USA > Vermont > The story of Vermont (1889) > Part 7
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THE PARTIES DIVIDE.
State has never again passed through such a season of dire distress.
The life of the people went on simply and natu- rally from year to year, and not till 1824 was a more exciting topic of conversation furnished than the memory of the cold summer. In that year Lafayette, the friend of Washington and the bene- factor of the young Republic, visited America and passed through a series of popular ceremonials of welcome such as the country had never before seen.
The time of his coming, just at the close of the era of good feeling, was auspicious. Men of all shades and no shade of political belief had a kind word and a huzza for the old French patriot; women held up their babies for him to touch or kiss, and delighted throngs of all ages. and sexes everywhere gathered to meet him. Ver- mont had the especial honor of Lafayette's pres- ence in the State on the Fourth of July. On that day he was met at Windsor by the Governor and a large number of citizens, who greeted him with an address and cheered his reply to the echo.
The veterans of the war of independence and the children from the schools marched in procession before the distinguished visitor; the day was made memorable with public ceremonies. General Lafayette quite won the hearts of the Vermonters
I 38
THE PARTIES DIVIDE.
by securing the release from jail of General Barton, a veteran who had been imprisoned for debt in the common jail at Danville and by laying the corner stone of the new building of the University of Vermont, the old one having been destroyed by fire.
Thus the first quarter of the nineteenth century closed for Vermont in the midst of profound peace and prosperity. The next was to witness changes more mighty in the State and nation than human imagination could then have con- ceived. Let us pause on the threshold of the vast social and industrial developments which were to accompany and follow the coming of the canal, the railway and the telegraph, and inquire what manner of people they were who lived in Vermont in the "good old times."
CHAPTER VI.
HOMESPUN FOLK.
HE first half-century after the settlement of Vermont was the homespun age of the State. Her people were the sturdy fron- tiersmen of the time, living remote from the civilization of the sea- coast and skilled in all self-reliant arts. It is difficult, indeed, to conceive of the variety and number of occupations then practiced in every household. In addition to those never-ending tasks which go by the comprehensive name of house- work, the women spun, wove, knit, sewed, dipped can- dles and helped in the rude work out-of-doors. Their clothes were home-made. They grew flax; they raised sheep for wool and geese for down; they rotted, braked, hatcheled, spun and wove their flax into linen; they put wool through processes almost as complex and laborious ere it emerged as the stout,
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durable homespun. The trousseau of the bride, with its quilts and counterpanes, its store of stout . cloth, and yards upon yards of fine linen, was largely the work of her own fair hands. The cloth- ing of the family came from these stores of wool and flax, supplemented in winter by the skins of animals. Gowns of silk or calico were luxuries to which it was within the province of all to aspire, but to which few attained. The men and boys, be- side the work of the farms, were by turns carpen- ters, butchers, masons, woodsmen, coopers, hunters, or even furniture - makers and cobblers. They
sat upon home-made chairs or settles; in houses reared by their own hands, they ate upon home- hewn tables from pewter or wooden dishes with horn or pewter spoons or wooden ladles. Silver was not the precious heirloom of all families nor was it always for daily use even by those who had it. The leather of their shoes was home-raised calfskin, cured at home or tanned "on shares " at the nearest tannery. Their mittens were knit of wool and over these they usually wore outer ones of yellow buckskin rudely shaped and sewn together with buckskin thongs or "waxed end." Often they made from the same invaluable mate- rial moccasins after the Indian fashion, the ideal footwear for warmth and comfort. When the weather permitted, no shoes at all were worn by
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the young of both sexes, and not always by their elders. The lads who used to drive in the cows to be milked on frosty mornings warmed their chilled feet on the ground where the cattle had been lying. Even now it is not so many years since, in many parts of rural New England, it was accounted the height of elegance for pupils to walk barefoot to the schoolhouse door, and there put on their shoes, while dispensing altogether with any foot- covering was even more common. Economy which no one thought a cause for shame was the undevi- ating rule; thrift and industry were almost the alter- native of starvation; and none starved.
Even the children's toys, for the children were not made dull by all work and no play, were of ingenious home contrivance. The sleds were made of wood by the boys or by their fathers; as a rule they were built in exact imitation of the bigger ox-sleds - cleft tongue, heavy beams, wooden shoes and all. The girls' dolls were faint reflections of the human likeness rudely fashioned from rags, with undecided features done in ink or charcoal. Then there were skates bound on with long buck- skin thongs, and bows of hickory with cat-tail flags or feathered rods for arrows. There was hunting and trapping for those old enough for such sport ; there was the digging of sweet flagroot in the spring, the gathering of nuts in the fall, the climbing of
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trees, the wrestling or ball playing at all seasons. There was plenty of sport even in the midst of the hard home-work.
In the more serious occupations of the elders many peculiarities were due to the scarcity and cost of iron in all its forms, and the abundance of wood and leather. Their buckets were of wood, with bent wooden handles fastened on by wooden pins. Smaller buckets were lifted by one of the staves which was some inches longer than its fellows and terminated in a rounded handle. For wagons they had at first no need. Their sleds were home-made and were of wood even to the shoes, which were fastened on with wooden pins. Nails, which were wrought by the blacksmith's hand, were quite expensive and were naturally reserved for only the indispensable uses.
The frames of houses and barns were always pinned, not spiked, together; wooden pins were used to fasten the boards to the posts of fences ; and even, in very early times, to attach shingles to the roofs or sides of buildings. The latches and hinges of doors and the fastenings of barns were of wood. Yet the most important of the many uses of this invaluable material was that suggested by the great open fireplaces up whose yawning mouths the flames went roaring of a cold winter night, while in the radiant circle of its light sat
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the father of the family with his bullet mold and bar of lead, or perhaps with the dish of melted tallow which he was rubbing upon the boots of the entire household; within the genial glow of the great fire gathered, too, all the family-the son with his traps and with his book, the mother with her needle and the daughter with her knitting.
1.
THE SINGING SCHOOL.
Winter was indeed the chief season of the year. The summer was passed in felling trees which often had been better left unfelled, in pulling stumps, burning wood for charcoal and harvesting the crops by the slow and laborious process of the sickle and the scythe. Autumn's sounds were
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the pounding of the flails and the rustle of the corn as it was husked. But when the frost came and the snow covered the ground there were entirely new duties awaiting the settler. The latter half of November and the first weeks of December were " butchering time," for then meat could be frozen solid and kept for weeks or months with but little care. The pigs which had been grow- ing all summer for this occasion, were slaughtered and cut up, the hens were sentenced to the block and the fat bullocks and heifers yielded up their lives.
Butchering time brought a host of occupations in its train for the "women folks." There were sausages and head-cheese to make, lard and tallow to try out, candles tr mold or dip and brine barrels to prepare for pork. By the time that all these operations were finished, and when the snow had covered a little deeper the surface of the ground, the year's marketing was to be done. The mart of the Western towns was Troy, of the Eastern ones Boston.
Great sleds were loaded with bags of wheat, with pork and poultry, butter and cheese, potash, maple sugar and honey, with linen, woollen yarn, mittens, stockings and other products of the farm or household. Drawn by one, two, or three yoke of oxen they went creaking and swaying along the
-
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country roads to town, the teamster perched a-top of his load when all went well, or running alongside to guide his team at difficult turn-outs.
Usually several of these sleds went together, for the sake of company and of ready assistance in case of need. The coming of one of these caravans into a quiet Massachusetts town at the close of a winter's day, freighted with the produce and burdened with the errands of half a township, must have been a stirring sight. The cracking of whips, the shouts to the oxen, and the straining and creaking of the great sleds were welcome sounds to the ears of innkeepers and to all people who de- lighted in good company.
Not unfrequently a clergyman was of the party, driving his own sled loaded with his household wares, or in his stead a deacon or two to restrain profanity or unseemly conduct. Wholesome mirth was never interfered with nor, it must be confessed, was the frequent tendency to over-much tippling. For, when the hard day's work was done, when the teamsters gathered about the tavern fire to spend a few hours before going to bed in prepa- ration for the morrow's early start greasing their boots, setting all in readiness and chatting as they worked about the day's haps and mishaps, then the wagging tongues were apt to be loosened and the chilled bodies thawed into a glow by generous
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sips from jug or pitcher as it went the rounds filled with hard cider or with Medford rum. In the "good old days" of Vermont's early statehood there had been no temperance reform either in the State or out of it.
In the New England Farmer of 1831 appeared a letter from Henry Stevens of Barnet, Vt., giving the year's produce and the stock of five farmers of that town who, he said, were about to start for Boston to market a portion of their crops. The letter which has been reprinted in several of the newspapers of the State, continues :
William Bachop has 45 acres of mowing, 22 of tillage and 45 of pasture, valued at $1699. He has four oxen, 17 cows, 20 other cattle, 12 horses, 62 sheep, 10 fat hogs, seven shoats ; has 65 tons of hay, 90 bushels wheat, 275 bushels oats, 175 bushels corn, 12 bushel beans, 900 bushels of potatoes ; has for market 2500 pounds of pork and 1950 pounds butter.
Cloud Harvey has 30 acres of mowing, 15 of tillage and 30 of pasturage, valued at $372, exclusive of house and lot; has two oxen, 14 cows, seven horses, 2S sheep, six fat hogs, eight shoats; has 35 tons hay, 150 bushels wheat, 300 of oats, So of corn, two of beans and 500 of potatoes; has for market 1500 pounds of pork and 1300 pounds of butter.
Moses Bouce has 14 acres of mowing, 34 of tillage, 29 of pasture, valued at $968; has seven cows, five other cattle, six horses, 24 sheep, eight fat hogs, four shoats ; has 21 tons hay, 60 bushels wheat, 75 of oats, 50 of corn, five of beans, 523 of potatoes, 12 of turnips and 50 pounds of flax, and has for market 1600 pounds of pork and 600 pounds of butter.
William Shearer has 23 acres of mowing, 13 of tillage and 40 of pasturage, valued at $600; has six oxen, seven cows, IS other cattle, six horses, 3S sheep, 10 fat hogs, four shoats; cuts 35 tons hay, 35 bushels wheat, 300 of oats, 80 of corn, six of barley, two of beans and 400 of potatoes; has 1600 pounds pork, 350 pounds of butter.
William Warder, jr., has 26 acres of mowing. 150 of tillage. 20 of pasture, valued at $414; has two oxen, six cows, 12 other cattle, four horses, IS sheep, nine fat hogs and five shoats; has for market 1700 pounds of pork and 500 pounds of butter.
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These figures are not to be considered common by any means. They were given with the express purpose of inducing New England farmers to move to Vermont instead of Michigan, or to stay in Vermont if already there. They may be taken as representing farming in the State at its best under the old conditions. But they do at least cast some light upon the nature of the products most in favor in the days when farmers found a profit in hauling their wares to a market two hundred miles away and selling them at prices considerably below those of the present home markets.
By the time the pork and the potash and other wealth of the soil had been exchanged for powder, axes and the few staples of commerce which were needed, the winter was well begun. The remainder, with the month of February as its culmination, was given over to gayeties such as no other season could witness. The young and old attended parties and meetings of all kinds; they visited distant friends, a whole family crowding into the big ox sled ; they went to singing-school and learned to quaver " China " and to sound the harmonies of " Mear," the young men seeing the maidens home when the moon had risen. Need it be added that it was the time of the year more sacred to courtship than was even the spring? Then, to most advan- tage and with greatest opportunities of leisure, did
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the future wise men of the State con their books by the great blazing fires. By day there was always the wood-pile to replenish for another year; or when this was done the logs were to be got out for the saw-mill, until at last the lengthening days started the sap in the rock maples. Then the sugar-makers -their descendants have learned better- cut cruel gashes in the bark of the trees, stuck chips in the lower corners to guide the sap and set wooden troughs or buckets to catch it as it fell.
The boiling of the syrup was done in an open kettle hung by a logging chain from the butt end of a strong pole resting in a notched upright. There was much waste of fuel in this boiling out of doors, a matter not always considered then. The sap was constantly watched; when it showed a tendency to boil over its foaming rise was checked by dipping into it a piece of pork or a green hemlock bough. The red gleam of the fire did not die out till late at night, and its light served the double purpose of aiding the work of the boiler and enabling him to study his algebra or well-thumbed grammar. The sugaring season was one of hard work and homely joys. When it was over, the spring plowing and seeding soon began the round of another year.
Teaming was almost entirely done with oxen, and in winter. Most of the roads were bad until
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the snow had leveled them; they were in fact often but bridle paths along which no wheeled vehicle could pass. Grain was carried to mill on horseback or upon the shoulder, the doctor, the clergyman and the lawyer made their rounds in the saddle; on Sunday those who could not walk went to church on horseback. Not until the beginning of the present century were double wagons used to any great extent, their place in farm work being sup- plied even in summer by sledges. Single road wagons came a decade or so later. Up to that time women made long journeys on horseback to the towns of Massachusetts or Connecticut, carry- ing the youngest child in arms.
Where means of transit were so primitive, the bulkier crops could not be marketed to much advantage. It was this fact that forced Ver- monters to feed their grain to pigs and cattle and to market the latter. To transport the grain crop itself would have been impossible, but pork could be hauled and cattle driven at comparatively light expense. The southwestern corner of the State, which was near water communication at Troy, did indeed, up to 1825, raise quantities of wheat for the New York market. This yield in bread-stuffs en- joyed a reputation like that of Western New York thirty years ago or that of Dakota later; but the ravages of the Hessian fly and the competition of
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broader acres put an end to the industry, and for almost half a century the State has not produced enough wheat to feed its own people.
The making of potash, pearl ash and "black salts " was in the early times a considerable source of revenue. The ashes from fireplaces and logging heaps were carefully saved ; they were first leached and the lye boiled down to a rude potash. This by refinement became the pearl ash of commerce. Thousands of acres of valuable timber were destroyed in this wasteful manufacture. Charcoal burning was equally destructive, and to get hemlock bark for the tanners still more slaughter of the forests was necessary.
The log cabin period did not last so long as in some other States, since water power was plentiful and saw-mills were everywhere built at the time of settlement. But through the years of hardest strug- gle with the wilderness the picturesque log huts sheltered many a family and gave way but slowly to their clapboard successors. Long after the saw- mills were doing their useful work it was still the custom to rive shingles out of cedar or pine " bolts " and laboriously finish them with the draw- shave, a few hundred a day. There was a limited market for these and for ash hoops and barrel staves. The raising of wool was greatly encouraged by the tariff of 1828, and by the opening of the
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Bridgman
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Champlain Canal. From this latter event the dairy interests of the State received great encouragement.
Manufactures were for many years crude and few. Starch factories were early built to make an outlet for the potato crop, which was too bulky to transport to market. Fulling mills for finishing domestic woollen cloth were common; smelting furnaces began to work the iron of the State be- fore the first years of the present century. Boat- building became an important art with the opening of steam navigation on Lake Champlain in 1808, just one year after Fulton's Clermont ascended the Hudson. Until the opening of the canal the quar- ries of the State, since so rich and promising, lan- guished for lack of transportation facilities.
Wild animals were at first numerous. Venison agreeably varied the monotony of salt pork in the settler's bill of fare and the rivers were well- stocked with fish. Noxious animals troubled the settlers greatly, by making havoc among their flocks and herds, but did not often assail people except under the provocation of extreme hunger. In the early days of Bennington Catherine Mason was killed by wolves while on her way home from an evening's merry-making. During the Revolu- tionary War as Captain Stephen Goodrich was hurrying to a place of safety on a lonely night journey, he encountered these assassins of the forest,
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and escaped death only by incessantly flashing powder in the pan of his musket. Catamounts and bears were among the enemies of the early settlers, but soon became rare, though occasional specimens are still seen. The fur-bearing animals. the mink, otter, musk-rat, beaver and fox, were plentiful and added somewhat to the resources of the State.
The gloom of the woods, the hard conditions of life, the danger from wild beasts, the serious aims and occupations of the people were favorable to grave reflections and religious steadfastness. From far and near the people on Sunday gathered to the church, where they sat in their pews and listened to healthy doctrine in liberal measure. For the most part the services were simple and wholesome, but religious vagaries were not uncom- mon in the early part of the century, perhaps as a natural reaction from the irreligion so much affected at the time of the French Revolution. One of these grew under other skies into the famous system of Mormonism. Others died a natural death, meeting little encouragement from the hard common-sense of the people. The leading denomination was the Congregationalist, though others were vigorous, and increased even more rapidly in numbers.
The church buildings, of whatever denomination,
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were plain and unpretentious structures usually of wood. They were not large, had high-backed pews, and lofty pulpits from which the Word was preached morning and afternoon. In winter their fireless rigor was alleviated only by the foot-stoves which, filled with live coals, were brought to church, and by thick and warm clothing. There was at first no instrumental music, but there were always strong and clear voices to lead the rest in hearty con- gregational singing. Round about each church were scattered the graves of those of the con- gregations who had gone before.
Schools and newspapers came to these new com- munities almost as soon as the churches. Two vigorous colleges were founded in 1800, and before that time schools and academies had long been in beneficent operation. The first newspaper was founded in 1778, at Westminster. It was short- lived. In 1783 the Vermont Gazette or Freeman's Depository was founded at Bennington. It lived considerably more than half a century. The Windsor Journal, still living, claims the same date. The Rutland Herald dates back to 1794, the Montpelier Watchman to 1806, the Danville North Star to 1807, the Montpelier Argus to 1819, the Burlington Free Press to 1827, the St. Albans Messenger to 1833, the Brattleborough Phoenix to 1837, the Middlebury Register to 1836. All of these
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are still published. Wherever newspapers were printed, books were made. Bennington and Bur- lington, Montpelier and Brattleborough have always been centres for the publication of more or less ambitious works. The industry was well established at the beginning of the present cent- ury. Libraries were early founded in the large towns. One was established in 1797 in Pittsfield, which illustrated to posterity the value in which good books were held and the detestation of their abuse by adopting the following scale of fines for damaged volumes :
Ist. For each blot or entire obscuration of print of the superficial area of one half inch square and so in proportion for any other dimention
2d. For each grease spot of like dimention 8 cents
12 cents
3d. For every blur
. 3 cents
4th. For every leaf folded down 6 cents
5th. For each Tear in the print of one half inch and so .
in proportion 12 cents
The political, like the religious, domestic and social characteristics of the times were simple, direct and sincere. Public office was a public trust. Two of the great occasions of the year - more im- portant indeed than any except "training day "- were freeman's meeting in September, as election day was called, and town meeting in March. The latter was by far the more important of the two alike in fact and in estimation.
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This notable assemblage of freemen, a lineal de- scendant of the Saxon witenagemote, settled, as it still does, all questions of town government. It held the purse-strings and made each year the necessary appropriations. It authorized new enter- prises by vote, and elected the town officers. The money of the people was economically spent, for every citizen was well informed upon town affairs, and the public officers were held to a strict account- ability. It was a system which impressed all the citizens with a sense of their personal responsi- bilities ; it bred politicians in numbers and states- men not a few.
Men like Chipman, Seymour, Bradley and Pren- tiss were taught in the school of the town meet- ing. Young men prof- ited by the free discus- sion and impartial de- cision of affairs and carried their Yankee ways to the newly form- ing States in the West. Not the least among the influences which have helped Vermont from the earliest time up to the present must be BORROWING FIRE.
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reckoned the simple democracy of its local govern- ment. This, by bringing the decision of the most important questions to the direct vote of the people, has acted at once as a safeguard and a means of political education.
Neighbors were neighbors in the homespun days. They appreciated those kindly acts of mutual helpful- ness which make life sweet and wholesome. Before matches were invented, they " borrowed fire " of one another, running briskly from house to house with the smoking brands. The buckskin thong which served as a latch-string always hung outside the door, and any one was free to enter. Tools served a neighbor as well as the owner, and there was always a chance to return a favor in kind. There were " bees " on all possible pretexts and occasions. Logging bees cleared fields like magic; husking bees served for rare frolics on autumn evenings ; chopping parties made light work of the minister's woodpile.
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