Various - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 3

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Charles Sumner often differed from the President, and on the floor of
the Senate Chamber frequently gave utterance to statements which carried
grief into the White House. But Mr. Lincoln knew and understood Charles
Sumner. An incident may here be recalled. The President was solicitous
that his views, as embodied in an act then claiming the attention of
Congress, should become law prior to the adjournment of that body on the
4th of March. Mr. Sumner opposed the bill, because he thought it did not
sufficiently guard the interests of the freedmen of that State. Owing to
the opposition of the Senator and a few of his friends the bill was
defeated. Mr. Lincoln felt displeased, and the newspapers throughout the
country published that the friendship which had so long existed between
the two men was at an end.

But Mr. Lincoln was not a man who would withdraw friendship on account
of an honest difference of opinion. It was not he who made the mistake
of urging the dismissal of Mr. Sumner from the chairmanship of the
Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. On the 4th of March Mr. Lincoln
was reinaugurated; on the evening of the 6th occurred the Inauguration
Ball. Mr. Sumner had never attended one of these state occasions, and he
did not purpose doing so at this time until he received, in the course
of the afternoon, the following letter:--

DEAR MR. SUMNER,--Unless you send me word to the contrary, I shall
this evening call with my carriage at your house, to take you with
me to the Inauguration Ball.

Sincerely yours,

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

The great Senator entered the ball-room, with Mrs. Lincoln leaning on
his arm, and took his seat by the side of the President. The evening was
pleasantly spent, and the newspapers at once discovered how great a
blunder they had made.

At length the curtain fell upon the bloody scenes of the war. Under the
mighty blows of Grant and his lieutenants the Rebellion was crushed.
On a bright day the President, accompanied by Mr. Sumner, entered the
streets of Richmond, and witnessed the grateful tears of thousands of
the race he had redeemed from bondage and disgrace. Having returned to
Washington, he convened a cabinet council on the 14th of April. During
the session his heart overflowed with kind and charitable thoughts
towards the South, and towards those officers who had deserted the flag
of their country in her trying hour he poured out a forgiving spirit.

After that cabinet meeting he went to drive with Mrs. Lincoln,--they two
were alone. "Mary," said he, "we have had a hard time of it since we
came to Washington; but the war is over, and, with God's blessing, we
may hope for four years of peace and happiness, and then we will go back
to Illinois and pass the rest of our lives in quiet. We have laid by
some money, and during this term we will try and save up more, but shall
not have enough to support us. We will go back to Illinois, and I will
open a law-office at Springfield or Chicago, and practise law, and at
least do enough to help give us a livelihood." Such were the dreams of
Abraham Lincoln the last day of his life. The whole world knows the
remainder of the story,--of that terrible night at the theatre; of that
passing away in the early dawn of the morning; of that sad and mournful
passage from the Capitol to the grave at Oak Ridge Cemetery. It is
painful to dwell upon it; it makes the heart faint even to recall it.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN needs no eulogy. There is but one other name in
American history which can be mentioned with his as that of a peer,--the
name of Washington. He was as pure, and just, and as patriotic as the
Father of his Country. He was born of his time, a creature of the age of
giants, a genius from the people, all the greater for his struggles, for
he really did more than any man of his day to destroy caste and give
courage to the lowly; and therein he wrote the brightest pages of
progress. The shaft that marks his silent resting-place, the books he
read, the office he used, the strong body that covered his warm heart
and wise purposes, were only the outer symbols to the higher gifts of
his Creator. All gifts and graces are not found in one person. He is
great in whom the good predominates. All persons are not born equal.
Gifts are diversified; but if ever a man had the "genius of greatness,"
it was Abraham Lincoln. As all are eloquent in that which they know, he
was eloquent in what he both knew and did.

A few words more. The President left a heart-broken widow, a woman whose
intellect was shattered by one of the most awful shocks in human
history. No mind can picture the agonies which she suffered, even till
the day of her death, on July 16, 1882. I make mention of her now,
because, during her eventful life in Washington and afterwards, she was
most cruelly treated by a portion of the press and people. I can
conceive of nothing so unmanly, so devoid of every chivalric impulse, as
the abuse of this poor, wounded, and bereft woman. But I am reminded of
the splendid outburst of eloquence on the part of Edmund Burke, when,
speaking of the heart-broken Queen of France, he said:--

"Little did I dream that I should live to see such disasters fall upon
her in a nation of gallant men,--a nation of men of honor, cavaliers.
I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards to
avenge even a look that threatened her with insult. But the age of
chivalry is gone."

"Lincoln was incontestably the greatest man I ever knew. What marked
him was his sincerity, his kindness, his clear insight into affairs,
his firm will and clear policy. I always found him preeminently a
clear-minded man. The saddest day of my life was that of Lincoln's
assassination."--U.S. GRANT.

[The death of GENERAL GRANT has occurred since this article was put into
type.--_Ed._]

* * * * *

NANTASKET BEACH.

By Edward P. Guild.

The outline of Boston harbor somewhat resembles a very irregular
letter C, with its open side facing to the north-east. The upper horn
terminates with Point Shirley, in the town of Winthrop. The lower horn
is a narrow ridge of land of varying width, extending four miles from
the mainland, then abruptly turning to the westward for three miles.
This peninsula is the town of Hull; the sharp elbow is Point Allerton.

The stretch of four miles from the point to the mainland is of greatly
varying width, the harbor side being of most irregular and fantastic
outline; but the side toward the sea is smooth and even, and forms
Nantasket Beach,--one of the most popular watering-places on the
Atlantic coast.

The development of Nantasket as a summer resort began a long time ago,
although the era of large hotels and popular excursions began in the
last few years. Forty or fifty vears ago people from Boston, Dorchester,
Hingham, and other towns, when hungering for a sniff of unalloyed
sea-breeze, or a repast of the genuine clam-chowder, were in the habit
of resorting to this beach, where they could pitch their tents, or
find accommodations in the rather humble cottages which were already
beginning to dot the shore. That the delights of the beach were
appreciated then is evinced by the habitual visits of many noted men of
the time, among them Daniel Webster, who often came here for recreation,
usually bringing his gun with him that he might indulge his sporting
proclivities; and, according to his biographer, "he was a keen
sportsman. Until past the age of sixty-five he was a capital shot; and
the feathered game in his neighborhood was, of course, purely wild. He
used to say, after he had been in England, that shooting in 'preserves'
seemed to him very much like going out and murdering the barn-door
fowl. His shooting was of the woodcock, the wild-duck, and the various
marsh-birds that frequent the coast of New England.... Nor would he
unmoor his dory with his 'bob and line and sinker,' for a haul of cod or
hake or haddock, without having Ovid, or Agricola, or Pharsalia, in the
pocket of his old gray overcoat, for the 'still and silent hour' upon
the deep."

Another frequent visitor--Peter Peregrine--wrote: "The Nantasket Beach
is the most beautiful I ever saw. It sweeps around in a majestic curve,
which, if it were continued so as to complete the circle, would of
itself embrace a small sea. There was a gentle breeze upon the water,
and the sluggish waves rolled inward with a languid movement, and broke
with a low murmur of music in long lines of foam against the opposite
sands. The surface of the sea was, in every direction, thickly dotted
with sails; the air was of a delicious temperature, and altogether it
was a scene to detain one for hours."

Evidently, Peter was a lover of nature at the sea-side; but to show that
those who sojourned here forty years ago were not unexposed to ridicule,
the following extract is given from a letter written from Hull in 1846:
"The public and private houses at Nantasket are overrun with company,
chiefly from Boston. Some of our fashionable people, as the rich are
vulgarly called, will leave their airy, cool, well-appointed
establishments in Boston, with every luxury the market affords, in the
vain hope of finding comfort in such houses. They will leave their city
palaces, the large and convenient rooms, comfortable bedsteads and
mattresses, and all the delicacies of the season, and submit to being
stowed away on straw-beds or cots, even upon the floor, half-a-dozen in
a small chamber, or four deep in an entry, to be half-starved into the
bargain upon badly cooked fish and other equally cheap commodities, for
the mere sake of being able to think that they are enjoying the
sea-breeze." Had the writer of this satire lived to lodge for a night in
one of the palace hotels which now adorn Nantasket Beach he would have
sung another song.

The peninsula of Hull is graced by three gentle elevations,--Atlantic
Hill, a rocky eminence marking the southern limit of the beach; Sagamore
Hill, a little farther to the north; and Strawberry Hill, about midway
to Point Allerton. The last of these elevations is the most noted of
the three. On its summit is an old barn, which is not only a well-known
landmark for sea-voyagers, but a point of the triangulations of the
official harbor surveys. In 1775 a large barn, containing eighty tons
of hay, was burned on this spot by the Americans, that it might not be
secured by the British. The splendid scene which this fire must have
produced was doubtless applauded with even more enthusiasm than the
great illuminations which are now a part of each season's events at the
beach.

It is said that fierce conflicts among the savages used to often occur
on the plains extending toward Point Allerton, before these parts were
invaded by the white man. The theory has arisen from the finding of
large numbers of skulls, bones, arrows, tomahawks, and other relics in
this locality.

The trip to Nantasket from Boston by boat on a summer day is most
delightful, affording a sail of an hour among the most interesting
objects of Boston harbor. The point of departure is at Rowe's wharf,
near the foot of Broad street, where the passenger steps on board one of
the well-equipped steamers of the Boston and Hingham Steamboat Company.
The course down to Nix's Mate, and thence to Pemberton, is quite
straight, but the route the remainder of the way, especially after
entering Weir river, is so tortuous as to cause the passenger to
constantly believe that the boat is just going to drive against the
shore. Upon the arrival at Nantasket pier the passenger is aware that he
is at a popular resort. Barges and coaches line the long pier; ambitious
porters give all possible strength of inflection to the names of their
respective hotels; while innumerable _menu_ cards are thrust into
the visitors' hands, each calling particular attention to the chowders
of the ------ House as being the best to be had on the New England
coast.

Two minutes' walk is sufficient to cross from the steamboat-pier over
the narrow ridge of land to the beach. The difference between one side
and the other is very striking. On the one is the still, dark water of
Weir river; on the other, the open sea and the rolling surf. The beach
at once impresses the visitor as being remarkably fine, and, indeed, it
is equalled by none on the coast, unless, possibly, by Old Orchard. The
sands are hard and firm, and at low tide form a spacious boulevard for
driving or walking. Before the eye is the open sea, dotted here and
there with glistening sails. The long, dark vessel which appears in the
distance, about four o'clock on Saturday afternoon, is a Cunard steamer,
which has just left East Boston for its voyage to Liverpool. For two or
three hours it is in sight, slowly and majestically moving toward the
horizon.

The scene on the beach is in marked contrast to what might have been
witnessed a generation ago. Then one would have found here and there
a family group just driven down in the old-fashioned carryall, and
enjoying a feast of clam-chowder cooked over a fire of drift-wood. Now
the beach is thronged by crowds of many thousands; immense hotels vie
with those of the metropolis in grandeur; there are avenues and parks,
flying horses, tennis-grounds, shops for the sale of everything that the
city affords, and some that it does not, dog-carts and goat-wagons,
fruit and peanut-stands, bowling-alleys, shooting-targets, and, in fact,
as many devices to empty the pocket-book as are usually found at a
cattle-show and a church-fair together. An excursion party has just
arrived, but this occurs, sometimes, several times in a day,--for
Nantasket is a Mecca to the excursionist. Societies and lodges come
here; clubs resort hither for a social dinner; mercantile firms send
their employes on an annual sail to this place, and philanthropists
provide for hundreds of poor children a day's outing on this beach.

Thus, there is no exclusiveness about Nantasket; but, at the same time,
the tone of the place is excellent, and there seems to be no tendency
toward its falling into disrepute, as has been the case with other
very popular watering-places. It is, in fact, admitted by a New York
newspaper that "Bostonians are justly proud of Nantasket Beach, where
one can get cultured clams, intellectual chowder, refined lager, and
very scientific pork and beans. It is far superior to our monotonous
sand-beach in its picturesqueness of natural beauty, in the American
character of the visitors, and in the reasonableness of hotel charges,
as well as the excellence of the service."

The oldest of the large hotels now in existence at the beach is the
Rockland House, which was opened in 1854 by Colonel Nehemiah Ripley, who
was proprietor for many years. At first, it had forty rooms; it now has
about two hundred, and is beautifully furnished. It stands at the head
of a broad, rising lawn, and from its balconies and windows the view of
the sea is magnificent. It is now in the hands of Russell & Sturgis, who
are also proprietors of the Hotel Nantasket,--the most effective in its
architecture of any of the great houses here. Its towers and pinnacles
are numbered by the score, and it has the broadest of piazzas. In front
of the hotel, toward the water, is the band-stand from which Reeve's
celebrated band gives two concerts daily during the season, their
entrancing music mingling with the monotone of the surf, to the delight
of large audiences which assemble on the piazzas.

The Rockland Cafe, also under the same management, is joined to the
hotel by a long arcade, and enjoys an excellent reputation for its
chowders and fish dinners.

The Atlantic House, which crowns the hill of the same name, is a
spacious and elegant hotel, always filled during the season with guests,
including many of the representatives of wealth and culture in the
metropolis. The view from here is very grand, commanding the entire
beach and a vast expanse of the sea. The proprietors are L. Damon &
Sons.

Bathing is, naturally enough, a prominent feature of Nantasket's
attractions. Bath-houses are scattered all along the beach, where one
may, for a small sum,--fifty to two-hundred per cent. of its
value,--obtain the use of a suit for as long a time as he or she may
choose to buffet the waves of the briny Atlantic. The most appreciative
patrons of the surf seem to be the children, who are always ready to
pull off shoes and stockings, and, armed with a wooden pail and shovel,
amuse themselves with digging sand, and letting the surf break over
their feet. It is very evident that not a few older people envy the
children in this innocent amusement.

It is said that the life of the hotels and the drift of excursionists,
great as they appear, are falling into the background, while the
popularity of cottage life is rapidly on the increase. This plan is much
more economical than boarding at the highest-price hotels, although
those who have ample means find a summer spent at either the houses of
Russell & Sturgis, or at the hostelry of Damon & Sons, most eminently
satisfactory in every respect. New cottages spring up like mushrooms
every year from one end of the beach to the other, and they represent
every style of architecture, although Queen Anne is held responsible for
the most frequent style as yet. But in size, coloring, and expense the
cottages vary as widely as the tastes and wealth of their several
owners. "There are big houses and little; houses like the Chinese
pagodas in old Canton blue-ware; houses like castles, with towers and
battlements; houses like nests, and houses like barracks; houses with
seven gables, and houses with none at all."

During the heavy easterly gales of winter seaweed and kelp are washed
ashore in great quantities. This is carted off by the farmers, who find
it valuable as a fertilizer, and they are indebted to the sea for
thousands of dollars' worth of this product every year. Nantasket in
winter presents a gloomy contrast to its life and gayety in the summer.
The winds are cold and fierce. The pretty cottages are deserted, and the
sea moans with a sound betokening peril to the craft that ventures to
tempt the waves. The nearly buried timbers of old vessels that are seen
in the sands are relics of disaster in years gone by.

But in the summer months, Nantasket must ever remain a sea-side paradise
to those who know its attractions.

* * * * *

IDLENESS.

By Sidney Harrison.

A flutter 'mid the branches, and my heart
Leaps with the life in that full chirp that breathes;
The brown, full-breasted sparrow with a dart
Is at my feet amid the swaying wreaths
Of grass and clover; trooping blackbirds come
With haughty step; the oriole, wren and jay
Revel amid the cool, green moss in play,
Then off in clouds of music; while the drum
Of scarlet-crested woodpecker from yon
Old Druid-haunting oak sends toppling down
A ruined memory of ages past;
O life and death--how blended to the last!

* * * * *

THE GRIMKE SISTERS.

THE FIRST AMERICAN WOMEN ADVOCATES OF ABOLITION AND WOMAN'S RIGHTS.

By George Lowell Austin.

This is an era of recollections. The events of twenty and twenty-five
years ago are being read and reconsidered anew with as much interest as
though they were the fresh and important events of the present. It was
long claimed by those who believed that they thought and wrote with
authority that not only was slavery the main cause of the civil war in
America, but that the abolition of slavery was its chiefest object.
A more sober criticism of the motives and deeds of those who were the
prime actors in that inglorious struggle has tended somewhat to alter
this opinion. It will, however, be again called to mind by a forthcoming
biography,--that of Sarah and Angelina Grimke, better known as "the
Grimke Sisters." The task of preparing this biography was intrusted to
Mrs. Catherine H. Birney, of Washington, who knew the sisters well, and
who lived for several years under the same roof with them.

There need be no hesitation in saying this book is one of the most
interesting and valuable contributions to the history of abolitionism
ever published. From first to last, during that momentous struggle, the
phrase "the Grimke Sisters" was familiar to everybody, and the part
which they enacted in the struggle was no less familiar. Mr. Phillips
often spoke of them in his public addresses; they were prominent members
of the anti-slavery societies; they themselves frequently appeared
before large audiences on public platforms. Indeed, no history of the
great moral cause would be complete that was not, in large part, made up
of their noble deeds; and no less valiantly did they contend for Woman's
Rights.

SARAH and ANGELINA GRIMKE were born in Charleston, South Carolina;
Sarah, Nov. 26, 1792; Angelina, Feb. 20, 1805. They were the daughters
of the Hon. John Fauchereau Grimke, a colonel in the revolutionary war,
and judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina. His ancestors were
German on the father's side, French on the mother's; the Fauchereau
family having left France in consequence of the revocation of the Edict
of Nantes in 1685.

Judge Grimke's position, character, and wealth placed his family among
the leaders of the very exclusive society of Charleston. His children
were accustomed to luxury and display, to the service of slaves, and to
the indulgence of every selfish whim, although the father's practical
common-sense led him to protest against the habits to which such
indulgences naturally led. To Sarah he paid particular attention, and
was often heard to declare that if she had been of the other sex she
would have made the greatest jurist in the land.

Children are born without prejudice, and the young children of Southern
planters never felt or made any difference between their white and
colored playmates. So that there is nothing singular in the fact that
Sarah Grimke early felt such an abhorrence of the whole institution of
slavery that she was sure it was born in her.

When Sarah was twelve years old two important events occurred to
interrupt the even tenor of her life. Her brother Thomas was sent off to
Yale College, leaving her companionless; but a little sister, Angelina
Emily, the last child of her parents, and the pet and darling of Sarah
from the moment the light dawned upon her blue eyes, came to take his
place. Sarah almost became a mother to this little one; whither she led,
Angelina followed closely.

In 1818 Judge Grimke's health began to decline. So faithful did Sarah
nurse him that when it was decided that he should go to Philadelphia,
she was chosen to accompany him. This first visit to the North was the
most important event of Sarah's life, for the influences and impressions
there received gave some shape to her vague and wayward fancies, and
showed her a gleam of the light beyond the tangled path which still
stretched before her.

Her father died; and in the vessel which carried his remains from
Philadelphia Sarah met a party of Friends. She talked with them on
religious matters, and after a few months acknowledged to one of them,
in the course of a correspondence, her entire conversion to Quakerism.
Ere long circumstances and the inharmonious life in her family urged her
again to seek Philadelphia, where she arrived in May, 1821. Angelina
remained at Charleston, where she grew up a gay, fashionable girl.

We pass over the interesting correspondence which, from this time
onward, was carried on between the sisters.

The strong contrast between Sarah and Angelina Grimke was shown not
only in their religious feelings, but in their manner of treating the
ordinary concerns of life, and in carrying out their convictions of
duty. In her humility, and in her strong reliance on the "inner light,"
Sarah refused to trust her own judgment, even in the merest trifles,
such as the lending of a book to a friend, postponing the writing of a
letter, or sweeping a room to-day when it might be better to defer it
until to-morrow. She says of this: "Perhaps to some, who have been led
by higher ways than I have been into a knowledge of the truth, it may
appear foolish to think of seeking direction in little things, but my
mind has for a long time been in a state in which I have often felt a
fear how I came in or went out, and I have found it a precious thing to
stop and consult the mind of truth, and be governed thereby."

Already the sisters had begun to reflect upon the evils of slavery.
Evidences of the tenor of their reflection are furnished in their
letter, and also in Sarah's diary, which she commenced in 1828. Angelina
was the first to express her abhorrence of the whole system; while
Sarah's mind, for a while at least, was too much absorbed by her
disappointed hopes and her trials in the ministry to allow her to do
much more than express sympathy with Angelina's anti-slavery sentiments.

In the autumn of 1829 Angelina left Charleston never to return, and made
her home with Sarah in the home of Catherine Morris. She soon became
interested in Quakerism, and eventually joined the Society. The daily
records of their lives and thoughts, for the ensuing four or five years,
exhibit them in the enjoyment of their quiet home, visiting prisons,
hospitals, and almshouses, and mourning over no sorrow or sins but their
own. Angelina was leading a life of benevolent effort, too busy to admit
of the pleasure of society, and her Quaker associations did not favor
contact with the world's people, or promote knowledge of the active
movements in the larger reforms of the day. As to Sarah, she was
suffering keenly under a great sorrow of her life.

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