CHAPTER XXXV.
JENNY AGAIN.
Franklin was suddenly recalled to America.
He stood at Samuel Franklin's door.
Samuel Franklin was an old man now.
"I have come to Boston once more," said Benjamin Franklin. "I would go to my parents' graves and the grave of Uncle Ben. But they are in the enemy's camp now. Samuel, I found your father's pamphlets in London."
"Is it possible? Where are they now?"
"I will return them to you when the colonies shall be free. The reading of them shall be a holiday in our old lives."
"I may never live to see that day. Benjamin, I am an old man. I want that you should will those pamphlets to my family."
The old men went out and stood by the gate late in the evening. The moon was rising over the harbor; it was a warm, still night. Sentries were pacing to and fro, for Boston was surrounded by sixteen thousand hostile men in arms.
The nine o'clock bell rang.
"I must go back to the camp," said Franklin, for he had met Samuel within the American lines.
"Cousin Benjamin, these are perilous times," said Samuel. "Justice is what the world needs. Make those pamphlets live, and return them with father's name honored in yours to my family."
"I will do so or perish. I am in dead earnest."
He ascended the hill and looked down on the British camps in Boston town.
Franklin had been sent to Cambridge as a commissioner to Washington's army at this time. It was October, 1775.
He longed to see his sister Jane—"Jenny"—once more. His sister was now past sixty years of age. Foreseeing the siege of Boston, he had written to her to come to Philadelphia and to make her home with him. But she was unwilling to remove from her own city and old home, though she was forced to find shelter within the lines of the American army.
One night, after her removal from Boston, there came a gentle knock at the door of her room. She opened it guardedly, and looked earnestly into the face of the stranger.
"Jenny!"
"My own brother!—do I indeed see you alive? Let me put my hand into yours once more."
He drew her to him.
"Jenny, I have longed for this hour."
"But what brings you here at this time? You did not come wholly to see me? Sit down, and let us bring up all the past again."
He sat down beside her, holding her hand.
"Jenny, you ask what brings me here. Do you remember Uncle Ben?"
"Whose name you bear? Never shall I forget him. The memory of a great man grows as years increase."
"Jenny, I've heard the bells in Ecton ring, and I found in Nottinghamshire letters from Uncle Benjamin, and they coupled your name when you was a girl with mine when I was a boy; do you remember what he said to us on that showery summer day when all the birds were singing?"
"Yes, Ben—I must call you 'Ben'—he said that 'more than wealth, more than fame, more than anything, was the power of the human heart, and that that power grows by seeking the good of others.'"
"What he said was true, but that was not all he said."
"He told you to be true to your country—to live for the things that live."
"Jenny, that is why I am here. He told you to be true to your home. You have been that, Jenny. You took care of father when he was sick for the last time, and you anticipated all his wants. I love you for that, Jenny."
"But it made me happy to do it, and the memory of it makes me happy now."
"And mother, you were her life in her old age. They are gone, both gone, but your heart made them happy when their steps were retreating. O Jenny, Jenny, your hair is turning gray, and mine is gray already. You have fulfilled Uncle Benjamin's charge under the trees. You have been true to your home."
"I only wish that I could have done more for our folks; and you, Ben—I can see you now as you were on that summer day—you have been true to your country."
"Jenny, do you remember the old writing-school master, George Brownell? You do? Well, I have a great secret for you. I used to tell my affairs to you many years ago. I am in favor of the independence of the colonies; and when Congress shall so declare, I shall put my name, that the old schoolmaster taught me to write, to the Declaration."
"Ben, it may cost you your life!"
"Then I will leave Uncle Ben's name in mine to the martyrs' list. I must be true to my country as you have been to your family—I must live for the things that live. I am Uncle Ben's pamphlet, Jenny. I know not what may befall me. This may be the last time that I shall ever visit Boston town—my beloved Boston—but I have found power with men by seeking their good, and my prayer is that I may one day meet you again, and have you say to me that I have honored Uncle Ben's name. I would rather have that praise from you than from any other person in the world: 'More than wealth, more than fame, more than anything, is the power of the human heart.'"
It was night. The camp of Washington was glimmering far away. Boston Neck was barricaded. There was a ship in the mouth of the Charles. A cannon boomed on Charlestown's hills.
"Jenny, I must go. When shall we meet again? Not until I have put Uncle Ben's name to the declaration of American liberty and independence is won. I must prepare the minds of the people to resolve to become an independent nation. My sister, my own true sister, what events may pass before we shall see each other again! When you were younger I made you a present of a spinning-wheel; later I sent you finery. I wish to leave you now this watch. The hours of the struggle for human liberty are at hand. Count the hours!"
They parted at the gate. The leaves were falling. It was the evening of the year. He looked back when he had taken a few steps. He was nearly seventy years of age. Yet his great work of life was before him—it was yet to do, while white-haired Jenny should count the hours on the clock of time.
Sam Adams had grasped the idea that the appeal to arms must end in the independence of the colonies. Franklin saw the rising star of the destiny of the union of the colonies to secure justice from the crown. He left Boston to give his whole soul to this great end.
The next day they went out to Tuft's Hill and looked down on the encamped town, the war ships, and the sea. It was an Indian summer. The trees were scarlet, the orchards were laden with fruit, and the fields were yellow with corn.
Over the blue sea rose the Castle, now gone. The smoke from many British camps curled up in the still, sunny air.
The Providence House Indian (now at the farm of the late Major Ben Perley Poore) gleamed over the roofs of the State House and its viceregal signs, which are now as then. Boston was three hills then, and the whole of the town did not appear as clearly from the hills on the west—the Sunset Hills—as now.
"Jenny, liberty is the right of mankind, and the cause of liberty is the cause of mankind," said Franklin. "Why should England hold provinces in America to whom she will allow no voice in her councils, whose people she may tax and condemn to prisons and death at the will of the king? I have told you my heart. America has the right of freedom, and the colonies must be free!"
They walked along the cool hill ways, and he looked longingly back at the glimmering town.
"Beloved Boston!" he said. "So thou wilt ever be to me!" He turned to his sister: "I used to tell my day dreams to you—they have come true, in part. I have been thinking again. If the colonies could be made free, and I were to be left a rich man, I would like to make a gift to the schools of Boston, whose influence would live as long as they shall last. Sister, I was too poor in my boyhood to answer the call of the school bells. I would like to endow the schools there with a fund for gifts or medals that would make every boy happy who prepares himself well for the work of life, be he rich or poor. I would like also to establish there a fund to help young apprentices, and to open public places of education and enjoyment which would be free to all people."
"You are Silence Dogood still," said Mrs. Mecom. "Day dreams in your life change into realities. I believe that all you now have in your heart to do will be done. Benjamin, these are great dreams."
"It may be that I will be sent abroad again."
"Benjamin, we may be very old when we meet again. But the colonies will be made free, and you will live to give a medal to the schools of Boston town. I must prophesy for you now, for Uncle Benjamin is gone. I began life with you—you carried me in your arms and led me by the hand. We used to sit by the east windows together; may we some day sit down together by the windows of the west and review the book of life, and close the covers. We may then read in spirit the pamphlets of Uncle Ben."
There was a thunder of guns at the Castle. War ships were coming into the harbor from the bay. Franklin beheld them with indignation.
"The people must not only have justice," he said, "they must have liberty."
They returned by the Cambridge road under the bowery elms. It would be a long time before they would see each other again.
In such beneficent thoughts of Boston the Franklin medal had its origin. It was coined out of his heart, that echoed wherever it went or was destined to go, "Beloved Boston!"