Title of the piece: | The Autobiography of Mathew Carey: Letter II |
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Author: | Mathew Carey (1760–1839) |
First published: | The New-England Magazine (Boston: J. T. and E. Buckingham, 1833): volume 5; issue 6. |
Copyright: | out of copyright |
[[Double-bracketed passages, such as this, contain the editor's annotations.]]
WHEN I determined on emigration, I hesitated between New-York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, and was finally led to prefer Philadelphia, because I had lately received a parcel of papers from this city; among others the Pennsylvanian Packet of June 10, 1784, and Bradford's Weekly Advertiser, of about the same date, which contained an account of the proceedings of the House of Commons against me. In Philadelphia, therefore, my case was known; and of course the oppression I had undergone, I was led to conclude, would probably make me friends there.
In sailing up the river Delaware, the America, which was under the care of a drunken pilot, ran aground on the Brandywine shoals, and was in imminent danger but - after a long struggle, was finally got off, by the aid of a number of hardy passengers, and half a dozen sailors belonging to a vessel bound for Jamaica, which had been wrecked at sea. They were taken off the wreck by a Philadelphia vessel, bound for London, which we met, and which removed them to the America.
As this vessel was a clipper, very sharp built, and aground at high water, there was a great alarm among the passengers, who were bewailing their hard fate, to be in such imminent danger, after a safe passage of three thousand miles. Men six feet high displayed the utmost consternation, and actually shed tears. Trunks and boxes were opened to secure money, and trinkets, and other valuable articles which were in a small compass, and could be carried about the person. The alarm was greatly increased, by the frantic conduct of the pilot, who lost his self-possession, and ran about distracted.
Behold me now landed in Philadelphia, with about a dozen guineas in my pocket, without relation, or friend, and even without an acquaintance, except my compagnons de voyage, of whom very few were eligible associates.
While I was contemplating a removal into the country, where I could have boarded at about a dollar, or a dollar and a quarter a week, intending to wait the arrival of my funds, a most extraordinary and unlooked-for circumstance occurred, which changed my purpose, gave a new direction to my views, and, in some degree, colored the course of my future life. It reflects great credit on the Marquess de La Fayette, who was then at Mount Vernon, to take leave of General Washington. A young gentleman of the name of Wallace, a fellow-passenger of mine, had brought letters of recommendation to the General; and having gone to his seat to deliver them, fell into the Marquess's company, and in the course of conversation, the affairs of Ireland came on the tapis. The Marquess, who had, in the Philadelphia papers, seen an account of my adventures with the Parliament, and the persecution I had undergone, inquired of Wallace, what had become of the poor persecuted Dublin printer? He replied, "He came passenger with me, and is now in Philadelphia," stating the boarding-house where I had pitched my tent. On the arrival of the Marquess in this city, he sent me a billet, requesting to see me at his lodgings, whither I went. He received me with great kindness; condoled with me on the persecution I had undergone; inquired into my prospects; and having told him that I proposed, on the receipt of my funds, to set up a newspaper, he approved the idea, and promised to recommend me to his friends, Robert Morris, Thomas Fitzsimons, &c. &c. After half an hour's conversation, we parted. Next morning, while I was at breakfast, a letter from him was handed me, which, to my very great surprise, contained four one hundred dollar notes of the Bank of North-America. This was the more extraordinary and liberal, as not a word had passed between us on the subject of giving or receiving, borrowing or lending money; and a remarkable feature in the affair was, that the letter did not contain a word of reference to the enclosure.
In the course of the day I went to his lodgings, and found that he had, an hour or two previously, departed for Princeton, where Congress then sat, having been in some measure driven from Philadelphia, by a mutiny among the soldiers, who were clamorous for their pay, and had kept them in a state of siege for three hours in the State-House. I wrote to him to New-York, whither, I understood, he had gone from Princeton, expressive of my gratitude in the strongest terms, and received a very kind and friendly answer.
I cannot pass over this noble trait in the character of the illustrious Marquess without urging it strongly on the overgrown wealthy of our country, as an example worthy of imitation. Here was a foreign nobleman, who had devoted years of the prime of his life, and greatly impaired his fortune, in the service of a country, separated by thousands of miles distance from his native land. After these mighty sacrifices, he meets, by an extraordinary accident, with a poor persecuted young man, destitute of friends and protectors - his heart expands towards him - he freely gives him means of making a living without the most remote expectation of return, or of ever again seeing the object of his bounty. He withdraws from the city to avoid the expression of the gratitude of the beneficiary. I have more than once assumed, and I now repeat, that I doubt whether in the whole life of this (I had almost said) unparalleled man, there is to be found anything, which, all the circumstances of the case considered, more highly elevates his character.*
[* It is due to myself to state, that though this was in every sense of the word a gift, I regarded it as a loan, payable to the Marquess's countrymen, according to the exalted sentiment of Dr. Franklin, who, when he presented a bill for ten pounds to the Rev. Mr. Nixon, an Irish Clergyman, (who was in distress in Paris, and wanted to migrate to America,) told him to pay the sum to any Americans whom he might find in distress, and thus "let good offices go round." I fully paid the debt to Frenchmen in distress - consigned one or two hogsheads of tobacco to the Marquess, {I believe it was two, but am uncertain,} and, moreover, when, in 1824, he reached this country, with shattered fortunes, sent him to New-York, a check for the full sum of four hundred dollars, which he retained till he reached Philadelphia, and was very reluctant to use, and finally consented, only at my earnest instance.]
I immediately issued proposals for printing the Pennsylvania Herald, which was extremely imprudent, as I was so utterly unacquainted with the temper and manners of the people. In a word, I was as destitute of some of the most important qualifications requisite to carry on a paper in Philadelphia, as I had been in Dublin, when I there commenced the Volunteer's Journal. I ought at once to have gone to work as a journeyman printer, and deferred entering into business on my own account for a year or two, until I had become acquainted with the country and those among whom my lot was cast. But foolish pride prevented me from taking this rational course, which I have often since had occasion to regret.
I soon supplied myself with types, but had no press. A Scotch bookseller and printer, of the name of Bell, had recently died in Philadelphia, and his stock, in which there was a press, was to be sold at auction about this time. As the press was very old, and very much impaired in usefulness, I expected to have it a bargain. But Colonel Oswald, who printed the Independent Gazetteer, and who viewed my operations with a jealous eye, commenced that hostility, which, ultimately, as will appear in the sequel, nearly cost me my life. He bid against me; and as I had absurdly fixed on a day for publication which was so near that I had not time to procure a new press, he continued bidding till he raised the price to about fifty pounds currency, or, one hundred and thirty-three dollars, being one third of my whole fortune, and about the price of a new press.
My expectations of a remittance of the sum due me by my brother, were almost entirely disappointed. Of the amount I received but fifty pounds. The Volunteer's Journal finally perished, partly by the persecution of my brother, but chiefly by means of a paper set up under the auspices of government, with a similar title, which drew off a portion of the sale of the original paper, and most of the advertising custom.
At length I issued the first number of the Pennsylvania Herald on the 25th of January, 1785, which dragged its slow length along with slender hopes of success. On the 25th of March, same year, I took Mr. William Spotswood and C. Talbot into partnership, when the paper was enlarged; but still it did not make much progress, until I commenced the publication of a regular series of the debates of the House of Assembly, which was here quite a novelty. To this undertaking I was led by the following circumstance. A town-meeting had been called at the State-House, to take into consideration the calamitous state of the trade of the country, at which I attended, in the midst of a large concourse of citizens, in order to give the public a statement of the proceedings. Jared Ingersoll, Esq. addressed the meeting with great effect. I sat down on my return home to write merely the heads of his speech - but found it run so smoothly, that I gave it in a regular series in the third person. When I handed it to Mr. Ingersoll for the purpose of examination and correction, he made only a few slight verbal alterations, and declared that he could scarcely have done it so well himself, as he had spoken without notes.
I naturally concluded that if I could publish a speech from memory, without having taken a single note, I should certainly be able to take down debates, with the advantage of a seat, a table, and pens, ink and paper. Accordingly, on the 27th of August, 1785, I commenced the publication of the debates of the House of Assembly, without the least knowledge of stenography. I abridged and took down the leading words, and was enabled to fill up the chasms by memory and the context; and as the printers had then more scruples about pirating on each other, than some of them have at present, none of them republished the debates, of which the Pennsylvania Herald had, for that session, the exclusive advantage. John Dunlap, a respectable revolutionary character, who printed the Pennsylvania Packet, offered me a liberal compensation for the privilege of republication—but I declined, knowing that it would deprive the Herald of the very great superiority it possessed.
In the following session, Mr. Dunlap hired a stenographer, the well-known Thomas Lloyd, who, though an excellent stenographer, so far as taking down notes, was a miserable hand at putting them in an English dress. I learned his system, which was one invented by the Jesuits at St. Omer's, but did not succeed better with it, than I had done before.
At this period, parties ran as high in Pennsylvania as they have done at any time since. The denominations were Constitutionalists and Republicans. The former were supporters of the constitution then existing, which conferred the legislative powers on a single body, styled the House of Assembly, and the executive department on a President and executive Council. The Republicans were zealous for a change in the legislature, so as to have two branches, - a Senate, and House of Representatives. There were various minor points of difference unnecessary to be particularized.
There was at that time a society of foreigners established in Philadelphia, from various nations, English, Irish, Scotch, French, and West-Indians, who styled themselves the newly adopted sons of the United States. Among the leaders were A. J. Dallas, the unfortunate Gerald, who, I believe, died in Botany Bay, Counsellor Heatly, --- Coulthurst, &c. &c. I was a member. The society was in perfect accordance in political opinions with the constitutional party, to which it became an auxiliary. As there were in it a number of zealous powerful writers, they greatly annoyed the Republican party. Colonel Oswald, who was the mouth-piece of the latter party, assailed their opponents with great virulence, and particularly their new auxiliaries, whom he grossly abused as foreign renegadoes. I wrote a reply to one of his attacks, in which were the following remarks which did not warrant the very acrimonious, and personal attack which followed, on the part of the Colonel.
"National reflections are in every case as illiberal as they are unjust, - but from Americans, they are something worse. Yes, sir, I say they are something worse. It is a bold saying. and may prove disagreeable to nice ears - but it is not the less true. They are, sir, ungrateful to the highest degree. It is a fact, too recent and too notorious to admit a doubt, that a great part of those armies, that nobly gained America her independence, were 'aliens,' or 'foreigners,' many of whose countrymen are now subjects of obloquy and reproach. I mean, French, Germans, Irish, &c.
"I shall conclude with one remark, that it gives me pain to see the conductor of a free press, so capable, from the energy of his writings and his intrepid spirit, to defend the cause of liberty, debase his paper by such illiberality."
Philadelphia, Nov. 7, 1785
A long and most violent controversy took place, which continued for some weeks, and was terminated as follows:
Colonel Oswald having commented on some of my paragraphs, which expressed doubts of sundry current rumors of the day, I replied as follows, with great severity, irritated by the infuriated style of his attacks - which were not confined to politics, but clearly manifested a desire to destroy me in the public estimation, and to prevent any chance of my success in life.
"I am, sir, as you say, in doubt about several things. But there is one thing of which I never entertained any doubt, which is, that the literary assassin, who basely attempts to blast a character, IS A VlLLAIN - whether he struts in glare of day, a ferocious Colonel Oswald, with a drawcansir countenance, or skulks, a Junius, concealed for a quarter of a century.
M. CAREY."
To this Colonel Oswald replied.
"Your being a cripple is your main protection against personal insults, which your oblique insinuations would otherwise challenge.
ELEAZER OSWALD."
My rejoinder was as follows:
"On this I shall only remark, that the quoted paragraph, which the Colonel alludes to, is as direct an obliquity as I have ever heard of. It cannot fail to remind the reader of the anecdote of the man, desired by the father of a girl to whom he paid his addresses, never to come near his house again, but who having gone there afterwards, contrary to those directions, was kicked down stairs In some time, being met by an acquaintance, and asked how his love affair succeeded - he replied, that the last time he went to visit his Desdemona, her father had kicked him down stairs: so, added he, I took the HINT, and never went there since. One remark further: Colonel Oswald, who served in the army, is not to be told at this period, that though I am a cripple, there is a CERTAIN MODE in which I would be on an equality with him. This hint is the less necessary to a man whose newspaper frequently holds out threats of coming to the point."
"It is possible some of them, when discovered, might come to the point." Gazetteer, No. 215.
"But if fighting delights them, then come to the point." No. 220.
This correspondence I republished in "The Plagi Scurriliad, a Hudibrastic Poem, addressed to Col. Oswald." As soon as he received a copy, he sent it to me, by a Capt. Rice, who, pointing to the above passage, said, "Col. Oswald considers this as a challenge." I coolly replied, "It was so intended, sir." He was proceeding to talk about time and place and other preliminaries, when I cut him short, and told him, I had nothing to do with those arrangements, and referred him to a French gentleman, a Mr. Marmie, of the house of Turnbull, Marnie & Co. to whom, presuming the affair would end in a duel, I had applied to act as my second. This interview was on Monday morning, the 16th of January, 1786. The seconds fixed on Saturday, the 21st for the meeting. In an hour or two after the first visit, Capt. Rice called on me a second time, and told me that the affair had made great noise - that there was danger of our being arrested, and bound over, - and that therefore it was necessary to anticipate the time. Although there was great impropriety in his calling on me, instead of Mr. Marnie, I assented to Thursday. In another hour or two, he called again, with the same story, and wished a further reduction of time. I was, as may be supposed, exasperated at being treated as a child, and replied in a passion, "It is the part of a bully to bring such different messages." (I meant to have said send, but passion frequently does not allow time to choose the most appropriate words.) The captain took fire at this expression, which implicated him - and said he did not understand such language. I told him, as my warmth had not abated, that he might understand it as he pleased. But on a moment's reflection, knowing that I had no right to hurt his feelings, and had not intended to do so, I explained my mistake, and distinctly stated, that the offensive expression was not intended for him, but for his principal. This was satisfactory. I then agreed to meet on Wednesday.
On Wednesday morning, I must candidly confess, that I felt somewhat qualmish about the result. I had before been, or supposed myself to be, in danger of my life, once, as I have stated, on the Brandywine shoals another time, when, crossing the river Delaware, on the ice, I fell into an air hole, without any person near to assist me, but a cowardly boy, and when I scrambled out, I scarcely knew how. In both those cases I had been calm and collected. But to stand up in a field, to be shot at, like a crow, c'etait une autre affaire, and had a far more menacing aspect. Candor calls on me to avow, that I took a couple of glasses of wine in the morning, to fortify my nerves, lest my courage should, like that of Bob Acres, "ooze out at my fingers' ends." On one thing, however, I was resolved, that if I displayed the white feather, I would never more see Philadelphia.
The place of meeting was in New-Jersey, opposite the city. The principals and seconds, and I believe, but am not certain, Dr. Jones, passed over in a ferry-boat. From the moment I entered her, till the affair was over, I found that the wine had been wholly unnecessary; and that I was as cool and collected, as if I had been engaged in duels all my life. When we came to the appointed spot, we found at the fence eight or ten persons, whom curiosity, and a report of the intended rencontre, had brought there.
It has rarely happened that a greater disparity has existed between two combatants. I had never drawn a trigger but once, and that was to try a pocket-pistol, with which I had provided myself, having been informed that Colonel Oswald intended to horsewhip me in the street. My antagonist was a military character, who had, I believe, served throughout the revolutionary war, and been more than once engaged as a duelist. While the pistols were charging - the ground marking out - the other preliminaries arranging - and Colonel Oswald and I were walking by each other, he made a sort of overture for an accommodation. "Mr. Carey," he observed, "it was never my wish to come to this issue with you." To this I replied: "Colonel Oswald, you must have known, from the nature of your attacks on me, and the great disparity of physical force between us, that it could never come to any other issue."
I would have cheerfully met his overture, (if it was so meant, as doubtless it was,) half-way, but that knowing he had a powerful party to support him, he would make the world believe that I had made advances and concessions to him, an idea that I could not endure. I assure the reader that the leading sentiment of my mind, and which gave me considerable uneasiness, was, the utter inequality in which we stood in regard to connexions. My antagonist had a wife and five or six children depending on him; whereas there was not a person in America who had a drop of blood, kindred to me, in his or her veins. This reflection exacted a pang.
We stood at the distance of ten paces. As soon as we had taken our stations, Captain Rice, Colonel Oswald's second, cried out in a voice of thunder -"Gentlemen, if either of you steps beyond the line, by --- I will blow his brains out." I was horror-struck at the idea this speech conveyed, as if we were murderers - and the impulse of the moment was, to throw my pistol at his head.
We fired at the word of command. My pistol, as might have been expected, was harmless. Colonel Oswald shot me through the thigh, a little above the knee. It was reported and currently believed, that he said he fired low, as he did not wish to kill, but merely to wing me. His long experience with fire-arms, renders this idea probable. Had his ball been half an inch or an inch lower down, it would have struck the joint, and rendered amputation necessary. It went through the thigh-bone.
I did not feel the stroke. The first knowledge I had of being wounded, was when I found myself on the ground, and the blood spouting out of the wound, as water spouts from a jet d' eau. Some of the spectators informed me afterwards, that when I was struck, I sprung from the ground half a foot or a foot into the air.
The wound was bandaged on the field, as well as it could be done in such circumstances. I was brought home and ordered to be kept quiet, and no visiters to be admitted. And here I performed a gratuitous act of justice, which was probably one of the best acts of my life, but which did me considerable injury.
During the course of the controversy, some of the correspondents of the Pennsylvania Herald, had thrown out strong insinuations against the courage of Colonel Oswald, which I had published. After the duel, in which his conduct disproved the allegation, while smarting under a wound that endangered my life - a wound, the result of a wanton attack on my private character, I deemed it right to retract the accusation, which I did in the following words, in the Pennsylvania Packet:
"Having on Wednesday last had a rencontre with Colonel Oswald, which to my great satisfaction has not terminated to his injury, and he having behaved himself as a gentleman and man of honor, I with pleasure embrace this opportunity of retracting what I have asserted, derogatory to his character.
M. CAREY
Philadelphia, Jan. 20, 1786."
This gave high offence to the Irish, who had taken great interest in the affair on my side, many of whom never forgave me for what they called a degradation. My second, Mr. Marnie, a man of a nice sense of honor, was unappeasably offended. He forsook me; and when I sent for him, and complained of his absence, he said, with the most perfect sang froid, that as I had taken the affair into my own hands, he would have no more concern in it. I never saw him afterwards.
By neglect and mismanagement, the cure of the wound was not completed till fifteen or sixteen months had elapsed, during a part of which time, I had to be lifted up and down stairs, and during the remainder, had to use crutches.
Here let me state a most curious fact.
During the controversy, I had advanced charges of plagiarism against Colonel Oswald, which I had substantiated by quotations from Junius and the North Briton, which were taken in some instances verbatim, and in others with slight variation, by the Colonel; and many of which, however applicable they were to the Duke of Bedford and the Duke of Grafton, had no application whatever to me. I concluded the essay with the words: "I have now done with Colonel Oswald." A friend to whom I showed the essay, advised me not to retain that idea as circumstances might arise that would render it necessary for me to resume the controversy. Accordingly, I took the paper, and altered the conclusion to read thus: "I would now hope I have done with Colonel Oswald; but if I am rightly informed, there is in his composition, too much of that quality which, in good men and applied to good purposes, is termed perseverance, and in bad men and applied to bad purposes, is termed obstinacy, to allow me to be very sanguine on the subject." After the duel, as soon as I was allowed to read, the first book I took up, was Tristram Shandy and I at once opened on the very same words applied to Uncle Toby. It is easy to conceive my fright. The book dropped from my hands, and I was seized with a cold sweat, as I thought with what apparent justice the charge might he retorted on me. But I had not read Tristram Shandy for probably ten years. This extraordinary fact fully proves the truth of the maxim, that "Le vrai n'est pas toujours vraisemblable."
M. CAREY
Philadelphia, Nov. 12, 1833.