Volume I Part 11 (1/2)
I feel stronger and more active. Yet I would not have you think that I fancy I shall grow young again. I know that men of my Bulk often fail suddenly: I know that according to the Course of Nature I cannot at most continue much longer, and that the living even of another Day is uncertain. I therefore now form no Schemes, but such as are of immediate Execution; indulging myself in no future Prospect except one, that of returning to Philadelphia, there to spend the Evening of Life with my Friends and Family.
There was a time when he loved England and would perhaps have contentedly lived and died there, if his Lares and Penates could have been enticed into taking up their abode there. With his broad, tolerant, jocund nature, he was, it must be confessed, not a little like a hare, which soon makes a form for itself wherever it happens to crouch. The homesickness, which colors a few of his letters, is to no little extent the legacy of illness.
But much as he was absent from home, alchemist as he always was in trans.m.u.ting all that is disagreeable in life into what is agreeable, or at least endurable, the family hearthside never ceased to have a bright, cheerful glow for his well-ordered, home-loving nature.
Grave illness was more than once his lot during his mission to England.[22]
Shortly after his arrival in that country in 1757, he was seized with a violent attack of sickness, accompanied by delirium, which left him in an invalid condition for quite a time. From the account that he gives of the cupping, vomiting and purging that he underwent, under the care of good Doctor Fothergill, there would seem to have been no lack of opportunity for the escape of the disease, which, judging by the amount of bark that he took in substance and infusion, was probably some form of malarial fever.
This attack gives a decidedly valetudinary tone to one of his subsequent letters to Deborah. ”I am much more tender than I us'd to be,” he said, ”and sleep in a short Callico Bedgown with close Sleeves, and Flannel close-footed Trousers; for without them I get no warmth all Night. So it seems I grow older apace.” Deborah's health, too, about this time was not overgood, for, a few months later, he writes to her: ”It gives me Concern to receive such frequent Accts of your being indisposed; but we both of us grow in Years, and must expect our Const.i.tutions, though tolerably good in themselves, will by degrees give way to the Infirmities of Age.” Shortly after Franklin's arrival in England in 1764, he was seized with another attack of illness, but he was soon able to declare that, thanks to G.o.d, he was got perfectly well, his cough being quite gone, and his arms mending, so that he could dress and undress himself, if he chose to endure a little pain. A few months later, he says it rejoices him to learn that Deborah is freer than she used to be from the headache and the pain in her side. He himself, he said, was likewise in perfect health. Again he writes to Deborah in the succeeding year: ”I congratulate you on the soon expected Repeal of the Stamp Act; and on the great Share of Health we both enjoy, tho' now going in Four-score (that is, in the fourth score).” He was not allowed, however, to indulge long the spirit of congratulation, for, a few months later, one of his letters to Deborah brings to our knowledge the fact that he had been very ill. After his recovery from this illness, he does not seem to have been attacked by anything again while in England, beyond a fit or so of the gout, and in 1768 he readily a.s.sents to the statement of Deborah that they were both blessed with a great share of health considering their years, then sixty-three. A few years more, however, and Franklin's correspondence indicates plainly enough that this statement was no longer applicable to Deborah. In the letter last-mentioned, her husband writes to her that he wonders to hear that his friends were backward in bringing her his letters when they arrived, and thinks it must be a mere imagination of hers, the effect of some melancholy humor she happened then to be in; and some four years afterwards he recommends to her a dietary for the preservation of her health and the improvement of her spirits. But both were then beyond repair, and, two years later, she was in the Elysian fields where, despite what was reported, as we shall see, by Franklin to Madame Helvetius about his Eurydice and M. Helvetius, it is impossible to believe that she, faithful, loving creature that she was, did anything but inconsolably await his coming.
Of course, we are not wholly dependent upon Franklin's letters to Deborah for details relating to Sally and Richard Bache. A very readable letter of his is the one written by him to Sally from Reedy Island on his way to England in 1764. Its opening sentences bring home to us anew the mult.i.tude of his friends and the fervid enthusiasm of their friends.h.i.+p.
Our good friends, Mr. Galloway, Mr. Wharton, and Mr.
James, came with me in the s.h.i.+p from Chester to New Castle and went ash.o.r.e there [he said]. It was kind to favour me with their good company as far as they could.
The affectionate leave taken of me by so many friends at Chester was very endearing. G.o.d bless them and all Pennsylvania.
Then, after observing that the natural prudence and goodness of heart, with which G.o.d had blessed Sally, made it less necessary for him to be particular in giving her advice, Franklin tells her that the more attentively dutiful and tender she was towards her good mama the more she would recommend herself to him, adding, ”But why should I mention _me_, when you have so much higher a promise in the commandments, that such conduct will recommend you to the favour of G.o.d.” After this, he warns her that her conduct should be all the more circ.u.mspect, that no advantage might be given to the malevolence of his political enemies, directs her to go constantly to church and advises her in his absence to acquire those useful accomplishments, arithmetic and book-keeping.
In his next letter to Sally, he tells her that he has met her husband at Preston, where he had been kindly entertained for two or three days by her husband's mother and sisters, whom he liked much. The comfort that this a.s.surance gave to a wife, who had never met her husband's relatives, can be readily appreciated. He had advised Bache, he said, to settle down to business in Philadelphia, where he would always be with her; almost any profession a man has been educated in being preferable, in his opinion, to an office held at pleasure, as rendering him more independent, more a freeman, and less subject to the caprices of superiors. This means, of course, that the Baches, too, were looking for a seat in the Post-Office carryall, in which room was found for so many of Franklin's relations and _proteges_.
By Industry & Frugality [Franklin further said], you may get forward in the World, being both of you yet young. And then what we may leave you at our Death may be a pretty Addition, tho' of itself far from sufficient to maintain & bring up a Family. It is of the more Importance for you to think seriously of this, as you may have a Number of Children to educate. 'Till my Return you need be at no Expence for Rent, etc, as you are all welcome to continue with your Mother, and indeed it seems to be your Duty to attend her, as she grows infirm, and takes much Delight in your Company and the Child's. This Saving will be a Help in your Progress: And for your Encouragement I can a.s.sure you that there is scarce a Merchant of Opulence in your Town, whom I do not remember a young Beginner with as little to go on with, & no better Prospects than Mr.
Bache.
Ben of course is not overlooked. ”I am much pleas'd with the Acc' I receive from all Hands of your dear little Boy. I hope he will be continu'd a Blessing to us all.” It must have been a great gratification to him to learn that Betsey, William Franklin's wife, as well as Deborah, had stood as G.o.dmother for the child. In his next letter to Sally, acknowledging the receipt of a pleasing letter from her, he states that he is glad that she has undertaken the care of the housekeeping, as it would be an ease to her mother, especially if she could manage to her approbation. ”_That_,” he commented significantly, ”may perhaps be at first a Difficulty.”[23] It would be of use to her, he continued, if she would get a habit of keeping exact accounts, and it would be some satisfaction to him to see them, for she should remember, for her encouragement in good economy, that, whatever a child saves of its parents' money, will be its own another day. ”Study,”
the letter concludes, ”Poor Richard a little, and you may find some Benefit from his Instructions.” These letters were all written from London.
The rest of Franklin's letters to Sally alone were written from Pa.s.sy. In the first he says that, if she knew how happy her letters made him, and considered how many of them miscarried, she would, he thought, write oftener. A daughter had then been added to the members of the Bache household, and that he had a word to pen about her goes almost without saying. He expresses the hope that Sally would again be out of the city during the hot months for the sake of this child's health, ”for I begin to love the dear little creature from your description of her,” he said. This was the letter in which Sally was so pointedly scored for not living more simply and frugally.
I was charmed [he declared] with the account you gave me of your industry, the table cloths of your own spinning, &c.; but the latter part of the paragraph, that you had sent for linen from France, because weaving and flax were grown dear, alas, that dissolved the charm; and your sending for long black pins, and lace, and _feathers!_ disgusted me as much as if you had put salt into my strawberries. The spinning, I see, is laid aside, and you are to be dressed for the ball!
You seem not to know, my dear daughter, that, of all the dear things in this world, idleness is the dearest, except mischief.
Then Ben as usual comes in for notice. As he intended him for a Presbyterian as well as a Republican, he had sent him to finish his education at Geneva, Franklin stated.
He is much grown [he continues] in very good health, draws a little, as you will see by the enclosed, learns Latin, writing, arithmetic, and dancing, and speaks French better than English. He made a translation of your last letter to him, so that some of your works may now appear in a foreign language.
A few sentences more, with regard to her second son, Will, and another topic and there is a regurgitation of his disgust over Sally's extravagance.
When I began [he said] to read your account of the high prices of goods, ”a pair of gloves, $7; a yard of common gauze, $24, and that it now required a fortune to maintain a family in a very plain way,” I expected you would conclude with telling me, that everybody as well as yourself was grown frugal and industrious; and I could scarce believe my eyes in reading forward, that ”there never was so much pleasure and dressing going on,” and that you yourself wanted black pins and feathers from France to appear, I suppose, in the mode!
This leads me to imagine, that it is perhaps not so much that the goods are grown dear, as that the money is grown cheap, as everything else will do when excessively plenty; and that people are still as easy nearly in their circ.u.mstances, as when a pair of gloves might be had for half a crown. The war indeed may in some degree raise the prices of goods, and the high taxes which are necessary to support the war may make our frugality necessary; and, as I am always preaching that doctrine, I cannot in conscience or in decency encourage the contrary, by my example, in furnis.h.i.+ng my children with foolish modes and luxuries. I therefore send all the articles you desire, that are useful and necessary, and omit the rest; for, as you say you should ”have great pride in wearing anything I send, and showing it as your father's taste,” I must avoid giving you an opportunity of doing that with either lace or feathers. If you wear your cambric ruffles as I do, and take care not to mend the holes, they will come in time to be lace, and feathers, my dear girl, may be had in America from every c.o.c.k's tail.
Franklin's last letter to Sally was written from Pa.s.sy, and contains the inimitable strictures on the Order of the Cincinnati, to which we shall hereafter return, but nothing of any personal or domestic interest.
Two of the letters of Franklin are written to Sally and her husband together. ”Dear Son and Daughter,” is the way he begins, and one ends, ”I am ever my dear Children, your affectionate Father.”
Both of these letters were written from Pa.s.sy. One of them, in addition to letting the parents know that Ben promised to be a stout, as well as a good, man, presents with no little pathos the situation of the writer on the eve of his departure from France for Philadelphia in 1785. After mentioning his efforts to engage some good vessel bound directly for Philadelphia, which would agree to take him on board at Havre with his grandsons, servants and baggage, he sketches this lugubrious picture of himself.
Infirm as I am, I have need of comfortable Room and Accommodations. I was miserably lodg'd in coming over hither, which almost demolish'd me. I must be better stow'd now, or I shall not be able to hold out the Voyage. Indeed my Friends here are so apprehensive for me, that they press me much to remain in France, and three of them have offer'd me an Asylum in their Habitations. They tell me I am here among a People who universally esteem and love me; that my Friends at home are diminish'd by Death in my Absence; that I may there meet with Envy and its consequent Enmity which here I am perfectly free from; this supposing I live to compleat the Voyage, but of that they doubt. The Desire however of spending the little Remainder of Life with my Family, is so strong, as to determine me to try, at least, whether I can bear the Motion of a s.h.i.+p. If not, I must get them to set me on sh.o.r.e somewhere in the Channel, and content myself to die in Europe.
This is melancholy enough, but the wonderful old man weathered out the voyage, and contrived on the way to write three elaborate treatises on practical subjects which, good as they are of their kind, the general reader would gladly exchange for the addition of a few dozen pages to the _Autobiography_. In his last years, he was like the mimosa tree, dying, to all appearances, one year, and the next throwing out fresh verdurous branches from his decaying trunk.