Nat the Navigator. A Life of Nathaniel Bowditch. For Young Persons

by Henry I. Bowditch

Nathaniel Bowditch, whose history I shall relate to you, was one whose character and actions presented many circumstances which cannot fail of being interesting to you. He died more than thirty years ago, in Boston; and, from having been a poor and ignorant boy, he became a man known all over the world for his great learning, while at the same time he was beloved for the goodness of his heart and the integrity of his character. May the perusal of his history excite some of you to imitate his virtues and his energy.

BIRTHPLACE.

EARLY SCHOOL DAYS.

He was born in Salem, a town about fourteen miles from Boston, the capital city of our State of Massachusetts. His birthday was March 26, 1773. His father was at first a cooper, and afterwards a shipmaster. He and his wife were exceedingly poor, and they had many children. Nat was the fourth child. He had two sisters and three brothers. When he was about two and a half years old, his parents removed to a very small wooden house in Danvers, about three miles from Salem; and here the boy attended school for the first time, and began to show those generous feelings, and that love of learning, which he displayed so much in after-life. A few years ago the old school-house in which he learned to spell and read remained entire. It was an old-fashioned building, with a long, slanting roof, which, at the back of the house, nearly reached the ground. Its single chimney, with many curious and pretty corners, then rose in the middle of the roof, as it had for ninety years. Around the dwelling is a grass plat, upon which he used, when a child like yourselves, to play with his schoolmates. It was planted with shrubs, such as the farmers most need. The house in which he lived still stands nearly opposite that in which the school was kept. This house formerly had but two rooms in it, and all its furniture was of the simplest kind.

HIS FIRST SCHOOL-HOUSE.

BROTHERS AND SISTERS.

I visited the relations of the schoolmistress. She died many, many years ago; but her niece, when I asked about Nat Bowditch, told me how her aunt used to love him for his earnestness in pursuing his studies, and for his gentleness, while under her care. He was “a nice boy,” she used to say. While in Danvers, his father was most of the time at sea, he having been obliged to give up his trade and become a sailor when the Revolutionary War broke out.[1] Nat lived, during his father’s absence, very happily with his mother and his brothers and sisters. During the whole of his after-life, he used to delight to go near the small house in which he had dwelt so pleasantly. The family was “a family of love.” He had a brother William, to whom he was very much attached. He was more grave and sober than Nat; for the latter, with all his devotion to study, was full of fun, frolic, and good nature. But William was equally, and perhaps more, gentle. The brothers frequently studied together from an old family Bible, and on Sundays, when they were quite small, their grandmother, who was a very excellent woman, used to place this large book, with its wooden covers and bright brazen clasps, upon the foot of her bed; and hour after hour did those two boys trace, with their fingers upon the map, the forty years’ wanderings of the Israelites, before they came into the long-looked-for land of Canaan.

GRANDMOTHER’S BIBLE.