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But every one loved him, even to Remarkable Pettibone, to whom he occasioned
some additional trouble; he was so frank, so sincere, and, at times, so
mirthful. He was now in his regular Christmas visit, and had not been in the
village an hour, when Richard summoned him to fill a seat in the sleigh, to
meet the landlord and his daughter.
Before explaining the character and situation of Mr. Grant, it will be
necessary to recur to times far back in the brief history of the settlement.
There seems to be a tendency in human nature to endeavour to provide for the
wants of this world, before our attention is turned to the business of the
other. Religion was a quality but little cultivated, amid the stumps of
Temple s Patent, for the first few years of its settlement; but as most of its
inhabitants were from the moral states of Connecticut and Massachusetts, when
the wants of nature were satisfied, they began seriously to turn their
attention to the introduction of those customs and observances, which had been
the principal care of their forefathers. There was certainly a great variety
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of opinions, on the subject of grace and free-will amongst the tenantry of
Marmaduke; and, when we take into consideration the variety of the religious
instruction which they received, it can easily be seen, that it could not well
be otherwise.
Soon after the village had been formally laid out, into the streets andblocks
that resembled a city, a meeting of its inhabitants had been convened, to take
into consideration the propriety of establishing an Academy! This measure
originated with Richard, who, in truth, was much disposed to have the
institution designated a University, or at least a College. Meeting after
meeting was held, for this purpose, year after year. Theresolutions of these
assemblages appeared in the most conspicuous columns of a little, bluelooking
newspaper, that was already issued weekly from the garret of a dwelling-house
in the village, and which the traveller might as often see, stuck into the
fissure of a stake, that had been erected, at the point where the footpath
from the log cabin of some settler entered the highway, as a post-office for
an individual. Sometimes the stake supported a small box, and a whole
neighbourhood received a weekly supply, for their literary wants, at this
point, where the man who rides post, regularly deposited a bundle of the
precious commodity. To these flourishing resolutions, which briefly recounted
the general utility of education, the political and geographical rights of the
village of Templeton, to a participation in the favours of the regents of the
university, and the salubrity of the air, and wholesomeness of the water,
together with the cheapness of food, and the superior state of morals in the
neighbourhood, were uniformly annexed, in large Roman capitals, the names of
Marmaduke Temple, as chairman, and Richard Jones, as secretary.
Happily for the success of this undertaking, the regents were not accustomed
to resist these appeals to their generosity, whenever there was the prospect
of a donation to second the request. Eventually, Judge Temple concluded to
bestow the necessary land, and to erect the required edifice chiefly at his
own expense. The skill of Mr., or, as he was now called, from the circumstance
of his having received the commission of a justice of the peace, Squire
Doolittle, was again put in requisition, and the science of Mr. Jones was once
more restored to.
We shall not recount the different devices of these architects on the
occasion; nor would it be decorous so to do, seeing that there was a
convocation of the society of the ancient and honourable fraternity of the
free and accepted masons, at the head of whom was Richard, in the capacity of
master, doubtless to approve or reject, such of the plans as, in their wisdom,
they deemed to be for the best. The knotty point was, however, soon decided;
and, on the appointed day, the brotherhood marched, in great state, displaying
sundry banners and mysterious symbols, each man with a little mimic apron
before him, from a most cunningly contrived appartment in the garret of the
Bold Dragoon, an inn, kept by one Captain Hollister, to the site of the
intended edifice. Here Richard laid the corner-stone, with great state, amidst
an assemblage of more than half the men, and all the women, within ten miles
of Templeton.
In the course of the succeeding week, there was another meeting of the
people, not omitting swarms of the gentler sex, when the abilities of Hiram,
at the square rule, were put to the test of experiment. The frame fitted
well; and the skeleton of the fabric was reared without a single accident, if
we except a few falls from horses, while the labourers were returning home in
the dusk of the evening. From this time, the work advanced with great
rapidity, and in the course of the season, the labour was completed; the
edifice standing, in all its beauty and proportions, the boast of the village,
the study of the young aspirants for architectural fame, and the admiration of
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every settler on the Patent.
It was a long, narrow house, of wood, painted white, and more than half
windows; and when the observer stood at the western side of the building, the
edifice offered but a small obstacle to a full view of the rising sun. It was,
in truth, but a very comfortless, open place, through which the daylight shone
with prodigious facility. On its front were divers ornaments, in wood,
designed by Richard, and executed by Hiram; but a window in the centre of the
second story, immediately over the door, or grand entrance, and the steeple,
were the pride of the building. The former was, we believe, of the composite
order, for it included in its composition a multitude of ornaments, and a
great variety in figure. It consisted of an arched compartment in the centre,
with a square, and smaller division on either side, the whole encased in heavy
frames, deeply and laboriously moulded in pine wood, and lighted with a vast
number of blurred and green-looking glass, of those dimensions which are
commonly called eight by ten. Blinds, that were intended to be painted
green, kept the window in a state of preservation, and probably might have
contributed to the effect of the whole, had not the failure in the public
funds, which seems always to be incidental to any undertaking of this kind,
left them in the sombre coat of lead colour with which they had been
originally clothed. The steeple was a little cupola, reared on the very
centre of the roof, on four tall pillars of pine, that were fluted with a
gouge, and loaded with mouldings. On the tops of the columns was reared a
dome, or cupola, resembling in shape an inverted tea-cup without its bottom,
from the centre of which projected a spire, or shaft of wood, transfixed with
two iron rods, that bore on their ends the letters N. S. E. and W., in the
same metal. The whole was surmounted by an imitation of one of the finny
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