Volume I Part 19 (2/2)
In his first letter, addressed to ”My Dear Child,” Franklin tells Polly, who was then about twenty years of age, that he had hoped for the pleasure of seeing her the day before at the Oratorio in the Foundling Hospital, but that, though he looked with all the eyes he had, not excepting even those he carried in his pocket, he could not find her. He had, however, he said, fixed that day se'nnight for a little journey into Ess.e.x, and would take Mrs. Stevenson with him as far as the home of Mrs. Tickell, Polly's aunt, at Wanstead, where Polly then was, and would call for Mrs. Stevenson there on his return. ”Will,” he says in a postscript, ”did not see you in the Park.” Will, of course, was his son. In the succeeding year, he writes to Polly that he embraces most gladly his dear friend's proposal of a subject for their future correspondence, though he fears that his necessary business and journeys, with the natural indolence of an old man, will make him too unpunctual a correspondent.
But why will you [he asks], by the Cultivation of your Mind, make yourself still more amiable, and a more desirable Companion for a Man of Understanding, when you are determin'd, as I hear, to live single? If we enter, as you propose, into _moral_ as well as natural Philosophy, I fancy, when I have fully establish'd my Authority as a Tutor, I shall take upon me to lecture you a little on that Chapter of Duty.
He then maps out a course of reading for her, to be conducted in such a manner as to furnish them with material for their letters. ”Believe me ever, my dear good Girl,” he concludes, ”your affectionate Friend and Servant.”
With his next letter, he sends her a gift of books, and begs her to accept it, as a small mark of his esteem and friends.h.i.+p, and the gift is accompanied with more specific advice as to the manner in which she was to prosecute her studies, and obtain the benefit of his knowledge and counsel.
When he writes again, his letter discloses the fact that a brisk interchange of ideas had been actually established between them. ”'Tis a very sensible Question you ask,” he says, ”how the Air can affect the Barometer, when its Opening appears covered with Wood?” And her observation on what she had lately read concerning insects is very just and solid too, he remarks. The question he has no difficulty in answering, and the observation on insects leads to some agreeable statements about the silk-worm, the bee, the cochineal and the Spanish fly, and finally to an interesting account of the way in which the great Swedish naturalist, Linnaeus had been successfully called in by his King to suggest some means of checking the ravages of the worm that was doing such injury to the Swedish s.h.i.+ps. Nor was all this mellifluous information imparted without a timely caution.
There is, however [he concluded], a prudent Moderation to be used in Studies of this kind. The Knowledge of Nature may be ornamental, and it may be useful; but if, to attain an Eminence in that, we neglect the Knowledge and Practice of essential Duties, we deserve Reprehension. For there is no Rank in Natural Knowledge of equal Dignity and Importance with that of being a good Parent, a good Child, a good Husband or Wife, a good Neighbour or Friend, a good Subject or Citizen, that is, in short, a good Christian. Nicholas Gimcrack, therefore, who neglected the Care of his Family, to Pursue b.u.t.terflies, was a just Object of Ridicule, and we must give him up as fair Game to the satyrist.
A later letter is an amusing ill.u.s.tration of the manner in which he occasionally reminded his pupil that she must not take herself and Philosophy too seriously. Polly was at the time at the famous Wells of Bristol about which so much of the social pageantry of the eighteenth century centred.
Your first Question, _What is the Reason the Water at this place, tho' cold at the Spring, becomes warm by Pumping?_ it will be most prudent in me to forbear attempting to answer [he said], till, by a more circ.u.mstantial account, you a.s.sure me of the Fact. I own I should expect that Operation to warm, not so much the Water pump'd, as the Person pumping. The Rubbing of dry Solids together has been long observ'd to produce Heat; but the like Effect has never yet, that I have heard, been produc'd by the mere Agitation of Fluids, or Friction of Fluids with Solids.
He might have let the matter rest there but he did not. The occasion was too opportune a one to impress upon Polly the importance of not jumping at conclusions too quickly for him to refrain from borrowing an apt story from Selden about a young woman who, finding herself in the presence of some gentlemen, when they were examining what they called a Chinese shoe, and carrying on a dispute about it, put in her word, and said modestly, ”Gentlemen, are you sure it is a Shoe? Should not that be settled first?”
Then he pa.s.ses to a highly edifying explanation of tidal movements in rivers, so simple that even a child, to say nothing of a bright-witted girl, could experience no difficulty in understanding it, and ends with the question:
After writing 6 Folio Pages of Philosophy to a young Girl, is it necessary to finish such a Letter with a Compliment? Is not such a Letter of itself a Compliment? Does it not say, she has a Mind thirsty after Knowledge, and capable of receiving it; and that the most agreeable Things one can write to her are those that tend to the Improvement of her Understanding?
With his next letter, he enclosed a paper containing his views on several points relating to the air and the evaporation of water, and informed Polly that he would shortly accompany her good mother again to Wanstead, when they could take a walk to some of Lord Tilney's ponds, and make a few experiments there that would explain the nature of tides more fully.
”Adieu, my dear little Philosopher,” he exclaims in another letter, after suggesting that thirsty unfortunates at sea might be greatly relieved by sitting in sea water, and declaring that wet clothes do not create colds, whatever damp may do. No one catches cold by bathing, he said, and no clothes can be wetter than water itself.
In another letter, he makes some most readable observations upon the evaporation of rivers and the relations of colors to heat. The ignorant, he declared, suppose in some cases that a river loses itself by running underground, whereas in truth it has run up into the air. And, with reference to the interdependence of heat and color, he pursued this fresh train of ideas:
What signifies Philosophy that does not apply to some Use? May we not learn from hence, that black Clothes are not so fit to wear in a hot Sunny Climate or Season, as white ones; because in such Cloaths the Body is more heated by the Sun when we walk abroad, and are at the same time heated by the Exercise, which double Heat is apt to bring on putrid dangerous Fevers? That Soldiers and Seamen, who must march and labour in the Sun, should, in the East or West Indies have an Uniform of white? That Summer Hats, for Men or Women, should be white, as repelling that Heat which gives Headaches to many, and to some the fatal Stroke that the French call the _Coup de Soleil_? That the Ladies' Summer Hats, however, should be lined with Black, as not reverberating on their Faces those Rays which are reflected upwards from the Earth or Water? That the putting a white Cap of Paper or Linnen _within_ the _Crown_ of a black Hat, as some do, will not keep out the Heat, tho' it would if placed _without_? That Fruit-Walls being black'd may receive so much Heat from the Sun in the Daytime, as to continue warm in some degree thro' the Night, and thereby preserve the Fruit from Frosts, or forward its Growth?--with sundry other particulars of less or greater Importance, that will occur from time to time to attentive Minds?
Sometimes he exchanges language like this for such bantering questions as these: ”Have you finish'd your Course of Philosophy? No more Doubts to be resolv'd? No more Questions to ask? If so, you may now be at full Leisure to improve yourself in Cards.”
Another letter, dated June 7, 1762, was written in contemplation of the fact that he was about to leave the Old World for the New.
I fancy I feel a little like dying Saints [he said], who, in parting with those they love in this World, are only comforted with the Hope of more perfect Happiness in the next. I have, in America, Connections of the most engaging kind; and, happy as I have been in the Friends.h.i.+ps here contracted, _those_ promise me greater and more lasting Felicity. But G.o.d only knows whether these Promises shall be fulfilled.
Then came the letter written to her from a ”wretched inn” at Portsmouth when he was on the point of embarking for America. It is none the less noteworthy because it reveals the fact that the thought of a marriage between Polly and his son had been a familiar one to him and her.
It (the paper on which he wrote) [he said] will tell my Polly how much her Friend is afflicted, that he must, perhaps, never again, see one for whom he has so sincere an Affection, join'd to so perfect an Esteem; who he once flatter'd himself might become his own, in the tender Relation of a Child, but can now entertain such pleasing Hopes no more. Will it tell _how much_ he is afflicted? No, it can not.
Adieu, my dearest Child. I will call you so. Why should I not call you so, since I love you with all the Tenderness, All the Fondness of a Father? Adieu. May the G.o.d of all Goodness shower down his choicest Blessings upon you, and make you infinitely Happier, than that Event could have made you.
No wonder that the fatherless girl should have felt from the day that she received this letter until the day that she helped to a.s.suage the pain of Franklin's last hours by her loving ministrations that the heart in which she was so deeply cherished was one of these blessings. A few months later, Franklin writes to her from America a long, communicative letter, valuable among other reasons for the evidence that it affords of the ready sympathy with which he had entered into her circle of youthful friends.h.i.+ps. He tells her that he shares her grief over her separation from her old friend Miss Pitt; ”Pitty,” he calls her in another place in this letter when he sends his love to her. He congratulates her upon the recovery of her ”dear Dolly's” health. This was Dorothea Blount to whom he repeatedly refers in his letters to her. ”I love that dear good Girl myself, and I love her other Friends,” he said. Polly's statement in the letter, to which his letter was a reply, that she had lately had the pleasure of spending three days with Doctor and Mrs. Hawkesworth at the house of John Stanley, all warm friends of his, elicits from him the exclamation, ”It was a sweet Society!”
These are but a few of the many details that make up this letter. Polly was one of the stimulating correspondents who brought out all that was best in Franklin's own intellectual resources, and the next time that he wrote to her from America he used this appreciative and grateful language. ”The Ease, the Smoothness, the Purity of Diction, and Delicacy of Sentiment, that always appear in your Letters, never fail to delight me; but the tender filial Regard you constantly express for your old Friend is particularly engaging.”
In later letters to Polly, written after his return to England in 1764, there are other lively pa.s.sages like those that animated his letters to her before his return to America. On one occasion he answers a letter from her in verse.
A Muse, you must know, visited me this Morning! I see you are surpriz'd, as I was. I never saw one before.
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