Chapter 18

OLDTOWN FOLKS, 1869.

PROFESSOR STOWE THE ORIGINAL OF "HARRY" IN "OLDTOWN FOLKS."--PROFESSOR
STOWE'S LETTER TO GEORGE ELIOT.--HER REMARKS ON THE SAME.--PROFESSOR
STOWE'S NARRATIVE OF HIS YOUTHFUL ADVENTURES IN THE WORLD OF SPIRITS.
--PROFESSOR STOWE'S INFLUENCE ON MRS. STOWE'S LITERARY LIFE.--GEORGE
ELIOT ON "OLDTOWN FOLKS."

This biography would be signally incomplete without some mention of
the birth, childhood, early associations, and very peculiar and
abnormal psychological experiences of Professor Stowe. Aside from the
fact of Dr. Stowe's being Mrs. Stowe's husband, and for this reason
entitled to notice in any sketch of her life, however meagre, he is
the original of the "visionary boy" in "Oldtown Folks;" and "Oldtown
Fireside Stories" embody the experiences of his childhood and youth
among the grotesque and original characters of his native town.

March 26, 1882, Professor Stowe wrote the following characteristic
letter to Mrs. Lewes:--

MRS. LEWES,--I fully sympathize with you in your disgust with Hume and
the professing mediums generally.

Hume spent his boyhood in my father's native town, among my relatives
and acquaintances, and he was a disagreeable, nasty boy. But he
certainly has qualities which science has not yet explained, and some
of his doings are as real as they are strange. My interest in the
subject of spiritualism arises from the fact of my own experience,
more than sixty years ago, in my early childhood. I then never thought
of questioning the objective reality of all I saw, and supposed that
everybody else had the same experience. Of what this experience was
you may gain some idea from certain passages in "Oldtown Folks."

The same experiences continue yet, but with serious doubts as to the
objectivity of the scenes exhibited. I have noticed that people who
have remarkable and minute answers to prayer, such as Stilling,
Franke, Lavater, are for the most part of this peculiar temperament.
Is it absurd to suppose that some peculiarity in the nervous system,
in the connecting link between soul and body, may bring some, more
than others, into an almost abnormal contact with the spirit-world
(for example, Jacob Boehme and Swedenborg), and that, too, without
correcting their faults, or making them morally better than others?
Allow me to say that I have always admired the working of your mind,
there is about it such a perfect uprightness and uncalculating
honesty. I think you are a better Christian without church or theology
than most people are with both, though I am, and always have been in
the main, a Calvinist of the Jonathan Edwards school. God bless you! I
have a warm side for Mr. Lewes on account of his Goethe labors.

Goethe has been my admiration for more than forty years. In 1830 I got
hold of his "Faust," and for two gloomy, dreary November days, while
riding through the woods of New Hampshire in an old-fashioned
stagecoach, to enter upon a professorship in Dartmouth College, I was
perfectly dissolved by it.

Sincerely yours,

C. E. STOWE.

In a letter to Mrs. Stowe, written June 24, 1872, Mrs. Lewes alludes
to Professor Stowe's letter as follows: "Pray give my special thanks
to the professor for his letter. His handwriting, which does really
look like Arabic,--a very graceful character, surely,--happens to be
remarkably legible to me, and I did not hesitate over a single word.
Some of the words, as expressions of fellowship, were very precious to
me, and I hold it very good of him to write to me that best sort of
encouragement. I was much impressed with the fact--which you have told
me--that he was the original of the "visionary boy" in "Oldtown
Folks;" and it must be deeply interesting to talk with him on his
experience. Perhaps I am inclined, under the influence of the facts,
physiological and psychological, which have been gathered of late
years, to give larger place to the interpretation of vision-seeing as
subjective than the professor would approve. It seems difficult to
limit--at least to limit with any precision--the possibility of
confounding sense by impressions derived from inward conditions with
those which are directly dependent on external stimulus. In fact, the
division between within and without in this sense seems to become
every year a more subtle and bewildering problem."

In 1834, while Mr. Stowe was a professor in Lane Theological Seminary
at Cincinnati, Ohio, he wrote out a history of his youthful adventures
in the spirit-world, from which the following extracts are taken:--

"I have often thought I would communicate to some scientific physician
a particular account of a most singular delusion under which I lived
from my earliest infancy till the fifteenth or sixteenth year of my
age, and the effects of which remain very distinctly now that I am
past thirty.

"The facts are of such a nature as to be indelibly impressed upon my
mind they appear to me to be curious, and well worth the attention of
the psychologist. I regard the occurrences in question as the more
remarkable because I cannot discover that I possess either taste or
talent for fiction or poetry. I have barely imagination enough to
enjoy, with a high degree of relish, the works of others in this
department of literature, but have never felt able or disposed to
engage in that sort of writing myself. On the contrary, my style has
always been remarkable for its dry, matter-of-fact plainness: my mind
has been distinguished for its quickness and adaptedness to historical
and literary investigations, for ardor and perseverance in pursuit of
the knowledge of facts,--_eine verst�ndige Richtung_, as the
Germans would say,--rather than for any other quality; and the only
talent of a higher kind which I am conscious of possessing is a turn
for accurate observation of men and things, and a certain broad humor
and drollery.

"From the hour of my birth I have been constitutionally feeble, as
were my parents before me, and my nervous system easily excitable.
With care, however, I have kept myself in tolerable health, and my
life has been an industrious one, for my parents were poor and I have
always been obliged to labor for my livelihood.

"With these preliminary remarks, I proceed to the curious details of
my psychological history. As early as I can remember anything, I can
remember observing a multitude of animated and active objects, which I
could see with perfect distinctness, moving about me, and could
sometimes, though seldom, hear them make a rustling noise, or other
articulate sounds; but I could never touch them. They were in all
respects independent of the sense of touch, and incapable of being
obstructed in any way by the intervention of material objects; I could
see them at any distance, and through any intervening object, with as
much ease and distinctness as if they were in the room with me, and
directly before my eyes. I could see them passing through the floors,
and the ceilings, and the walls of the house, from one apartment to
another, in all directions, without a door, or a keyhole, or crevice
being open to admit them. I could follow them with my eyes to any
distance, or directly through or just beneath the surface, or up and
down, in the midst of boards and timbers and bricks, or whatever else
would stop the motion or intercept the visibleness of all other
objects. These appearances occasioned neither surprise nor alarm,
except when they assumed some hideous and frightful form, or exhibited
some menacing gesture, for I became acquainted with them, as soon as
with any of the objects of sense. As to the reality of their existence
and the harmlessness of their character, I knew no difference between
them and any other of the objects which met my eye. They were as
familiar to me as the forms of my parents and my brother; they made up
a part of my daily existence, and were as really the subjects of my
consciousness as the little bench on which I sat in the corner by my
mother's knee, or the wheels and sticks and strings with which I
amused myself upon the floor. I indeed recognized a striking
difference between them and the things which I could feel and handle,
but to me this difference was no more a matter of surprise than that
which I observed between my mother and the black woman who so often
came to work for her; or between my infant brother and the little
spotted dog Brutus of which I was so fond. There was no time, or
place, or circumstance, in which they did not occasionally make their
appearance. Solitude and silence, however, were more favorable to
their appearance than company and conversation. They were more pleased
with candle-light than the daylight. They were most numerous,
distinct, and active when I was alone and in the dark, especially when
my mother had laid me in bed and returned to her own room with the
candle. At such times, I always expected the company of my serial
visitors, and counted upon it to amuse me till I dropped asleep.
Whenever they failed to make their appearance, as was sometimes the
case, I felt lonely and discontented. I kept up a lively conversation
with them,--not by language or by signs, for the attempt on my part to
speak or move would at once break the charm and drive them away in a
fret, but by a peculiar sort of spiritual intercommunion.

"When their attention was directed towards me, I could feel and
respond to all their thoughts and feelings, and was conscious that
they could in the same manner feel and respond to mine. Sometimes they
would take no notice of me, but carry on a brisk conversation among
themselves, principally by looks and gestures, with now and then an
audible word. In fact, there were but few with whom I was very
familiar. These few were much more constant and uniform in their
visits than the great multitude, who were frequently changing, and too
much absorbed in their own concerns to think much of me. I scarcely
know how I can give an idea of their form and general appearance, for
there are no objects in the material world with which I can compare
them, and no language adapted to an accurate description of their
peculiarities. They exhibited all possible combinations of size,
shape, proportion, and color, but their most usual appearance was with
the human form and proportion, but under a shadowy outline that seemed
just ready to melt into the invisible air, and sometimes liable to the
most sudden and grotesque changes, and with a uniform darkly bluish
color spotted with brown, or brownish white. This was the general
appearance of the multitude; but there were many exceptions to this
description, particularly among my more welcome and familiar visitors,
as will be seen in the sequel."

"Besides these rational and generally harmless beings, there was
another set of objects which never varied in their form or qualities,
and were always mischievous and terrible. The fact of their appearance
depended very much on the state of my health and feelings. If I was
well and cheerful they seldom troubled me; but when sick or depressed
they were sure to obtrude their hateful presence upon me. These were a
sort of heavy clouds floating about overhead, of a black color,
spotted with brown, in the shape of a very flaring inverted tunnel
without a nozzle, and from ten to thirty or forty feet in diameter.
They floated from place to place in great numbers, and in all
directions, with a strong and steady progress, but with a tremulous,
quivering, internal motion that agitated them in every part.

"Whenever they appproached, the rational phantoms were thrown into
great consternation; and well it might be, for if a cloud touched any
part of one of the rational phantoms it immediately communicated its
own color and tremulous motion to the part it touched.

"In spite of all the efforts and convulsive struggles of the unhappy
victim, this color and motion slowly, but steadily and uninteruptedly,
proceeded to diffuse itself over every part of the body, and as fast
as it did so the body was drawn into the cloud and became a part of
its substance. It was indeed a fearful sight to see the contortions,
the agonizing efforts, of the poor creatures who had been touched by
one of these awful clouds, and were dissolving and melting into it by
inches without the possibility of escape or resistance.

"This was the only visible object that had the least power over the
phantoms, and this was evidently composed of the same material as
themselves. The forms and actions of all these phantoms varied very
much with the state of my health and animal spirits, but I never could
discover that the surrounding material objects had any influence upon
them, except in this one particular, namely, if I saw them in a neat,
well furnished room, there was a neatness and polish in their form and
motions; and, on the contrary, if I was in an unfinished, rough
apartment, there was a corresponding rudeness and roughness in my
aerial visitors. A corresponding difference was visible when I saw
them in the woods or in the meadows, upon the water or upon the
ground, in the air or among the stars."

"Every different apartment which I occupied had a different set of
phantoms, and they always had a degree of correspondence to the
circumstances in which they were seen. (It should be noted, however,
that it was not so much the place where the phantoms themselves
appeared to me to be, that affected their forms and movements, as the
place in which I myself actually was while observing them. The
apparent locality of the phantoms, it is true, had some influence, but
my own actual locality had much more.)"

"Thus far I have attempted only a general outline of these curious
experiences. I will now proceed to a detailed account of several
particular incidents, for the sake of illustrating the general
statements already made. I select a few from manifestations without
number. I am able to ascertain dates from the following
circumstances:--

"I was born in April, 1802, and my father died in July, 1808, after
suffering for more than a year from a lingering organic disease.
Between two and three years before his death he removed from the house
in which I was born to another at a little distance from it. What
occurred, therefore, before my father's last sickness, must have taken
place during the first five years of my life, and whatever took place
before the removal of the family must have taken place during the
first three years of my life. Before the removal of the family I slept
in a small upper chamber in the front part of the house, where I was
generally alone for several hours in the evening and morning.
Adjoining this room, and opening into it by a very small door, was a
low, dark, narrow, unfinished closet, which was open on the other side
into a ruinous, old chaise-house. This closet was a famous place for
the gambols of the phantoms, but of their forms and actions I do not
now retain any very distinct recollection. I only remember that I was
very careful not to do anything that I thought would be likely to
offend them; yet otherwise their presence caused me no uneasiness, and
was not at all disagreeable to me.

"The first incident of which I have a distinct recollection was the
following:--

"One night, as I was lying alone in my chamber with my little dog
Brutus snoring beside my bed, there came out of the closet a very
large Indian woman and a very small Indian man, with a huge bass-viol
between them. The woman was dressed in a large, loose, black gown,
secured around her waist by a belt of the same material, and on her
head she wore a high, dark gray fur cap, shaped somewhat like a lady's
muff, ornamented with a row of covered buttons in front, and open
towards the bottom, showing a red lining. The man was dressed in a
shabby, black-colored overcoat and a little round, black hat that
fitted closely to his head. They took no notice of me, but were rather
ill-natured towards each other, and seemed to be disputing for the
possession of the bass-viol. The man snatched it away and struck upon
it a few harsh, hollow notes, which I distinctly heard, and which
seemed to vibrate through my whole body, with a strange, stinging
sensation The woman then took it and appeared to play very intently
and much to her own satisfaction, but without producing any sound that
was perceptible by me. They soon left the chamber, and I saw them go
down into the back kitchen, where they sat and played and talked with
my mother. It was only when the man took the bow that I could hear the
harsh, abrupt, disagreeable sounds of the instrument. At length they
arose, went out of the back door, and sprang upon a large heap of
straw and unthreshed beans, and disappeared with a strange, rumbling
sound. This vision was repeated night after night with scarcely any
variation while we lived in that house, and once, and once only, after
the family had removed to the other house. The only thing that seemed
to me unaccountable and that excited my curiosity was that there
should be such a large heap of straw and beans before the door every
night, when I could see nothing of it in the daytime. I frequently
crept out of bed and stole softly down into the kitchen, and peeped
out of the door to see if it was there very early in the morning.

"I attempted to make some inquiries of my mother, but as I was not as
yet very skillful in the use of language, I could get no satisfaction
out of her answers, and could see that my questions seemed to distress
her. At first she took little notice of what I said, regarding it no
doubt as the meaningless prattle of a thoughtless child. My
persistence, however, seemed to alarm her, and I suppose that she
feared for my sanity. I soon desisted from asking anything further,
and shut myself more and more within myself. One night, very soon
after the removal, when the house was still, and all the family were
in bed, these unearthly musicians once made their appearance in the
kitchen of the new house, and after looking around peevishly, and
sitting with a discontented frown and in silence, they arose and went
out of the back door, and sprang on a pile of cornstalks, and I saw
them no more.

"Our new dwelling was a low-studded house of only one story, and,
instead of an upper chamber, I now occupied a bedroom that opened into
the kitchen. Within this bedroom, directly on the left hand of the
door as you entered from the kitchen, was the staircase which led to
the garret; and, as the room was unfinished, some of the boards which
inclosed the staircase were too short, and left a considerable space
between them and the ceiling. One of these open spaces was directly in
front of my bed, so that when I lay upon my pillow my face was
opposite to it. Every night, after I had gone to bed and the candle
was removed, a very pleasant-looking human face would peer at me over
the top of that board, and gradually press forward his head, neck,
shoulders, and finally his whole body as far as the waist, through the
opening, and then, smiling upon me with great good-nature, would
withdraw in the same manner in which he had entered. He was a great
favorite of mine; for though we neither of us spoke, we perfectly
understood, and were entirely devoted to, each other. It is a singular
fact that the features of this favorite phantom bore a very close
resemblance to those of a boy older than myself whom I feared and
hated: still the resemblance was so strong that I called him by the
same name, Harvey.

"Harvey's visits were always expected and always pleasant; but
sometimes there were visitations of another sort, odious and
frightful. One of these I will relate as a specimen of the rest."

"One night, after I had retired to bed and was looking for Harvey, I
observed an unusual number of the tunnel-shaped tremulous clouds
already described, and they seemed intensely black and strongly
agitated. This alarmed me exceedingly, and I had a terrible feeling
that something awful was going to happen. It was not long before I saw
Harvey at his accustomed place, cautiously peeping at me through the
aperture, with an expression of pain and terror on his countenance. He
seemed to warn me to be on my guard, but was afraid to put his head
into the room lest he should be touched by one of the clouds, which
were every moment growing thicker and more numerous. Harvey soon
withdrew and left me alone. On turning my eyes towards the left-hand
wall of the room, I thought I saw at an immense distance below me the
regions of the damned, as I had heard them pictured in sermons. From
this awful world of horror the tunnel-shaped clouds were ascending,
and I perceived that they were the principal instruments of torture in
these gloomy abodes. These regions were at such an immense distance
below me that I could obtain but a very indistinct view of the
inhabitants, who were very numerous and exceedingly active. Near the
surface of the earth, and as it seemed to me but a little distance
from my bed, I saw four or five sturdy, resolute devils endeavoring to
carry off an unprincipled and dissipated man in the neighborhood, by
the name of Brown, of whom I had stood in terror for years. These
devils I saw were very different from the common representations. They
had neither red faces, nor horns, nor hoofs, nor tails. They were in
all respects stoutly built and well-dressed gentlemen. The only
peculiarity that I noted in their appearance was as to their heads.
Their faces and necks were perfectly bare, without hair or flesh, and
of a uniform sky-blue color, like the ashes of burnt paper before it
falls to pieces, and of a certain glossy smoothness."

"As I looked on, full of eagerness, the devils struggled to force
Brown down with them, and Brown struggled with the energy of
desperation to save himself from their grip, and it seemed that the
human was likely to prove too strong for the infernal. In this
emergency one of the devils, panting for breath and covered with
perspiration, beckoned to a strong, thick cloud that seemed to
understand him perfectly, and, whirling up to Brown, touched his hand.
Brown resisted stoutly, and struck out right and left at the cloud
most furiously, but the usual effect was produced,--the hand grew
black, quivered, and seemed to be melting into the cloud; then the
arm, by slow degrees, and then the head and shoulders. At this instant
Brown, collecting all his energies for one desperate effort, sprang at
once into the centre of the cloud, tore it asunder, and descended to
the ground, exclaiming, with a hoarse, furious voice that grated on my
ear, 'There, I've got out; dam'me if I haven't!' This was the first
word that had been spoken through the whole horrible scene. It was the
first time I had ever seen a cloud fail to produce its appropriate
result, and it terrified me so that I trembled from head to foot. The
devils, however, did not seem to be in the least discouraged. One of
them, who seemed to be the leader, went away and quickly returned
bringing with him an enormous pair of rollers fixed in an iron frame,
such as are used in iron-mills for the purpose of rolling out and
slitting bars of iron, except instead of being turned by machinery,
each roller was turned by an immense crank. Three of the devils now
seized Brown and put his feet to the rollers, while two others stood,
one at each crank, and began to roll him in with a steady strain that
was entirely irresistible. Not a word was spoken, not a sound was
heard; but the fearful struggles and terrified, agonizing looks of
Brown were more than I could endure. I sprang from my bed and ran
through the kitchen into the room where my parents slept, and
entreated that they would permit me to spend the remainder of the
night with them. After considerable parleying they assured me that
nothing could hurt me, and advised me to go back to bed. I replied
that I was not afraid of their hurting me, but I couldn't bear to see
them acting so with C. Brown. 'Poh! poh! you foolish boy,' replied my
father, sternly. 'You've only been dreaming; go right back to bed, or
I shall have to whip you.' Knowing that there was no other
alternative, I trudged back through the kitchen with all the courage I
could muster, cautiously entered my room, where I found everything
quiet, there being neither cloud, nor devil, nor anything of the kind
to be seen, and getting into bed I slept quietly till morning. The
next day I was rather sad and melancholy, but kept all my troubles to
myself, through fear of Brown. This happened before my father's
sickness, and consequently between the four and six years of my age."

"During my father's sickness and after his death I lived with my
grandmother; and when I had removed to her house I forever lost sight
of Harvey. I still continued to sleep alone for the most part, but in
a neatly furnished upper chamber. Across the corner of the chamber,
opposite to and at a little distance from the head of my bed, there
was a closet in the form of an old-fashioned buffet. After going to
bed, on looking at the door of this closet, I could see at a great
distance from it a pleasant meadow, terminated by a beautiful little
grove. Out of this grove, and across this meadow, a charming little
female figure would advance, about eight inches high and exquisitely
proportioned, dressed in a loose black silk robe, with long, smooth
black hair parted up her head and hanging loose over her shoulders.
She would come forward with a slow and regular step, becoming more
distinctly visible as she approached nearer, till she came even with
the surface of the closet door, when she would smile upon me, raise
her hands to her head and draw them down on each side of her face,
suddenly turn round, and go off at a rapid trot. The moment she turned
I could see a good-looking mulatto man, rather smaller than herself,
following directly in her wake and trotting off after her. This was
generally repeated two or three times before I went to sleep. The
features of the mulatto bore some resemblance to those of the Indian
man with the bass-viol, but were much more mild and agreeable."

"I awoke one bright, moonlight night, and found a large, full-length
human skeleton of an ashy-blue color in bed with me! I screamed out
with fright, and soon summoned the family around me. I refused to tell
the cause of my alarm, but begged permission to occupy another bed,
which was granted.

"For the remainder of the night I slept but little; but I saw upon the
window-stools companies of little fairies, about six inches high, in
white robes, gamboling and dancing with incessant merriment. Two of
them, a male and female, rather taller than the rest, were dignified
with a crown and sceptre. They took the kindest notice of me, smiled
upon me with great benignity, and seemed to assure me of their
protection. I was soothed and cheered by their presence, though after
all there was a sort of sinister and selfish expression in their
countenances which prevented my placing implicit confidence in them.

"Up to this time I had never doubted the real existence of these
phantoms, nor had I ever suspected that other people had not seen them
as distinctly as myself. I now, however, began to discover with no
little anxiety that my friends had little or no knowledge of the
aerial beings among whom I have spent my whole life; that my allusions
to them were not understood, and all complaints respecting them were
laughed at. I had never been disposed to say much about them, and this
discovery confirmed me in my silence. It did not, however, affect my
own belief, or lead me to suspect that my imaginations were not
realities.

"During the whole of this period I took great pleasure in walking out
alone, particularly in the evening. The most lonely fields, the woods,
and the banks of the river, and other places most completely secluded,
were my favorite resorts, for there I could enjoy the sight of
innumerable aerial beings of all sorts, without interruption. Every
object, even every shaking leaf, seemed to me to be animated by some
living soul, whose nature in some degree corresponded to its
habitation. I spent much of my life in these solitary rambles; there
were particular places to which I gave names, and visited them at
regular intervals. Moonlight was particularly agreeable to me, but
most of all I enjoyed a thick, foggy night. At times, during these
walks, I would be excessively oppressed by an indefinite and deep
feeling of melancholy. Without knowing why, I would be so unhappy as
to wish myself annihilated, and suddenly it would occur to me that my
friends at home were suffering some dreadful calamity, and so vivid
would be the impression, that I would hasten home with all speed to
see what had taken place. At such seasons I felt a morbid love for my
friends that would almost burn up my soul, and yet, at the least
provocation from them, I would fly into an uncontrollable passion and
foam like a little fury. I was called a dreadful-tempered boy; but the
Lord knows that I never occasioned pain to any animal, whether human
or brutal, without suffering untold agonies in consequence of it. I
cannot, even now, without feelings of deep sorrow, call to mind the
alternate fits of corroding melancholy, irritation, and bitter remorse
which I then endured. These fits of melancholy were most constant and
oppressive during the autumnal months.

"I very early learned to read, and soon became immoderately attached
to books. In the Bible I read the first chapters of Job, and parts of
Ezekiel, Daniel, and Revelation, with most intense delight, and with
such frequency that I could repeat large portions from memory long
before the age at which boys in the country are usually able to read
plain sentences. The first large book besides the Bible that I
remember reading was Morse's 'History of New England,' which I
devoured with insatiable greediness, particularly those parts which
relate to Indian wars and witchcraft. I was in the habit of applying
to my grandmother for explanations, and she would relate to me, while
I listened with breathless attention, long stories from Mather's
'Magnalia' or (Mag-nilly, as she used to call it), a work which I
earnestly longed to read, but of which, I never got sight till after
my twentieth year. Very early there fell into my hands an old school-
book, called 'The Art of Speaking,' containing numerous extracts from
Milton and Shakespeare. There was little else in the book that
interested me, but these extracts from the two great English poets,
though there were many things in them that I did not well understand,
I read again and again, with increasing pleasure at every perusal,
till I had nearly committed them to memory, and almost thumbed the old
book into nonenity. But of all the books that I read at this period,
there was none that went to my heart like Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's
Progress.' I read it and re-read it night and day; I took it to bed
with me and hugged it to my bosom while I slept; every different
edition that I could find I seized upon and read with as eager a
curiosity as if it had been a new story throughout; and I read with
the unspeakable satisfaction of most devoutly believing that
everything which 'Honest John' related was a real verity, an actual
occurrence. Oh that I could read that most inimitable book once more
with the same solemn conviction of its literal truth, that I might
once more enjoy the same untold ecstacy!

"One other remark it seems proper to make before I proceed further to
details. The appearance, and especially the motions, of my aerial
visitors were intimately connected, either as cause or effect, I
cannot determine which, with certain sensations of my own. Their
countenances generally expressed pleasure or pain, complaisance or
anger, according to the mood of my own mind: if they moved from place
to place without moving their limbs, with that gliding motion
appropriate to spirits, I felt in my stomach that peculiar tickling
sensation which accompanies a rapid, progressive movement through the
air; and if they went off with an uneasy trot, I felt an unpleasant
jarring through my frame. Their appearance was always attended with
considerable effort and fatigue on my part: the more distinct and
vivid they were, the more would my fatigue be increased; and at such
times my face was always pale, and my eyes unusually sparkling and
wild. This continued to be the case after I became satisfied that it
was all a delusion of the imagination, and it so continues to the
present day."

It is not surprising that Mrs. Stowe should have felt herself impelled
to give literary form to an experience so exceptional. Still more must
this be the case when the early associations of this exceptional
character were as amusing and interesting as they are shown forth in
"Oldtown Fireside Stories."

None of the incidents or characters embodied in those sketches are
ideal. The stories are told as they came from Mr. Stowe's lips, with
little or no alteration. Sam Lawson was a real character. In 1874 Mr.
Whittier wrote to Mrs. Stowe: "I am not able to write or study much,
or read books that require thought, without suffering, but I have Sam
Lawson lying at hand, and, as Corporal Trim said of Yorick's sermon,
'I like it hugely.'"

The power and literary value of these stories lie in the fact that
they are true to nature. Professor Stowe was himself an inimitable
mimic and story-teller. No small proportion of Mrs. Stowe's success as
a literary woman is to be attributed to him. Not only was he possessed
of a bright, quick mind, but wonderful retentiveness of memory. Mrs.
Stowe was never at a loss for reliable information on any subject as
long as the professor lived. He belonged, to that extinct species, the
"general scholar." His scholarship was not critical in the modern
sense of the word, but in the main accurate, in spite of his love for
the marvelous.

It is not out of place to give a little idea of his power in
character-painting, as it shows how suggestive his conversation and
letters must have been to a mind like that of Mrs. Stowe:--

NATICK, _July_ 14, 1839.

I have had a real good time this week writing my oration. I have
strolled over my old walking places, and found the same old stone
walls, the same old footpaths through the rye-fields, the same bends
in the river, the same old bullfrogs with their green spectacles on,
the same old terrapins sticking up their heads and bowing as I go by;
and nothing was wanting but my wife to talk with to make all complete.
. . . I have had some rare talks with old uncle "Jaw" Bacon, and other
old characters, which you ought to have heard. The Curtises have been
flooding Uncle "Jaw's" meadows, and he is in a great stew about it. He
says: "I took and tell'd your Uncle Izic to tell them 'ere Curtises
that if the Devil did n't git 'em far flowing my medder arter that
sort, I didn't see no use o' havin' any Devil." "Have you talked with
the Curtises yourself?" "Yes, hang the sarcy dogs! and they took and
tell'd me that they'd take and flow clean up to my front door, and
make me go out and in in a boat." "Why don't you go to law?" "Oh, they
keep alterin' and er tinkerin'-up the laws so here in Massachusetts
that a body can't git no damage fur flowing; they think cold water
can't hurt nobody."

Mother and Aunt Nabby each keep separate establishments. First Aunt
Nabby gets up in the morning and examines the sink, to see whether it
leaks and rots the beam. She then makes a little fire, gets her little
teapot of bright shining tin, and puts into it a teaspoonful of black
tea, and so prepares her breakfast.

By this time mother comes creeping down-stairs, like an old tabby-cat
out of the ash-hole; and she kind o' doubts and reckons whether or no
she had better try to git any breakfast, bein' as she 's not much
appetite this mornin'; but she goes to the leg of bacon and cuts off a
little slice, reckons sh'll broil it; then goes and looks at the
coffee-pot and reckons sh'll have a little coffee; don't exactly know
whether it's good for her, but she don't drink much. So while Aunt
Nabby is sitting sipping her tea and munching her bread and butter
with a matter-of-fact certainty and marvelous satisfaction, mother
goes doubting and reckoning round, like Mrs. Diffidence in Doubting
Castle, till you see rising up another little table in another corner
of the room, with a good substantial structure of broiled ham and
coffee, and a boiled egg or two, with various et ceteras, which Mrs.
Diffidence, after many desponding ejaculations, finally sits down to,
and in spite of all presentiments makes them fly as nimbly as Mr.
Ready-to-Halt did Miss Much-afraid when he footed it so well with her
on his crutches in the dance on the occasion of Giant Despair's
overthrow.

I have thus far dined alternately with mother and Aunt Susan, not
having yet been admitted to Aunt Nabby's establishment. There are now
great talkings, and congresses and consultations of the allied powers,
and already rumors are afloat that perhaps all will unite their forces
and dine at one table, especially as Harriet and little Hattie are
coming, and there is no knowing what might come out in the papers if
there should be anything a little odd.

Mother is very well, thin as a hatchet and smart as a steel trap; Aunt
Nabby, fat and easy as usual; for since the sink is mended, and no
longer leaks and rots the beam, and she has nothing to do but watch
it, and Uncle Bill has joined the Washingtonians and no longer drinks
rum, she is quite at a loss for topics of worriment.

Uncle Ike has had a little touch of palsy and is rather feeble. He
says that his legs and arms have rather gi'n out, but his head and
pluck are as good as they ever were. I told him that our sister Kate
was very much in the same fix, whereat he was considerably affected,
and opened the crack in his great pumpkin of a face, displaying the
same two rows of great white ivories which have been my admiration
from my youth up. He is sixty-five years of age, and has never lost a
tooth, and was never in his life more than fifteen miles from the spot
where he was born, except once, in the ever-memorable year 1819, when
I was at Bradford Academy.

In a sudden glow of adventurous rashness he undertook to go after me
and bring me home for vacation; and he actually performed the whole
journey of thirty miles with his horse and wagon, and slept at a
tavern a whole night, a feat of bravery on which he has never since
ceased to plume himself. I well remember that awful night in the
tavern in the remote region of North Andover. We occupied a chamber in
which were two beds. In the unsuspecting innocence of youth I
undressed myself and got into bed as usual; but my brave and
thoughtful uncle, merely divesting himself of his coat, put it under
his pillow, and then threw himself on to the bed with his boots on his
feet, and his two hands resting on the rim of his hat, which he had
prudently placed on the apex of his stomach as he lay on his back. He
wouldn't allow me to blow out the candle, but he lay there with his
great white eyes fixed on the ceiling, in the cool, determined manner
of a bold man who had made up his mind to face danger and meet
whatever might befall him. We escaped, however, without injury, the
doughty landlord and his relentless sons merely demanding pay for
supper, lodging, horse-feed, and breakfast, which my valiant uncle,
betraying no signs of fear, resolutely paid.

Mrs. Stowe has woven this incident into chapter thirty-two of "Oldtown
Folks," where Uncle Ike figures as Uncle Jacob.

Mrs. Stowe had misgivings as to the reception which "Oldtown Folks"
would meet in England, owing to its distinctively New England
character. Shortly after the publication of the book she received the
following words of encouragement from Mrs. Lewes (George Eliot), July
11, 1869 :--

"I have received and read 'Oldtown Folks.' I think that few of your
readers can have felt more interest than I have felt in that picture
of an elder generation; for my interest in it has a double root,--one
in my own love for our old-fashioned provincial life, which had its
affinities with a contemporary life, even all across the Atlantic, and
of which I have gathered glimpses in different phases from my father
and mother, with their relations; the other is my experimental
acquaintance with some shades of Calvinistic orthodoxy. I think your
way of presenting the religious convictions which are not your own,
except by the way of indirect fellowship, is a triumph of insight and
true tolerance. . . . Both Mr. Lewes and I are deeply interested in
the indications which the professor gives of his peculiar
psychological experience, and we should feel it a great privilege to
learn much more of it from his lips. It is a rare thing to have such
an opportunity of studying exceptional experience in the testimony of
a truthful and in every way distinguished mind."

"Oldtown Folks" is of interest as being undoubtedly the last of Mrs.
Stowe's works which will outlive the generation for which it was
written. Besides its intrinsic merit as a work of fiction, it has a
certain historic value as being a faithful study of "New England life
and character in that particular time of its history which may be
called the seminal period."

Whether Mrs. Stowe was far enough away from the time and people she
attempts to describe to "make (her) mind as still and passive as a
looking-glass or a mountain lake, and to give merely the images
reflected there," is something that will in great part determine the
permanent value of this work. Its interest as a story merely is of
course ephemeral.