"In her old age, when her own children had left her fireside, it was one of her dearest pleasures to gather a group of their children, or of the children of others around her. She did all in her power to promote their enjoyment, and her benevolent smile was always ready to encourage them. On Thanksgiving-day,1 she depended on having all her children and grand children with her; and until she was 80 years of age, she herself made the pies with which the table was loaded! Not satisfied with feasting them to their heart's content while they were with her, she always had some nice great pies ready for them to take home with them."
1 Thanksgiving-day is in New England, what Christmas is in the Southern States and England. It is always in November, on a day fixed by Proclamation of the Governor of each State, in each year. Christmas, from the anti-Catholic zeal of the Puritan Pilgrims, is almost entirely neglected; being, with all its train of quips, cranks, gambols and mince-pies, thought to savor too strongly of popery.
Joseph's education, till his fourteenth year, was at the public school in Roxbury; one of those common schools, which, from the earliest times of New England, have been planting and nurturing in her soil the seeds and shoots of virtue and freedom. Even in boyhood, our hero was manly, fearless and generous: always taking the part of his weaker school-fellows against a strong oppressor—always the
| "village Hampden, that with dauntless breast, The little tyrant of his fields withstood." |
At fourteen, he entered Harvard University. His talents, perseverance, gentleness and courage, here gained him unrivalled popularity. That he did not acquire or preserve the regard of his fellow students by any base compliances with vice or disorder, the following incident shews.
Some of them had once resolved on some breach of the laws, which, from the sturdiness of his principles, they knew that young Warren would disapprove, and by his powerful influence probably prevent. They therefore met in an upper room of the college, to arrange their plans secretly; fastening the door against him. He found what they were about; and seeing the window of their room open, crept out, through a scuttle door, upon the roof—crawled to the eaves—and there, seizing a water-spout nearly rotten with age, he swung and slid down by it to the window, and unexpectedly sprang in amongst the conspirators. The spout, at the instant of his quitting it, fell with a crash to the ground, and was shivered to pieces. Only saying, in answer to the exclamations of astonishment that burst from his comrades, "it stayed up just long enough for my purpose," he commenced an expostulation against their intended misdemeanor, and succeeded in diverting them from it.
On leaving college, he studied medicine, and began to practise at the age of 23, just previously to a visit of the small pox to Boston, with those fearful ravages which usually attended its march, before the virtues of vaccination were known. Dr. Warren's judgment, tenderness, and skill, made him pre-eminently successful in treating the disease. And it is said, that his gentle and courteous deportment completely neutralized the usual tendency of such professional success, to enkindle the jealousy of his brethren. His mild features and winning smile, true indexes, for once, to the soul within, gained every heart; his knowledge and talents added respect to love. Thus, by the same qualities which had distinguished him at school and at college, did he acquire among his fellow townsmen an influence which no other man of his age and day possessed.
When the British Parliament and Crown began, in 1764, that course of unconstitutional legislation, which was destined, after eleven years of wordy war, to end in a war of blood, Dr. Warren was among the first to stand forth for the rights of America—to assert, and to labor in demonstrating to his countrymen, that the power to tax them (claiming, as they did, all the liberties of Englishmen) could not exist in a government of which no representatives of theirs formed a part. Fostered by him, and by others like him, the spirit of resistance to tyranny grew daily more strong. The inhabitants of the whole country, and especially of Boston, gave token after token of their fixed resolve, to spurn the chain which they saw preparing for them. In 1768, Col. Dalrymple with two royal regiments, reinforced afterwards by additional troops, entered that devoted town, with more than the usual "pomp and circumstance" of military bravado; and there remained in garrison, to repress what the king and ministry were pleased to call "the seditious temper" of the people. Never was attempt at restraint more impotent; nay, more suicidal. The curb, feebly and capriciously or unskilfully plied, served but to infuriate the noble animal it was meant to check and guide: and no wonder that the rider was at length unseated, and stretched in the dust. The New Englanders—we should rather say, the Americans—were too stubborn to be driven, and too shrewd to be circumvented. Every measure of tyranny, they met with an appropriate measure of resistance. Tea had been brought from India, to be the vehicle of unconstitutional taxation. They threw part of it into the sea; another part they hindered from being landed; and the remainder they excluded from use, by mutual pledges to "touch not, taste not" "the unclean thing." Judges were sent over to judge them—creatures of the king—the panders of ministerial oppression. The people would not suffer them to mount the judgment seat—closed the court houses—referred all their differences to arbitrators chosen by the parties—and even so far tamed the spirit of litigation and disorder, as to make tribunals of any sort in a great degree needless.2 Between the British troops and the Boston people, animosities soon ran high. The soldiers seized every opportunity to exasperate the people: the people assembled in mobs, to revenge themselves on the soldiers. Amidst these tumults, Dr. Warren repeatedly exposed his life to soothe and restrain his countrymen. His eloquent persuasions were generally successful. At first, the more violent would endeavor to repel him, and would clamor to drown his voice. "While they did this, he would stand calmly and look at them. His intrepidity, his commanding and animated countenance, and above all, their knowledge that he was on their side so far as it was right to be, would soon make them as eager to hear as he was to speak: and finally, they would disperse to their homes with perfect confidence that they could not do better than to leave their cause in such hands." Those who seek to restrain the excesses of contending factions, may always expect rough usage from both sides. Warren incurred the occasional displeasure of his own party; but he did not escape insult and outrage from the British. They often called him rebel, and threatened him with a rebel's doom. One day, on his way to Roxbury, to see his mother, he passed near several British officers, standing in the Neck, which joins the peninsula of Boston to the main land. Not far before him stood a gallows. One of the officers called out, "Go on, Warren, you will soon come to the gallows:" and the whole party laughed aloud. Walking directly up to them, he calmly asked, which of them had thus addressed him? Not one was bold enough to avow the insolence, and he left them, crest-fallen and ashamed.
2 We have grouped together here, the events of several years, in the rapidity of our narrative. The dependence of the judges for their salaries on the Crown, instead of on the Colonial Legislatures, (whence we date their meriting to be called creatures and panders,) began in 1772: and the tea was thrown into Boston Harbor, Dec. 16th, 1773.
Distinguished for his eloquence, our young physician was repeatedly called on to address the people, upon the great and soul-stirring topics of the times. Far the most interesting of these, was the Massacre of the Fifth of March. Our authoress has passed too slightly over this incident. Let us be a little more full.