated, and that his own claim could be maintained.

It was evident that neither of these claims could be justly vindicated in its integrity, as, if either were allowed, the other was virtually destroyed. In this condition, things rested until the coming of Penn. The new pro- priètary, soon after his arrival, learning of the claims put forth by his neighbor at the head of the Chesapeake, determined to visit him, and for two days the clashing demands of the two Governors were talked over and canvassed. But, as the weather became cold, so as to preclude the possi- bility of taking observations to fix accurately the latitude, it was agreed to postpone further consideration of the question for the present. A picture of these two eminent men in this opening controversy would be one of great historical interest. We can well imagine that, while the representative of Pennsylvania preserved throughout the conference a demeanor that was "child-like and bland." there was in the brain which the broad-brim sheltered, and in the heart which the shad-bellied coat kept warm, an unalterable pur- pose not to yield the best portion of his heritage.

Early in the spring Penn invited Lord Baltimore to come to the Delaware for the settlement of their differences, but it was late in the season before he arrived. Penn proposed that the hearing be had before them in the nature of a legal investigation, with the aid of council and in writing. But this was not agreeable to Baltimore, and now he complained of the sultriness of the weather. Before it was too cold, and now it was too hot. Accordingly, the conference again broke up without anything being accom-

5.4

OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.

plished. It was now plainly evident that Baltimore did not intend to come to any agreement with Penn, but would carry his cause before the royal tribunal in London.

Penn now understood all the conditions of the controversy, and that there were grave difficulties to be encountered. In the first place, his own charter was explicit, and would give him, if allowed, three full degrees of latitude and five of longitude. On the other hand, the charter of Baltimore made his northern boundary the 40th degree, but whether the beginning or the ending was not provided. If the beginning, then Maryland would be crowded down nearly to the northern limits of the city of Washington, and Pennsylvania would embrace the city of Baltimore and the greater portion of what is now Maryland, and westerly beyond Maryland a solid portion of Virginia, now West Virginia. On the other hand, if the ending, then Philadelphia and all its southern tier of counties would have to be given up. By the usual interpretation of language, the charter of Lord Baltimore would only give him to the beginning of the fortieth degree. But he had boldly assumed the other interpretation, and had made nearly all his settlements above that line. Again, it was provided in his charter that the boundaries prescribed should not include any territory already settled by any Christian prince. But it was well known that the settlements along the right bank of the Delaware, from the first visit of Hudson, in 1609, long before the charter of Lord Baltimore was given, had been made on the territory now claimed by him, settlements in which he had no interest, which he had done nothing to promote, and over which he had exercised no governmental control.

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Our country and its people. A historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania., Part 6

Author: Bates, Samuel P. (Samuel Penniman), 1827-1902 Publication date: 1899 Publisher: Boston : W. A. Fergusson Number of Pages: 1044

Author: Bates, Samuel P. (Samuel Penniman), 1827-1902
Publication date: 1899
Publisher: Boston : W. A. Fergusson
Number of Pages: 1044