JOHN DAVIS OF SALISBURY.

1801-1802.

IN the year 1798 John Davis came to America. He had been very much of a traveler, had lived in the East Indies, had crossed the equator several times and doubled the Cape of Good Hope more than once. Davis came from Salisbury, in England. He deserves a place in the biographical dictionaries, but is not found there. Having been a sailor before the mast for eleven years, he became a desultory man of letters, of considerable literature, who paid his way while in this country by potboiling for New York and Philadelphia booksellers and by teaching in South Carolina and Virginia.[M] He brought with him across the Atlantic a library of 300 volumes, French, Latin and English. These books he read. For statistics, commerce, land speculations, Davis cared nothing whatever. He was an impressionist and not to be disregarded as a poet. His work, therefore, is distinct among these early travels which are usually records of fact as fact, and as such are extremely valuable. However a man sees, let him write.

Thomas Jefferson, who was pleased to accept the dedication to him of this volume, supposed that it would be of a statistical sort. “Should you in your journeyings have been led to remark on the same objects on which I gave crude notes some years ago, I shall be happy to see them confirmed or corrected by a more accurate observer,” wrote President Jefferson from Monticello.

Davis accepted the acceptance and published a book as little like the “Notes on Virginia” as any book could well be. The author had read Horace and believed as that poet did that his work was going to last. “That this volume will regale curiosity while man continues to be influenced by his senses and affections, I have little doubt,” was the statement of John Davis in his preface. “It will be recurred to with equal interest on the banks of the Thames and those of the Ohio. There is no man who is not pleased in being told by another what he thought of the world and what the world thought of him.” There is a good deal of truth in both the particular and the general observation. We have not yet taken the time to review our history with much care. Whenever that is done, John Davis, of Salisbury, citizen of the world, more or less, should find readers again after a hundred years.Having translated for bookseller Caritat, in New York (at Aaron Burr’s suggestion), “The Campaign in Italy of General Buonaparte,” and afterwards having spent a winter as tutor in the family of Mr. Drayton, of South Carolina, Davis came back to the North, wrote a novel called the “Wanderings of William,” for Thompson, of Philadelphia, and, nevertheless, being in want of ready money, applied to Mr. Burr, now Vice-President, for a recommendation that might lead to government employment. The Vice-President very obligingly promised the indigent author a place in the Treasury Department. Davis set out for Washington, which at that time had only begun to emerge. The village of 1801 is thus described, as if by Goldsmith: “Washington, on my second journey to it wore a very dreary aspect. The multitude had gone to their homes, and the inhabitants of the place were few. There were no objects to catch the eye but a forlorn pilgrim forcing his way through the grass that overruns the streets, or a cow ruminating on a bank, from whose neck depended a bell, that the animal might be found the more readily in the woods. I obtained accommodations at the Washington Tavern, which stands opposite the Treasury. There I found seven Cherokee chiefs. They came to be instructed in the mode of European agriculture.” Presenting himself to Secretary Gallatin immediately after the Cherokee chiefs had descended the Treasury stairs, Davis was told by the Secretary that the Vice-President had made a mistake, and that there was no consulship or any other office to be had. Another instance of the startling difference between promise and fulfilment.“Finding a schooner at Georgetown ready to sail for Alexandria, I put my trunk on board of her, and left without regret the Imperial City. The wind being contrary, we had to work down the Potomac. The river here is very beautiful. Mason’s Island forms one continued garden; but what particularly catches the eye is the Capitol, rising with sacred majesty above the woods. It was easier landing at Alexandria in America than Alexandria in Egypt; and I found elegant accommodations at Gadesby’s hotel. It is observable that Gadesby keeps the best house of entertainment in the United States. The splendour of Gadesby’s hotel not suiting my finances, I removed to a public-house kept by a Dutchman.

“To what slight causes does a man owe some of the principal events of his life. I had been a fortnight at Alexandria, when, in consequence of the short advertisement I had put in the Gazette, a gentleman was deputed to wait on me from a Quaker, on the banks of the Occoquan, who wanted a Tutor for his children. The following evening I left Alexandria on horseback to visit the abode of Mr. Ellicott. Having crossed the bridge [at Colchester], which is built over the Occoquan, I alighted at the door of the tavern.

“Having ordered supper, I gazed with rapture on the Occoquan River, which ran close to the house, and, gradually enlarging, emptied itself into the capacious bosom of the Potomac. The fishermen on the shore were hawling their seine, and the sails of a little bark, stemming the waves, were distended by the breeze of night. The seaboy was lolling over the bow, and the helmsman was warbling a song to his absent fair.“The next day I proceeded to Occoquan; but so steep and craggy was the road that I found it almost inaccessible. On descending the last hill, I was nearly stunned by the noise of two huge mills, whose roar, without any hyperbolical aggravation, is scarcely inferior to that of the great falls of the Potomac, or the cataract of Niagara. My horse would not advance; and I was myself lost in astonishment.

“Friend Ellicott and his wife received me with an unaffected simplicity of manners, whom I was happy to catch just as they were going to dinner. An exquisite Virginia ham smoked on the board, and two damsels supplied the guests with boiled Indian corn, which they had gathered with their own hands. Friend Ellicott, uncorrupted by the refinement of modern manners, had put his hat to its right use, for it covered his head.

“Our agreement was soon made. Quakers are men of few words. Friend Ellicott engaged me to educate his children for a quarter of a year. He wanted them taught reading, writing, and arithmetic. Delightful task! As to Latin or French, he considered the study of either language an abuse of time; and very calmly desired me not to say another word about it.

“No place can be more romantic than the view of Occoquan to a stranger, after crossing the rustic bridge, which has been constructed by the inhabitants across its stream. He contemplates a river urging its course along mountains that lose themselves among the clouds; he beholds vessels taking on board flour under the foam of the mills, and others deeply laden expanding their sails to the breeze; while every face wears contentment, every gale wafts health, and echo from the rocks multiplies the voices of the waggoners calling to their teams.

“No walk could be more delightful than that from Occoquan to Colchester, when the moon was above the mountains. You traverse the bank of a placid stream over which impend rocks, in some cases bare, but more frequently covered with an odoriferous plant that regales the traveller with its fragrance. So serpentine is the course of the river that the mountains, which rise from its bank, may be said to form an amphitheatre; and nature seems to have designed the spot for the haunt only of fairies; for here grow flowers of purple dye, and here the snake throws her enamelled skin.

“After clambering over mountains, almost inaccessible to human toil, you come to the junction of the Occoquan with the noble river of the Potomac, and behold a bridge, whose semi-elliptical arches are scarcely inferior to those of princely London. And on the side of this bridge stands a tavern, where every luxury that money can purchase is to be obtained at a first summons; where the richest viands cover the table, and where ice cools the Madeira that has been thrice across the ocean.[N] The apartments are numerous and at the same time spacious; carpets of delicate texture cover the floors; and glasses are suspended from the walls in which a Goliah might survey himself. No man can be more complaisant than the landlord. Enter but his house with money in your pocket, and his features will soften into the blandishments of delight; call and your mandate is obeyed; extend your leg and the boot-jack is brought you.

“On the north bank of the Occoquan is a pile of stones, which indicates that an Indian warrior is interred underneath. The Indians from the back settlements, in traveling to the northward, never fail to leave the main road, and visit the grave of their departed hero. If a stone be thrown down, they religiously restore it to the pile; and, sitting round the rude monument, they meditate profoundly; catching, perhaps, a local emotion from the place.

“A party of Indians, while I was at Occoquan, turned from the common road into the woods to visit this grave on the bank of the river. The party was composed of an elderly Chief, twelve young War Captains, and a couple of Squaws. Of the women, the youngest was an interesting girl of seventeen; remarkably well shaped, and possessed of a profusion of hair, which in colour was raven black. She appeared such another object as the mind images Pocahontas to have been.

“The Indians being assembled round the grave, the old Chief rose with a solemn mien, and, knocking his war-club against the ground, pronounced an oration to the memory of the departed warrior. No orator of antiquity ever exceeded this savage chief in the force of his emphasis, and the propriety of his gesture. Indeed, the whole scene was highly dignified. The fierceness of his countenance, the flowing robe, elevated tone, naked arm, and erect stature, with a circle of auditors seated on the ground, and in the open air, could not but impress upon the mind a lively idea of the celebrated speakers of ancient Greece and Rome.

“Having ended his oration, the Indian struck his war-club with fury against the ground, and the whole party obeyed the signal by joining in a war-dance—leaping and brandishing their knives at the throats of each other, and accompanying their menacing attitudes with a whoop and a yell, which echoed with ten-fold horror from the banks of the river. The dance took place by moonlight, and it was scarcely finished, when the Chief produced a keg of whiskey, and having taken a draught, passed it round among his brethren. The squaws now moved the tomahawks into the woods, and a scene of riot ensued. The keg was soon emptied. The effects of the liquor began to display itself in the looks and motions of the Indians. To complete the scene, the old warrior was uttering the most mournful lamentations over the keg he had emptied; inhaling its flavour with his lips, holding it out with his hands in a supplicating attitude, and vociferating to the bye-standers, ‘Scuttawawbah! Scuttawawbah! More strong drink! More strong drink!’

“About eight miles from the Occoquan mills is a house of worship, called Powheek Church; a name it derives from a Run that flows near its walls. Hither I rode on Sundays and joined the congregation of Parson Weems. I was confounded on first entering the church-yard at Powheek to hear

‘Steed threaten steed with high and boastful neigh.’

Nor was I less stunned with the rattling of carriage-wheels, the cracking of whips, and the vociferations of the gentlemen to the negroes who accompanied them. But the discourse of Parson Weems calmed every perturbation.

“After church I made my salutations to Parson Weems, and having turned the discourse to divine worship, I asked him his opinion of the piety of the blacks. ‘Sir,’ said he, ‘no people in this country prize the Sabbath more seriously than the trampled-upon negroes. They are swift to hear; they seem to hear as for their lives.—How, sir, did you like my preaching?’ ‘Sir,’ cried I, ‘it was a sermon to pull down the proud and humble the haughty.’

“I had been three months at Occoquan. My condition was growing irksome. I, therefore, resigned my place to an old drunken Irishman, who was traveling the country on foot in search of an Academy. I remonstrated with Friend Ellicott on the impropriety of employing a sot to educate his children. ‘Friend,’ said he, ‘of all the schoolmasters I ever employed, none taught my children to write so good a hand, as a man who was constantly in a state that bordered on intoxication. They learned more of him in one month than of any other in a quarter. I will make trial of Burbridge.’”

Davis returned to New York, collecting a few dollars at Philadelphia, due him from sales of “The Wanderings of William.” In April, 1802, he was at Washington again, where Congress was in session. “I watched an opportunity to make the Vice-President my salutations as he came out of the Capitol. He demonstrated no little pleasure to see me; and his chariot being at the steps, he took me home with him to dine.” The House of Representatives was then sitting in a detached temporary building. Davis thought John Randolph the most eloquent in debate. After a few days in Washington, the itinerant passed on to Prince William County, where he had been engaged as tutor by Mr. Ball at twenty-five pounds the quarter. At Frying Pan, in Prince William County, Davis inquired the way. “How far, my boy,” said I, “is it to Frying Pan?” “You be in the Pan now,” replied the boy.

“Frying Pan is composed of four log huts and a meeting-house. It took its name from a curious circumstance. Some Indians, having encamped on the run, missed their frying pan in the morning, and hence the name was conferred on the place. I did not stop at Frying Pan, but prosecuted my walk to Newgate, where in the piazza of the tavern I found a party of gentlemen from the neighboring plantations carousing over a bowl of toddy and smoking segars. No people could exceed these men in politeness. On my ascending the steps to the piazza every countenance seemed to say: This man has a double claim to our attention because he is a stranger. In a moment there was room made for me to sit down; a new bowl was called for, and every one who addressed me did so with a smile of conciliation. The higher Virginians seem to venerate themselves as men. Whatever may be advanced against Virginians, their good qualities will ever outweigh their defects; and when the effervescence of youth has abated, when reason asserts her empire, there is no man on earth who discovers more exalted sentiments, more contempt for baseness, more love of justice, more sensibility of feeling, than a Virginian. At Newgate my pilgrimage was nearly at an end, for Mr. Ball’s plantation was only distant eight miles.”

Beyond Newgate, Bull Run was to be crossed. Having passed that famous stream, the pedagogue and peripatetic, after a mile or two, came to the Ball plantation. An old negro showed him the way, who related, among many other things, that when he was a young buck he made as much as fifteen dollars one winter as capitation money—“Master, I don’t tell you a word of a lie”—levied on the wolves of the region. At Mr. Ball’s: “In my way through the garden I passed two young ladies gathering roses, who, however immured in the woods, were clad with not less elegance than the most fashionable females of Europe. I asked them whether Mr. Ball was at home. They replied that their papa was in the parlour, and with much sweetness of manner directed me by the shortest path to the house. Mr. Ball[O] received me with undissembled accents of joy. He said he had long expected my coming and was gratified at last. I was not a little delighted with the suavity of his manners and the elegance of his conversation. I now opened what some called an Academy and others an Old Field School; and, however it may be thought that content was never felt within the walls of a seminary, I for my part experienced an exemption from care and was not such a fool as to measure the happiness of my condition by what others thought of it. Of the boys I can not speak in very encomiastic terms. Of my female students there was none equal in capacity to Virginia. Geography was one of our favorite studies. I often addressed the rose of May in an appropriate ode—

What with a horse, the artisanry of verse, a mild philosophy, and the business of his office, John Davis spent three months very agreeably on Bull Run, within sight of the Blue Ridge. Then a New Jersey farmer of the neighborhood discovered that his eldest boy wrote a better hand than the teacher. Davis resigned the academy to the carpenter of the plantation. “I now once more seized my staff and walked towards Baltimore. It was a killing circumstance to separate from Virginia (the student of geography), but who shall persume to contend against fate? Phyllida amo ante alias, nam me discedere flevit. I embarked August, 1802, in the good ship Olive, Captain Norman, lying at Baltimore, for Cowes, in the Isle of Wight.”