Full text of "Dorothy Q, together with A ballad of the Boston tea party & Grandmother's story of Bunker Hill battle"

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Dorothy

Together with

A Ballad of the Boston Tea Party

Grandmother's Story of Bunker Hill Battle

By Oliver Wendell Holmes

fVith Illustrations by

Howard Pyle

Boston and New York
Houghton, Mifflin and Company

by Google

ji/l rights reserved.

by Google

I OROTHY QUINCY, the subject of the
\ first poem in this volume, was aunt
of the first Josiah Quincy, Junior,
" that fervid orator -who expended
his life for the cause of his country, dying on ship-
board in sight of home, as he returned from Eng-
land after hostilities had begun only seven days."
She was also the aunt of a second Dorothy Quincy,
who became the wife of fohn Hancock, President
of the first Continental Congress.

The painting hung in the house of my grand-
father, Oliver Wendell, which was occupied by
British officers before the evacuation of Boston.
One of these gentlemen ainused kitnself by stabbing
poor Dorothy {the pictured one) as near the right
eye as his swordsmanship would serve him to do
it. The canvas was so decayed that it became neces-
sary to remount the painting, in the process of

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doing which the hole made by tke rafter was lost
sight of. I toq^ some photographs of the picture
before it was transferred to the new canvas.

The tax on tea, which was considered so odious
and led to the act on which A Ballad of the Boston
Tea Party is founded, was but a small matter,
only two pence in the pound. But it involved a
principle of taxation, to which tke Colonies would
not submit. Their objection was not to the amount,
but the claim. The East India Company, however,
sent out a number of tea-ships to different Amer-
ican ports, three of them to Boston.

The inhabitants tried to send them back, but in
vain. The captains of the ships had consented, if
permitted, to return with their cargoes to England,
but the consignees refused to discharge them from
their obligations, the custom house to give them a
clearance for their return, and the governor to
grant them a passport for going by the fori. It
was easily seen thai the tea would be gradually
landed from the ships lying so near the town, and
that if landed it would be disposed of, and the
purpose of establishing the monopoly and raising
a revenue effected To prevent the dreaded conse-
quence, a number of armed men, disguised like
Indians, boarded the ships and threw their whole
cargoes of tea into the dock. About seventeen per-
sons boarded the ships in Boston harbor, and
emptied three hundred and forty-two chests of tea. •
Among these '^Indians" was Major Thomas Mel-
> Holmu'i Aiaoit iff Amtrita, vol. ii. pp. iSi-i.

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ville, the same who suggested to me the poem,
" The Last Leaf."

The story of Bunker Hill battle is told as liter-
ally in accordance with the best authorities as it
would have been if it had been written in prose
instead of in verse. I have often been asked what
steeple it was from which the little group I speak
of looked upon the conflict. To this I answer that
I am not prepared to speak authoritatively, but
that the reader may take his choice among all the
steeples standing at that time in the northern part
of the city. Christ Church in Salem Street is the
one I always think of but I do not insist upon its
claim. As to the personages who made up the
small company that followed the old corporal, it
would be hard to identify them, but by ascertaining
where the portrait by Copley is now to be found,
some light may be thrown on their personality.

Daniel Malcolm^ s gravestone, splintered by Brit-
ish bullets, may be seen in the Copp's Hill burial-

O. W. H.

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DOROTHY Q.

Portrait of Dorothy Q., from a p^ting in the pos-
session of Dr. Holmes . . Frontispiice,

Half TiUe

Painting the Picttiie

" Girlish bust, but womanly air "

" Hint and promise of stately mien

" Soft b the tiieath of a maiden's 1

" Lady and lover "

A BALLAD OF THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY
" The Boston teapot bubbled "
Half Title

) of Tea

" Many a ^x-foot grenadier

The flattened grass had measu
" Her tearful memories treasured
" Behold the guests advancing"
"The lively barber"
" The truant tapster " .
" The cooper's boys "

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" The lusty young Fort-Hillers ''
" The Tories sei« the omen "
" The Mohiwk band is swarming "
" So gracious, sweet, ajid puning "
" The quiet dame "...

An Old North-Ender

GRANDMOTHER'S STORY OF BUNKER-HI
BATTLE
Watcbing the Battle from the Steeple

Half Title

The Grandmother ....

" Lord Percy's hunted soldiers " .

" Says grandma ' Wliat 's the matter ? ' "

" The Mohawks killed her father" .

" ' Don't you fret and worry any ' "

" Down my hair went as 1 hurried "

" The Corporal marched before "

" We climbed the creaking stair " .

" The earthwork hid them from us "

" The cannons' deafening thrill '■ .

" Like a gentleman of leisure " .

" The belled grenadiers "

" The barges gliding onward " .

" Again they formed in order "

" They wail and answer not " .

" The Corporal, our old cripple " ,

Dan'l Malcolm's Grave

" Jn the bush of expectation "

" Like a thunder-cloud it breaks "

" A headlong crowd is flying "

■"Aretheybeatenf'"

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" The]' ait baffled, not defeated " .
"The roofs of Charlestown blazing"
" We can see each massive column "

isralm

broken "

" The frightened braves of Howe
" We looked, poor timid creature
" ' Have a drop of old Jamaiky ' "
" They were creeping round to fo
" In dose array they come " .
" They su^fld above the breast-w
" They say I fainted " ,
" ' Here 's a soldier bleeding ' " .
" Brought him from the battle"
" I saw his eyes were blue "
" We came to know each other "
" His picture Copley painted " ,

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■^^

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Dorothy Q.

Grandmother's mother; her age, 1

Thirteen summers, or something less;
Girlish bust, but womanly air;
Smooth, square forehead, with- up-
rolled hair,
Lips that lover has never kissed;
Taper fingers and slender w
Hanging sleeves of stifE brocade ;
So they painted the little m^d.

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On her hand a parrot green
Sits unmoving and broods serene.
Hold up the canvas full in view, —
Loolil there's a rent the light shines

through.
Dark with a century's fringe of

dust,—
That was a Red-Coat's rapier thrust !
Such is the tale the lady old,
Dorothy's daughter's daughter, told.

Who the painter was none may tell, —
One whose Ijest was not over well ;
Hard and dry, it must be confessed,
Flat as a rose that has long been

pressed ;
Yet in her cheek the hues are bright.
Dainty colors of red and white.
And in her slender shape a
Hint and promise of stately mien.

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byGoogIc —

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Dear is that ancient name's

For many a civic wreath they won,

The youthful sire and the gray-haired

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And under the folds that look so still
The bodice swelled with the bosom's

thrill ?
Should I be I, or would it be
One tenth another, to nine tenths

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It shall be a blessing, my little maid !
I will heal the stab of the Red- Coat's

blade.
And freshen the gold of the tarnished

And gild with a rhyme your household

So you shall smile on us brave and

As first you greeted the morning's

light.
And live untroubled by woes and

Through a second youth of a hundred

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-4

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It kept King George so ]oiig awake,

His brain at last got addled,
It made the nerves of Britain shake,

With sevenscore millions saddled ;
Before that bitter cup was drained,

Amid the roar of cannon,
Tlie Western war-cloud's crimson

The Thames, the Clyde, the Shan-

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byGoogIc —

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Full many a six-foot grenadier

The flattened grass had measured,
And many a mother many a year

Her tearful memories treasured;
Fast spread the tempest's darkening
pall,

TTie mighty realms were troubled.
The storm broke loose, but first of all

The Boston teapot bubbled !

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An evening party, — only that,

No formal invitation.
No gold-laced coat, no stiff cravat,

No feast in contemplation,
Nosilk-robed dames, no fiddling band,

Noflowers, no songs, no dancing, —
A tribe of red men, axe in hand, —

Behold the guests advancing I

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&=.

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How fast the stragglers join the
throng.

From stall and workshop gathered 1
The lively barber skips along.

And leaves a chin half-lathered;

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The smith has flung his hammer

The horseshoe still is glowing;

The truant tapster at the Crown

Has left a beer-cask flowing;

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The cooper's boys have dropped the

And trot behind their master;

Up run the tarry ship-yard lads, —

The crowd is hurrying faster, —

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Out from the Millpond's purlieus
gush

The streams of white-faced millers,
And down their slippery alleys rush

The lusty young Fort-Hillers ;

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^'^

TI.eFoTt'Hillers

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3:^

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The ropewalk lends its 'prentice

The tones seize the omen :
" Ay, boys, you '11 soon have work to
do
For England's rebel foemen,
' King Hancock,' Adams, and their
gang.
That fire the mob with treason, —
When these we shoot and those we
hang,
The town will come to reason."

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On — on to where the tea-ships ride !

And now theirranks are forming, —
A rush, and up the Dartmouth's side

The Mohawit band is swarming!
See the fierce natives ! What a glimpse

Of paint and fur and feather,
As all at once the full-grown imps

Light on the deck together!
A scarf the pigtail's secret keeps,

A blanket hides the breeches, —
And out the cursM cargo leaps,

And overboard it pitches !

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O woman, at the evening board

So gracious, sweet, and purring,
So happy while the tea is poured,

So blest while spoons are stirring,
What martyr can compare with thee,

The mother, wife, or daughter.
That night, instead of best Bohea,

Condemned to milk and water )

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Ah, little dreams the quiet dame

Who plies with rock and spindle
The patient flas, how great a flame

Yon little spark shall kindle !
The lurid morning shall reveal

A fire no king can smother,
Where British flint and Boston steel

Have flashed against each other!
Old charters shrivel in its track,

His Worship's bench has crumbled,
It climbs and clasps the union-jack,

Its blazoned pomp is humbled,
The flags go down on land and sea

Like com before the reapers ;
So burned the fire that brewed the tea

That Boston served her keepers!

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The waves that wrought a century's
wreck

Have rolled o'er whig and tory ;
The Mohawks on the Dartmouth's
deck

Still live in song and story ;
The waters in the rebel bay

Have kept the tea-leaf savor ;
Our old North-Enders in their spray

Still taste a Hyson flavor;
And Freedom's teacup still o'eiflows

With ever fresh libations,
To cheat of slumber all her foes

And cheer the wakening nations !
S3

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'T IS like stirriog living embers when,

at eighty, one remembers
All the achings and the quakings of

" the times that tried men's

souls;"
When I talk of WAig and Tory,

when I tell the Jlede/ story.
To you the words are ashes, but to

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I had heard the muskets' rattle of the

April running battle ;
Lord Percy's hunted soldiers, I can

see their red coats still ;
But a deadly chill comes o'er me, as

the day looms up before me.
When a thousand men lay bleeding

on the slopes of Bunlcer's Hill.

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.'^^

byGoogIc —

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T was a peaceful summer's morning,
when the first thing gave us warn-
ing

Was the booming of the cannon from
the river and the shore :

" Child," says grandma, " what 's the
matter, what is all this noise and
clatter ?

Have those scalping Indian devib
come to murder us once more ? "
63

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Poor old soul ! my sides were shaking

in the midst of all my quaking,
To hear her talk of Indians when the

guns began to roar :
She had seen the burning village, and

the slaughter and the pillage,
When the Mohawks killed her father

with their bullets through his

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Then I said, " Now, dear old granny,
don't you fret and worry any,

For 1 11 soon come back and tell you
whether this is work or play;

There can't be mischief in it, so I

For

't be gone a minute " —
inute then I started.
gone the livelong day.

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No time for bodice-lacing orior look-
ing-glass grimacing ;

Down my hair went as I hurried,
tumbling half-way to my heels;

God forbid your ever knowing, when
there 's blood around her flowii^.

How the lonely, helpless daughter of
a quiet household feels !

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In the street I heard a thumping ; and

I knew it was the stumping
Of the Corporal, our old neighbor, on

that wooden leg he wore,
With a knot of women round him, —

it was lucky I had found him.
So I followed with the others, and the

Corporal marched before.

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They were making for the steeple, —

the old soldier and his people;
The pigeons circled round us as we

climbed the creaking stair,
Just across the narrow river — oh,

so close it made me shiverl —
Stood a fortress on the hill-top that

but yesterday was bare.

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Not slow our eyes to find it ; well we
knew who stood behind it,

Though the earthwork hid them from
us, and the stubboni waUs were

Here were sister, wife, and mother,
looking wild upon each other.

And their lips were white with terror
as they said. The hour has
come!

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The morning slowly wasted, not a

morsel had we tasted.
And our heads were almost splitting

with the cannons' deafening thrill,
When a iigure tall and stately round

the rampart strode sedately;
It was Prescott, one since told me ;

he commanded on the hill.
76

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V^^ r;

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Evety woman's heart grew bi^er
when we saw his manly figure,

With the banyan buckled round it,
standing up so straight and tall ;

Like a gentleman of leisure who is
strolling out for pleasure.

Through the storm of shells and can-
non-shot he walked around the
wall.

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At eleven the streets were swarming,
for the red-coats' ranks were
forming;

At noon in marching order they were
moving to the piers ;

How the bayonets gleamed and glis-
tened, as we looked far down, and
listened

To the trampling and the drum-beat
of the belted grenadiers !

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bvGoogle

At length the men have started, with

a. cheer (it seemed faint-hearted),
In their scarlet regimentals, with

their knapsacks on their backs,
And the reddening, rippling water, as

after a sea-light's slai^hter.
Round the barges gliding onward

blushed like blood along their

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So they crossed to the other border,

and again they formed in order ;
And the boats came back for soldiers,

cane for soldiers, soldiers still :
The time seemed everlasting to us

women faint and fasting, —
At last they 're moving, marching,

marching proudly up the hill.

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■VC>=

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We can see the bright steel glancing

all along the lines advancing —
Now the front rank tires a volley —

they have thrown away their shot ;
For behind their earthwork lying, all

the balls above them flying,
Our people need not hurry; SO they

wait and answer not.
87

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Then the Corporal, our old cripple

(he would swear sometimes and

tipple),—
He had heard the bullets whistle (in

the old French war) before, —
Calls out in words of jeering, just as

if they all were hearing, ^
And his wooden leg thumps fiercely

on the dusty belfry floor ; -^

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" Oh ! fire away, yc villains, and earn

King George's shillin's,
But ye 'II waste a ton of powder afore

a ' rebel ' falb ;
You may bang the dirt and welcome,

tliey're as safe as Dani Mai-
Ten foot beneath the gravestone that

you 've splintered with your

balb!"

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In the hush of expectation, in the

awe and trepidation
Of the dread approaching moment,

we are well-nigh breathless all ;
Though the rotten bars are failing on

the rickety belfry railing.
We are crowding up against them

like the waves against a wall.

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Just a glimpse (the air is clearer),
they are nearer, — nearer, —

When a flash — a curling smoke-
wreath — then a crash — the
steeple shakes —

The deadly truce is ended ; the tem-
pest's shroud is rended;

Like a morning mist it gathered,

like a thunder-cloud it breaks 1

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Oh the sight our eyes discover as the

blue-black smoke blows over !
The red-coats stretched in windrows

as a mower rakes his hay;
Here a. scarlet heap is lying, there a

headlong crowd is flying
Like a billow that has broken and is

shivered into spray.

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Then we cried, " The troops are

routed ! they are beat — it can't
be doubted 1
God be thanked, the fight is over!"
— Ah ! the grim old soldier's

" Tell us, tell us why you look so ? "
(we could hardly speak, we shook
so), —

" Are they beaten ? Are they beaten ?
Are they beaten?" — "Wait a

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Oh tlie trembling and the terror! for

They are baffled, not defeated; we
have driven them back in v^n ;

And the columns that were scattered,
round the colors that were tat-
tered,

Toward the sullen, silent fortress turn
their belted breasts again.

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All at once, as we are gazing, lo the

roofs of Charlestown blazing!
They have fired the harmless village;

in an how it will be down !
The Lord in heaven confound them,

rain his fire and brimstone round

them, —
The robbing, niurdering red-coats,

that would bum a peaceful town !

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They are inarching, stern and solemn;

we can see each massive column
As they near the naked earth-mound

with the slanting walls so steep.
Have our soldiers got faint-hearted,

and in noiseless haste departed ?
Are they panic-struck and helpless ?

Are they palsied or asleep?

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Now! the walla they 're almost under!
scarce a rod the foes asunder!

Not a firelock flashed against them !
up the earthwork they will swarm I

But the words have scarce been spo-
ken, when the ominous calm is

And a bellowing crash has emptied
all the vengeance of the storm 1

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So again, with murderous slaughter,

pelted backwards to the water,
Fly Pigot's running heroes and the

frightened braves of Howe ;
And we shout, " At last they 're done

for, it 's their barges they have

run for:
They are beaten, beaten, beaten ; aad

the battle 's over now ! "

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-- V

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And we looked, poor timid creatures,
on the rough old soldier's fea-

Our lips afraid to question, but he

knew what we would ask ;
" Not sure," he said ; " keep qiiiet, —

once more, I guess, they'll try

It-
Here 's damnation to the cut-throats ! "

— then he handed me his flask,

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Saying," " Gal, you 're looking shaky ;

have a drop fi old Jamaiky ;
I 'm afeard there '11 be more trouble

afore the job is done ; "
So I took one scorching swallow ;

dreadful faint I felt and hollow,
Standing there from early morning

when the firing was begun.

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All thrai^h those hours of trial I

had watched a calm clock di&l,
As the hands kept creeping, creeping,

— they were creeping round to

When the old man said, " They 're
fonning with their bagonets fixed
for storming :

It 's the death-grip that 's a-coming,

— they will try the works once
more."

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With brazen trumpets blaring, the

flames behind them glaring,
The deadly wall before them, in close

array they come ;
Still onward, upward toiling, like a

dragon's fold uncoiling, —
Like the rattlesnake's shrill warning

the reverberating drum !

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Over heaps all tom and gory — shall
I tell the fearful story,

How they surged above the breast-
work, as a sea breaks over a
deck;

How, driven, yet scarce defeated, our
worn-out men retreated,

With their powder-horns all emptied,
like the swimmers from a wreck ?

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It has all been told and painted ; as

for me, they say I fainted,
And the wooden-legged old Corporal

stumped with me down the stair :
When 1 woke from dreams afFrighted

the evening lamps were lighted, —
On the floor a youlh was lying ; his

bleeding breast was bare.

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And I heard through all the flurry,

"Send for Warren! hurry I

huny!
Tell him here 's a soldier bleeding,

and hell come and dress his

wound ! "
Ah, we knew not till the mofrow told

its tale of death and sorrow,
How the starlight found him stiilened

on the dark and bloody ground.

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Who Ihe youth was, what his name
was, where the place from which

Who had brought him from the bat-
tle, and had left him at our door.

He could not spealc to tell us; but
't was one of our brave fellows.

As the homespun plainly showed us
which the dying soldier wore.

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For they all thought he was dying,
as they gathered round him cry-
ing,—

And they said, " Oh, how they 'II miss
him ! " and " What will his
mother do ? "

Then, his eyelids just unclosing like
a child's that has been dozing.

He feJntly murmured, " Mother ! "
— and — I saw his eyes were

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" Why, grandma, how you 're wink-
ing '. " Ah, my child, it sets me
thinking

Of a story not like this one. Well,
he somehow lived along;

So we came to know each other, and
I nursed him like a — mother.

Till at last he stood before me, tall,
and rosy-cheeked, and strong.

i:,Googk'

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And we sometimes walked together
in the pleasant summer weather,

— " Please to tell us what his name
was ? " Just your own, my little

There 's his picture Copley painted :
we became so well acquainted,

That — in short, that 's why I 'm
grandma, and you children all

131

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Full text of "Dorothy Q, together with A ballad of the Boston tea party & Grandmother's story of Bunker Hill battle"

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