X.—THE GRAVEYARD OF GERMANTOWN.
In Germantown there is an old-time graveyard. No gravelled walks,
no delicate sculpturings of marble, no hot-beds planted over corruption are
there. It is an old-time graveyard, defended from the highway and encircling
fields by a thick stone wall. On the north and west it is shadowed by
a range of trees, the sombre verdure of the pine, the leafy magnificence of
the maple and horse-chesnut, mingling in one rich mass of foliage. Wild
flowers are in that graveyard, and tangled vines. It is white with tomb-stones.
They spring up, like a host of spirits from the green graves; they
seem to struggle with each other for space, for room. The lettering on these
tombstones, is in itself, a rude history. Some are marked with rude words
in Dutch, some in German, one or more in Latin, one in Indian; others in
English. Some bend down, as if hiding their rugged faces from the light,
some start to one side; here and there, rank grass chokes them from the
light and air.
You may talk to me of your fashionable graveyards, where Death is
made to look pretty and silly and fanciful, but for me, this one old graveyard,
with its rank grass and crowded tombstones, has more of God and
Immortality in it, than all your elegant cemetries together. I love its soil:
its stray wild flowers are omens to me, of a pleasant sleep, taken by weary
ones, who were faint with living too long.
It is to me, a holy thought, that here my bones will one day repose. For
here, in a lengthening line, extend the tombstones, sacred to the memory of
my fathers, far back in to time. They sleep here. The summer day may
dawn, the winter storm may howl, and still they sleep on. No careless
eye looks over these walls. There is no gaudiness of sculpture to invite
the lounger. As for a pic nic party, in an old graveyard like this, it would
be blasphemy. None come save those who have friends here. Sisters
come to talk quietly with the ghost of sisters; children to invoke the spirit
of that Mother gone home; I, too sometimes, panting to get free from the
city, come here to talk with my sisters—for two of mine are here—with my
father—for that clover blooms above his grave.
It seems to me, too, when bending over that grave, that the Mother's
form, awakened from her distant grave, beneath the sod of Delaware, is also
here!—Here, to commune with the dead, whom she loved while living;
here, with the spirits of my fathers!
I cannot get rid of the thought that good spirits love that graveyard. For
all at once, when you enter its walls, you feel sadder, better; more satisfied
with life, yet less reluctant to die. It is such a pleasant spot, to take a long
repose. I have seen it in winter, when there was snow upon the graves,
and the sleigh-bells tinkled in the street. Then calmly and tenderly upon
the white tombstones, played and lingered the cold moon.
In summer, too, when the leaves were on the trees, and the grass upon
the sod, when the chirp of the cricket and katy-did broke shrilly over the
graves through the silence of night. In early spring, when there was scarce
a blade of grass to struggle against the north wind, and late in fall when
November baptizes you with her cloud of gloom, I have been there.
And in winter and summer, in fall and spring, in calm or storm, in sickness
or health, in every change of this great play, called life, does my heart
go out to that graveyard, as though part of it was already there.
Nor do I love it the less, because on every blade of grass, in every flower,
that wildly blooms there, you find written:—“This soil is sacred from
creeds. Here rests the Indian and the white man; here sleep in one sod,
the Catholic, Presbyterian, Quaker, Methodist, Lutheran, Mennonist, Diest,
Infidel. Here, creeds forgotten, all are men and women again, and not one
but is a simple child of God.”
This graveyard was established by men of all creeds, more than a century
ago. May that day be darkness, when creeds shall enter this rude gate.
Better had that man never been born, who shall dare pollute this soil with
the earthly clamor of sect. But on the man, who shall repair this wall, or
keep this graveyard sacred from the hoofs of improvement, who shall do his
best to keep our old graveyard what it is, on that man, be the blessings of
God; may his daughters be virtuous and beautiful, his sons gifted and brave.
In his last hour, may the voices of angels sing hymns to his passing soul.
If there was but one flower in the world, I would plant it on that man's
grave.
It was in November, not in chill, gloomy November, but in golden November,
when Paradise opens her windows to us, and wafts the Indian
Summer over the land, that I came to the graveyard.
There was a mellow softness in the air, a golden glow upon the sky,
glossy, gorgeous richness of foliage on the trees, when I went in. It was
in the afternoon. The sun was half-way down the sky. Everything was
still. A religious silence dwelt all about the graveyard.
An aged man, with a rosy countenance, and snow-white hair, sat on a
grave. His coat was strait and collarless, his hat broad in the rim. At
once I knew him for a Disciple of Saint William, the Patron Saint of Pennsylvania.
His eyes were fixed upon something at his feet. I drew nigh,
and beheld two skeletons resting on the grass near a new-made grave.
The old Quaker greeted me kindly, and I sat down opposite on a grassy
mound. The skeletons presented a strange, a meaning sight. Around
their crumbling bones were fluttering the remnants of soldiers' uniform.
Buttons, stamped with an eagle, pieces of the breast-belt, fragments of military
boots—ah, sad relics of the fight of Germantown! The sunlight
streamed slowly over their skulls, lighting up the hollow orbits, where once
shone the eyes; and over the bones of the hand, protruding from the crumbling
uniform.
We sat for a long while in silence.
At last the Quaker spoke.
“I am trying to remember which is John and which is Jacob?” said he.
“John?—Jacob?”
“Truly so. For I knew them well. I was but a youth then—on the
day of the battle, thee minds? The fourth of the tenth month, 1777!
Jacob was a fine young man, with light curly hair; he was married. John
was dark-haired, something younger than Jacob, but quite as good looking.
They were both with Washington at Skippack; with him they came to the
battle—”
“Ah, you remember the battle?”
“As well as if it happened last week. Did thee ever see a small, one
story house, about half-way down Germantown, with 1713 on its gable?
Jacob's wife lived there. On the morning of the battle, about ten o'clock,
she was standing in the door, her babe resting on her bosom. There was
a thick fog in the air. She was listening to the firing. I stood on the
opposite side, thinking what a fine-looking wife she was, for does thee mind,
she was comely. Her hair was glossy and brown; her eyes dark. She
was not very tall, but a wondrous pleasant woman to look upon. As I
stood looking at her, who should come running down the road, but Jacob
there, with this same uniform on, and a gun in his hand. I can see him
yet; and hear his voice, as plain as I now hear my own.
“ `Hannah! Hannah!' he cried, `we've beat 'em!' And he ran towards
her, and she held the babe out to him, but just at that moment, he fell in the
middle of the road, torn almost in two by a cannon ball, or some devil'swork
of that kind. Young man, it was a very sad sight! To see that
poor Jacob, running to kiss his wife and child, and just as the wife calls and
the babe holds out its little hands—ah!”
The Quaker rubbed his eye, blaming the road side dust for the tear that
glimmered there.
“And John?”
“Poor John! We found him after the battle in Chew's field. He was
quite dead—look! Thee can see the bnllet hole in his brain.”
And with his cane, he pointed to the scull of the soldier.
“We buried them together. They were fine-looking young men, and
many of us shed tears, when we put the sod upon their brows.”
“Sod? Had you no coffins?”
The old man opened his eyes.
“Had thee seen the village people, taking their barn-doors off their hinges,
so that they might carry away the dead bodies by dozens at a time, and
bury them in the fields, whenever a big hole was dug—had thee seen this,
thee would'nt ask such a question!”
“Was there not a great deal of glory on that day?”
“If thee means, that it was like an election parade, or a fourth of July
gathering, I can tell thee, there was not much glory of that kind. If thee
means that it made my blood boil to see the bodies of my neighbors carried
by, some dead, some groaning yet, some howling mad with pain; others
with legs torn off, others with arms rent at the very shoulder, here one with
his jaw broken, there another with his eyes put out;—if thee means that
boiling of the blood, caused by sights like these, then I can tell thee, there
was plenty of
glory!”
“The battle was bloody then?”
“Did thee ever see how rich the grass grows on Chew's lawn? How
many hearts spent their last blood to fatten that soil?”
“You helped to bury the dead?”
“I remember well, that thy grandfather—he is buried yonder—took hold
of one corner of a barn-door, while I and two friends took the others. There
were some six or seven bodies piled crosswise, and huddled together on that
barn-door. We took them to the fields and buried them in a big pit. I
remember one fair-faced British officer; his ruffled shirt was red with blood.
He was a fine-looking young man, and doubtless had a wife or sister in England.
I pitied him very much.”
“Were you near the scene of conflict? I do not wish to imply that you
bore arms, for your principles forbid the thought.”
“I can remember standing in my father's door, when a wounded soldier
pursued by another, fell at my feet crying `quarter!' I remember that I
seized the pursuer's musket, and rapped him over the head, after which he
let the wounded soldier be.”
“Did you hurt him much?”
“He did'nt move afterward. Some evil people wished to make it appear,
that I killed him. But thee sees that was false, for he may have been
very tired running and died from the heat. However, I hit him with all
my strength.”
The Quaker held out his right arm, which was an arm of iron, even in
its withered old age.
“What was he? British or American?”
“He was dressed in red,” meekly responded the Quaker.
“Did you see General Washington during the fight?”
“I saw a tall man of majestic presence riding a grey horse. I saw him
now go in the mist; now come out again; now here, now there. One
time I saw him, when he reigned his horse in front of Chew's wall—he
looked terrible, for his eyes seemed to frown, his lips were clenched; his
forehead was disfigured by a big vein that seemed bursting from the skin.
He was covered with dust and blood—his saddle-cloth was torn by bullets.
I never forgot the look of that man, nor shall I, to the hour of my death.
That man they told me was George Washington.”
“Why was he thus moved?”
“An aid-de.camp had just told him that one of his Generals was drunk
under a hedge.”
“Did you see Cornwallis?”
“That I did. He was riding up the street, as fast as his horse could go
—a handsome man, but when I saw him, his face was white as a meal-bag.
Thee sees he was a brave man, but friend Washington came on him before
day, without timely notice.”
There was a curious twitch about the Quaker's mouth. He did not smile,
but still it was a suspicious shape for a Quaker's mouth.
