My father’s decisions came always without warning. In the fall of 1769 I was just gone back to the academy, and put to work at mathematics and some Greek under James Wilson, at that period one of the tutors, and some time later an associate judge of the Supreme Court. This great statesman and lawyer of after-days was a most delightful teacher. He took a fancy to my Jack, and, as we were inseparable, put up with my flippancy and deficient scholarship. Jack’s diary says otherwise, and that he saw in me that which, well used, might make of me a man of distinction. At all events, he liked well to walk with us on a Saturday, or to go in my boat, which was for us a great honour. My father approved of James Wilson, and liked him on the holiday to share our two-o’clock dinner. Then, and then only, did I understand the rigour and obstinacy of my father’s opinions, for they ofttimes fell into debate as to the right of the crown to tax us without representation. Mr. Wilson said many towns in England had no voice in Parliament, and that, if once the crown yielded the principle we stood on, it would change the whole political condition in the mother-land; and this the king would never agree to see. Mr. Wilson thought we had been foolish to say, as many did, that, while we would have no internal taxes, we would submit to a tax on imports. This he considered even worse. My father was for obedience and non-resistance, and could not see that we were fighting a battle for the liberty of all Englishmen. He simply repeated his opinions, and was but a child in the hands of this clear-headed thinker. My father might well have feared for the effect of Mr. Wilson’s views on a lad of my age, in whose mind he opened vistas of thought far in advance of those which, without him, I should ever have seen.
John Wynne was, however, too habitually accustomed to implicit obedience to dream of danger, and thus were early sown in my mind the seeds of future action, with some doubt as to my father’s ability to cope with a man like our tutor, who considerately weighed my father’s sentiments (they were hardly opinions), and so easily and courteously disposed of them that these logical defeats were clear even to us boys.
Our school relations with this gentleman were abruptly broken. One day, in late October of 1769, we went on a long walk through the proprietary’s woods, gathering for my mother boughs of the many-tinted leaves of autumn. These branches she liked to set in jars of water in the room where we sat, so that it might be gay with the lovely colours she so much enjoyed. As we entered the forest about Eighth street Mr. Wilson joined us, and went along, chatting agreeably with my mother. Presently he said to me: “I have just left your father with Mr. Pemberton, talking about some depredations in Mr. Penn’s woods. He tells me you boys are to leave school, but for what I do not know. I am sorry.”
Jack and I had of late expected this, and I, for one, was not grieved, but my friend was less well pleased.
We strolled across to the Schuylkill, and there, sitting down, amused ourselves with making a little crown of twisted twigs and leaves of the red and yellow maples. This we set merrily on my mother’s gray beaver, while Mr. Wilson declared it most becoming. Just then Friend Pemberton and my father came upon us, and, as usual when the latter appeared, our laughter ceased.
“I shall want thee this afternoon, Hugh,” he said. “And what foolishness is this on thy head, wife? Art thou going home in this guise?”
“It seems an innocent prettiness,” said Pemberton, while my mother, in no wise dismayed, looked up with her big blue eyes.
“Thou wilt always be a child,” said my father.
“Je l’espere,” said the mother; “must I be put in a corner? The bon Dieu hath just changed the forest fashions. I wonder is He a Quaker, Friend Pemberton?”
“Thou hast ever a neat answer,” said the gentle old man. “Come, John, we are not yet done.”