 | Saratoga in 1901 |  |
THE PERKINS' FAMILY.
Congress Hall, Aug. 26th.
The ladies came to me this morning, and wished me to
entertain them with some reminiscences of the Perkins' family,
their religious and political belief, and their philosophica,
traits. I divided my sermon into four heads:
1. Biographical.
2. Theological.
3. Political.
4. Advisatory (philosophical).
1st. Biographical.—The Perkinses are a great family. Some
of them were in almost every battle of the Revolution—some on
one side and some on the other. Nathaniel Perkins was in the
battle of Saratoga. All day he was in the thickest of the fight
—carrying water to the British.
My father lost his arms at the battle of Saratoga—he threw
them away so he could run faster. He led his men so well that
he was sent for by Wm. Leland to lead the Union Hall Germans.
My uncle, Abraham Perkins, first served with General McClellan,
but getting a chance of promotion, he became a quarter-master
on Beauregard's staff. He was lost at Gettysburg, but afterwards
found hid away behind a barrel eating hard boiled eggs.
I only speak of the Saratoga Perkinses incidentally. Our
pride of blood, and name, and revolutionary aristocracy culminate
in Litchfield County—State of Connecticut.
There I was born.
I had no father or mother. I was born an orphan. It took
place at my aunt's—aunt Sarah Perkins. My father died in
infancy. His name was Cyrus Perkins. I think he had Circassian
blood in his veins. My uncles' names are Nathaniel,
Joseph, Isaac, Jacob, Nehemiah, and Consider. My aunts are
Debora, Ruth and Rebecca. My grandfather never patronized
name the other day at the Grand Union, Wm. Leland asked him
if he kept a clothing store.
“Why?” asked my uncle Jacob indignantly.
“Because there are so many Jacobs on Chatham St.”
My uncle Consider Perkins was named after Captain Consider
Standish, of Plymouth. Plymouth was named after Mr.
Beecher's church.
The Perkinses in Litchfield County are famous agriculturists—
they raise prize cucumbers and large families of healthy children.
I was one of a family of eleven—but not the only one. The children
generally turned out well, and the cucumbers brought a
good price. My uncle Consider has frequently started for New
London with a load of small cucumbers. It was a long distance,
but the cucumbers continued to grow in the wagon. From these
few baskets of small cucumbers my uncle often sold three or four
wagon loads in New London.
New London was then larger than New York, and a good deal
more aristocratic. Peter Minuet bought Manhattan Island for
sixteen pounds sterling. He sold out to one of the Stuyvesants
for £26, and went back to England, built a castle, and revelled
in luxury.
William Tweed and Peter Sweeney have sold out the city a
good many times since, and they, too, alas! revel in luxurious
castles on Fifth Avenue.
In the days of the Colonists, New London and the Perkins
family were great. They distinguished themselves in agriculture
and other scientific branches, and whitened the ocean with the
sails of glorious commerce—they sold mackerel. The Pequot
house was then a lone fisherman's hut. Mr. Pequot married a
Perkins, and my grandfather gave him the house as a wedding
present. Pequot thrived well. He raised a good many Pequots,
who in turn begot other Pequots. They finally got so strong
that they went over to Salem on a crusade against the Puritans.
People talked a good deal about religious liberty in those days,
but alas! it was the same as now. New Yorkers talk a good
deal about liberty, but they have got to go over to New Jersey
for their Sunday lager and Orange parades.
2nd, Theological.—My uncle Consider is a great Baptist.
He said he would kill every darned Presbyterian in the country
if he had his way. He was devoted to religion!
My father was a member of the Episcopal Church. He said
he did not believe much in religion, and that Church came nearest
to his belief. I inherited my father's religious faith. I am happy
in it. Our Church permits swearing in a mild form. Most all of
the Fifth Avenue swell fellows belong to our Church. We never
let our religion interfere with our dancing and euchre playing.
Far different.
I used to believe everything I read in church books, but, alas!
I find they won't do to tie to always. When I visited Parma, I
saw a hand of the Virgin Mary—I saw another in Rome—then
one in Cologne, and lastly one in Tvertza near Moscow. I never
could reconcile all these hands. As the priest showed them to
me, he wept a pious tear, and said, “They are all the true hands
of the Virgin, and here are the books to prove it.” I said, “Alas!
people were handier in those days than they are now.”
In Tartary they talked of sending missionaries to convert the
poor heathen in New York. Then they showed me piles of
burnt bones, where their good heathen had died for their faith,
like our John Huss, Cranmer, and Latimer of Oxford. I said,
“Alas! you are all honest—you are all right. You can all have
Confucius, Mohamed, the Pope, Swedenburgh, and Brigham
Young, but they can't all be right. I don't want to run any
risks.”
3rd. Political.—The Perkinses are staunch Democrats,
though I favor the Present Administration. I had one cousin,
Nicodemus Perkins, who was so Democratic that he enlisted in
the Confederate army, under General Lee. One day the
“Niggerdemus” Perkins for picket duty. My cousin was captured
that night by one Union scout. He now loves the old
flag. He frequently sings:
“Sweet flag, I love thee still,”
search of it, and digs for hours. Many of the Connecticut
Perkinses are still voting the Presidency ticket.
“Why do you do so, Uncle Consider?” I asked.
“Do you want me to marry a nigger?” he exclaimed in pious
indignation.
Alas! it is chronic with him!
Many of my relations are pursuing the evil tenor of their ways
in Saratoga. Some dance, some go to church, and some alas!
like the dissolute Saratogians, spend their time drinking Congress
water.
Yesterday my uncle Jacob had a fight with the spring boy,
because he wanted to waste a glass of water, simply because it
had a small snake in it. After my snake story, he continued to
drink the water with even greater relish. He said the time to
stop drinking the water was when the snakes were in—not after
they had come out. They are great philosophers—the Perkins
are. They all marry the first time young. After that they are
not so particular.
No Perkins ever dyed his hair, colored his mustache, owned a
striped shirt, or wore a paper collar. No Perkins was ever a call-porter,
peddler, photographer, circus man, life insurance agent,
book canvasser, lightning-rod agent, or negro minstrel.
Far different.
4th. Advice (philosophical).—When I first saw the four hands
of the Virgin Mary, and the statue of William Tell, I thought I
had learned some wise things. Then I thought with Mr.
Billings, that you'd better not know so much, than to know so
many things that a'n't so.
This I give to you in good English. I can spell better than
A. Ward or J. Billings.
2nd. In selecting your companions my advice is to associate
with the nicest people. If you know nice people, it is easy
enough to descend in the scale. If you begin with the lowest,
we read in Lacon, it is impossible to ascend. “In the grand
theatre of human life, a box ticket takes us through the house.”
3rd. “If you want enemies excel others; if you want friends
let others excel you.” We hate those only of whom we are
envious and jealous, because they excel us. We desire their
goods or talents. Contempt applies to a person who has done a
mean thing. To be hated by the envious and jealous, is a frank
admission that you are their superior.
4th. Everybody is susceptible of flattery. When they abuse
and ridicule your rivals, they indirectly flatter you, and you are
pleased. Diogenes abused the superiors of himself and the
Athenian mob, and delighted his vulgar auditors. Some one
said to the old blind poet:—
“Mr. Milton, you are the only person we have ever met who is
not susceptible to flattery.”
“I am pleased to hear you say so,” said the old poet.
5th. Conversation generally runs around in a circle. Littleminded
people talk clear round the circle, and repeat every day,
while great minds talk on and on, and it will take a month to
even find which way the race is going to turn, you will hardly
live long enough to hear them repeat. Little minds see one
horse, one book, one house. Large minds take in every racer
on the track, carry “libraries” in their brains, and, in fancy, see
whole villages and cities, as you see men on a checker board.
6th. Dull people are many times improperly called dull, because
they consider you of two little importance to call them out.
Their great minds do not show out everything in a minute.
They have a ground glass shade over their minds, and if they
choose to lift it, they can flood you with intellectual light.
you, and soon talk out, while the dull friend is “like taking
a cat in your cap, after holding a squirrel.” Thunder makes a
big noise, but lightning strikes!
7th. A moneyed aristocracy is not to be sneezed at. Money
buys bath tubs, choice cuts of beef, country places, and well
ventilated houses. A horse fed on oats, will look more beautiful
than a horse fed on hay: so children fed on spring chickens are
better than children fed on dry crusts The beautiful daughters
of the rich are caught up by those who can afford the luxury,
and whole families may acquire, through good food and well
ventilated rooms, an elevated type of features and figure.
Because some of the rich degenerate and grow gouty on champagne
and salads, you must not overlook the many who become
beautiful on roast beef (happy hearts), and the regenerating
bath.
Lastly. My uncle Consider in a late sermon where he was
sworn in to preach the Gospel—as he understood it—promulgated
the following undisputed facts—says Consider:—
First—I see before me ladies drest in rich camel's hair shawls,
and gentlemen in long-tailed Russian overcoats—at grate expense.
You all look nice. Neither of you kan see hiz own close.
So I should think that all this vanity would be a bore, for you
hav to wear nobby close just for poky people to look at—so to
speak.
Second—Billtweed is a grate skoolmaster—he teaches both by
precept and example. He advises virtue and pracktices korruption.
His precept is good, and his awful example is enough to
konvince everybody.
Third—If you want to be wize, let other people do all the
tocking; and soon you will no all tha no, and hav your own
noledge besides. Brown's Boys at a Fifth Heavenue party
korner a bottle of shampane themselves, and then “lay lo” and
drink with everybody else.
Fourth—When a man lies to you he says I'm so “klever”
that you kant see thru me. He kompliments hisself at your
expense.
Fifth—Periclese tho't it was a “big thing” to be pointed out
on the Broadway of Athens, but the same thing happens every
day in New York to Morressy and Heenan, and Kount Jones
the wash-tub inventor. Athens was a one-horse town to New
York, so Periclese must be a one-horse man to Kount Jones.
Sixth—If you hear a society swell mention any young lady's
name lightly, watch him. If he looks noing and boasts of undue
familiarity, he is one of two things—to wit: If what he sez is
true, he is a goose and a lo skoundrel for telling it; and if it is
false—but I've rezolved to keep all profanity out of this sermon!
Seventh—Dr. Johnson sed that the anshunt Romuns, when
poor, robbed others, and when rich themselves. For 200 years
New York has ben engaged in robbing herself. I pitty humanity
if she ever gets redy to turn around and filibuster on the rest of
the world. I dred the universal piracy which will follow the
turning point.
If New York were as smart as Rome she would have plundered
the world first, for now she kan't raise money enuf to start on a
decent krusade!
Eighth—My dear young ladies, I have been a great philosopher
in my time. The Perkinses are all great philosophers.
Once I saw a man pulling his arms off trying to get on a new
pair of boots, I said:
Philosophically they are too small, and you will never be able
to get them on till you have worn them a spell!
I heard an officer in the Seventh Regiment scolding a private
for coming too late to drill, so I said:
Philosophically somebody must always come last; this fellow
ought to be praised, for, if he had come earlier, he would have
shirked the scolding off upon somebody else!
I saw an old maid at the Fifth Avenue, with her face covered
with wrinkles, turning sadly away from the mirror, so I said:
Philosophically mirrors now-a-days are faulty. They don't make
such nice mirrors as they used to when you were young!
I heard a young lady from Brooklyn praising the sun, so I
said:
Philosophically the sun may be very good, but the moon is a
good deal better, for she gives us light in the night when we need
it, while the sun only shines in the day time, when it is light
enough!
I saw two men shoot an eagle, and as he dropped on the
ground, I said:
Philosophically you might have saved your powder for the fall
alone would have killed him!
An old man in Philadelphia brought a blooming girl to church
to be married to her. The minister stepped behind the baptismal
font, and said as he sprinkled water over her head:
Philosophically I'm glad you brought the dear child to be
baptized!
A young man was disappointed in love
at Niagara Falls, so he went out on a
terrible precipice, took off his clothes, cast
one long look into the fearful whirlpool,
and then—
Philosophically went home and went to
bed!
Two Mississippi River darkies saw for the first time a train of
cars. They were in a quandary to know what kind of a monster
it was, so one said:
Philosophically it is a dried up steamboat getting back into
the river!
A poor sick man, with a mustard plaster on him, said:
Philosophically if I should eat a loaf of bread, I'd be a live
sandwich!
As a man was burying his wife, he said to his friend in the
graveyard, “Alas! you feel happier than I.” “Yes, neighbor,” said
the friend:
“Philosophically I ought to feel happier, I have two wives buried
here!
A man “out West” turned “State's evidence,” and swore that
he was a member of a gang of thieves. By-and-by they found
the roll of actual members, and accused the man of swearing
falsely. “I was a member,” said the man. “I—
Philosophically “I was an honorable member!”
| Saratoga in 1901 | |