Homes of American Statesmen; With Anecdotical, Personal, and Descriptive Sketches. VariousЧитать онлайн книгу.
small traces of facetiousness appear; and so far as physiognomy goes, we should be rather inclined to look to his grandmother, to whose accompanying portrait the artist has given a fine open countenance, with something of a magnificent and voluptuous style of beauty, for the source of those social qualities and captivating manners by which their famous grandson was distinguished. The minister of Lexington had two sons, both also ministers, one of whom became his father's colleague. The other, the father of our John Hancock, was settled at Braintree, near Boston, in that part of it which now constitutes the town of Quincy; and it was here that in the year 1737 our John Hancock was born, only a short distance from the birth-place of John Adams, who was some two years his senior. The old house in which the future patriot first saw the light was destroyed by an accidental fire previous to the Revolution; and the land on which it had stood coming subsequently into the possession of John Adams, he presented it to the town of Quincy as a site for a future academy.
At the age of six or seven years, the young John Hancock was left without a father; but in his uncle, Thomas Hancock, he found a guardian and protector, who not only loved him, but was able to assist him. Thomas Hancock early in life had been placed as an apprentice to a Boston stationer, and had afterwards set up in that line of business for himself: but subsequently extending the sphere of his operations, he became one of the most eminent and successful merchants of New England. As he had no children, he adopted, as his own, his young nephew, whose affable and joyous temper had not failed to make him dear to his uncle, as they did to so many others; and having sent him to Harvard College, where he graduated at the early age of seventeen, he took him afterwards into his counting-house to be initiated into the mysteries of merchandise; and in due season admitted him as a partner. It was, perhaps, as well on business as for pleasure, or general improvement, that the young Hancock visited England, whither he went in company with the returning Governor Pownall, whose taste for social enjoyment was similar to his own, and where he saw the funeral of George II. and the coronation of George III., little thinking at that moment how active a part he was himself soon to take in curtailing the limits of the British monarchy, and in snatching from the young king's crown its brightest jewel.
Thomas Hancock, the uncle, died in 1764, leaving behind him a fortune amassed by his judicious and successful mercantile enterprises, of not less than $350,000, one of the largest ever acquired in Boston, up to that time, though small in comparison with several of the present day, when even ten times as much may be produced by combined good fortune, tact, and perseverance. Thomas Hancock bestowed by his will some considerable legacies for charitable purposes, among others a thousand pounds to Harvard College to endow a professorship of oriental languages, being thus, as the historian of the college assures us, the first native American to endow a professorship in any literary institution; – but the great bulk of his fortune he bequeathed to his favorite nephew, $250,000 at once, and a reversionary interest in $100,000 more, of which his widow was to enjoy the use during her life.
Thus in 1764, at the early age of twenty-seven, and just upon the eve of the commencement of the revolutionary disputes with the mother country, John Hancock came into possession of one of the largest fortunes in the province.
Yet, though this large estate was an instrument and a stepping-stone, without the help of which Hancock would never have attained to that social and political distinction which he coveted and enjoyed so much, yet without his rare personal gifts and accomplishments it would have been wholly unavailing to that end; and so far from qualifying him, would have disqualified him, as it did so many other of the rich men of that time, for playing the conspicuous part he did in political affairs. Though for some time after his uncle's death he continued in business as a merchant, there were others who knew much better than he how to increase estates, already in the popular estimate – especially considering the use made of them – quite too large. Indeed, his business operations do not seem to have had mainly or primarily in view the making of money; for though he started new enterprises, going largely into ship-building, it was rather, at least so Hutchinson insinuates, as a politician than as a capitalist, looking more to the number of people he employed, and the increase thereby of his influence and popularity, than to the enlargement of his already plentiful fortune. There were others also who knew much better than he how to keep what they had, at least as they thought, men who used no less economy in spending their money than they or their fathers had done in acquiring it. But although the rich man who keeps his capital entire, and even increasing, is, in some sense, certainly a public benefactor, yet the fountain that overflows, sending forth a copious stream which the thirsty passers-by are all free to drink from, or at least to look at, is always more joyfully seen and more pleasingly remembered – even though it does run the risk of some time running dry – than the deep well, whose water is hardly visible, and which, though quite inexhaustible, yet for want of any kind of a bucket that can be made to sink into it, or any rope long enough to draw such a bucket up, is very little available to the parched throats of the fainting wayfarers, who, in the spirit and with the feelings of Tantalus, are thus rather disposed to curse than to bless it.
To be able to make money is, at least in New England, a very common accomplishment, to be able to keep it not a rare one; but very few have understood so well as Hancock did, how to make the most of it in the way of spending it, obtaining from it, as he did, the double gratification of satisfying his own private inclinations, at the same time that he promoted his political views by the hold that he gained on the favor and good-will of his fellow-citizens.
He possessed, indeed, in a degree, those tastes which wealth is best able to gratify, and to the gratification of which it is most essential. In the very face and eyes of the puritanical opinions and the staid and ultra-sober habits of New England, he delighted in splendid furniture, fine clothes, showy equipages, rich wines, good dinners, gay company, cards, dances, music, and all sorts of festivities. Nothing pleased him so much as to have his house full of guests to share with him in these enjoyments, and few were better qualified, by winning manners, graceful and affable address, a ready wit, a full flow of spirits, and a keen enjoyment of the whole thing, to act the part of master of the feast. But while thus luxuriously inclined, he had no disposition for gross debauch: and the presence of ladies at all his entertainments, while it seemed to give to them a new zest, banished from his house that riotous dissipation into which mere male gatherings are so certain to sink; and which in times past, in New England, made the idea of gross dissipation almost inseparable from that of social enjoyment, nor even yet is the distinction between them fully apprehended by every body.
Among other property which Hancock had inherited from his uncle, was a stone mansion-house, still standing, and now in the very centre of the city of Boston, but which then was looked upon as quite retired and almost in the country. This house, which was built about the year that Hancock was born, fronts eastwardly on Boston Common, since so elaborately improved and converted into so beautiful a park, with its gravel walks, trees, and smooth-shaven lawns, but which was then a common in the old English sense of the word, a common pasture for the cows of the neighbors, and a training field for the militia, with very few improvements except a single gravel walk and two or three rows of trees along Tremont-street. This house was situated a little west of the central and highest summit of that triple hill, which had early acquired for the peninsula of Boston the name of Trimountain, – since shortened into Tremont, and preserved in the name of the street above mentioned, which central summit was, from an early period, known as Beacon Hill, a name preserved in that of Beacon-street. This name was derived from the use to which this highest central summit had been put from a very early period – materials being always kept in readiness upon the top of it for kindling a bonfire, as a means of alarming the country round in case of invasion or other danger. After having been a good deal graded down, this summit is now occupied as a site for the State House, which, with its conspicuous dome, crowns and overlooks the whole city.
It was in this mansion-house of his uncle's, which seems as if by a sort of attraction to have drawn the State House to its side, that Hancock continued to live except when absent at Philadelphia in attendance on the Continental Congress; and not content with its original dimensions, to afford more room for his numerous guests, he built at one end of it a wooden addition, since removed, containing a dining-room, dancing-hall, and other like conveniences. It was here Hancock, assisted by his amiable and accomplished wife, who entered into all his tastes and feelings, and who contributed her full share to give expression and realization to them,