"Jackson had a horse on the course which was beaten that day. The recklessness of his bets, his violent gesticulations and imprecations, outdid all competition. If I had been told that he was to be a future President of the United States, I should have thought it a very strange thing."
There are still a few old men, I believe, at Nashville who remember General Jackson's demeanor on the race ground, and they confirm the record of Mr. Flower. After a ride of a thousand miles or so, he presented his letter of introduction to Mr. Jefferson at Poplar Forest, and had a cordial reception. The traveler describes the house as resembling a French château, with octagon rooms, doors of polished oak, lofty ceilings, and large mirrors. The ex-President's form, he says, was of somewhat majestic proportions, more than six feet in height; his manners simple, kind, and polite; his dress a dark pepper-and-salt coat, cut in the old Quaker fashion, with one row of large metal buttons, knee-breeches, gray worsted stockings, and shoes fastened by large metal buckles, all quite in the old style. His two grand-daughters, Misses Randolph, were living with him then. Mr. Jefferson soon after returned to his usual abode, Monticello, and there Mr. Flower spent the greater part of the winter, enjoying most keenly the evening conversations of the ex-President, who delighted to talk of the historic scenes in which he was for fifty years a conspicuous actor.
George Flower and his party would have settled near Monticello, perhaps, but for the system of slavery, which perpetuated a wasteful mode of farming, and disfigured the beautiful land with dilapidation.
He had, meanwhile, sent home word that prairies existed in America, and in the spring of 1817 his partner in the enterprise, Morris Birkbeck, and his family of nine, came out from England, and they all started westward in search of the prairies. They went by stage to Pittsburg, where they bought horses, mounted them and continued their journey, men, ladies, and boys, a dozen people in all. The journey was not unpleasant, most of them being persons of education and refinement, with three agreeable young ladies among them, two of them being daughters of Mr. Birkbeck, and Miss Andrews, their friend and companion.
All went well and happily during the journey until Mr. Birkbeck, a widower of fifty-four with grown daughters, made an offer of marriage to Miss Andrews, aged twenty-five. It was an embarrassing situation. She was constrained to decline the offer, and as they were traveling in such close relations, the freedom and enjoyment of the journey were seriously impaired. Then Mr. Flower, who was a widower also, but in the prime of life, proposed to the young lady. She accepted him, and they were soon after married at Vincennes, the rejected Birkbeck officiating as father of the bride.
But this was not finding the prairies. At length, toward the close of the second summer, they began to meet with people who had seen prairies, and finally their own eyes were greeted with the sight. One day, after a ride of seven hours in extreme heat, bruised and torn by the brushwood, exhausted and almost in despair, suddenly a beautiful prairie was disclosed to their view. It was an immense expanse stretching away in profound repose beneath the light of an afternoon summer sun, surrounded by forest and adorned with clumps of mighty oaks, "the whole presenting a magnificence of park scenery complete from the hand of nature." The writer adds: "For once, the reality came up to the picture of the imagination."
If the reader supposes that their task was now substantially accomplished, he is very much mistaken. After a good deal of laborious search, they chose a site for their settlement in Edwards County, Illinois, and bought a considerable tract; after which Mr. Flower went to England to close up the affairs of the two families, and raise the money to pay for their land and build their houses. They named their town Albion. It has enjoyed a safe and steady prosperity ever since, and has been in some respects a model town to that part of Illinois.
The art of founding a town must of course soon cease to be practiced. It is curious to note how all the institutions of civilized life were established in their order. First was built a large log-cabin that would answer as a tavern and blacksmith's shop, the first requisites being to get the horses shod, and the riders supplied with whiskey. Then came other log-cabins, as they were needed, which pioneers would undertake to build for arriving emigrants for twenty-five dollars apiece. Very soon one of the people would try, for the first time in his life, to preach a sermon on Sundays, and as soon as there were children enough in the neighborhood, one of the settlers, unable to cope with the labors of agriculture, would undertake to teach them, and a log-cabin would be built or appropriated for the purpose.
Mr. Flower reports that, as soon as the school was established, civilization was safe. Some boys and some parents would hold out against it for a while, but all of them at last either join the movement or remove further into the wilderness.
"Occasionally," he says, "will be seen a boy, ten or twelve years old, leaning against a door-post intently gazing in upon the scholars at their lessons; after a time he slowly and moodily goes away. He feels his exclusion. He can no longer say: 'I am as good as you.' He must go to school or dive deeper into the forest."