صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

On Friday, the seventeenth of December, he arrived at Annapolis. Two years before, on his way northward, he had been received here with every honor in the gift of the city, and had delighted the people by his amenity, at a public dinner, and at a ball graced by the beauty and finest intelligence of the state. He was now met several miles from the capital, by Generals Gates and Smallwood, and a large concourse of distinguished citizens, who escorted him to his hotel, amid discharges of cannon, the display of banners, and every sign of popular respect and admiration. On Monday, a dinner was given to him by the members of Congress, at which more than two hundred persons were present, and in the evening he attended a grand ball,* in the state-house, which was brilliantly illuminated. In reply to a speech by the Mayor, just before he retired, he remarked, "If my conduct has merited the confidence of my fellow-citizens, and has been instrumental in obtaining for my country the blessings of peace and freedom, I owe it to that Supreme Being who guides the hearts of all, who has so signally interposed his aid in every stage of the contest, and who has graciously been pleased to be

Johnson, he is not alone, by a vast many. These scamps could not conquer the men of this country, but every where they have taken the women, almost without a trial, damn them! But as you say, it's the girls that ought to be damned, who could not hold out against a spruce uniform, nor remember a brave heart. Well, it's their weakness. But I'm in the wrong if one of them who has taken a British husband does not rue it, for which, certainly, I shall not care." The unhappy influence of "spruce uniforms," so feelingly alluded to, was no mere fancy, and the public interests were not unfrequently made to suffer as deeply as the feelings of individuals. In August, 1779, Governor Livingston wrote to his daughter Catherine, "The complaisance with which we treat the British prisoners, considering how they treat us when in captivity, of which you justly complain, is what the Congress can never answer to their constituents, however palliated with the specious name of humanity. It is thus that we shall be at last humanized out of our liberties. . . . I know there are a number of flirts in Philadelphia, equally famed for their want of modesty and their want of patriotism, who will triumph in our over-complaisance to the red coat prisoners lately arrived in that metropolis. I hope none of my connections will imitate them, in the dress of their heads, or in the Tory feelings of their hearts."

The ball was opened by General Washington and Mrs. James Macubbin, one of the most beautiful women of the time.

stow on me the greatest of earthly rewards, the approbation and affection of a free people."

One more scene, among the most sublime in human history, and not less impressive than that of his separation from his companions in arms, awaited him before his retirement to private life. On the twenty-third of December, according to a previous order, he was admitted to a public audience by the Congress, and soon after he was seated, the President, General Mifflin, informed him that that body was prepared to receive his communications. In a brief and appropriate speech he offered his congratulations on the termination of the war, and having alluded to his object in appearing thus in that presence-that he might resign into the hands of Congress the trust committed to him, and claim the indulgence of retiring from the public service-he concluded: "I consider it an indispensable duty to close this last act of my official life, by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God, and those who have the superintendence of them to his holy keeping. Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the theatre of action, and bidding an affectionate farewell to this august body, under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life." He then advanced and delivered into the hands of the President his commission, with a copy of his address, and when he had resumed his place, General Mifflin replied, reviewing in a few words the great career thus brought to a close, and saying in conclusion, "The glory of your virtues will not terminate with your military command: it will continue to animate the remotest ages.... We join with you in commending the interests of our country to Almighty God, beseeching Him to dispose the hearts and minds of its citizens to improve the opportunity afforded them of becoming a happy and respectable nation. And for you, we

address to Him our warmest prayers, that a life so beloved may be fostered with all his care, that your days may be as happy as they have been illustrious, and that he will finally give you that reward which this world cannot bestow." The editor of the Maryland Gazette, a journal which in this period was printed at Annapolis, remarks, after describing these affecting scenes: "Few tragedies ever drew so many tears, from so many beautiful eyes, as the moving manner in which his Excellency took his final leave of Congress. The next morning he set out for Virginia, accompanied, as far as South River, by Governor Paca, with the warmest wishes of the city for his repose, health, and happiness. Long may he live to enjoy them!" He arrived at his home the same evening, having been absent more than eight years and a half, during which time he had never been at his own house, except incidentally while on his way with Count Rochambeau to Yorktown, and in returning from that expedition. Here, for a while, we leave him, surrounded by his family, receiving every day some new homage from his grateful countrymen and from the noblest men of other nations, and occupied with those rural pursuits for which he had longed so many years, that we may take a brief survey of the social condition of our principal cities after the termination of the revolution.

II.

TURNING from the most credulous study of the half fabulous annals of ancient nations, to the history of our own country, for the period which is embraced in the memories of many who are still living, our reason falters in astonishment; we instinctively regard with doubt and disbelief the unparalleled advance in population, wealth, power, and all the elements of greatness, of those feeble and exhausted colonies, which in 1783 were acknowledged

to be independent states, and which now constitute one of the first of the leading sovereignties of the world. Since Washington resigned his sword, at Annapolis, our three millions of people have increased to thirty millions, and New York, with its suburbs, which since some of her present citizens arrived at the age of manhood had but thirty thousand inhabitants, is now the third city in Christendom, likely at the next decennial census to have rank nearest to London, and at no distant period to take from even that great capital her long enjoyed supremacy, in numbers, riches, and magnificence. Boston contained at the close of the war about thirteen thousand inhabitants, in 1786 fourteen thousand and two hundred, and in 1789 eighteen thousand; the population of New York had increased, when the federal government was inaugurated, to thirty-three thousand, of whom two thousand and three hundred were slaves; and that of Philadelphia to forty-two thousand, of whom less than three hundred were slaves, and these probably for the most part owned by temporary residents.

In each of these three cities, and indeed throughout the colonies, there was at the commencement of the war as much refinement of manners, with as generous a culture of the heart and the understanding, as could be found perhaps in any foreign society. Many of the young men who were then coming forward had been educated at Eton, Oxford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh; and our own colleges of Harvard, Yale, Nassau Hall, and William and Mary, and King's College in New York, were far more respectable for the character and learning of their professors, the judicious thoroughness of their courses of instruction, and the gentlemanly discipline maintained in them, than is commonly supposed. Schools for young women also were very numerous, and some of them were widely known and most liberally supported. The most celebrated of these was the Moravian establishment at Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania,

where, in nun-like seclusion, were educated a large proportion of the belles who gave the fashionable circles of New York and Philadelphia their inspiration during the last twenty years of the century.*

in

In Boston there was undoubtedly more real respectability than any other town of its population in the British empire. It was the home of the families of Winthrop, variously illustrious from the foundation of the colony, and of Cushing, Quincy, Bowdoin, Dana, Prescott, and others of hereditary distinction; and here lived the "silver tongued orator" Thomas Cooper, and Samuel Adams, John Adams, Joseph Warren, James Otis, John Hancock, John Singleton Copley, and a great number besides who became honorably conspicuous in history. Except in letters, in which the names of Dana and Prescott have reappeared with additional splendors, Boston has never since, notwithstanding her growth in numbers, magnificence, and means and displays of refinement, presented a more remarkable array of dignified character and eminent abilities.

We have some glimpses of the social life of Boston at the close of the war, in the entertaining memoirs of the Marquis de Chastellux, who went the round of fashionable gayeties here in 1782. He noticed the prevalence in society of a certain "ton of ease and freedom," but thought the gentlemen awkward dancers, particularly in the minuet. The women were well-dressed, but with less elegance than those of Philadelphia. The assembly room was superb, in a good style of architecture, well decorated and well lighted—much superior to that of the Philadelphia City Tavern. He drank tea

"I have seen a remarkable institution for the education of young ladies, at Bethlehem. About one hundred and twenty of them live together under the same roof; they sleep all together, in the same garret; I saw one hundred and twenty beds, in two long rows, in the same room; the beds and bedclothes were all of excellent quality, and extremely neat. How should you like to live in such a nunnery?"-John Adams, to his daughter, March 17, 1777.

« السابقةمتابعة »