AUTHOR'S EARLY CHARACTER. 21 qualities my childhood had unfolded, I might say, that, with a sufficient share of obstinacy and impatience of control, I had never manifested a propensity to mischief; and though I might sometimes have been a follower, I had never promoted or been a leader in those pranks which are denominated unlucky: Thank Heaven, I had never been guilty of a trick, and rarely, if ever, of a lie. I had no cunning, and, consequently, gave no token of those talents which might qualify me, one day, to rise in a commonwealth. On a scrutiny, therefore, of my character, the possibility might have been inferred, that, in an evil hour, and at a riper age, my passions might have hurried me into acts of fatal rashness, as, under better stars, they might have impelled me into the path of a Hampden; but that, in no situation, I could have trod the track of a Gracchus or a Drusus. The Gracchi fond of mischief-making laws, Neither could the unshrinking determination which must enter into the composition of a Brutus have justly been imputed to me; not even on the specious ground of public good; my stuff was not so stern. My amusements, as I have already said, depended much upon myself. I had a passion for drawing; and my early essays were considered as indications of much genius for the art. I was in the practice also of cutting men and horses out of cards. By separating the legs of the bipeds, I mounted them without difficulty; and by a similar process on those of the quadrupeds, I could give them a firm stand on a table. By these means I could either send them a hunting with a pack of hounds, 22 AUTHOR'S EARLY CHARACTER. in like manner set upon their feet, or attach unmounted horses to sleighs, or wheel carriages, (all of which I manufactured,) at pleasure. My talent also gave me the command of regiments of cavalry, and my evenings, when there was no company, were generally employed in arranging them in order of battle. Divided into two bodies, they were disposed in hostile array, while round pieces of card, representing cannon balls, were the misşiles alternately thrown at the different corps; that side being held to be defeated which was first battered down. It was truly a war of extermination, as the vanquished were always cut off to a man. Both my grandfather and grandmother, as well as my aunts, were pleased with my exhibitions; and it became a matter of doubt in the family, whether my genius most inclined me to the profession of a limner or a general. Music, too, was an art for which I had discovered a propensity, and had already the enthusiasm of an amateur. From the drums and fifes of Otway's regiment, which every morning passed our door, I had, among other tunes, learnt the Grenadier's March; and I remember one day being on a visit to my father, who then resided in the country, at a place of Dr Denormandie's, as I was whistling it with great devotion, and marching to it in proper time, he was delighted with the truth of my ear, and the correctness of my performance: For he was much of a musical man, and played upon the violin, though, as I have been informed by one of his old friends, with more of science than execution. Another circumstance, of some affinity to the topic, I cannot withhold, since it is an evidence of my coincidence in taste with the celebrated Mr Addison. I have somewhere seen it mentioned, that he was a warm ad ANECDOTE OF ADDISON. 23 mirer of the ballad of Sally of the Alley. I once, when very young, heard my mother sing it over a cradle, and was so enraptured with its simple pathos, that I was continually importuning her to repeat it. Whether it was the composition or the melody which had charmed me, I know not, but to my infant heart it appeared inimitably tender and affecting. The only verse I recollect of it is the following : Of all the days within the week, I dearly love but one day, And that's the day that comes between For then I'm drest All in my best, To walk abroad with Sally; She is the darling of my heart, And lives in our alley. be yet Though an old ballad, it is possible that it may so well known as to render this recital unnecessary, if not to give it an appearance of triteness. At any rate, I should hardly have ventured to notice it had it not been dignified by the approbation of a respectable name. It was sometime before my entering into the Latin school that I had the misfortune to lose my father. This was in March 1761. He had just finished a country house on a favourite spot, sufficiently elevated to overlook the adjacent district for some miles round, and to command a view of the town of Bristol, distant not quite a mile, as well as that of Burlington, together with an extensive intervening tract of meadow ground, stretching to the shore of the Delaware, whose bright expanse was also subjected to the eye. He had long been improving the scite before he began to build; had 24 DEATH OF AUTHOR'S FATHER. رو planted it with the best fruits in every kind, and given to it the style of embellishment, both with respect to the disposition of the grounds and the trees, which was at that time in fashion. But this residence, at once so cherished and delightful, he was permitted to enjoy not quite a year. The blow was desolating to my mother, "whose heart was apt to feel;" and who, in addition to the calamity of being bereaved of one with whom her union had been happiness uninterrupted, found herself, at about the age of two and thirty, solely involved in the cares of a young family of four children, of whom I, about to complete my ninth year, was the eldest. Το me, who was at home when the event took place, it was rather a shock than a matter of poignant grief. It was the first death that had been brought home to me; and the deep distress of the family, together with the dismal apparatus of coffins and hearses, could not fail to overwhelm me in the general gloom. The next day I was sent to Philadelphia, whither the remains of my father, attended by his faithful and dejected friend Joseph Church, were conveyed for interment, As funeral honours upon these occasions are the only solace of the afflicted, they were here bestowed with an unsparing hand. Much pomp was shown, and much expence incurred, both of which would have been saved had the will of the deceased, which enjoined a plain and economical burial, been previously opened. The pall, sustained by six of his old city friends, I followed as chief mourner, and saw, the body deposited in the grave yard of Market Street Meeting-House, in or near the tomb wherein his first wife had been laid. My father, as already mentioned, came to this country a married man, and was about twenty years older than my mother. Though LATIN SCHOOL-MR BEVERIDGE. 25 proper he died possessed of a large and valuable landed ty in the neighbourhood of Bristol, consisting of an equal part of one thousand acres, purchased, in conjunction with Mr M'Ilvaine, in the year 1752, of William Whitaker of London, it was encumbered; and the provision, made necessary by a settlement on his first marriage, for two children, who were the issue of it, rendered the residue inadequate to the support of his widow and her children. Hence, a removal of the family to Philadelphia became expedient, and was resolved on as soon as the requisite arrangements could be made; and it accordingly took place in the course of the year. I have said that I was about to enter the Latin school. The person whose pupil I was consequently to become was Mr John Beveridge, a native of Scotland, who retained the smack of his vernacular tongue in its primitive purity. His acquaintance with the language he taught was, I believe, justly deemed to be very accurate and profound. But as to his other acquirements, after excepting the game of backgammon, in which he was said to excel, truth will not warrant me in saying a great deal. He was, however, diligent and laborious in his attention to his school; and had he possessed the faculty of making himself beloved by the scholars, and of exciting their emulation and exertion, nothing would have been wanting in him to an entire qualification for his office. But, unfortunately, he had no dignity of character, and was no less destitute of the art of making himself respected than beloved. Though not, perhaps, to be complained of as intolerably severe, he yet made a pretty free use of the ratan and the ferule, but to very little purpose. He was, in short, no disciplinarian, and, consequently, very unequal to the management of seven |