CHAPTER XXXXI.
In speaking of the changes, in habits and customs, which have occurred in my day, it will be difficult to draw the line between those, which only my older readers will remember, and those more recent ones, which will be recalled by the young. In noting these changes I shall not confine myself to Plymouth, but shall as far as possible include those which have elsewhere come under my observation. The population of Plymouth in 1820, two years before my birth, was 4,384. Its growth to 11,017, in 1905, is one of the least remarkable changes in the history of the town during that period. Turning, however, to the nationality of the population, we find a change which has kept pace with the growing facilities of international communication, and the restless tide of migration, which characterized the 19th century. This change in nationality began to show itself about the time of my birth. Up to that time the population was not only practically wholly American, but also largely of Plymouth nativity. There are records showing that in 1813 there were two Irishmen, John Burke and Michael Murphy, living in Plymouth, and there are reasons for believing that they and their families were the only persons of Irish birth in the town. It is possible that the above two men were servants, or employees of Judge Joshua Thomas, who lived in the house on Main street, now called the Plymouth Tavern. At any rate, Judge Thomas must have felt a special interest in them, as in the year above mentioned, 1813, Bishop Cheverus, by his invitation, came down from Boston and celebrated mass for their benefit in the parlors on the southerly side of his house. It is undoubtedly true that Bishop Cheverus was the most distinguished Divine who ever visited Plymouth. He was born in Mayenne, France, Jan. 28, 1768, and came to Boston in 1796, where he became associated with the Catholic mission. In 1803 he raised by subscription money to build the Catholic church in Franklin street, the site of which is now occupied by Devonshire street, and more than $3,000 of the sum raised was subscribed by Protestants, of whom John Adams headed the list. The esteem in which he was held in Boston was further shown by the gratuitous services of Charles Bulfinch, the distinguished architect, who furnished the design for the church, and by the gift of a picture of the crucifixion by Henry Sargent, a Boston artist, to place on its walls. Among the subscribers to the church fund were Harrison Gray Otis, Benjamin Crowinshield, Theodore Lyman, Thomas H. Perkins and Samuel Dexter, and General E. Hasket Derby gave the church a bell. While in Boston Bishop Cheverus accepted invitations to preach in Protestant churches, following as he said, the example of Christ, who preached in the synagogues. In 1810 he was consecrated in Baltimore the first Bishop of Boston, and in 1818 his associate, the Abbé Mantignon, died, at whose funeral the body was borne to the grave through the streets of Boston with the Bishop wearing ecclesiastical garments, and a mitre, presenting a novel scene to the eyes of New England people. In 1823, the Bishop was called to France to take charge of the Bishopric of Montauban, and in 1826 was nominated to the Metropolitan See of Bordeaux. In 1828 he was made councillor of state, and in 1830 commander of the order of the Holy Ghost. In February, 1836, he was made a Cardinal, and on the 9th of March received from Louis Philippe the Cardinal’s hat. He died July 2d, 1836.
Until ocean steamers were built of sufficient size to accommodate steerage passengers, immigration was chiefly confined to the Irish, who came in the packet ships plying between London or Liverpool and New York, Philadelphia, or Boston. There were the Cambridge, Devonshire, London, Henry Clay, Yorkshire, Liverpool, Ashburton and Hottingeur, coming to New York; the Daniel Webster, North America, Anglo Saxon and Ocean Monarch coming to Boston, and the Tuscarora and Shenandoah to Philadelphia, and for some years their steerages were crowded with Irish immigrants. With the coming in of the steamers the numbers largely increased. It was during the period from 1835 to 1855, that the Irish element began to be perceptible to any considerable extent in Plymouth. Within my day the first Irishman to come to the town was John Cassidy, about 1820 or 1830. He had been living for a time in Boston, and there his son, John S., our townsman, was born. He was a blacksmith by trade, and a man of striking appearance. He had two daughters, whom I knew very well, fine women; Elizabeth, who married Gridley T. Poole, and Ellen, who married a Mr. Southmayd of Campton, New Hampshire. There was a Michael McCarthy who came not long after Mr. Cassidy, whose daughter was the mother of our late townsman, Timothy Downey. Quite a number came both before and soon after 1850, including Timothy and John Quinlan in 1849, John O’Brien in 1851, and not far from those dates Jeremiah Murray, John Murray, Timothy Regan, Wm. O’Brien, Timothy Lynch, James Ready, Timothy Hurley, James Lynch, James Burns, Barney Sullivan and others. For many years the number of Catholics in Plymouth was insufficient to maintain a church, and father Moran of Sandwich, where the glass works had gathered a considerable Irish population, was in the habit of holding service once or twice in each month in the town hall and Davis Hall, and elsewhere, until the Catholic church was erected in 1874.
After the advent of the Irish there was for some years quite a large German immigration, which found occupation in the Cordage works at Seaside. The German population, however, was rather a changeable one, and after a few years of savings, it largely found its way west, and was followed in Plymouth by the Italians, French and Portuguese, who, added to the Irish, now make up nearly one quarter of the population of the town. The Portuguese have drifted here chiefly from New Bedford and Provincetown, to which places they found their way in vessels bringing the first catch of oil landed at the Western Islands by whale ships from those ports. The effect of this immigration on Provincetown has been remarkable. The first time I ever went to that town was in 1836, when I was permitted as a boy of fourteen to join a party of older persons in the sloop Thetis, going one day and returning the next. At that time its population was about two thousand, nearly all of whom were Cape Cod people, who had moved there to either engage in the whale or cod fishery, or to keep stores for the sale of ship chandlery and supplies of all kinds to vessels making harbor there. A man by the name of Lothrop from some up Cape town, kept a hotel, and by the aid of loam brought from distant towns, he was cultivating the only garden in town. The only street was parallel with the shore, and from fence to fence it was a bed of loose sand, through the middle of which everybody waded, the women I have heard it said, having a way of kicking their heels in walking by which they kept the sand out of their shoes. One of our party asked the landlord if he could have a horse and ride through the village. “My dear sir,” said Mr. Lothrop, “there is not a horse owned in town, but the mail chaise will arrive about six o’clock, and perhaps the driver will let you have his horse.” During the administration of Andrew Jackson not only was our National debt extinguished, but a very considerable surplus revenue grew up, which in 1836 was divided among the states in the form of a loan, each state giving its obligation to repay the loan if ever called for. Massachusetts distributed its share among the towns, and Provincetown spent her portion in building plank sidewalks. At the present time the Portuguese constitute a majority of the population of the town. At the beginning of the civil war one of the measures proposed for the relief of the financial straits of the government was a call on the states for the payment of the loan above mentioned. It has been stated by Mr. L. E. Chittenden, Register of the Treasury under President Lincoln, that it was found at that time that the obligations of the Rebel states had mysteriously disappeared.
One of the important results of the foreign immigration in Plymouth County, and probably elsewhere has been the solution of the problem concerning the future of our abandoned farms. These foreigners, more especially the Portuguese and Italians, have picked them up one after another, and are prospering, where their former native owners failed. It must not be forgotten, while considering changes in population and occupation, that the abandonment of the fisheries has caused a great change in the industries of our town. With seventy-three vessels engaged in the Grand Bank fishery, as there were thirty-five years ago, our wharves and flake yards presented busy scenes. The large increase, however, of our coal and lumber trade, amounting now in the former, to thirty thousand tons annually, has helped materially to prevent any recent depreciation of wharf property.
I propose now to speak of the changes which have occurred within my recollection in carriages and in general methods of travel. I have in an early chapter referred to buggies and wagons, giving the derivation of their names, and the countries where they were originally used. The introduction of the carry-all in Plymouth occurred within my time, and as far back as I can remember there were only two, one in the stable of George Drew in Middle street, and the other owned by Bourne Spooner. It is generally supposed that its spacious interior gave rise to its name which, however, is really only a corruption of the name of the French Carriole. A vehicle called a cab, which is simply an abbreviation of cabriolet came quite extensively into use in Boston about 1840, but never reached Plymouth, and in the city has now largely given way to a four wheeler, which retains the old name. The carriage known as a hack, brought to America from London, and receiving the name which there applied to the horse alone, was never introduced into Plymouth until 1870. At the celebration of the dedication of the Soldiers’ Monument on Training Green in 1869, the committee of arrangements borrowed one from Geo. W. Wright of Duxbury, and hired another in Boston. There is probably no city in the world in which the hack has been for more than a hundred years in such general use as in Boston. The superior quality for which Boston hacks have long been distinguished, has been probably due to the fact that wealthy families have patronized hack stables rather than keep carriages of their own, and they wanted the best. I can well remember when there were not more than four private carriages and coachmen in Boston, and when nothing in livery was seen on its streets. About 1850 Mr. Deacon, who built an elegant mansion at the south end after the style of a French Chateau, surrounded by a high brick wall, set up a livery, and when his flunkey first appeared sitting like Solomon in all his glory on the box, he was followed and hooted at by the boys. The vehicle for many years in general use was in Boston, as elsewhere, the chaise. Lawyers and doctors and merchants constantly used them, and always drove themselves, while before the days of street cars business men drove every morning into the city from suburban homes, and put up their horses for the day in some central stable. I remember stables in Cambridge street, Bowdoin Square, Howard street, Elm street, Brattle street, Devonshire street, Franklin street, Federal street, School street, Bromfield street, Bedford street, West street and Charles street. With the introduction of street cars leading to neighboring towns, the livery business gradually disappeared, and the high price of central city lots has left the older sections of the city with scarcely a place where a horse can be put up for a night. These stables first found a new resting place in the extension of Chestnut street on the river side of Charles street, which Tom Appleton, the Boston wit, called Horse Chestnut street, but they have gradually extended to localities farther west. In the process of evolution the wheel has now turned, and the suburban business men are deserting the street cars, and, coming to Boston in their automobiles, instead of chaises, put them up for the day in the grand garage in Park Square. Again referring to the general use of chaises, I remember that such men as President Quincy, Lucius Manlius Sargent, Ebenezer Francis and Jeremiah Mason were frequently seen driving their chaises, and Mr. Webster often rode in one over the road from Marshfield to Boston, holding the reins himself, and having a trunk lashed to the axle. Mr. Mason, above mentioned, the distinguished lawyer, one day when riding in his chaise, turned from Washington street into Spring Lane, and met a truckman coming up with his team. He was six feet six inches in height, but he always sat in his chaise so bent as not to appear to be a tall man. The truckman called out to him to back out, which Mr. Mason was not inclined to do, as he would have to back up hill, while the truckman could more easily back down. Mr. Mason said nothing, but the truckman finally began to swear at him, and showed a disposition to fight. Mr. Mason becoming a little angry, began to straighten up and show his size, much to the astonishment of the man with the team, who called out, “for God’s sake, Mr., don’t uncoil any more, I’ll get out of the way.”
The stage derived its name, which it took from the stage coach of England, from the word stage, meaning a section or the whole of a road route. The name, however, reached New England many years before the arrival of the English coach, and was applied to a carriage of very different construction. The New England stage in the early part of the last century was a long covered wagon hung on leather thorough-braces, and contained seats without backs, which were reached by climbing over the seats in front. In 1801, according to the Farmer’s Almanac, there were twenty-five lines of coaches running out of Boston, most of which started from the King’s Inn on the corner of Exchange street and Market Square. The stages running to Cambridge and Roxbury and Brookline, made each two trips a day, and the stage to Plymouth made three trips a week by the way of Hingham, being ten hours on the road. The South Boston and Dorchester turnpike running as far as Neponset River, was incorporated, March 4, 1805, and the Braintree and Weymouth turnpike running from Quincy to Queen Ann’s Corner in West Scituate, was incorporated March 4, 1803. Thus a new route was opened by the last named turnpike, over which the fast line ran every day, while the mail line ran every alternate day through Hingham. Until the Old Colony Railroad was opened these turnpikes were toll roads. After a few years the clumsy stage gave way to the well known English coach made with the addition of a middle seat with an adjustable back strap. With the exception of the English post carriage a sort of a barouche drawn by two horses, one of which was ridden by a uniformed postilion, I have never found a more comfortable and attractive traveling carriage. In 1846 I rode with the coachman on one of these coaches from Glasgow to Carlisle, ninety miles, in nine hours, with the four horses on the gallop, and never leaving the centre of the track. The red coated guard occupying a seat at the back of the coach, warned with his horn every team to clear the road, and when passing a post office he threw off a mail pouch and took another from a hooked rod, held up by the master of the post. On approaching a station for change of horses, the guard gave notice with his horn, and the coachman halting in the middle of the road, dropped his reins right and left, and four hostlers, two to unhitch, and two to hitch, would have a new team ready with a delay of not more than two minutes, the coachman leaving his seat but once in the nine hours. During the last years of these coaches the schedule time of a trip from London to Edinburgh, four hundred miles, was forty hours. The hansom, which for more than fifty years has been used in London, has found a difficult entrance into Boston, but is now gradually finding its way into use. The fares charged for them are much lower in London than in Boston. In 1895 I took one at the railway station and rode with a fellow passenger to Morley’s hotel at Trafalgar Square, nearly three miles, and paid two and six pence for the two, while in Boston the charge would have been from two to three dollars.
The introduction of omnibuses in Boston, first used in London, was very gradual. Having an aunt living in Cambridge, one of my excursions during my vacation visits in Boston was to her home, and thus I became early familiar with the methods of communication with that town. As long ago as I can remember these omnibuses, taking the place of the old coaches, made only two or three trips a day, in answer to calls entered on a slate at the office in Brattle street, picking up passengers at their houses, and dropping them at their destinations. As business increased, passengers were obliged to take the omnibuses at the office, starting at every hour, and thus they became known as hourlies. Their business was partially interrupted for a time by the construction of a branch of the Fitchburg railroad, which had a station about where the law school is now located, but it was soon abandoned, and the track was taken up.
As I have begun to speak of matters connected with Boston, I may as well speak of the changes in that city since my early boyhood. For this digression I ask to be excused. I was almost as familiar with Boston, when a boy, as I was with Plymouth, as I spent nearly every vacation there with my grandmother who lived in Winthrop Place, which, with Otis Place, formed a circuitous avenue, entering from and returning to Summer street. Summer street during my early life was distinguished, not only for its beautiful shade trees and elegant houses, but also for its notable residents. Among the latter whom I remember were, Dr. Jacob Bigelow, Robert C. Winthrop, Dr. Putnam, Edward H. Robbins, Nathaniel Goddard, John Wells, Horace Gray, John P. Cushing, Benjamin Buzzey, Charles Tappan, Edward Everett, Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Langdon Frothingham, John C. Gray, Benjamin Rich, Rev. Dr. Alexander Young, Wm. Sturgis, Joseph Bell, Benjamin Loring, James W. Paige, and Daniel Webster. There also were Trinity church on the north side, and the Octagon church, Unitarian, at the junction of Summer and Bedford streets, while in Winthrop and Otis Place lived Rufus Choate, Abel Adams, Wm. Perkins, Samuel Whitwell, H. H. Hunnewell, George Bond, Henry Cabot, Joshua Blake, George Bancroft, Nathaniel Bowditch, and Israel Thorndike.
When that neighborhood was changed from a residential to a business one, Winthrop Place was extended across Franklin street to State street, the whole taking the name of Devonshire street. From Franklin to Milk street the nucleus of the extended street was Theatre Alley, so-called, because in the alley was the stage entrance of the Federal Street Theatre. The Catholic church, which stood on the south side of Franklin street, was taken down to make way for the extended street. Ma’am Dunlap’s famous cigar, snuff and tobacco store, which every gentleman in Boston knew, partly on account of the quality of her goods, and partly on account of the beauty of her daughter Rachel, stood on the west side of the alley. Boston has always been famous for its alleys, at least fifteen of which I remember. They furnished very convenient cut shorts for those who were in a hurry, or did not wish to encounter undesirable friends. Mr. Choate, whose office was on the southerly corner of Court and Washington streets, lived at different times at the United States hotel, in Edinboro street and Winthrop Place, and in going home he invariably went down State to Devonshire street, and thence through Theatre Alley and Catholic Church Alley. The Alley from State street to Dock Square, now called Change Alley, was formerly called Flagg Alley, taking its name from its pavement of flagstones, which again took their name from Elisha Flagg, who about 1750 opened a quarry in Grafton, and furnished Boston and some other New England towns with slabs of that description. For some unknown reason alleys seem to have been peculiar to seaport places like Provincetown, Salem, Marblehead, Newburyport and Plymouth, in the last of which were in my day, Thomas’s Alley, Cooper’s Alley, LeBaron’s Alley, Spooner’s Alley and Clamshell Alley, all of which remain except Thomas’s Alley on the south side of the estate of Col. Wm. P. Stoddard, which was closed some years ago, under an agreement with the town.
On the south side of Franklin street, until about 1800, known as Barrell’s pasture, extending from the Catholic Alley, now Devonshire street, up to Hawley street, there was a single block called the Tontine block, such as we ought to see more of in Boston today. It was designed by Charles Bulfinch, and contained sixteen dwelling houses, with a front curved to correspond to the curve of the street, and built with a palace front, two houses at each end projecting about six feet, and the centre carried up higher than the rest of the building, and built over three arches, a central arch for a street called Arch street to pass through, and one smaller arch on each side over the Arch street sidewalks. A door under the arch led up to the old Boston Library, which is still in existence with a home in Boylston Place. The block was built on the Tontine plan, with a certain number of owners, the property descending to the survivors. After some years its tontine feature was abandoned and the property divided among the survivors.
All through my boyhood, Franklin, Federal, Atkinson, now called Congress, Pearl, High, Purchase, South, Lincoln, Summer, Arch, Winter, Tremont, West, Bedford, Chauncy, Boylston, Essex and Kingston streets, Otis Place, Winthrop Place and Fort Hill were occupied by dwelling houses. Fort Hill, which rose about twenty-five or thirty feet above Pearl street, was cut down in 1865, and High street extended across it. Pemberton hill, the residence of Gardner Greene, was cut down in 1835 to its present level, and Pemberton Square laid out for houses. The estate covered by Pemberton hill was a famous historic estate. It was occupied by Sir Harry Vane in 1636, by Rev. John Cotton and his son Seaborn, John Hull, Wm. Vassall, Madame Hayley, the society leader in Boston, Jonathan Mason, and Gardner Green. The house of Mr. Green, which was taken down in 1835, was built by Mr. Vassall in 1760. When the hill was levelled, a rare tree called the Gingko, brought from China, was removed to the Common, slips from which are now standing on the grounds of Jason W. Mixter and B. F. Mellor in Plymouth.
When the city government decided to remove the hill Patrick T. Jackson, in behalf of the city, made a contract with Asa G. Sheldon of Wilmington to perform the work and fill the flats north of Causeway street. Mr. Sheldon moved the Gingko tree to a spot on the Common near the Beacon street mall on a stone dray drawn by oxen, driven by Waterman Brown of Woburn.
Washington street, once called the Neck, was until 1786 the only way in and out of Boston. South Boston, then a part of Dorchester, could only be reached by the way of Roxbury; and Cambridge could not be reached except by ferry, only by going through Roxbury and Brookline. The Charles River Bridge Company was incorporated March 9, 1785, and built the old Charlestown bridge, which was opened June 17, 1786. This bridge furnished a new and convenient route to Cambridge. The West Boston Bridge Company was incorporated March 9, 1792, and built the bridge extending from Cambridge street, which was opened November 23, 1793. These two bridges continued as toll bridges until January 30, 1858. Dorchester Neck, now known as South Boston, was annexed to Boston, March 6, 1804, then having only ten families, and on the same date the South Bridge Co. was incorporated. The Dover street bridge was built by that company, and opened Oct. 1, 1805, and was sold to the city April 19, 1832, and made free, tolls having been charged up to that time. Canal bridge now Craigie’s Bridge, a toll bridge, leading to East Cambridge, was built by a company incorporated Feb. 27, 1807, and after its purchase by the state, was made free January 30, 1858. On the 14th of June, 1814, Isaac P. Davis, Uriah Cotting and Wm. Brown, and their associates, were incorporated as the Boston and Roxbury Mill Corporation, who built the mill dam leading from Beacon street to Brookline, over which a road was opened July 2, 1821. This was a toll road, and during my college life the toll gate was located a little east of Arlington street, and tolls were collected until it was laid out as a highway, Dec. 7, 1868. The Boston Free Bridge Corporation was incorporated March 4, 1826, and built the South Boston Bridge, which crossed Fort Point Channel at Sea street, and was bought by the city September 16, 1828, and called Federal street bridge. The Warren Bridge Corporation was incorporated March 11, 1828, and opened Dec. 25, in that year. It was assumed by the state in 1833, and made free in 1858.
Between the toll gate on the Mill Dam and Brookline there were no houses, and what is now called the Back Bay extended from the Mill Dam to Washington street. In this connection the statement may be interesting that in 1830 the pasturage of cows on the Common was for the first time forbidden by a city ordinance.
When I was ten years old, my great uncle, Isaac P. Davis, who was born in 1771, and who as one of the corporators of the Mill Dam, was familiar with that neighborhood, took me one day down to the corner of Boylston street and Charles street, and said to me, William, here was the original bank of Charles River, and on this spot the British embarked for Charlestown on the morning of the battle of Bunker Hill. I was also told by one of the building committee of Trinity church, that in driving piles to support the foundation, the bed of an old channel was found where hard bottom could not be reached, and the expedient was adopted of clearing away the earth between the piles several feet down and filling the space with cement, thus holding them from the top instead of supporting them at the bottom. On this foundation, containing either five thousand piles at a cost of $7 each, or seven thousand at a cost of $5, I have forgotten which, the structure stands without a crack, to show any settling. If an X ray could penetrate the sub-surface of the Back Bay, it would disclose thousands of piles with a composite between, of old hats, bonnets, shoes, hoop skirts and tomato cans on which stand the domiciles of wealth and fashion. Perhaps, however, such a foundation is as genuine and real as that on which stands fashion itself. In my youth the South Bay, east of Washington street, was open to the harbor through Fort Point channel, only obstructed by the Dover street, and the old South Boston bridges. At that time the yards of the houses in Purchase street extended to the water, and Atlantic Avenue, north of Dewey Square, was built along the harbor margin. Thus within my recollection, there have been added between the Mill Dam and Washington street, Boylston street, Huntington, Columbus, Atlantic, Shawmut and Harrison avenues, all built where once was water, and adding more than eight hundred acres of made land to the old peninsula of Boston, which contained only six hundred and ninety. Until 1852 the Commonwealth owned 2,453,730 square feet of land in the Back Bay, which in that year it began to have filled with the view of selling it. At that time it was estimated that the land was worth, less the cost of filling, $906,516.00. The conservatism of this estimate is shown by the fact that in 1872 $3,551,514 had been received from sales, or $2,044,294 taking out the cost of filling, and 500,000 square feet remained unsold, valued at $750,000, leaving a profit to the Commonwealth of $1,887,178. In view of the probably speedy and profitable sales of this land, the question came up in the legislature of 1859, when I was a member of the Senate, whether it would not be well to devote a part of the proceeds of these sales to educational purposes, and petitions were presented looking to this end, which were referred to the committee on education, of which I was chairman. After several hearings I drew up a report at the request of the committee, and after I submitted it to the legislature, the daily papers paid it the unusual compliment of printing it in full. Resolves accompanied the report, giving $100,000 to the Museum of Natural History and Comparative Zoology in Cambridge, fifty thousand dollars to Tufts college, and $25,000 each to Amherst and Williams colleges, and the Wilbraham academy, and in addition a substantial amount to enlarge the school fund of the state. Against some opposition the Resolves were passed by both branches of the legislature, and it has always been a source of satisfaction to me that I was in some degree instrumental in prosecuting to a successful issue a measure so plainly conducive to the best interests of the state.
One of the most striking changes in Boston within my time, has been the change in the location of meeting houses from those localities where they were once marked features, to the newer parts of the city. While many of the meeting houses which stood sixty years ago in Purchase street, Summer street, Hollis street, Cambridge street, Chambers street and Hanover street, have been abandoned, and others in Federal street, Franklin street, Summer street, Washington street and Essex street have been replaced by new, no less than twenty-five have been built in sections which in 1840 were covered by water. Thus the money changers, instead of being driven out of the temple, have driven the temples away from the haunts of trade.
In recalling these recollections of Boston, to which I have merely glanced, it seems to me that I have witnessed its growth from youth to age. There are other evidences of its growth than those to which I have alluded. I was told many years ago by Edwin Rice, a resident in East Boston, which now contains a population of thirty thousand, that when he settled there its population did not exceed a hundred. I recall sitting one calm summer afternoon nearly seventy years ago on the grassy bank of Noddles Island, as East Boston was called, now covered with a dense population, and listening to the roar of the city across the harbor. I do not remember to have heard it before or since. The experience was an interesting one. There was no single distinguishable sound, but the rattle of wheels on the pavement, the footfall of horses on the bridges, the hammer on the anvil, the drum of a passing band, the cries of street venders, and, perhaps the rustle of trees and the voices of boys at play, all mingled in a continuous rumble of a busy, populous city. It has been stated that during the battle of Waterloo the people of Brussels heard neither the rattle of musketry, nor the booming of cannon, but both were combined in an unbroken roar of the battle field. In recalling that summer afternoon at East Boston, I have thought that the voices of the past, not the voice of this man or that, performing his part in the drama of life, but the voices of all good and great men who have lived and died need time and distance to be blended as a harmonious whole in the grand symphony of civilization.
In 1832 the whole of East Boston, containing 663 acres of upland and marsh with the flats contiguous thereto and one house, was bought by Wm. H. Sumner, Stephen White, Francis J. Oliver and others for about $80,000, and the East Boston corporation was soon after formed. From that time it rapidly grew, attracting a large population, and becoming a hive of industry. Before the civil war two hundred and thirty or more vessels had been built on its shores, with a measurement of more than two hundred thousand tons. Ship builders were drawn there from the shallow waters of Duxbury, the North river and other places, among whom the chief were Samuel Hall, Donald McKay, Daniel D. Kelly, A. & G. T. Sampson, Jackson & Ewell, Paul Curtis, Jarvis Pratt, Brown, Bates & Delano, Robert E. Jackson, Andrew Burnham, Brown & Lovell, Hugh R. McKay, G. & T. Boole, Wm. Hall, Pratt & Osgood, Samuel Hall, Jr., Joseph Burke, Wm. Kelly, Otis Tufts, Burkett & Tyler, C. F. & H. D. Gardiner; E. & H. O. Briggs. There Donald McKay built the fleet of ships which made his name famous. The following is, I believe, a correct list of his vessels:
| Anglo Saxon, | 894 | tons | Star of Empire, | 1635 | tons |
| Ocean Monarch, | 1301 | tons | Romance of the Seas, | 1500 | tons |
| Washington Irving, | 751 | tons | Challenger, | 1400 | tons |
| New World, | 1404 | tons | Lightning, | 2083 | tons |
| Moses, | 700 | tons | Great Republic, | 4556 | tons |
| Anglo American, | 704 | tons | Champion of the Seas, | 2447 | tons |
| Az, | 700 | tons | James Baines, | 2526 | tons |
| Jenny Lind, | 533 | tons | Commodore Perry, | 1964 | tons |
| Plymouth Rock, | 960 | tons | Santa Claus, | 1256 | tons |
| Helicon, | 400 | tons | Benin, | 692 | tons |
| Reindeer, | 800 | tons | Blanche Moore, | 1787 | tons |
| Parliament, | 998 | tons | Japan, | 1964 | tons |
| Moses Wheeler, | 900 | tons | Adriatic, | 1327 | tons |
| Antarctic, | 1116 | tons | Mastiff, | 1030 | tons |
| Daniel Webster, | 1187 | tons | Zephyr, | 1184 | tons |
| Staghound, | 1534 | tons | Defender, | 1413 | tons |
| Flying Cloud, | 1782 | tons | Donald McKay, | 2594 | tons |
| Staffordshire, | 1817 | tons | Abbott Lawrence, | 1497 | tons |
| North American, | 1469 | tons | Amos Lawrence, | 1396 | tons |
| Sovereign of the Seas, | 2421 | tons | Minnehaha, | 1695 | tons |
| Westward Ho, | 1650 | tons | Harry Hill, | 568 | tons |
| Bald Eagle, | 1704 | tons | Baltic, | 1720 | tons |
| Empress of the Seas, | 2200 | tons | L Z, | 897 | tons |
The total tonnage of the above, forty-six ships, was 67,041, averaging 1,457. The greatest achievements of these vessels were the passage of the Flying Cloud, Capt. Cressey, from New York to San Francisco in 89 days, and the run by the Sovereign of the Seas of 430 geographical miles in 24 hours.
Some of the customs prevailing in my youth and early manhood may be as interesting as the topographical changes in Boston. There was no day police established in Boston until 1854, and old Constable Derastus Clapp stationed in and about State street, was the only officer ever seen. In the above year a police force, under the direction of a chief, was established, but not uniformed until 1856. I remember that the newspapers on a day after the 4th of July, commented with pride on the quiet and peaceful dispersion of the crowd on the Common, witnessing the fireworks the evening before, without a police officer to keep them in order. There were only night watchmen with their rattles who cried the hour with “All is well.” They wore in cool weather plaid camlet cloaks, and as there was a city ordinance forbidding smoking in the streets, which by the way has never been repealed, I have many a time when meeting them concealed my cigar until they were out of sight. My readers may not be aware that a by-law was adopted in Plymouth in 1831, which is still in force, forbidding smoking in any street, lane or public square, or on any wharf in the town.
Ringing the bell at various hours during the day and evening for the convenience of the inhabitants, has so far as Plymouth is concerned, been confined to the town sexton. Since, however, the ringing has been detached from the duties of a sexton proper, who was an officer of the church, the name sexton in our town is now given to the bell ringer, who continues to be chosen by the town every year, though he has now no connection with the church. The first mention of a sexton in the town records is under date of 1712, when Eleazer Rogers was chosen “to ring the bell, sweep the meeting house, keep the doors and windows of said meeting house shut and open for the congregation’s use upon all occasions, and carefully look after said house as above said.” In 1714 he was required to ring the bell at nine o’clock every evening. From that time to this a town sexton is chosen each year, who since the severance of the First Church from the town no longer rings the bell for church, while each church has its own sexton for that duty. The custom in Plymouth is to ring the Town bell as follows at 7 a. m., 12 noon, 1 p. m. and nine p. m., all the year; 6 p. m. when the sun sets after that hour, and on Saturdays 5 p. m., instead of 6. This custom of bell ringing existed in Boston, as well as other places, and I have heard it stated that the Old South Church bell was rung as late as 1836 at 11 a. m. to announce “the grog time o’ day.” The nine o’clock evening bell had its origin in the ancient curfew bell, which derived from the French words, “couvre feu,” was rung at an hour when the fires in houses should be covered up. It was adopted in New England merely to indicate the hour.
There was a method in Boston of lighting the street lamps, which was primitive. The city was divided into districts, and a lamplighter was appointed for each district. The lamps were all oil lamps until 1834, and each lighter would start from home in the morning carrying a ladder, a can of oil, and a filled and trimmed lamp. He would take the old lamp out of the first lantern, putting the fresh one in its place. He would then fill and trim the lamp he took out and go on to the next lantern, and so on through his district. There was another custom, so far as I know peculiar to Boston, where domestic life was less extravagantly and luxuriously enjoyed than in New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore. Few families kept men servants, and many gentlemen, rather than impose the work of blacking boots on servant girls, or have blacking in the house, fell in with a plan suggested by the Brattle street negroes. For many years the shops on the south side of that street were chiefly occupied by shoe blacks and negro dealers in second hand clothing. Some of these negroes went about on the first of January and secured lists of subscribers for their work for the year as a milkman or an ice man would for his milk or ice. If, for instance, he was a beginner in the industry, he would start out early in the morning with two rods about eight feet long, and an inch or more in diameter, and calling at the house of the first subscriber, take his boots and stringing them by the tugs on a rod like herrings on a stick, go the rounds of his subscribers, and the next morning exchange the clean boots for soiled ones. A more general employment of men servants, and finally boot black shops and stands put an end to this custom.