wreck of the masts that dragged and bumped alongside. As the homewardbound vessel darted past down the slippery side of a great wave, a wail went up from the doomed brig, and under her counter they saw, painted in white letters, FRIDAY of WILMINGTON. tre of the first importance. But in those ed and thundered as if the Dutchman and days many of the prominent citizens were his demon crew were loose, a homewardboat-owners, and their docks and their bound vessel, running before the gale, warehouses stood along the Christiana saw the hulk of a brig pitching heavily within easy distance of their houses. in the trough of the sea, while her crew Along the Brandywine River, the brawl- ran about the deck, cutting loose the ing stream which Dame Shipley crossed, | beside which flour mills, once the greatest in the country, were subsequently located, the price of grain was all the topic of interest. Along the Christiana it was the Irish and the West India trade. The arrival of the ships was looked forward to with the most intense interest, as bringing the town not only the latest foreign news, but many luxuries then only to be procured in the Old World. Sometimes an immigrant ship would move slowly up the Christiana, laboriously towed by two row-boats ahead, to which lines were attached. "It was amusing," says the chronicle, "to see the people land in the sun, some without bonnets, and often wrapped in red and blue cloaks. In those days there was an odd custom in practice called chairing the captain, if his treatment on the voyage had gained their good feeling, and if he would submit to the lofty honor. Two long poles were fastened under an arm-chair, where he was seated; four stout men took each an end of the pole on his shoulder, bearing the chair, and paraded the streets, men, women, and children following in a long procession, cheering and shouting, 'Hurrah! hurrah for Captain The oncoming wave rose like a wall between the vessels, and when they lifted on the crest of the next, nothing was to be seen but a few floating timbers. When Mrs. Harvey heard the news she folded her hands and remarked: "I told thee so, Isaac. This is all thy sixth-day doings. Now thee sees the consequence. Thee never had the vessel insured.” During the Revolution in France numbers of the émigrés settled in and around Wilmington, forming a society entirely of themselves, visiting among each other, dining with each other, and associating but little with the community in the midst of which they had established themselves. Whether there was something that suited them in the hilly streets of the queer old-fashioned town, or whether it was that the strict conservatism of the Quaker folks was congenial to them, certain it is that there were few if any such communities of these people outside of England. They kept their manners, customs, and language intact while they re Some of the stories handed down border so closely upon the legendary that one hesitates to place the entire reliance upon them which a historical narrative deserves. Such, for instance, is the story of the boat Friday, built by Isaac Har-mained in this country. Along the millvey, which runs thus: Isaac laid the keel of the brig on a Friday; that night his wife had an ill dream, and strongly urged him to tear it up, and begin the ship anew on Saturday (seventh day, in the Quaker vernacular). But Isaac was a hard-headed, matter-of-fact man, and placed no faith in a woman's dreams. It is these little things in life that breed strife in a family, and strife was bred in this; but altercation only made Isaac more fixed in his own way, so that, out of pure perversity, he not only fitted the brig out on Friday, but he named her the Friday, and sent her out under command of a good captain on Friday. On that Friday week, in the midst of a gale that piped and roar race banks of the Brandywine on the Wilmington side they built their bathhouses, and on every Monday morning their French servants washed the linen on benches in the clear water there. Among these French refugees were names famous and noble. The Duponts de Nemours, whose parent, the famous Pierre Samuel, now lies buried at the family estates near Wilmington; General Anne Louis de Toussard, who served along with Lafayette in the war of the Revolution; la Marquise de Sourci and her son; Doctor Didie, a noted French physician of the time; M. Garesché; M. Bauduy— were among the members of the French society of this period. Stories concern ing the lives and habits of these people | formed from childhood, she had not the have been handed down in the chronicles strength, even if she had had the experiof the town to the present day. General ence, to struggle for her living in a strange De Toussard found his house damp after land and among strange people. Her counhe had settled in it, and so had canvas trymen came forward to her assistance, stretched on frames and set into the walls. until her son took her support into his Many of his guests, notably M. Bauduy, own hands. The boy had a considerable had been friends and patrons of the art- talent for contriving ingenious toys and ists that flourished in the times of Louis knickknacks. A dwarf gourd grew in the XVI.; and so, after dinner, when the garden of the little stone house in which wine warmed them generously, perhaps, they lived; he shaped the fruit into little they would amuse themselves by painting globe boxes, carved figures upon them, figures, still-life, or landscapes on the con- varnished them, and peddled them about veniently canvassed walls; and so those the streets. Finding these sold rapidly, walls became a gallery of extempore art. he contrived toy boats and other playthings, which he sold to the school-children. Among other things, he invented a grasshopper of wood and whalebone, which he caused to hop across the ice on the Christiana Creek, when it was frozen over, to the vast amusement of a crowd of men and boys who stood spectators on the banks. The following year, with his own hands, he built himself a boat, by means of which he transported sand and gravel, for building purposes, across from New Jersey. During one of these expeditions a storm arose, and the following day young De Sourci's boat was found floating bottom upward down the river. His body was never recovered. His mother did not survive his loss very long, and now lies buried in the old Swedes Church yard. M. Michel Martel was another French refugee, formerly of wealth and position in his own country. He was a linguist of considerable note, being proficient in fifteen different languages. Through this proficiency he gained an easy and comfortable living both in Boston and New York. At length he heard news of some of his friends in Wilmington, and of the pleasant little settlement there; so he determined to resign the more lucrative business in the larger cities, and to enjoy the society of his friends with the modest income that he could realize by teaching in Wilmington; but not long after his arrival in that town he had a stroke of paralysis, from which he recovered but slowly, and then only with impaired faculties and an entire loss of knowledge of any language but French. His compatriots were too poor to render him any material assistance; and although many friends came forward to help him, they could not be expected to maintain him for his life. Charity is only too apt to wane with loss of interest, so that in time poor old M. Martel found himself in the county almshouse-a great white building standing near the spot where Dame Shipley first saw "the hill between the valleys.' M. Martel had once been a teacher of languages to Theodosia Burr, and on intimate terins with her father. To the lady he had dedicated several of the works, chiefly translations, which he had written after coming to this country. The Marquise de Sourci's life in this country was even more sorrowful than that of M. Martel. She was reared in France with every luxury; she left there with scarcely money enough to transport her and her boy across the ocean, and she arrived in Wilmington in a totally destitute condition. Being infirm and de Few of those French families remained in this country permanently. The Duponts still live along the Brandywine, where are the great gunpowder-works belonging to them. M. Garesché, who married the daughter of M. Bauduy, also established powder-works near the Christiana, but no direct descendant of the family remains of late years. Such of the others as were able seem to have returned to their native land upon the reestablishment of the old dynasty. For some years the Dupont family have been nearly the only remains of the French émigrés in Wilmington. Besides the French refugees there were other political aliens who found their way to this peaceful old town, the tranquillity and quietude of which shielded them from the storms of life without. In the year 1797 Archibald Hamilton Rowan, a noted Irish patriot, who had been imprisoned in his own country on account of his efforts as an agitator, established himself as a calico printer and dyer on the banks of the Brandywine, in an old barley mill that stood at the ford where Elizabeth Shipley crossed the stream on her first memorable visit. William Cobbett, also, the well-known "Peter Porcupine," taught school for a while in an old house standing in a part of the town called Quaker Hill (so named not only on account of the numerous Quaker families who lived there, but also on account of the old Friends' meetinghouse and school-house that stand on the windy summit of the hill). Cobbett's straight, soldierly figure and military tread, and his strongly marked face, were well known in the town, and long remembered by his scholars. A man of such distinguishing characteristics, of note enough to be included in Bulwer's Historical Characters, where he figures as the Man of Contention, merits more than a passing mention. His life was one battle, in which his hand was against every man, and every man's hand against him. A most voluminous political writer, he heaped invective, sarcasm, satire, and reproach upon his opponents without stint. His literary existence was, he tells us, touched to life by Swift's Tale of a Tub, for which he spent his last threepence in the face of starvation, and which he read under a hay-stack, so absorbed that hunger and thirst alike were forgotten. He came to America in 1792, and settled at first in Wilmington, whence he afterward removed to Philadelphia, where he started Peter Porcupine's Gazette, shooting, as he says, his quills at every game. He attacked the Democracy, then first come into power at the waning of Washington's popularity and the succession of Jefferson to the Presidential chair. Against this party he wrote his most clever if somewhat scurrilous fable of Democracy among the Pots." But attacks against a party did not seem to satiate his bellicose nature, so he picked out Dr. Rush, who had risen to great repute by his system of purging and bleeding for the cure of the yellow fever, and descended upon him with the swoop of a hawk. The doctor sued him for slander, and the satirical journalist was fined $5000. Soon after this he sailed for England, where he started The Porcupine in advocacy of Pitt's administration. In 1817 he was again exiled to America, under the "Six Acts," but returned in 1819, when those acts were repealed. In this second return from America to England he took with him the bones of Tom Paine; "for which riddance," says one of his critics, "America owes Cobbett's memory no little respect." The London Times, in its critical notice of a new edition of Cobbett's collected writings, says, "The general characteristics of his style were perspicuity unequalled and unexampled, a homely, muscular vigor, a purity always simple, and a raciness often elegant." Wilmington lay on the outskirts of the Battle of Brandywine. The importance of its flour mills, and its location as the key that opened the door to the province of Pennsylvania, rendered it a point of position desired by both parties during the Revolutionary war. eral Washington made a considerable stay here, and he and his staff officers were entertained by a worthy Friend, Joseph Tatnall, who alone dared to grind corn for the famishing patriot army. Several small naval engagements occurred in the Delaware River and Bay during the time that the British occupied Philadelphia, and just previous to the occupation of that town. In one of these fights, off the coast at Cape May, the American sloop of war Randolph was victorious. A travelling artist, who gained a precarious living by painting tavern signs, was at that time in Wilmington, and painted for John Marshall, who kept an inn, the Sign of the Ship-an ideal pic THE DESTRUCTION OF THE SIGN. tending forces had foraged upon the farms in the vicinity, there was a great scarcity of provisions. Two ladies, bent on marketing errands, met in the street, which was filled with soldiers lounging near their stacked arms, and expressing their indignation at seeing the redcoats pervading their peaceful streets in this manner, blamed the constable of the town for permitting it. An officer who was standing near stepped forward, and, tapping the elder dame upon the shoulder, said: "Do you know, madam, that you are all prisoners? I advise you to go quietly home, so you may avoid being locked up yourselves." And they went. ture of the battle, in which the little Amer- was market morning, and as the conican sloop was annihilating two British three-deckers in the most imposing manner. The narrator says: "When the English fleet lay opposite this town, the sailors passing to and fro were much annoyed by the sign, and always made some harsh remark as they passed. One day two sailors, dressed in petticoat trousers, carrying a bag up the street, arrested the attention of a young girl who was a great observer of the daily events, and who watched their doings. They stopped at the foot of the post, emptied their budget, took out an axe and other tools, ran up the post and drew down the sign, and split the hateful painting to atoms, and, hewing down the post, left not a vestige of its former glory." John Marshall watched them from the porch of the tavern, not daring to interfere. "Tis a vast pity," said he, pointing to the wreck of the sign as he spoke"tis a vast pity that you did not have pluck enough to beat the little Randolph, for then I would not have had a handsome sign hacked to pieces in that way." The day after the battle the British entered Wilmington before the dawn, and stacked their muskets along the stony streets in the moonlight. Governor McKinley was at that time in the town, and was awakened by the noise of the enemy entering the streets. The morning following the capture of the town The great events of the world are like mountains, their magnitude only to be seen as we are removed from them. No doubt the builders of the Parthenon were more pleased with the goodness of the mid-day meal which their wives brought them than with the magnificence of the temple they were erecting. No doubt Shakspeare thought more of the acting qualities of King Lear than he did of the echoes it would send down through the hollow depths of futurity. The little events of every-day life are like the stones in a mosaic, each going to make up the whole picture. So in this paper the aim has been to chronicle, not the great events that affect the destiny of a nation, but rather the homely every-day life of the last century. |