Philadelphia (Repplier)/Chapter 10

IT is hardly a matter for surprise that Pennsylvania should have been more languid than Massachusetts or Virginia in asserting her independence; that Philadelphia, destined to be the birthplace of the nation, should have been slower than restless Boston to defy authority, and take up arms against her King. To the sane and somewhat sluggish minds of wealthy merchants and well-paid mechanics, a principle is not always worth fighting for, unless its sacrifice involves a serious loss of personal comfort or well-being. And for nearly a century the Quaker City, though sometimes weary of wrangling, had been exceedingly comfortable, and had lacked nothing that the colonial heart could reasonably ask or desire. The gentlemen who drove every evening, after the easy cares of the days, to their beautiful country-seats,—to Stenton, to Mount Pleasant, to Cliveden, or to Bush Hill,—must have found life very well worth living. It was the custom of all wealthy citizens to build these country-seats, and their tranquil beauty did much to foster the spirit of conservative content. Belmont Mansion stood looking over ​woods and water, boasting the finest avenue of hemlocks in the country, a stately, strong old house, full of traditions and memories. William Peters, who purchased the estate and lived there many years, was a strict churchman and an unflinching Tory, detesting Quakers and patriots with the impartial sincerity of

Belmont Mansion

Praed's delightful "Quince." Not so his son Richard, afterwards Judge Peters, who threw in his lot with the revolutionists, and kept for us some lively records of that stirring time. His unconquerable vivacity left him light of heart when others chilled with despair, and never for one moment does he appear to have doubted the ultimate success of his cause. A genial ​and hospitable host, he made Belmont the gayest house of its day. There Washington sought respite from anxiety and care; there La Fayette planted a walnut tree, and John Quincy Adams ate one of the best and merriest dinners of his life,—a life in which good and merry dinners seem to have played a somewhat conspicuous part. Judge Peters enjoyed an enviable reputation as a wit, and some of his pleasantries have come floating down to us in cold unsympathetic print, illustrating, as a captious biographer expresses it, "the great difference between hearing a joke and reading one." The Indians, whose councils he occasionally attended, and who are not a humorous race, christened him the Talking Bird. It is a pity ever to waste wit upon Indians.

There is hardly one of the noble old country-houses that girdle Philadelphia which has not its historic interest, its close association with names and incidents inseparably interwoven with the annals of the province, and sometimes with the broader annals of the land. To Mount Pleasant, embedded in trees, and famous alike for the breadth of its stairs and the depth of its capacious fireplaces, Benedict Arnold brought home his bride; the pretty, vivacious, self-willed Peggy Shippen, daughter of Edward Shippen, afterwards judge of the Supreme Court, and chief justice of Pennsylvania. The estate was Arnold's marriage settlement upon his wife, and beneath this roof their ​first child was born to them, in the innocent, happy years, undimmed by trouble, untainted by the shadow of approaching shame.

Cliveden, the home of Chief Justice Chew, and better known to Philadelphians as Chew House, has a different history, for here occurred that memorable struggle by which victory was snatched from the very arms of defeat. The barricading of Chew House by Colonel Musgrave with six companies of the Fortieth Regiment, the fruitless assault by the American forces, the delay and danger thus occasioned, and the final routing of our soldiers from the hotly contested field, are well-known details of the battle of Germantown; as familiar to readers of American history as is the death of that gallant English officer, Brigadier-General Agnew, in the old Wister homestead, where the blood from his many wounds stained deeply red the smooth and polished floor. Agnew had fought bravely for the colonies in the French and Indian wars, and the inexorable voice of duty had sent him back to fight against them, when they threw off their allegiance to the King. His last act was an effort to save a German servant-maid from danger. Two hours later he was carried back to her master's roof, a dying man, yet so tranquil and content that, in the simple words of his aide-de-camp, it was "with seeming satisfaction" he passed quietly away from strife. He was buried in the Germantown graveyard, finding rest in the alien ​land to which he had been both friend and foe; and years afterwards his grandchildren came over the sea to visit the place where he lay.

More peaceful associations cling around other historic homes: Bush Hill, the country-seat of the Hamiltons

Wister House

before Woodlands was built; Walnut Grove, the most demure of houses, erected by Joseph Wharton, the most sedate of Quakers, yet destined to be the scene of the gayest, maddest, richest, courtliest frolic that Philadelphia has ever witnessed; and Fairhill, the home of Isaac Norris, and afterwards of that contentious, letter-writing patriot, John Dickinson. The gardens of Fairhill, ​grave English gardens with gravelled walks and well-clipped hedges, were esteemed the fairest in the province; and Francis Pastorius, who dearly loved their orderly charms, was wont to pronounce them the fairest in the world. Here grew strange exotics brought from distant lands, and here were found the first willow trees that ever drooped over Pennsylvania's soil. Isaac Norris owed these trees to the keen observation of Franklin, who noticed the sprouting of a willow wand, woven into a rough basket which lay on the deck of a boat moored in the Delaware. He carried the brave little sprout to Debby Norris, who planted it with care, and it became in time the parent of a numerous progeny, much admired because so little known.

Fairhill was destroyed during the Revolution. Its beauties are now only a tradition of the past, as are also the beauties of another famous country-seat, Lansdowne Mansion, built by John Penn, grandson of the Founder, in the romantic glen which bears its name. After Penn returned to England, Lansdowne was purchased by William Bingham who had amassed what, for those primitive days, seemed a colossal fortune, in the West Indies, and who made this lovely spot for many years his summer home. He married Ann Willing, the sixteen-year-old daughter of that able judge and very moderate Whig, Thomas Willing; and the letters and diaries of the day teem with descriptions of the young bride's beauty, her distinction of manner, her luxurious ​surroundings and wonderful gowns. Even in Paris these gowns won ample recognition, and so deeply impressed Miss Adams, daughter of John Adams, then busy with negotiations in France, that she filled up her journal with ardent accounts of their splendour.

We know from other equally enthusiastic contemporaries how handsomely Lansdowne and Mr. Bingham's town house were furnished, how the sofas were covered with Gobelin tapestry, and the folding-doors were inlaid with mirrors, into which awkward or absent-minded guests walked blunderingly. We are even familiar with the chairs, upholstered in crimson and yellow brocade, their rosewood backs shaped like lyres; and we are informed by Mr. Wansey, an English traveller who enjoyed much Philadelphia hospitality, that the drawing-room "was papered in the French taste, after the style of the Vatican at Rome," a suggestive but enigmatic statement which leaves us sunk in the depths of speculation. From all this magnificence the gay and graceful hostess was summoned too soon by the unkindly fates, and her husband, detesting the empty splendour of his home, abandoned it forever, and lived in Europe until his death. Joseph Bonaparte occupied Lansdowne House for several years, adding to the interest with which the fine old place was always regarded, until it was burned to the ground on the fourth of July, 1854, sacrificed, like so many other homes, and like so many ​lives, to our peculiar methods of celebrating our great national anniversary.

In sharp contrast to the stately country-seats which were the especial delight of wealthy and aristocratic Philadelphians, stood and still stands the old stone house, simple and beautiful, of John Bartram the botanist, whose famous gardens sloped down to the river's brink, and were the wonder and admiration of his day. Bartram's history is as interesting as that of Gilbert White of Selborne. Where the Englishman turned his keen and thoughtful eyes upon bird and beast, the American fixed his upon every green leaf that sprang from the fertile soil. Both men laboured quietly within their narrow bounds, both thought much of their work and little of the public, and both added generous shares to the useful knowledge of the world.

It was while ploughing his field that a little white daisy forced the current of Bartram's thoughts into a studious channel. The flower made its innocent appeal to him as to the pitying, passionate eyes of Burns, but the Quaker ploughman was no poet. He could only regret that his rude labour destroyed so many nurslings of the earth, and resolve to foster them in the future as far as lay in his power, and to learn what he could of their structure and existence. This was a harder matter than the Scotchman's inspired song. Bartram bought a Latin grammar, and to the profound annoyance of his wife, who, like all good helpmates, was steadfastly op​posed to her husband's inexplicable crotchets, he studied earnestly until, with the help of a neighbouring schoolmaster, he had acquired a sufficient knowledge of the language to enable him to read and understand several works of Linnæus. From that time forward, the joy of a beloved pursuit filled his life with sober happiness, and he illustrated, as did Gilbert White, how much can be accomplished by the close observation of a single student, working year after year within a limited compass. Watson, a very doubtful authority, asserts that, prior to the Revolution, Bartram enjoyed a small pension as botanist to the royal family. This, if true, was a pleasing token of appreciation on the royal family's part; but it does not appear that the Quaker farmer ever lacked sufficient means for his modest wants. He built in 1731 his quaint stone house, with his name and his wife's name cut into the wall; and forty years later he chiselled this couplet over the window of his study, where all who passed might see it:—

In this house, "small but decent," as St. John describes it, he lived a life of almost patriarchal simplicity. His family, his visitors, his hired servants and negro slaves all sat at the same board, his slaves below the salt, as the Saxon thralls of old. Yet his armorial bearings hung blazoned on the wall, for this Pennsylvania ​Quaker boasted a descent from one of the Norman knights who had stormed England under the Conqueror's banner, and he was most inconsistently proud of his strain of noble blood, which perhaps, indeed, furnished the keynote of his character, and accounted for the very simplicity of a household resembling in some respects the ancient château in Languedoc, where Eugénie de Guérin toiled in the great kitchen, directing and assisting the peasant servants in their homely work. Perhaps, too, this Norman lineage rendered John Bartram, gentle and peace-loving though he seemed, a little impatient of spiritual control; for we find him accused of Unitarianism by the Society of Friends, and exceedingly indifferent to its strictures. In 1741 a subscription was raised to enable him to travel through the neighbouring colonies in search of flowers and plants; and, as his knowledge widened, he wandered still further afield,—to Virginia, to Carolina, to Canada, and even, when nearly seventy years of age, to Florida, where he navigated the St. Juan in a clumsy boat with three oars and a sail, exploring those marshy and unfrequented shores, upon which, as his old chronicler delightfully expresses it, "the wild birds are held in awe by the thunder of the devouring alligator."

Of John Bartram's twelve children, only one, William Bartram, inherited his father's tastes and studious habits, with an additional aptitude for writing verses, which local critics, after the time-honoured custom of their ​race, compared favourably to the poetry of Burns. William died childless, and the property passed into the hands of his grand-niece, Ann, whose husband sold it after her death to Andrew Eastwick. Mr. Eastwick erected a more commodious residence on the estate; but the old Bartram homestead has been preserved

Old Bartram House

with great care, as well for its beauty as for its interesting associations. Strength, simplicity, an instinctive and unfailing sense of appropriateness,—these are the characteristics which, when seen in a house, indicate some corresponding qualities on the part of the man who built it, and these are precisely the characteristics that took flight for many a year from the fantastic and paltry architecture of the land.

​Into this peaceful province, so rich, so comfortable, so thoroughly satisfied, came rolling in 1765 the apple of discord in the shape of an obnoxious, unconstitutional Stamp Act, and the voice of the coming Revolution bade men arise from their pleasant hearths, and do battle for their civic rights. They were not quick to obey, though the call sank deeply into their hearts. Principle, not prosperity, was at stake, and the shadow of strife cast a disagreeable and ominous chill over the first buoyant enthusiasm for resistance. Moreover, there were many reasons moving many minds through different channels into the same sluggish course. The Episcopalians entertained honest sentiments of loyalty, as well they might, towards the crown, and towards the English establishment which had so often befriended them in their need; and they knew that only by help of the mother country, and the mother church, could they maintain their political importance. The Germans were just as honest in their way, being absolutely indifferent to the situation, and absolutely untouched by the restless and fast-growing spirit of discontent. The Quakers, though their entire history had been one of determined opposition to attempted encroachments upon the constitutional privileges of the colony, were far from desiring any radical change of government; and they mistrusted profoundly the movement for independence which threatened the complete overthrow of their present power and of their past work, of ​that fair structure upon which they had toiled patiently and lovingly for nearly a century of progress.

It would be difficult to overrate the influence of the Quakers in Philadelphia immediately before the Revolution, an influence which melted wholly away during those years of warfare, carrying with it much sanity and moderation that could ill be spared. They held a large part of the city's commerce in their capable hands, and the fortunes they acquired were spent with liberality and discretion. If they did not give their wives and daughters Paris gowns, nor cover their sofas with Gobelin tapestry, nor scandalize the town by aspiring, like Mrs. Bingham and her friends, to private boxes at the theatre, yet life held for them many demure and sober gayeties. John Adams, who has left us such epicurean descriptions of Philadelphia dinners and suppers that a feeble digestion is wrecked by even reading a list of the things he ate, or tried to eat, acknowledges that it was often under Quaker roofs he encountered these "sinful feasts." It was a Quaker hostess who pressed upon him at a single meal, "ducks, ham, chickens, beef, pig, tarts, creams, custards, jellies, fools, trifles, floating islands, beer, porter, punch, and wine." It was, he confesses, at the solicitation of a Quaker host that he "drank Madeira at a great rate, and found no inconvenience,"—for which the incredulous reader can only take his word.

In the interesting journal of Elizabeth Drinker, ​begun in 1759, and continued with occasional interruptions for nearly fifty years, we find, before the peaceful days are over, a perpetual record of tea-drinking and other gentle dissipations. Such items as "Drank tea at Joseph Trotter's," or "Peggy Parr with her sister-in-law, Nancy, and Polly drank tea with us," appear on every page; and it is plain this sedate young Quakeress has a lingering love for diversion. She flatly declines hearing an instructive lecture on electricity, which is greatly to her credit; but she pays two shillings to see a lioness which a wandering showman is carrying through the town. She "spends the day"—that old-time entertainment—at the houses of youthful friends; and she writes with inexpressible demureness that Henry Drinker, her future husband, has stayed until eleven o'clock at night,—"unseasonable hours," as she admits, adding softly, "My judgment doesn't coincide with my actions; 'tis a pity, but I hope to mend." Strictly conservative, and innocently loyal, she records with sadness, December 26, 1760, "the Death of our good old King, George the Second,"—the news being then two months old; and this contentment with the ruling powers, and with the placid tranquillity of the province, illustrates very accurately the attitude of the Quakers before the great division in their ranks. They, at least, had few complaints to offer. A wealthy and prominent Friend, meeting one of the "Apostates" or Free Quakers, ​bravely girt with a sword, said to him, "Why, what is this with which thou hast bedecked thyself? Surely not a rapier!" "Yes," was the staunch reply, "for liberty or death is now the watchword of every one who means to defend himself and his property." "Ah!" sighed the serene old Friend, "I had not expected such high feelings in thee. Thy mind has become as fierce as thy sword. As to property, I thought thee had none, and as to thy liberty, I thought thee already enjoyed it through the kindness of thy creditors." A purely commercial view, one may observe, to take of the situation.

It is well for us that the leisure of those days gave people time to keep journals, for it is to such records we must turn if we wish to understand the ordinary life and common sentiments of men and women who do not appear on the canvas of history, but who reflect with unconscious sincerity the public temper which made public action possible. The diaries of Elizabeth Drinker and Christopher Marshall, the memoirs of Dr. Graydon and Thomas Twining, give us, not only a number of interesting facts, but also the atmosphere of the last century which eludes all modern histories, and leaves them unsympathetic and judicial. We learn from Dr. Graydon that the letters of Junius awakened such a thrill of excitement in quiet Philadelphia that it became "highly fashionable"—delightful phrase—to discuss them on all occasions; and ​that the Rev. Mr. Duché published a series of papers on the subject, signing himself "Tamoc Caspipina," an acrostic—wholly impenetrable—upon his rightful title, "The Assistant Minister of Christ's Church and Saint Peter's, in Philadelphia, in North America."

As for Tom Paine and his seething sentences, we know from many sources what influence he acquired; how "Common Sense" was eagerly read by the colonists, and how the "Rights of Man" was quoted on every side during those unsettled, turbulent years which followed the Revolution. Dr. Graydon tells us that ardent patriots were wont to denounce Burke's "Reflections on the French Revolution" as "heavy and tedious," fit only to serve as a foil for the shining qualities of Paine. He himself, however, though sincerely patriotic and an officer of the Revolutionary army, was disinclined to accept this verdict. Having nourished his youth upon English classics, Fielding, Smollett and Richardson, he naturally found the "Revolution" less tedious than the "Rights"; and our sudden fierce enthusiasm for France, the tri-colour, and the guillotine, struck him as a little absurd and very dangerous. We had travelled far afield by 1791; but in 1765 even "Common Sense" had not yet dawned luridly upon our peaceful path: The province, though sufficiently ill-disposed towards unconstitutional taxation, was at heart loyal to the English crown; and Franklin, even while upholding his coun​try's cause, could find no words too forcible in which to give this loyalty expression. He was wont to say that the colonists loved England better than they loved each other. The time was fast approaching when the first of these laudable affections died a natural death, and the second ceased to be so apparent as to justify its use when a strong comparison or illustration was desired.