True Stories of History and Biography Part 15

Perhaps, in the enjoyment of his home, he had forgotten all about the Stamp Act, and scarcely remembered that there was a king, across the ocean, who had resolved to make tributaries of the New Englanders.

Possibly, too, he had forgotten his own ambition, and would not have exchanged his situation, at that moment, to be governor, or even a lord.

The wax candles were now lighted, and showed a handsome room, well provided with rich furniture. On the walls hung the pictures of Hutchinson's ancestors, who had been eminent men in their day, and were honorably remembered in the history of the country. Every object served to mark the residence of a rich, aristocratic gentleman, who held himself high above the common people, and could have nothing to fear from them. In a corner of the room, thrown carelessly upon a chair, were the scarlet robes of the chief justice. This high office, as well as those of lieutenant-governor, counsellor, and judge of probate, was filled by Hutchinson.

Who or what could disturb the domestic quiet of such a great and powerful personage as now sat in Grandfather's chair.

The lieutenant-governor's favorite daughter sat by his side. She leaned on the arm of our great chair, and looked up affectionately into her father's face, rejoicing to perceive that a quiet smile was on his lips. But suddenly a shade came across her countenance. She seemed to listen attentively, as if to catch a distant sound.

"What is the matter, my child?" inquired Hutchinson.

"Father, do not you hear a tumult in the streets?" said she.

The lieutenant-governor listened. But his ears were duller than those of his daughter; he could hear nothing more terrible than the sound of a summer breeze, sighing among the tops of the elm trees.

"No, foolish child!" he replied, playfully patting her cheek. "There is no tumult. Our Boston mobs are satisfied with what mischief they have already done. The king's friends need not tremble."

So Hutchinson resumed his pleasant and peaceful meditations, and again forgot that there were any troubles in the world. But his family were alarmed, and could not help straining their ears to catch the slightest sound. More and more distinctly they heard shouts, and then the trampling of many feet. While they were listening, one of the neighbors rushed breathless into the room.

"A mob!-a terrible mob!" cried he: "they have broken into Mr. Storey's house, and into Mr. Hallowell's, and have made themselves drunk with the liquors in his cellar, and now they are coming hither, as wild as so many tigers. Flee, lieutenant-governor, for your life! for your life!"

"Father, dear father, make haste!" shrieked his children.

But Hutchinson would not hearken to them. He was an old lawyer; and he could not realize that the people would do any thing so utterly lawless as to a.s.sault him in his peaceful home. He was one of King George's chief officers; and it would be an insult and outrage upon the king himself, if the lieutenant-governor should suffer any wrong.

"Have no fears on my account," said he; "I am perfectly safe. The king's name shall be my protection."

Yet he bade his family retire into one of the neighboring houses. His daughter would have remained, but he forced her away.

The huzzas and riotous uproar of the mob were now heard, close at hand.

The sound was terrible, and struck Hutchinson with the same sort of dread as if an enraged wild beast had broken loose, and were roaring for its prey. He crept softly to the window. There he beheld an immense concourse of people, filling all the street, and rolling onward to his house. It was like a tempestuous flood, that had swelled beyond its bounds, and would sweep every thing before it. Hutchinson trembled; he felt, at that moment, that the wrath of the people was a thousand-fold more terrible than the wrath of a king.

That was a moment when a loyalist and an aristocrat, like Hutchinson, might have learned how powerless are kings, n.o.bles, and great men, when the low and humble range themselves against them. King George could do nothing for his servant now. Had King George been there, he could have done nothing for himself. If Hutchinson had understood this lesson, and remembered it, he need not, in after years, have been an exile from his native country, nor finally have laid his bones in a distant land.

There was now a rush against the doors of the house. The people sent up a hoa.r.s.e cry. At this instant, the lieutenant-governor's daughter, whom he had supposed to be in a place of safety, ran into the room, and threw her arms around him. She had returned by a private entrance.

"Father, are you mad!" cried she. "Will the king's name protect you now?

Come with me, or they will have your life."

"True," muttered Hutchinson to himself; "what care these roarers for the name of king? I must flee, or they will trample me down, on the door of my own dwelling!"

Hurrying away, he and his daughter made their escape by the private pa.s.sage, at the moment when the rioters broke into the house. The foremost of them rushed up the stair-case, and entered the room which Hutchinson had just quitted. There they beheld our good old chair, facing them with quiet dignity, while the lion's head seemed to move its jaws in the unsteady light of their torches. Perhaps the stately aspect of our venerable friend, which had stood firm through a century and a half of trouble, arrested them for an instant. But they were thrust forward by those behind, and the chair lay overthrown.

Then began the work of destruction. The carved and polished mahogany tables were shattered with heavy clubs, and hewn to splinters with axes.

The marble hearths and mantel pieces were broken. The volumes of Hutchinson's library, so precious to a studious man, were torn out of their covers, and the leaves sent flying out of the windows. Ma.n.u.scripts, containing secrets of our country's history, which are now lost forever, were scattered to the winds.

The old ancestral portraits, whose fixed countenances looked down on the wild scene, were rent from the walls. The mob triumphed in their downfall and destruction, as if these pictures of Hutchinson's forefathers had committed the same offences as their descendant. A tall looking-gla.s.s, which had hitherto presented a reflection of the enraged and drunken mult.i.tude, was now smashed into a thousand fragments. We gladly dismiss the scene from the mirror of our fancy.

Before morning dawned, the walls of the house were all that remained. The interior was a dismal scene of ruin. A shower pattered in at the broken windows, and when Hutchinson and his family returned, they stood s.h.i.+vering in the same room, where the last evening had seen them so peaceful and happy.

"Grandfather," said Laurence indignantly, "if the people acted in this manner, they were not worthy of even so much liberty as the king of England was willing to allow them."

"It was a most unjustifiable act, like many other popular movements at that time," replied Grandfather. "But we must not decide against the justice of the people's cause, merely because an excited mob was guilty of outrageous violence. Besides, all these things were done in the first fury of resentment. Afterwards, the people grew more calm, and were more influenced by the counsel of those wise and good men who conducted them safely and gloriously through the Revolution."

Little Alice, with tears in her blue eyes, said that she hoped the neighbors had not let Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson and his family be homeless in the street, but had taken them into their houses, and been kind to them. Cousin Clara, recollecting the perilous situation of our beloved chair, inquired what had become of it.

"Nothing was heard of our chair for sometime afterwards," answered Grandfather. "One day in September, the same Andrew Oliver, of whom I before told you, was summoned to appear at high noon, under Liberty Tree.

This was the strangest summons that had ever been heard of; for it was issued in the name of the whole people, who thus took upon themselves the authority of a sovereign power. Mr. Oliver dared not disobey. Accordingly, at the appointed hour, he went, much against his will, to Liberty Tree."

Here Charley interposed a remark that poor Mr. Oliver found but little liberty under Liberty Tree. Grandfather a.s.sented.

"It was a stormy day," continued he. "The equinoctial gale blew violently, and scattered the yellow leaves of Liberty Tree all along the street. Mr.

Oliver's wig was dripping with water-drops, and he probably looked haggard, disconsolate, and humbled to the earth. Beneath the tree, in Grandfather's chair,-our own venerable chair,-sat Mr. Richard Dana, a justice of the peace. He administered an oath to Mr. Oliver, that he would never have any thing to do with distributing the stamps. A vast concourse of people heard the oath, and shouted when it was taken."

"There is something grand in this," said Laurence. "I like it, because the people seem to have acted with thoughtfulness and dignity; and this proud gentleman, one of his Majesty's high officers, was made to feel that King George could not protect him in doing wrong."

"But it was a sad day for poor Mr. Oliver," observed Grandfather. "From his youth upward, it had probably been the great principle of his life, to be faithful and obedient to the king. And now, in his old age, it must have puzzled and distracted him, to find the sovereign people setting up a claim to his faith and obedience."

Grandfather closed the evening's conversation by saying that the discontent of America was so great, that, in 1766, the British Parliament was compelled to repeal the Stamp Act. The people made great rejoicings, but took care to keep Liberty Tree well pruned, and free from caterpillars and canker worms. They foresaw, that there might yet be occasion for them to a.s.semble under its far projecting shadow.

Chapter IV

The next evening, Clara, who remembered that our chair had been left standing in the rain, under Liberty Tree, earnestly besought Grandfather to tell when and where it had next found shelter. Perhaps she was afraid that the venerable chair, by being exposed to the inclemency of a September gale, might get the rheumatism in its aged joints.

"The chair," said Grandfather, "after the ceremony of Mr. Oliver's oath, appears to have been quite forgotten by the mult.i.tude. Indeed, being much bruised and rather rickety, owing to the violent treatment it had suffered from the Hutchinson mob, most people would have thought that its days of usefulness were over. Nevertheless, it was conveyed away, under cover of the night, and committed to the care of a skilful joiner. He doctored our old friend so successfully, that, in the course of a few days, it made its appearance in the public room of the British Coffee House in King Street."

"But why did not Mr. Hutchinson get possession of it again?" inquired Charley.

"I know not," answered Grandfather, "unless he considered it a dishonor and disgrace to the chair to have stood under Liberty Tree. At all events, he suffered it to remain at the British Coffee House, which was the princ.i.p.al hotel in Boston. It could not possibly have found a situation, where it would be more in the midst of business and bustle, or would witness more important events, or be occupied by a greater variety of persons."

Grandfather went on to tell the proceedings of the despotic king and ministry of England, after the repeal of the Stamp Act. They could not bear to think, that their right to tax America should be disputed by the people. In the year 1767, therefore, they caused Parliament to pa.s.s an act for laying a duty on tea, and some other articles that were in general use. n.o.body could now buy a pound of tea, without paying a tax to King George. This scheme was pretty craftily contrived; for the women of America were very fond of tea, and did not like to give up the use of it.

But the people were as much opposed to this new act of Parliament, as they had been to the Stamp Act. England, however, was determined that they should submit. In order to compel their obedience, two regiments, consisting of more than seven hundred British soldiers, were sent to Boston. They arrived in September, 1768, and were landed on Long Wharf.

Thence they marched to the Common, with loaded muskets, fixed bayonets, and great pomp and parade. So now, at last, the free town of Boston was guarded and over-awed by red-coats, as it had been in the days of old Sir Edmund Andros.

In the month of November, more regiments arrived. There were now four thousand troops in Boston. The Common was whitened with their tents. Some of the soldiers were lodged in Faneuil Hall, which the inhabitants looked upon as a consecrated place, because it had been the scene of a great many meetings in favor of liberty. One regiment was placed in the town house, which we now call the Old State House. The lower floor of this edifice had hitherto been used by the merchants as an exchange. In the upper stories were the chambers of the judges, the representatives, and the governor's council. The venerable counsellors could not a.s.semble to consult about the welfare of the province, without being challenged by sentinels, and pa.s.sing among the bayonets of the British soldiers.

Sentinels, likewise, were posted at the lodgings of the officers, in many parts of the town. When the inhabitants approached, they were greeted by the sharp question-"Who goes there?" while the rattle of the soldier's musket was heard, as he presented it against their b.r.e.a.s.t.s. There was no quiet, even on the Sabbath day. The pious descendants of the Puritans were shocked by the uproar of military music, the drum, fife, and bugle, drowning the holy organ peal and the voices of the singers. It would appear as if the British took every method to insult the feelings of the people.

"Grandfather," cried Charley, impatiently, "the people did not go to fighting half soon enough! These British red-coats ought to have been driven back to their vessels, the very moment they landed on Long Wharf."

"Many a hot-headed young man said the same as you do, Charley," answered Grandfather. "But the elder and wiser people saw that the time was not yet come. Meanwhile, let us take another peep at our old chair."

"Ah, it drooped its head, I know," said Charley, "when it saw how the province was disgraced. Its old Puritan friends never would have borne such doings."