University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.
A COUNTRY GENTLEMAN.

Frank Meriwether is now in the meridian of
life;—somewhere close upon forty-five. Good cheer
and a good temper both tell well upon him. The
first has given him a comfortable full figure, and the
latter certain easy, contemplative habits, that incline
him to be lazy and philosophical. He has the substantial
planter look that belongs to a gentleman who
lives on his estate, and is not much vexed with the
crosses of life.

I think he prides himself on his personal appearance,
for he has a handsome face, with a dark blue
eye, and a high forehead that is scantily embellished
with some silver-tipped locks, that, I observe, he
cherishes for their rarity: besides, he is growing
manifestly attentive to his dress, and carries himself
erect, with some secret consciousness that his person
is not bad. It is pleasant to see him when he has
ordered his horse for a ride into the neighbourhood,
or across to the Court House. On such occasions,
he is apt to make his appearance in a coat of blue
broadcloth, astonishingly new and glossy, and with a
redundant supply of plaited ruffle strutting through
the folds of a Marseilles waistcoat: a worshipful

finish is given to this costume by a large straw hat,
lined with green silk. There is a magisterial fulness
in his garments that betokens condition in the world,
and a heavy bunch of seals, suspended by a chain of
gold, jingles as he moves, pronouncing him a man of
superfluities.

It is considered rather extraordinary that he has
never set up for Congress: but the truth is, he is an
unambitious man, and has a great dislike to currying
favour—as he calls it. And, besides, he is thoroughly
convinced that there will always be men enough in
Virginia willing to serve the people, and therefore
does not see why he should trouble his head about
it. Some years ago, however, there was really an
impression that he meant to come out. By some
sudden whim, he took it into his head to visit Washington
during the session of Congress, and returned,
after a fortnight, very seriously distempered with politics.
He told curious anecdotes of certain secret
intrigues which had been discovered in the affairs of
the capital, gave a pretty clear insight into the views
of some deep laid combinations, and became, all at
once, painfully florid in his discourse, and dogmatical
to a degree that made his wife stare. Fortunately,
this orgasm soon subsided, and Frank relapsed into
an indolent gentleman of the opposition; but it had
the effect to give a much more decided cast to his
studies, for he forthwith discarded the Whig, and
took to the Enquirer, like a man who was not to be
disturbed by doubts; and as it was morally impossible
to believe what was written on both sides, to

prevent his mind from being abused, he, from this
time forward, gave an implicit assent to all the facts
that set against Mr. Adams. The consequence of
this straight forward and confiding deportment was
an unsolicited and complimentary notice of him by
the executive of the state. He was put into the commission
of the peace, and having thus become a public
man against his will, his opinions were observed
to undergo some essential changes. He now thinks
that a good citizen ought neither to solicit nor decline
office; that the magistracy of Virginia is the sturdiest
pillar that supports the fabric of the constitution;
and that the people, “though in their opinions
they may be mistaken, in their sentiments they are
never wrong,”—with some other such dogmas, that, a
few years ago, he did not hold in very good repute.
In this temper, he has of late embarked upon the
mill-pond of county affairs, and, notwithstanding his
amiable and respectful republicanism, I am told he
keeps the peace as if he commanded a garrison,
and administers justice like a cadi.

He has some claim to supremacy in this last department;
for during three years of his life he smoked
segars in a lawyer's office at Richmond; sometimes
looked into Blackstone and the Revised Code; was
a member of a debating society that ate oysters once
a week during the winter; and wore six cravats and
a pair of yellow-topped boots as a blood of the metropolis.
Having in this way qualified himself for
the pursuits of agriculture, he came to his estate a
very model of landed gentlemen. Since that time

his avocations have had a certain literary tincture;
for having settled himself down as a married man,
and got rid of his superfluous foppery, he rambled
with wonderful assiduity through a wilderness of
romances, poems and dissertations, which are now
collected in his library, and, with their battered blue
covers, present a lively type of an army of continentals
at the close of the war, or a hospital of veteran
invalids. These have all, at last, given way to the
newspapers—a miscellaneous study very enticing to
gentlemen in the country—that have rendered Meriwether
a most discomfiting antagonist in the way
of dates and names.

He has great sauvity of manners, and a genuine
benevolence of disposition, that makes him fond of
having his friends about him; and it is particularly
gratifying to him to pick up any genteel stranger
within the purlieus of Swallow Barn, and put him
to the proof of a week's hospitality, if it be only for
the pleasure of exercising his rhetoric upon him.
He is a kind master, and considerate towards his
dependants, for which reason, although he owns
many slaves, they hold him in profound reverence,
and are very happy under his dominion. All these circumstances
make Swallow Barn a very agreeable
place, and it is accordingly frequented by an extensive
range of his acquaintances.

There is one quality in Frank that stands above
the rest. He is a thorough-bred Virginian, and consequently
does not travel much from home, except
to make an excursion to Richmond, which he considers

emphatically as the centre of civilization. Now
and then, he has gone beyond the mountain, but the
upper country is not much to his taste, and in his
estimation only to be resorted to when the fever
makes it imprudent to remain upon the tide. He
thinks lightly of the mercantile interest, and in fact
undervalues the manners of the cities generally;—
he believes that their inhabitants are all hollow hearted
and insincere, and altogether wanting in that substantial
intelligence and honesty that he affirms to be
characteristic of the country. He is a great admirer
of the genius of Virginia, and is frequent in his commendation
of a toast in which the state is compared
to the mother of the Gracchi:—indeed, it is a familiar
thing with him to speak of the aristocracy of talent
as only inferior to that of the landed interest,—the
idea of a freeholder inferring to his mind a certain
constitutional pre-eminence in all the virtues of citizenship,
as a matter of course.

The solitary elevation of a country gentleman,
well to do in the world, begets some magnificent
notions. He becomes as infallible as the Pope;
gradually acquires a habit of making long speeches;
is apt to be impatient of contradiction, and is always
very touchy on the point of honour. There is nothing
more conclusive than a rich man's logic any
where, but in the country, amongst his dependants,
it flows with the smooth and unresisted course of a
gentle stream irrigating a verdant meadow, and depositing
its mud in fertilizing luxuriance. Meriwether's
sayings, about Swallow Barn, import absolute

verity—but I have discovered that they are not so
current out of his jurisdiction. Indeed, every now
and then, we have some obstinate discussions when
any of the neighbouring potentates, who stand in the
same sphere with Frank, come to the house; for
these worthies have opinions of their own, and nothing
can be more dogged than the conflict between
them. They sometimes fire away at each other with
a most amiable and unconvinceable hardihood for a
whole evening, bandying interjections, and making
bows, and saying shrewd things with all the courtesy
imaginable: but for unextinguishable pertinacity in
argument, and utter impregnability of belief, there is
no disputant like your country gentleman who reads
the newspapers. When one of these discussions fairly
gets under weigh, it never comes to an anchor again
of its own accord—it is either blown out so far to sea
as to be given up for lost, or puts into port in distress
for want of documents,—or is upset by a call for
the boot-jack and slippers—which is something like
the previous question in Congress.

If my worthy cousin be somewhat over-argumentative
as a politician, he restores the equilibrium of
his character by a considerate coolness in religious
matters. He piques himself upon being a high-churchman,
but he is only a rare frequenter of places of
worship, and very seldom permits himself to get into
a dispute upon points of faith. If Mr. Chub, the
Presbyterian tutor in the family, ever succeeds in
drawing him into this field, as he occasionally has
the address to do, Meriwether is sure to fly the

course:—he gets puzzled with scripture names, and
makes some odd mistakes between Peter and Paul,
and then generally turns the parson over to his wife,
who, he says, has an astonishing memory.

Meriwether is a great breeder of blooded horses;
and, ever since the celebrated race between Eclipse
and Henry, he has taken to this occupation with a
renewed zeal, as a matter affecting the reputation of
the state. It is delightful to hear him expatiate
upon the value, importance, and patriotic bearing of
this employment, and to listen to all his technical lore
touching the mystery of horse-craft. He has some
fine colts in training, that are committed to the care
of a pragmatical old negro, named Carey, who, in his
reverence for the occupation, is the perfect shadow
of his master. He and Frank hold grave and momentous
consultations upon the affairs of the stable,
in such a sagacious strain of equal debate, that it
would puzzle a spectator to tell which was the leading
member in the council. Carey thinks he knows
a great deal more upon the subject than his master,
and their frequent intercourse has begot a familiarity
in the old negro that is almost fatal to Meriwether's
supremacy. The old man feels himself authorized
to maintain his positions according to the freest parliamentary
form, and sometimes with a violence of
asseveration that compels his master to abandon his
ground, purely out of faint-heartedness. Meriwether
gets a little nettled by Carey's doggedness, but
generally turns it off in a laugh. I was in the stable
with him, a few mornings after my arrival, when he

ventured to expostulate with the venerable groom
upon a professional point, but the controversy terminated
in its customary way. “Who sot you up,
Master Frank, to tell me how to fodder that 'ere
cretur, when I as good as nursed you on my knee?”
“Well, tie up your tongue, you old mastiff,” replied
Frank, as he walked out of the stable, “and
cease growling, since you will have it your own
way;”—and then, as we left the old man's presence,
he added, with an affectionate chuckle—“a faithful
old cur, too, that licks my hand out of pure honesty;
he has not many years left, and it does no harm to
humour him!”