University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.

Hamlet.

We must, now, carry the reader back a century,
in order to clear our tale of every appearance
of ambiguity. Reginald Lincoln was a cadet of
an extremely ancient and wealthy family, whose
possessions were suffered to continue as appendages
to a baronetcy, throughout all the changes
which marked the eventful periods of the commonwealth,
and the usurpation of Cromwell. He
had himself, however, inherited little more than
a morbid sensibility, which, even in that age, appeared
to be a sort of heir-loom to his family.
While still a young man he had married a woman
to whom he was much attached, who died in giving
birth to her first child. The grief of the husband
took a direction towards religion; but unhappily,
instead of deriving from his researches
that healing consolation, with which our faith
abounds, his mind became soured by the prevalent
but discordant views of the attributes of the
Deity; and the result of his conversion was to
leave him an ascetick puritan, and an obstinate
predestinarian. That such a man, finding but litde

to connect him with his native country, should
revolt at the impure practices of the Court of
Charles, is not surprising; and accordingly,
though not at all implicated in the guilt of the
regicides, he departed for the religious province
of Massachusetts-Bay, in the first years of the
reign of that merry prince.

It was not difficult for a man of the rank and
reputed sanctity of Reginald Lincoln, to obtain
both honourable and lucrative employments in
the plantations; and after the first glow of his
awakened ardour in behalf of spiritual matters had
a little abated, he failed not to improve a due portion
of his time by a commendable attention to
temporal things. To the day of his death, however,
he continued a gloomy, austere, and bigoted
religionist, seemingly too regardless of the vanities
of this world to permit his pure imagination to
mingle with its dross, even while he submitted to
discharge its visible duties. Notwithstanding this
elevation of mind, his son, at the decease of his
father, found himself in the possession of many
goodly effects; which were, questionless, the accumulations
of a neglected use, during the days
of his sublimated progenitor.

Young Lionel so far followed in the steps of his
worthy parent, as to continue gathering honours
and riches into his lap; though, owing to an early
disappointment, and the inheritance of the
`heir-loom' already mentioned, it was late in life
before he found a partner to share his happiness.
Contrary to all the usual calculations that are
made on the choice of a man of self-denial, he was
then united to a youthful and gay Episcopalian,
who had little, besides her exquisite beauty and
good blood, to recommend her. By this lady he
had four children, three sons and a daughter,
when he also was laid in the vault, by the side of

his deceased parent. The eldest of these sons
was yet a boy when he was called to the mother-country,
to inherit the estates and honours of his
family. The second, named Reginald, who was
bred to arms, married, had a son, and lost his life
in the wilds where he was required to serve, before
he was five-and-twenty. The third was the
grandfather of Agnes Danforth; and the daughter
was Mrs. Lechmere.

The family of Lincoln, considering the shortness
of their marriages, had been extremely prolific,
while in the colonies, according to that wise allotment
of providence, which ever seems to regulate
the functions of our nature by our wants; but the
instant it was reconveyed to the populous island of
Britain, it entirely lost its reputation for fruitfulness.
Sir Lionel lived to a good age, married, but
died childless, notwithstanding when his body lay in
state, it was under a splendid roof, and in halls so
capacious that they would have afforded comfortable
shelter to the whole family of Priam.

By this fatality it became necessary to cross the
Atlantic once more, to find an heir to the wide domains
of Ravenscliffe, and to one of the oldest
baronetcies in the kingdom.

We have planted and reared this genealogical
tree, to but little purpose, if it be necessary to tell
the reader, that the individual who had now become
the head of his race, was the orphan son of
the deceased officer. He was married, and the
father of one blooming boy, when this elevation,
which was not unlooked for, occurred. Leaving
his wife and child behind him, Sir Lionel immediately
proceeded to England, to assert his rights
and secure his possessions. As he was the nephew,
and acknowledged heir of the late incumbent, he
met with no opposition to the more important parts
of his claims. Across the character and fortunes of

this gentleman, however, a dark cloud had early
passed, which prevented the common eye from
reading the events of his life, like those of other
men, in its open and intelligible movements. After
his accession to fortune and rank, but little was
known of him, even by his earliest and most intimate
associates. It was rumoured, it is true, that
he had been detained in England, for two years,
by a vexatious contention for a petty appendage
to his large estates, a controversy which was, however,
known to have been decided in his favour,
before he was recalled to Boston by the sudden
death of his wife. This calamity befell him during
the period when the war of '56 was raging in its
greatest violence: a time when the energies of the
colonies were directed to the assistance of the mother-country,
who, according to the language of
the day, was zealously endeavouring to defeat the
ambitious views of the French, in this hemisphere;
or, what amounted to the same thing in effect, in
struggling to advance her own.

It was an interesting period; when the mild and
peaceful colonists were seen to shake off their
habits of forbearance, and to enter into the
strife with an alacrity and spirit that soon emulated
the utmost daring of their more practised
confederates. To the amazement of all who
knew his fortunes, Sir Lionel Lincoln was seen to
embark in many of the most desperate adventures
that distinguished the war, with a hardihood
that rather sought death than courted honour.
He had been, like his father, trained to arms, but
the regiment in which he held the commission of
Lieutenant Colonel, was serving his master in the
most eastern of his dominions, while the uneasy
soldier was thus rushing from point to point, hazarding
his life, and more than once shedding
his blood, in the enterprises that signalized the
war in his most western.

This dangerous career, however, was at length
suddenly and mysteriously checked. By the influence
of some powerful agency, that was never
explained, the Baronet was induced to take his
son, and embark once more for the land of their
fathers, from which the former had never been
known to return. For many years, all those inquiries
which the laudable curiosity of the towns-men
and towns-women of Mrs. Lechmere, prompted
them to make, concerning the fate of her nephew,
(and we leave each of our readers to determine
their numbers,) were answered by that lady
with the most courteous reserve; and sometimes
with such exhibitions of emotion, as we have already
attempted to describe in her first interview
with his son. But constand dropping will wear
away a stone. At first there were rumours that
the Baronet had committed treason, and had been
compelled to exchange Ravenscliffe for a less
comfortable dwelling in the Tower of London.
This report was succeeded by that of an unfortunate
private marriage with one of the Princesses
of the House of Brunswick; but a reference
to the calendars of the day, showed that
there was no lady of a suitable age disengaged,
and this amour, so creditable to the provinces,
was necessarily abandoned. Finally, the assertion
was made with much more of the confidence
of truth, that the unhappy Sir Lionel was the tenant
of a private mad-house.

The instant this rumour was circulated, a film
fell from every eye, and none were so blind as not
to have seen indications of insanity in the Baronet
long before; and not a few were enabled to
trace his legitimate right to lunacy through the
hereditary bias of his race. To account for its
sudden exhibition, was a more difficult task, and
exercised the ingenuity of an exceedingly ingenious
people, for a long period.

The more sentimental part of the community,
such as the maidens and bachelors, and those
votaries of Hymen who had twice and thrice
proved the solacing power of the god, did not
fail to ascribe the misfortune of the Baronet to
the unhappy loss of his wife; a lady to whom he
was known to be most passionately attached. A
few, the relicts of the good old school, under
whose intellectual sway the incarnate persons of
so many godless dealers in necromancy had been
made to expiate for their abominations, pointed
to the calamity as a merited punishment on the
backslidings of a family that had once known the
true faith; while a third, and by no means a small
class, composed of those worthies who braved the
elements in King-street, in quest of filthy lucre,
did not hesitate to say, that the sudden acquisition
of vast wealth had driven many a better man
mad. But the time was approaching, when the
apparently irresistible propensity to speculate on
the fortunes of a fellow-creature was made to yield
to more important considerations. The hour soon
arrived when the merchant forgot his momentary
interests to look keenly into the distant effects
that were to succeed the movements of the day;
which taught the fanatic the wholesome lesson,
that providence smiled most beneficently on those
who most merited, by their own efforts, its favours;
and which even purged the breast of the sentimentalist
of its sickly tenant, to be succeeded by
the healthy and ennobling passion of love of
country.

It was about this period that the contest for
principle between the parliament of Great Britain,
and the colonies of North America, commenced,
that in time led to those important results
which have established a new era in political
liberty, as well as a mighty empire. A brief glance
at the nature of this controversy may assist in rendering

many of the allusions in this legend more
intelligible to some of its readers.

The increasing wealth of the provinces had attracted
the notice of the English ministry so early
as the year 1763. In that year the first effort
to raise a revenue which was to meet the exigencies
of the empire, was attempted by the passage
of a law to impose a duty on certain stamped paper,
which was made necessary to give validity to
contracts. This method of raising a revenue was
not new in itself, nor was the imposition heavy in
amount. But the Americans, not less sagacious
than wary, perceived at a glance the importance
of the principles involved in the admission of a
right as belonging to any body to lay taxes, in
which they were not represented. The question
was not without its difficulties, but the direct
and plain argument was clearly on the side of the
colonists. Aware of the force of their reasons,
and perhaps a little conscious of the strength of
their numbers, they approached the subject with
a spirit which betokened this consciousness, but
with a coolness that denoted the firmness of their
purpose. After a struggle of nearly two years,
during which the law was rendered completely
profitless by the unanimity among the people, as
well as by a species of good-humoured violence
that rendered it exceedingly inconvenient, and
perhaps a little dangerous, to the servants of the
crown to exercise their obnoxious functions, the
ministry abandoned the measure. But, at the
same time that the law was repealed, the parliament
maintained its right to bind the colonies
in all cases whatsoever, by recording a resolution
to that effect in its journals.

That an empire, whose several parts were separated
by oceans, and whose interests were so often
conflicting, should become unwieldy, and fall, in

time, by its own weight, was an event that all wise
men must have expected to arrive. But, that the
Americans did not contemplate such a division at
that early day, may be fairly inferred, if there were
no other testimony in the matter, by the quiet and
submission that pervaded the colonies the instant
that the repeal of the stamp act was known. Had
any desire for premature independence existed,
the parliament had unwisely furnished abundant
fuel to feed the flame, in the very resolution
already mentioned. But, satisfied with the solid
advantages they had secured, peaceful in their
habits, and loyal in their feelings, the colonists
laughed at the empty dignity of their self-constituted
rulers, while they congratulated each other
on their own more substantial success. If the
besotted servants of the king had learned wisdom
by the past, the storm would have blown
over, and another age would have witnessed the
events which we are about to relate. Things
were hardly suffered, however, to return to their
old channels again, before the ministry attempted
to revive their claims by new impositions. The
design to raise a revenue had been defeated in the
case of the stamp act, by the refusal of the colonists
to use the paper; but in the present instance,
expedients were adopted, which, it was thought,
would be more effective—as in the case of tea,
where the duty was paid by the East-India Company
in the first instance, and the exaction was to be
made on the Americans, through their appetites.
These new innovations on their rights, were met by
the colonists with the same promptitude, but with
much more of seriousness than in the former instances.
All the provinces south of the Great Lakes,
acted in concert on this occasion; and preparations
were made to render not only their remonstrances
and petitions more impressive by a unity of action,
but their more serious struggles also, should an
appeal to force become necessary. The tea was
stored or sent back to England, in most cases,
though in the town of Boston, a concurrence of
circumstances led to the violent measure, on the
part of the people, of throwing a large quantity of
the offensive article into the sea. To punish this
act, which took place in the early part of 1774, the
port of Boston was closed, and different laws were
enacted in parliament, which were intended to
bring the people back to a sense of their dependence
on the British power.

Although the complaints of the colonists were
hushed during the short interval that had succeeded
the suspension of the efforts of the ministry to
tax them, the feelings of alienation which were engendered
by the attempt, had not time to be lost
before the obnoxious subject was revived in its
new shape. From 1763, to the period of our
tale, all the younger part of the population of the
provinces had grown into manhood, but they were
no longer imbued with that profound respect for
the mother country which had been transmitted
from their ancestors, or with that deep loyalty to
the crown that usually characterizes a people who
view the pageant of royalty through the medium
of distance. Still, those who guided the feelings,
and controlled the judgments of the Americans,
were averse to a dismemberment of the empire, a
measure which they continued to believe both impolitic
and unnatural.

In the mean time, though equally reluctant to
shed blood, the adverse parties prepared for that
final struggle which seemed to be unavoidably approaching.
The situation of the colonies was now
so peculiar, that it may be doubted whether history
furnishes a precise parallel. Their fealty to
the prince was everywhere acknowledged, while

the laws which emanated from his counsellors
were sullenly disregarded and set at naught.
Each province possessed its distinct government,
and in most of them the political influence of the
crown was direct and great; but the time had
arrived when it was superseded by a moral feeling
that defied the machinations and intrigues of
the ministry. Such of the provincial legislatures
as possessed a majority of the “Sons of Liberty,”
as they who resisted the unconstitutional attempts
of the ministry were termed, elected delegates to
meet in a general congress to consult on the ways
and means of effecting the common objects. In one
or two provinces where the inequality of representation
afforded a different result, the people supplied
the deficiencies by acting in their original capacity.
This body, meeting, unlike conspirators, with
the fearless confidence of integrity, and acting under
the excitement of a revolution in sentiment, possessed
an influence, which, at a later day, has been
denied to their more legally constituted successors.
Their recommendations possessed all the validity
of laws, without incurring their odium. While, as
the organ of their fellow-subjects, they still continued
to petition and remonstrate, they did not
forget to oppose, by such means as were then
thought expedient, the oppressive measures of the
ministry.

An association was recommended to the people,
for those purposes that are amply expressed
in the three divisions which were significantly
given to the subjects, in calling them by the
several names of `non-importation,' `non-exportation,'
and `non-consumption resolutions.' These
negative expedients were all that was constitutionally
in their power, and throughout the whole
controversy, there had been a guarded care
not to exceed the limits which the laws had affixed

to the rights of the subject. Though no overt
act of resistance was committed, they did not,
however, neglect such means as were attainable,
to be prepared for the last evil, whenever
it should arrive. In this manner a feeling of resentment
and disaffection was daily increasing
throughout the provinces, while in Massachusetts
Bay, the more immediate scene of our story, the
disorder in the body politic seemed to be inevitably
gathering to its head.

The great principles of the controversy had
been blended, in different places, with various
causes of local complaint, and in none more than
in the town of Boston. The inhabitants of this
place had been distinguished for an early, open,
and fearless resistance to the ministry. An armed
force had long been thought necessary to intimidate
this spirit, to effect which the troops were
drawn from different parts of the provinces, and
concentrated in this devoted town. Early in 1774,
a military man was placed in the executive chair of
the province, and an attitude of more determination
was assumed by the government. One of the
first acts of this gentleman, who held the high
station of Lieutenant-General, and who commanded
all the forces of the king in America,
was to dissolve the colonial assembly. About the
same time a new charter was sent from England,
and a material change was contemplated in the
polity of the colonial government. From this
moment the power of the king, though it was not
denied, became suspended in the province. A provincial
congress was elected, and assembled within
seven leagues of the capital, where they continued,
from time to time, to adopt such measures
as the exigencies of the times were thought to
render necessary. Men were enrolled, disciplined,
and armed, as well as the imperfect means of
the colony would allow. These troops, who

were no more than the élite of the inhabitants,
had little else to recommend them besides their
spirit, and their manual dexterity with fire-arms.
From the expected nature of their service, they
were not unaptly termed “minute-men.” The
munitions of war were seized, and hoarded with a
care and diligence that showed the character of
the impending conflict.

On the other hand, General Gage adopted a
similar course of preparation and prevention, by
fortifying himself in the strong hold which he
possessed, and by anticipating the intentions of
the colonists, in their attempts to form magazines,
whenever it was in his power. He had an easy
task in the former, both from the natural situation
of the place he occupied, and the species of force
he commanded.

Surrounded by broad and chiefly by deep
waters, except at one extremely narrow point,
and possessing its triple hills, which are not
commanded by any adjacent eminences, the
peninsula of Boston could, with a competent
garrison, easily be made impregnable, especially
when aided by a superior fleet. The works
erected by the English General were, however,
by no means of magnitude, for it was well known
that the whole park of the colonists could not exceed
some half dozen pieces of field artillery,
with a small battering train that must be entirely
composed of old and cumbrous ship guns. Consequently,
when Lionel arrived in Boston, he found a
few batteries thrown up on the eminences, some of
which were intended as much to control the town,
as to repel an enemy from without, while lines
were drawn across the neck which communicated
with the main. The garrison consisted of something
less than five thousand men, besides which,
there was a fluctuating force of seamen and marines,
as the vessels of war arrived and departed.

All this time, there was no other interruption to
the intercourse between the town and the country,
than such as unavoidably succeeded the stagnation
of trade, and the distrust engendered by the aspect
of affairs. Though numberless families had deserted
their homes, many known whigs continued
to dwell in their habitations, where their ears were
deafened by the sounds of the British drums, and
where their spirits were but too often galled by
the sneers of the officers, on the uncouth military
preparations of their countrymen. Indeed an impression
had spread further than among the idle
and thoughtless youths of the army, that the colonists
were but little gifted with martial qualities;
and many of their best friends in Europe were in
dread lest an appeal to force should put the contested
points forever at rest, by proving the incompetency
of the Americans to maintain them
to the last extremity.

In this manner both parties stood at bay; the
people living in perfect order and quiet, without
the administration of law, sullen, vigilant, and,
through their leaders, secretly alert; and the army,
gay, haughty, and careless of the consequences,
though far from being oppressive or insolent,
until after the defeat of one or two abortive
excursions into the country in quest of arms.
Each hour, however, was rapidly adding to the
disaffection on one side, and to the contempt and
resentment on the other, through numberless public
and private causes, that belong rather to history
than to a legend like this. All extraordinary
occupations were suspended, and men awaited
the course of things in anxious expectation. It was
known that the parliament, instead of retracing
their political errors, had imposed new restraints,
and, as has been mentioned, it was also rumoured

that regiments and fleets were on their way to enforce
them.

How long a country could exist in such a primeval
condition, remained to be seen, though it
was difficult to say when or how it was to terminate.
The people of the land appeared to slumber,
but, like vigilant and wary soldiers, they might
be said to sleep on their arms; while the troops
assumed each day, more of that fearful preparation,
which gives, even to the trained warrior, a
more martial aspect—though both parties still
continued to manifest a becoming reluctance to
shed blood.