’LECTION DAY, ’92.
Tuesday, the 8th of November, 1892, belongs to history now, but when it began it was only an ordinary ’lection day. Floods of night rain had washed the high peaks clear of snow, and at dawn the golden clouds swept eastward, and the fairest of November days began its course. All the horses and all the men turned their noses towards the wooden town-house in Tamworth village; and by nine o’clock long lines of wagons streamed under the two campaign flags, across the bridge over rushing Paugus River, and up to the stores where the smoke of pipes and the sound of laughter proclaimed the swarming of man. It was an occasion of more than usual interest, for not only was the great ex-president to test his tariff-reform lance against the silver shield of his once successful rival, but New Hampshire in general, and Tamworth in particular, were to try the Australian ballot system.
“Now, Jim,” said the committee-man, “remember to make a cross against the name of every Democrat. Take your time, and look for the letter D. Wherever you see D, put down your cross.” Then a sample ballot was displayed to Jim, and that worthy child of Quebec proved the truth of his assertion that he could “read D in English evvy time, sir.”
Just before ten, the three stores gave up their crowds in favor of the growing swarm in front of the town-house. It was a strange commingling of men. The bone and sinew of rural New England were there, and so were the gristle, the fat, and the lean. Men well past ninety tottered feebly to the benches which flanked the broad open floor of the hall. Young fellows, just of age, stepped briskly in and went to the platform to see that their names had been duly added to the printed check-list of voters. Gaunt, loose-jointed, thin-faced men, in worn shoddy, the modern successor of honest homespun, dragged themselves through the crowd, answering salutations with grim indifference. Big, burly men with broad, gray felt hats and scarlet flannel leggings strode in more confidently, fresh from the spruce woods. Well-dressed, clean-shaven men with city hats and big watch-chains shook hands with everybody, and with a hand on John’s shoulder or Edson’s elbow whispered a word in the young voter’s ear. The New England farmer or lumberman does not ride horseback. He probably knows how well enough, but his roads have no clay mud, his wagon runs easily, so he drives instead of riding. Not one man in fifty owns a saddle. Who is it, then, that comes up the long street at a breakneck pace, with flapping hat, trailing whip, and rattling spurs? He rides well, and has a dashing air about him strangely in contrast to the slouch of the man who always drives, with shoulders hunched and back curved. He proves to be a city man who has had enough of a ranch and is now extracting occupation from a farm and summer boarders.
Now a silk hat and a satin necktie loom up in the throng. They grace a sleek son of the town who has a store “down country,” but who comes home to vote. The silk hat looks strangely out of place among the well-worn felts and woolen caps which cover most of the heads in the crowd.
The bell in the meeting-house tower moves, and then its clang strikes harshly on the ear. Half a mile away it would be sweet-toned; here it is merely discordant. The men straggle into the town-house in large groups, and soon the room is crowded. Good air goes out by the chimney when the smokers come in by the door. The supervisors are in their seats, and an excited discussion is taking place in which they and many in the crowd join. An oldish man and a foreigner who served in the late civil war has just produced his naturalization papers and demanded to have his name placed upon the check-list. The officers object, and point to the book of statutes open before them, where a section states that no name shall be added to the list at this late hour except by way of restoring a name wrongfully dropped from an earlier list. The claimant declares that his name was or ought to have been on an earlier list; a candidate for office springs upon a chair and shouts to the supervisors that he will “make it hot” for them if they refuse the veteran his suffrage; the crowd cheers, and the officers yield. Then the warrant for the meeting is read, and immediately after an elder offers prayer, the hats and caps being doffed in obedience to a loud call of “hats off.” The prayer is simple and earnest, asking for help in a freeman’s highest duty. A moderator is chosen, and he delivers a brief and clear lecture upon the machinery of the new ballot law. Then a resolution is passed with a shout, allowing the old men to vote first, and the graybeards are pushed gently forward to the inclosed space in which the five little voting booths are built.
The voters are kept waiting half an hour, because at first no one can open the patent ballot box, but at last it gives way to some persuasive touch and the day’s work is fairly begun. By noon about fifty men have passed the guard, taken their folded ballots, entered the little booths, and spent from two to ten minutes each in marking or trying to mark for their favorite candidates.
“This is a great thing for the fools,” said an old farmer; “they can look just as wise as the wisest of us, but they nor nobody else will ever know just who they voted for.”
One man, after entering the booth, came out and said he wanted some one to mark for him. “Step this way,” shouted the moderator, “and take your solemn oath that you cannot read your ballot and must have help in marking it.” “I won’t swear to anything of the kind,” said the man indignantly, and he went back to his booth. The crowd became impatient at the delay, and began to push hard for the narrow entrance. Strong men cried out in pain or anger; the stove tottered and part of the pipe fell, scattering soot on the nearest heads; the moderator thundered rebukes, and several men went home disgusted with the new-fangled system, only to be dragged back later by the committees of their respective parties.
Back of the town-house, Paugus River, well filled by the night’s rain and the melted snow from the mountains, rushed noisily through its rock-choked bed. I escaped from the hustling crowd, in the hot hall, and watched the eager current till my eyes and ears were cleared of smoke and empty laughter, and a taste of something sweeter than politics was left on my tongue. The river, with its bright water, was following its course towards the Bearcamp and the sea, because for time out of mind it had flowed that way and knew no other. Most of the men inside the hall were acting their parts with much the same intelligence, and marking wherever they saw the letter R, or the letter D, not because they knew what those two great letters were struggling for this day in all the length and breadth of the Union, but because for years they had worshiped the one and hated the other with the fetich-maker’s fervor.
A bright-faced, blue-eyed committee-man, just old enough to cast his first vote for his party’s hero, came to call me to the dinner set for those who had come from a distance to vote. After dinner I took my share of the bone-crushing process inside the hall, marked my long ballot, and started at once for the city. First my friend’s wagon rolled along the pleasant Bearcamp valley to the pine plains. Turning a little aside, we drove past White Pond, a shallow, mirror-like lake in the heart of the plain, framed in snowy sand and gaunt pines. The view of the Sandwich range across this lake is exquisite at all times, but to-day, with the dark blue water dancing towards us in thousands of foam-capped waves, and the mountains standing out sharply against the pale blue sky, it was more than usually charming. Half a dozen wood-ducks were floating in the midst of the restless waves, not far from the shore. They paid no heed to our wagon as it crept through the sand on the beach.
When we reached the West Ossipee stage road I bade my friend good-by, and strolled towards the station alone. The south-bound train was not due till five, and it was now only half past two. The railway track was not more than half a mile distant across the pine plains, so, leaving the muddy road, I passed into the pines, following an obscure wood-path.
Presently the path became plainer, and as I glanced along its vista, my eye caught a flash of bright yellow gleaming from something at a distance. The object was shaped like a chimney, but it seemed to spring from the ground among the scrub-oaks. The path began to descend, at first gradually, then more abruptly, and I discovered that there was winding through the barrens ahead of me a small river, which a moment’s consideration told me must be the Chocorua River, on its way to the Bearcamp. Beyond the river was a small clearing and in it stood a red and white house with brilliant yellow chimneys. Then the land rose again abruptly, inclosing the little meadow and its cottage between high walls of sand, scrub, and pines.
Surprised to find an inhabited house in the heart of the plains, where I had supposed nothing but mayflowers and chewinks lived to break the monotony of scrub and pine, I pushed on to learn more of the place. When the path came to the river it crossed by a rustic bridge formed of a large bow-shaped tree with pieces of board nailed to it, and a strong hand-rail braced among its broken branches. The bridge was really artistic, as well as ingenious in construction. From its farther end I could see the whole of the tiny valley of which the mysterious house was the gay capital. Five or six acres of grass-land and pasture were surrounded by woods and sand hills. Three cows fed along the river bank. Near the house was a neatly fenced garden, and as I came to the fence I found it crossed by a real stile with three steps up and two steps down, and a rail to lean upon.
My approach had, ere this, attracted the attention of the inhabitants of the hidden valley, and five heads were visible at windows, house angle, and fence corners. I crossed the stile and gained the little piazza. The garrison massed around its commander and mother, who was ironing a white apron on the kitchen table. Strong, plump, and smiling, she was proud of her little army,—a boy of fourteen, with soft black eyes, black hair, and the rich color of the Acadian peasant glowing on his cheeks; three tow-headed girls, with their mother’s blue eyes, and a fifth, a girl of two summers, with beauty and dignity enough for a duke’s darling. No overtures of mine were sufficient to conquer this haughty little being’s reserve. She would have nothing of me, and finally intimated a desire that I should move on, and leave her undisturbed in her apple-eating. This I did, taking a farewell look at the cozy house from the crest of the sand-hills which rose between it and the railway. From the ridge I could see many a mile of forest, and many a mountain peak, none fairer than Chocorua. A grouse rose from the scrub at my feet, and flew nearly an eighth of a mile before alighting.
The little child’s beauty haunted me as I strolled down the railway track, and I wondered what her future would be if she grew up in that snug nook in the woods and sand; what her character would be with its mingling of Celtic, Gallic, and Saxon elements; frozen in the northern winter and burned under the hot summer suns of the Ossipee plains.
At last the train came and bore me away towards the city. The sun sank in orange splendor behind the Ossipees, and then the night overwhelmed color and form in its shadows, and left the mind freer in its musings. What had the day brought forth at the polls? Had the party of past glories and present decay won another of its wonderful series of victories, or had the people risen in their might and spoken for reform? I hoped for some gleam of news before the journey was over, but Portsmouth, Newburyport, Salem, and Lynn were all passed without tidings of what the day had done. Even in Boston, with its narrow streets filled with restless rivers of men and women, there seemed to be no word of victory or defeat.
At half past ten I reached a small room high in one of the great newspaper offices on Washington Street. Its windows looked out upon a strange sight. Far below me was a vast expanse of human heads upon which shone the bluish white glare of the hooded electric lamps. As white bubbles, densely spread upon the pale green of the ocean’s water in some rock-rimmed grotto, surge now out, now in; to left, to right; advancing, retreating; crowding or separating; so those countless human heads swayed first one way, then another, moved by fickle eddies and forces hard to understand. Wild cries came from the crowd, cheers, jeers, and yells of pain or brutal merriment.
Inside the room the wearisome clicking of a telegraph operator’s machine charmed a circle of eager men and women. As sheet after sheet was written by the operator, they passed from hand to hand. Some of those present read them nervously, others, really intensely concerned, seemed almost indifferent. Now and then hearty applause greeted a dispatch, or deep regret was expressed at some friend’s defeat; but as a rule the fragmentary news was received silently. Midnight passed, and then, as the morning hours wore on, we knew that the people had achieved one of the most remarkable transfers of political power ever accomplished in the Union. Still, the result in Massachusetts was in doubt, and even those who watched until dawn finally sought sleep without knowing how the smaller cities had settled the great governorship contest.
Before sleep came to me, a panorama of the day swept in feverish review across my closed eyelids. I saw the surging mob in Washington Street, the group around the telegraph machine, the motley crowd in the Tamworth town-hall, the baby beauty of the Ossipee plains, and then, like a benediction, came a vision of Chocorua, snow-capped and immutable in a pale blue sky, with the rosy light of the clear November morning flooding its wondrous peak.