Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. by Various

V >> Various >> Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI.

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But his subsequent life showed that the man's fortune was not luck; for
by economy, not by hoarding,--by foresight, and a generous trust to all
laborers who wished to lease lands, his wealth grew to nearly fifteen
million dollars.

When he found that he had enough to live comfortably upon, he retired
from the bar, and devoted himself to horticulture. He found that the
region in which he lived was adapted to the growth of the vine, and
began his experiments, which, during his life, extended to the culture
of more than forty varieties. He laid before the community, from time to
time, a report of his successes, he called on all to come and taste the
wines he made, until the tidings went over the earth, and from Germany,
France, Italy, came vine-dressers and wine-makers, who covered every
hill-side for miles around him with vintages.

Those who came from afar to inquire into this new branch of industry,
for which he had opened the way, were surprised to meet the
millionnaire, the Catawba-Prince, in his plain garb and with his humble
habits.

How many stories I could tell you of this unintentional, odd homeliness
of manner and life, from which he never departed, and which those around
him found it impossible to depart from, even in respect to the style of
the coffin in which he was laid, and the procession which followed him
to the beautiful cemetery! His dress was always that of a man of the
humblest fortunes; and Dame Gossip says that he was so fond of his old
coat, that, when a change became absolutely necessary, his daughters
were obliged to prepare the new one, and substitute it for the old
whilst he was asleep, so that in the morning he should put it on
unconsciously, or, if he discovered the change; must wear the new or
none. The same dame has it that a youth, who afterward became his
son-in-law, having caught sight somewhere of one of the old man's
daughters, desired to know her, and that, in the park, which was open to
all, he met the old gentleman, whom he supposed to be the gardener, and
offered him a bribe, if he would bring the lady out among the roses. The
old man accepted the bribe, and returned with the lady, whom, with a
sly twinkle of the eye, he introduced as "my daughter" to the blushing
youth. And again it is told, that once, on a very warm day, the old man,
having to wait for a friend, sat down on a stone just outside of his own
gate, took off his hat, and, closing his eyes, dozed a little. When he
got up, he found a silver quarter in his hat. Whether it was put there
by some one who really thought he was an object of charity, or by a wag,
the old man appreciated the joke, and, with a smile, put it into the
pocket out of which had to come forty thousand dollars for annual taxes.
These stories may or may not be true; but in some sense such stories
have a certain truth, whether invented or not. They can live and
circulate only in a community where they are characteristic of the
person of whom they are told. Generous men are not pursued by stories of
parsimony; mean men never hear even untrue stories of their generosity.

And this last remark leads me to speak of the relation in which the
wealthiest man of the West stood to the throngs of the poor and the
suffering who surrounded him.

If, in the city, you had gone to the President of the Boorioboola-Gha
Sewing-Circle, or to the Tract-Society Rooms, or to the clergy, and
inquired whether the city's richest man was charitable, you would have
received an ominous shrug in reply. Vainly have they gone to him for any
such charities. Vainly did they go to him for some "poor, but worthy and
Christian woman."

"I will give nothing," he replied; "there are enough who will give to
her; what I have to give shall go to the _unworthy_ poor, whom none
will help,--the Devil's poor, Sir,--those whom Christians leave to the
Devil."

Many a minister has been sorely puzzled by the receipt of a fifty-dollar
bill "for the relief of the depraved." His office was constantly
thronged with outcasts, who were generally relieved by small sums. In
his relations with these people, his simplicity and eccentricity were
noted by all who knew him. Among many stories which I know to be true, I
select the following.

Some six or eight years ago the winter was very cold; the river was
frozen, and all the "wharf-rats" were thrown out of work. A near
relative of the old gentleman came to the city, and passed the night at
his house. After tea he sauntered to the office to take a quiet cigar.
To his surprise, he found it filled with a crowd--more than fifty--of
brawny, beastly-looking men. The presence of the childlike old man, his
face beaming with shrewdness and kindly humor, seemed alone to keep them
from being a mob. His manner to them said,--"You poor wretches, I know
how reckless you are; yet I am not sure but I should be as bad, had I
been exposed to the same bad influences." These houseless vagrants had
been coming every night, while the river was frozen, to get a dime for a
night's lodging.

The young man had been forced by the unpleasantness of the crowd to go
and enjoy his cigar outside. As he sat there, the ugly crowd filed out
quietly, each with his dime, (the clerk distributing,) till the last
man. He seemed to feel very ill-used, and was scarcely clear of the
door-way before he gave vent to his indignation:--"I'll be d----d, if I
don't let Old ---- know that I won't be put off with a five-cent piece
and a three-cent piece! Let me ketch him out, and I'll mash his," etc.,
etc.

Glowing with righteous indignation, and glad of the opportunity, the
young relative rushed in and exclaimed,--

"Mr. ----! I have had many occasions to remonstrate with you on your
indiscriminate charities, your encouragement of beggary and vice. The
wretch who went out last is breathing threats of personal violence
against you, because he has been put off with a five-cent piece and a
three-cent piece!"

How was the indignant remonstrant mortified, when the old man simply
turned his head to the clerk and said,--

"Mark, why did you not give that man his dime?"

"I had given out all the dimes, Sir, and I gave him all I had left."

"See that he gets his extra two cents the next time he comes. I have no
doubt I should have been mad, if I had been in his place."

A forlorn-looking man once came and asked for help.

"I am afraid to give you money. I think I know how you will spend it."

Of course the man protested that strong drink was an abomination unto
him,--that what his nature most craved was "pure, fresh milk."

The old man, with a look in which it would be hard to say whether
shrewdness or credulity predominated, at once hastened to the
milk-cellar and returned with a glass of milk; the fellow swallowed the
dose with an eager reluctance quite comical to behold, but which excited
no movement in the muscles of the old gentleman's face.

On a raw, wet winter's day, a loafer applied for a pair of shoes. He had
on an old, shambling pair, out at both toes. The old Wine-Prince was
sitting with a pair of slippers on, and had his own shoes warming at the
fire.

"Well," said he to the applicant, "you do look rather badly off, for
such a cold, wet day; here, see if these shoes will fit you," handing
his own.

The fellow tried them on and pronounced them a complete fit, and went on
his way rejoicing. The clerk was amused, half an hour after, to see the
old gentleman searching for his shoes and wondering what had become of
them. He was reminded that he had given them to the beggar. On further
inquiry, he found that he had no other pair in the house.

The following significant story was told me by the son of the old man. I
present it in nearly his own words.

"Adjoining me in the country lives an old German who nearly seventy
years ago was _sold_ in New York for his passage. A confectioner of
Baltimore bought him for seven years' service, and he went with his
master to fulfil his obligation. When his time was out, he turned his
face towards the setting sun, and started to seek his fortune. On
arriving in Pittsburg, having no money, he engaged to 'work his way'
down the river on a flat-boat. He stopped at the little village, as our
city then was, and opened a shop. He was skilful, and succeeded. He came
to my father, and bought, on ten years' credit, a place in the country,
where, in course of time, he built a house, and, with my father's
assistance, planted a vineyard. He then gave up all other business but
that of the vine-dresser.

"One day, in the autumn, a few years ago, I overtook the old man on
horseback, on his way to town. After wishing me a cheery good-morning,
he said,--

"'I am on my way to town, to sell your father my wine.'

"'He will be glad to get it; he is buying wine, and yours is made so
carefully that he will be glad to have it.'

"'I mean to sell it to him for fifty cents a gallon.'

"'Oh,' said I, 'don't offer it at that. I know he is paying double that
sum.'

"'Nevertheless, I mean to sell it to him for half a dollar.'

"I looked inquiringly.

"'Well, Sir, I was but a boy when I left Germany; but I was old
enough to remember that a man, after a hard day's work, could go to a
wine-house, and for two cents could get a tumblerful. It did him good,
and he went home to his family fresher and brighter for his wine. He
was never drunk, and never wasted his earnings to appease a diseased
appetite. I want to see that state of things brought about here. Our
poor people drink whiskey. I want them to have cheap wine in its place.
Fifty cents a gallon will pay me well this year for my capital and
labor, and next year I think I can sell it for forty cents.'

"'But, my friend, see how this will work. You will sell your wine to Mr.
---- for fifty cents; and he will send it to his wine-cellar, and they
will bottle it and sell it for all they can get.'

"'That's _their_ lookout,' said the Teuton; 'I shall have done my duty.'

"It was rather hard to get an advantage of my father, but I thought now
I had him. On reaching the city, I sought him out, and told the story
with all its circumstances.

"'Now, Sir, in presence of the example of this old German,--sold in New
York for his passage, faithfully fulfilling the years of his servitude,
working his way to a small competency by savings and industry,--will you
dare to let the world hear of you, a rich man, making a profit on wine?'

"The old man's eye dropped an instant, then he said,--

"'My son, Heaven knows I do not wish to make money out of wine. I have
given much time and much money for the last fifty years to make this
doubtful experiment successful. I have paid high prices for wine, and
used all other means in my power to make it remunerative,--to induce
others to plant vineyards. If I should now take your suggestion and
bring wine down to a low price, I should ruin the enterprise. But let
the extended cultivation of the grape be once firmly established, and
then competition will bring it low enough.'

"'Well,' said I, 'that may be good worldly wisdom; but I like the spirit
of the old Dutchman better, after all.'

"'There I agree with you; for once, you are right.'"

A most careful accountant has shown that his contributions to
grape-culture amounted to one-fourth of his whole fortune: a clear loss
to him, but not to the public.

Though the lips of Christendom repeat, Sunday after Sunday, the warning
that the left hand should not know what the right hand doeth, yet it is
very apt to judge of a man's liberality by the paragraphs concerning him
in the newspapers. The old gentleman once gave his city several acres of
land for an observatory which was to be erected; and there is no doubt
that he had reason to conclude, as have others, that it was the worst,
as it was the most public, charity of his life. That his private
charities were numerous and without self-crediting, the present writer
_happens_ to know. Once, after going through the great wine-cellar where
millions were coined, I went through the barracks in the upper portion
of the same building, where a wretched tenantry of the Devil's poor
lived in squalor. Each of these families was required to pay room-rent
to the millionnaire. As I passed along, I found one man and woman in
wrathful distress. They must pay their rent, or be turned out of their
rooms. The rent was two or three dollars. I said,--

"The old gentleman will not turn you out."

"You do not know him; he will be sure to, if we do not pay him every
cent."

I determined to search him out and represent the case. I could not find
him; but before I concluded my search, I found that the poor people had
been compelled to sell a table and some chairs to pay the rent. The next
day I saw them again, and found them heartily abusing the old man as
"a stingy brute," who would "sell the chairs from under them." Yet I
observed that they had _a new table and three new chairs_. When I asked
them how they came by them, they said they had been sent by an unknown
hand, which they supposed to be mine. A thought struck me, and after
some trouble I ferreted out the fact, that, although the rich old man
had, for reasons connected with the good order of the barracks,
always exacted every cent of the rent from each tenant, whatever the
consequences, he had many times, as in this case, secretly returned more
than it had cost them to pay it. They were left to believe him a hard
man, and often attributed his benefits to societies and persons whose
charity would have been stifled by the whiskey-stench of their rooms.

Thus, then, went on his life, until the day when the Golden Wedding
was to be celebrated. That year, the sons, with the vine-dressers, the
bottlers, corkers, and all, gathered together and said,--

"Come, now! let us this year make a wine that shall be like the nectar
for a true man's soul!"

So, with one accord, they gathered the richest grapes, and selected from
them; then they made the wine-press clean and sweet, and cast the grapes
therein. One great hiss,--a spurt of gold flushed with rubies,--and all
that is acrid is left, all that is rich and sweet is borne away, to be
labelled "GOLDEN WEDDING."

And now, as I taste it, it seems to me flavored beyond all earthly wine,
as if it were the expression of an humble and faithful man, who had a
legitimate object, which he obtained by steadfastness. The wine-makers
maintain, that wine, though long confined in bottles, sympathizes still
with the vines from which it was pressed; and when the season of the
flowering of vines comes, it is always agitated anew. Surely the Catawba
must ever sparkle afresh, when in it, as now, we pledge the memory of
the brave and wise pioneer whose life climbed to its maturity along with
the purple clusters which so had garnered the frost and sunshine of a
life as well as of the seasons.

THE SILURIAN BEACH.

With what interest do we look upon any relic of early human history!
The monument that tells of a civilization whose hieroglyphic records we
cannot even decipher, the slightest trace of a nation that vanished and
left no sign of its life except the rough tools and utensils buried
in the old site of its towns or villages, arouses our imagination and
excites our curiosity. Men gaze with awe at the inscription on an
ancient Egyptian or Assyrian stone; they hold with reverential touch the
yellow parchment-roll whose dim, defaced characters record the meagre
learning of a buried nationality; and the announcement, that for
centuries the tropical forests of Central America have hidden within
their tangled growth the ruined homes and temples of a past race, stirs
the civilized world with a strange, deep wonder.

To me it seems that to look on the first land that was ever lifted above
the waste of waters, to follow the shore where the earliest animals and
plants were created when the thought of God first expressed itself
in organic forms, to hold in one's hand a bit of stone from an old
sea-beach, hardened into rock thousands of centuries ago, and studded
with the beings that once crept upon its surface or were stranded there
by some retreating wave, is even of deeper interest to men than the
relics of their own race, for these things tell more directly of the
thoughts and creative acts of God.

Standing in the neighborhood of Whitehall, near Lake George, one may
look along such a sea-shore, and see it stretching westward and sloping
gently southward as far as the eye can reach. It must have had a very
gradual slope, and the waters must have been very shallow; for at that
time no great mountains had been uplifted, and deep oceans are always
the concomitants of lofty heights. We do not, however, judge of this by
inference merely; we have an evidence of the shallowness of the sea
in those days in the character of the shells found in the Silurian
deposits, which shows that they belonged in shoal waters.

Indeed, the fossil remains of all times tell us almost as much of the
physical condition of the world at different epochs as they do of its
animal and vegetable population. When Robinson Crusoe first caught sight
of the footprint on the sand, he saw in it more than the mere footprint,
for it spoke to him of the presence of men on his desert island. We
walk on the old geological shores, like Crusoe along his beach, and the
footprints we find there tell us, too, more than we actually see in
them. The crust of our earth is a great cemetery where the rocks are
tombstones on which the buried dead have written their own epitaphs.
They tell us not only who they were and when and where they lived, but
much also of the circumstances under which they lived. We ascertain
the prevalence of certain physical conditions at special epochs by the
presence of animals and plants whose existence and maintenance required
such a state of things, more than by any positive knowledge respecting
it. Where we find the remains of quadrupeds corresponding to our
ruminating animals, we infer not only land, but grassy meadows also, and
an extensive vegetation; where we find none but marine animals, we know
the ocean must have covered the earth; the remains of large reptiles,
representing, though in gigantic size, the half aquatic, half
terrestrial reptiles of our own period, indicate to us the existence
of spreading marshes still soaked by the retreating waters; while the
traces of such animals as live now in sand and shoal waters, or in mud,
speak to us of shelving sandy beaches and of mud-flats. The eye of the
Trilobite tells us that the sun shone on the old beach where he
lived; for there is nothing in Nature without a purpose, and when so
complicated an organ was made to receive the light, there must have been
light to enter it. The immense vegetable deposits in the Carboniferous
period announce the introduction of an extensive terrestrial vegetation;
and the impressions left by the wood and leaves of the trees show
that these first forests must have grown in a damp soil and a moist
atmosphere. In short, all the remains of animals and plants hidden in
the rocks have something to tell of the climatic conditions and the
general circumstances under which they lived, and the study of fossils
is to the naturalist a thermometer by which he reads the variations of
temperature in past times, a plummet by which he sounds the depths of
the ancient oceans,--a register, in fact, of all the important physical
changes the earth has undergone.

But although the animals of the early geological deposits indicate
shallow seas by their similarity to our shoal-water animals, it must not
be supposed that they are by any means the same. On the contrary, the
old shells, crustacea, corals, etc., represent types which have existed
in all times with the same essential structural elements, but under
different specific forms in the several geological periods. And here
it may not be amiss to say something of what are called by naturalists
_representative types_.

The statement that different sets of animals and plants have
characterized the successive epochs is often understood as indicating
a difference of another kind than that which distinguishes animals now
living in different parts of the world. This is a mistake. There are
so-called representative types all over the globe, united to each other
by structural relations and separated by specific differences of
the same kind as those that unite and separate animals of different
geological periods. Take, for instance, mud-flats or sandy shores in the
same latitudes of Europe and America; we find living on each animals of
the same structural character and of the same general appearance,
but with certain specific differences, as of color, size, external
appendages, etc. They represent each other on the two continents.
The American wolves, foxes, bears, rabbits, are not the same as the
European, but those of one continent are as true to their respective
types as those of the other; under a somewhat different aspect they
represent the same groups of animals. In certain latitudes, or under
conditions of nearer proximity, these differences may be less marked.
It is well known that there is a great monotony of type, not only among
animals and plants, but in the human races also, throughout the Arctic
regions; and the animals characteristic of the high North reappear under
such identical forms in the neighborhood of the snow-fields in lofty
mountains, that to trace the difference between the ptarmigans, rabbits,
and other gnawing animals of the Alps, for instance, and those of the
Arctics, is among the most difficult problems of modern science.

And so is it also with the animated world of past ages; in similar
deposits of sand, mud, or lime, in adjoining regions of the same
geological age, identical remains of animals and plants may be
found, while at greater distances, but under similar circumstances,
representative species may occur. In very remote regions, however,
whether the circumstances be similar or dissimilar, the general aspect
of the organic world differs greatly, remoteness in space being thus in
some measure an indication of the degree of affinity between different
faunae. In deposits of different geological periods immediately
following each other we sometimes find remains of animals and plants so
closely allied to those of earlier or later periods that at first sight
the specific differences are hardly discernible. The difficulty of
solving these questions, and of appreciating correctly the differences
and similarities between such closely allied organisms, explains the
antagonistic views of many naturalists respecting the range of existence
of animals, during longer or shorter geological periods; and the
superficial way in which discussions concerning the transition of
species are carried on is mainly owing to an ignorance of the conditions
above alluded to. My own personal observation and experience in these
matters have led me to the conviction that every geological period
has had its own representatives, and that no single species has been
repeated in successive ages.

The laws regulating the geographical distribution of animals and their
combination into distinct or zoological provinces called faunae with
definite limits are very imperfectly understood as yet; but so closely
are all things linked together from the beginning till to-day that I am
convinced we shall never find the clue to their meaning till we carry on
our investigations in the past and the present simultaneously. The same
principle according to which animal and vegetable life is distributed
over the surface of the earth now prevailed in the earliest geological
periods. The geological deposits of all times have had their
characteristic faunae under various zones, their zoological provinces
presenting special combinations of animal and vegetable life over
certain regions, and their representative types reproducing in different
countries, but under similar latitudes, the same groups with specific
differences.

Of course, the nearer we approach the beginning of organic life, the
less marked do we find the differences to be, and for a very obvious
reason. The inequalities of the earth's surface, her mountain-barriers
protecting whole continents from the Arctic winds, her open plains
exposing others to the full force of the polar blasts, her snug valleys
and her lofty heights, her table-lands and rolling prairies, her
river-systems and her dry deserts, her cold ocean-currents pouring down
from the high North on some of her shores, while warm ones from tropical
seas carry their softer influence to others,--in short, all the
contrasts in the external configuration of the globe, with the physical
conditions attendant upon them, are naturally accompanied by a
corresponding variety in animal and vegetable life.

But in the Silurian age, when there were no elevations higher than
the Canadian hills, when water covered the face of the earth with the
exception of a few isolated portions lifted above the almost universal
ocean, how monotonous must have been the conditions of life! And what
should we expect to find on those first shores? If we are walking on a
sea-beach to-day, we do not look for animals that haunt the forests or
roam over the open plains, or for those that live in sheltered valleys
or in inland regions or on mountain-heights. We look for Shells, for
Mussels and Barnacles, for Crabs, for Shrimps, for Marine Worms, for
Star-Fishes and Sea-Urchins, and we may find here and there a fish
stranded on the sand or tangled in the sea-weed. Let us remember, then,
that, in the Silurian period, the world, so far as it was raised above
the ocean, was a beach, and let us seek there for such creatures as God
has made to live on sea-shores, and not belittle the Creative work,
or say that He first scattered the seeds of life in meagre or stinted
measure, because we do not find air-breathing animals when there was
no fitting atmosphere to feed their lungs, insects with no terrestrial
plants to live upon, reptiles without marshes, birds without trees,
cattle without grass, all things, in short, without the essential
conditions for their existence.

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