A lady who testified a wish to accompany me on a visit to the Miss Byleses, found little either to interest or amuse her,—the truth was, that being unable to enter the least into their characters, she looked very gravely all the time, and afterwards told me she saw nothing in them but foolishness.
I must do the Miss Byleses the justice to say, that they appeared to much less advantage on these the first visits of new people, than to those among the initiated, who took sufficient interest in them to cultivate an after-acquaintance. I went sometimes alone to sit an hour with them towards the decline of a summer afternoon,—and then I always found them infinitely more rational than when “putting themselves through their facings,” to show off to strangers. In the course of these quiet visits, they told me many little circumstances connected with the royalist side of our revolutionary contest, that I could scarcely have obtained from any other source,—the few persons yet remaining among us that were tories during that eventful period, taking care to say as little about it as possible: and every one is so considerate as to ask them no questions on a subject so sore to them.
But with the daughters of Dr. Byles, the case was quite different. They gloried,—they triumphed, in the firm adherence of their father and his family to the royalty of England,—and scorned the idea of even now being classed among the citoyennes of a republic; a republic which, as they said, they had never acknowledged, and never would; regarding themselves still as faithful subjects to the majesty of Britain, whoever that majesty might be. Of the kings that they knew of, they had a decided preference for George the Third, as the monarch of their youthful days, and under whom the most important events of their lives had taken place. All since the revolution was nearly a blank in their memories;—they dated almost entirely from that period,—and since then, they had acquired but a scanty accession to the number of their ideas. From their visiters they learnt little or nothing, as they always had the chief of the talk to themselves. With English history, and with the writers of the first half of the last century they were somewhat conversant,—but all that had transpired in the literary and political world since the peace of ’83, was to them indistinct and shadowy as the images of a dream not worth remembering. But they talked of what, to us, is now the olden time with a vividness of recollection that seemed as if the things had occurred but yesterday. In the coloring of their pictures, I, of course, made allowance for the predominant tinge of toryism, and who for a large portion of the lingering vanity, which I regarded indulgently, because it injured no one, and their self-satisfaction added to the happiness of these isolated old ladies. They once showed me, in an upper room, portraits of themselves at the ages of seventeen and eighteen, painted by Pelham, the brother-in-law, I believe, of Copley. The pictures were tolerably executed; and I think they must have been likenesses, for the faded faces of the octogenarian sisters still retained some resemblance to their youthful prototypes. The Miss Byleses were not depicted in the prevailing costume of that period. They had neither hoop-petticoats, stomachers, nor powdered heads,—both were represented in a species of non-descript garments, imagined by the painter,—and for head gear, Miss Catharine had her own fair locks in a state of nature,—and Miss Mary a thing like a small turban.
From their own account they must have been regarded somewhat in the light of belles by the British officers. They talked of walking on the Common arm in arm with General Howe and Lord Percy: both of whom, they said, were frequent visitors at the house, and often took tea and spent the evening there.
I imagined the heir of Northumberland, taking his tea in the old parlour, by the old fire-place, at the old tea-table,—entertained by the witticisms of Dr. Byles, and the prettinesses of his daughters; who, of course, were the envy of all the female tories of Boston, at least of those who could not aspire to the honor of being talked to by English noblemen. Moreover, Lord Percy frequently ordered the band of his regiment to play under the chesnut trees, for the gratification of the Miss Byleses, who then, as they said, had “God save the King” in perfection. By the bye, I have never heard either God save the king or Rule Britannia well played by an American band; though our musicians seem to perform the Marseillaise con amore.
The venerable ladies told me that the intimacy of their family with the principal British officers became so well known, that in a short time they found it expedient to close their shutters before dark, as the lights gleaming through the parlor windows made the house of Dr. Byles, a mark for the Americans to fire at from their fortifications on Dorchester heights, in the hope that every ball might destroy a red-coated visitor. Also, that the cannon-shot, still sticking in the tower of Brattle-street church, was aimed by the Cambridge rebels at General Howe, who had established his head-quarters at the old Province House. Unpractised artillerymen as they then were, it is difficult to believe that, if the Province House was really their mark, they could have missed it so widely.
The Miss Byleses related many anecdotes of their father; some of which were new to me, and with others I had long been familiar. For the benefit of such of my readers as have not yet met with any of these old fashioned jeux d’esprit I will insert a few samples of their quality.
For instance, his daughters told me of the doctor walking one day with a whig gentleman, in the vicinity of the Common, where a division of the British troops lay encamped. His companion pointing to the soldiers of the crown—said—“you see there the cause of all our evils—” “—But you cannot say that our evils are not red-dressed,” remarked Dr. Byles. “Your pun is not a good one,” observed his companion, “you have mis-spelt the word by adding another D.”—“Well—” replied the clerical joker,—“as a doctor of divinity, am I not entitled to the use of two D’s?”
They spoke of their father’s captivity in his own mansion. And one of them repeated to me the well known story of Dr. Byles coming out to the centinel who was on guard, in a porch that then ran along the front of the house, and requesting him to go to the street pump and bring a bucket of cold water, as the day was warm, and the doctor very thirsty. The soldier, it seems, at first declined; alleging his reluctance to violate the rules of the service by quitting his post before the relief came round. The doctor assured the man that he would take his place, and be his own guard till the water was brought. The centinel at last complied; and took the bucket and went to the pump,—first resigning his musket to Dr. Byles, who shouldered it in a very soldier-like manner, and paced the porch, guarding himself till the sentry came back,—to whom on returning his piece, he said,—“Now my friend, you see I have been guarded—re-guarded—and dis-regarded.”
The Miss Byleses also referred to the anecdote of their father having once paid his addresses to a lady who refused him, and afterwards married the Mr. Quincy of that time, a name which then, as now, is frequently in Boston pronounced Quinsy. The doctor afterwards meeting the lady, said to her jocosely,—“Your taste in distempers must be very bad, when it has led you to prefer the Quinsy to Byles.”