Читать книгу The Story of a Life - J. Breckenridge Ellis - Страница 14

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That was a wonderful day for the boy Oliver when, with the farewells of his parents, brothers and sisters, friends and benefactors, ringing in his ears, he started to college. As the stage coach rushed across the corner of Fleming County, and plunged through Nicholas and wound its way among the bluegrass pasture lands of Bourbon, he felt that he was seeing the world, at last; and not only seeing the world, but had the means to take an honored place in it; for to this youth of sixteen, there seemed no honor greater than that of preaching the Gospel.

It was so plain to him, this plea of the disciples of Christ; it appeared so evidently the truth of the whole matter; he was anxious to tell others about it, imagining in his inexperienced zeal, that others would be as glad to hear as he had been. But before he could preach, the collegiate fortresses of wisdom must be stormed and captured. Head of his class in mathematics at the academy—that is the best we can say for him now, and souls are not won from sin and error by the demonstrations of Euclid.

Here we are in Fayette County, and the train stops at Lexington. Here Oliver pauses, but does not stop, for the University is wanting several years of reaching this point. We must hold on our course—down through Jessamine County to Mercer. And now indeed, our blood thrills as if needles were pricking our veins, for we are near our destination,—near Harrodsburg the goal of our boyhood's ambition.

There are other boys in the stage coach going to the University, and we talk about the history of that institution, and of its professors, and of what we will do when we stop at the station, and where we will go,—all strangers as we are, and all young, in this year, 1861.

Some one tells how Bacon College was established by the disciples of Christ in Georgetown twenty-five years ago, and how its first president was Walter Scott—a name sufficient to bring up May's Lick before Oliver's mind, with a far-away suggestion of homesickness.

And another tells (or should tell for the refreshing of the reader's memory) of ten years of college life under James Shannon, until Bacon College went to sleep, or underwent suspended animation, and had to be brought to Harrodsburg by J. B. Bowman, to try what a new climate and a new name could do for it. So Bacon College became Kentucky University in 1858—just three years ago.

Then another—for there were four of these[4] boys, and being boys they talked a great deal, and, as we see, very much to our purpose—congratulates all upon the fortunate circumstances that have provided the University with the first teachers of the land—a fortunate circumstance for Harrodsburg, he means; of course a fortunate circumstance for anybody has a curious way of being unfortunate so far as somebody else is concerned.

Bethany College had been reduced to ashes; and although new walls were starting up from the gray ruins, such men of learning and piety as Bethany College boasted could not sit idly by, while brick was laid upon brick; they, too, might be building, and, by happy fortune, something more durable than stone. So Robert Milligan leaves his chair of mathematics at Bethany, to assume the presidency of our reawakened or newborn institution—old Bacon College, or new Kentucky University—one hardly knows if the author was Bacon or Shakespeare!—and Dr. Robt. Richardson entrusts his chair of Physical Science at Bethany to Dr. H. Christopher, and becomes vice-president at Harrodsburg. So now we know—by listening to the chatter of these prospective students—how it came about that Mattie Myers was treated to the preaching of these giants. She is over yonder at Daughters' College even now a girl of fourteen. Even then, she says, she "had given her life to serious study and preparation for her chosen life-work."

And what of Bethany College? How can it survive the loss of those illustrious men? Perhaps with its Alexander Campbell for president, it can weather the gale!

But certainly those of us who are Kentuckians and who have been attending the College in Virginia, because we had none of our own, now feel unbounded elation over our newly-captured prize! For in those days, says S. W. Crutcher, who was just such a student, "We had somehow gotten into the habit of spelling Kentucky with a big 'K' and the United States in small letters."

It was Crutcher who, then in Virginia, went with the other Kentuckians to "Hybernia" to congratulate Professor Milligan on being chosen president of Kentucky University. The Professor—who had already grown cautious about standing in draughts—expressed his resolution to spend the remainder of his life in the service of the University; and Mrs. Milligan, with thoughts for the present life, led the young men into the dining-room. Belle is in short dresses; for, as we have said, this was three years ago; and it is only last year that Robt. Graham left Harrodsburg for Arkansas.

We were speaking of S. W. Crutcher; and by a queer coincidence, there he is in the middle of the street as the stage coach brings Oliver Carr to Harrodsburg. We are here at last. Crutcher takes Oliver and his three traveling-companions to a boarding-house which proves an undesirable place, and President Milligan takes Oliver into his own home; there he finds Belle's dress three years nearer the floor than when Sam Crutcher told her farewell in Bethany; and Oliver is, of course, very much afraid of her; for was there ever a boy more awkward or more conscious of his tallness and thinness, than this youth from Lewis and Mason County?

Perhaps not. But he is much at ease with the president, himself, for the president is a man—and Oliver has dealt thus far principally with men—and not only so, but with a prince of men. If Eneas Myall, the blacksmith, could have had the choosing of Oliver's companions, knowing in his practical English head that his protege was in the danger-zone of youth, when companionship counts most—he could have selected with no greater care than Providence seemed to have done.

First of all, there was the Milligan household with its atmosphere as unlike that of the village hotel, as if it had been of another world. Then there was the man with whom Oliver used to walk home from school, with whom he loved to stroll in the twilight—the Professor of English, who examined the youth's fitness for his junior year by having him analyze and parse a hymn. Between this man and boy grew a liking that was soon ardent love. "My boy"—that is what L. L. Pinkerton called Oliver. And Oliver, as he walked with his favorite teacher, and heard him quote poetry—poetry in the balmy evenings of autumn, poetry in the crisp winter afternoon, poetry wherever Pinkerton was, whether that of others, or that of his own joyous temperament—here was another formative influence for the boy from the froglands.

When we, of another day, look back upon that time, and watch this sweet association, it is hard to understand the bitterness—we must not say hatred—that used to be roused at the mention of the Professor of English. Let us take a closer look at this man from Baltimore County, Maryland; a brief look, necessarily, but one which will seek to envelope his main attributes. In so doing, we have not forgotten that our central aim is to present the life of Mattie Myers over yonder in Daughters' College—where she has scarcely heard of Oliver Carr, though she knows Pinkerton by sight.

To begin at the beginning of L. L. Pinkerton's life—which was in his eighteenth year—we find him building a post-and-rail fence in West Virginia not far from Bethany; "black locust posts, black walnut rails," he remembers, "all taken from the stump, and fence set, for twenty-five cents per panel of eight feet." Not that the quality of wood or price of wages matters—at least now; what does matter is that one morning, before going to work, he found a paper on the table, edited by Alexander Campbell. The Millennial Harbinger was its name. Lewis picked up the paper casually, and was soon reading with strange intentness—reading and re-reading. Strange reading-matter to absorb the attention of a fence-builder of eighteen—it was all about Truth! Presently he went to Bethany to hear more about it, and at the close of a sermon by A. Campbell, was baptized—he rode home that night four miles in dripping garments. It was so wonderful to him, this plea of the disciples of Christ—one name for all Christendom, one rule of faith and practice, and that rule the Bible alone—he could not but believe that it would be eagerly accepted by a sect-divided world! He began preaching.

From Lexington he went to Midway, where he established the Orphan School of the Christian church. For sixteen years he labored in raising funds, and in teaching, for this exponent of practical Christianity. The same enthusiasm which had marked his acceptance of the "reformed religion" carried him over innumerable obstacles, whether of miserliness, poverty, or cold discouragement. Now the Midway Orphan School was firmly established, and the year before Oliver came to the University, Pinkerton accepted the English professorship.

But, unfortunately for his peace of mind, however fortunate for truth in the abstract and concrete, poetry was not the only thing that L. L. Pinkerton talked, outside of school hours. When we seek to pierce the clouds of misunderstanding and accusation that darken the atmosphere of those days, the charges of heresy, and the retorts of sectarianism, above all, the trumpet call that one or the other was not "sound,"—which opprobrious epithet, indeed, sounds above all the other jarring cries,—we cannot believe that this resolution to "down Pinkerton" came from the sole desire to exalt the Christ. No doubt his opposers believed such to be the case, but they were mistaken. It was all the war, the spirit of the times. Though the heavens fall, Pinkerton must proclaim his conviction that slavery was of the devil, must lecture about it, must do everything that lay in his power to convince others, must declare his satisfaction when Lincoln's Proclamation—that one proclamation that calls for no explanatory data to remind one what proclamation—outraged those who did not believe slavery to be of the devil; far otherwise, indeed.

For the war has burst upon us, now in all its fury, and though we, as a state, are "neutral," everybody knows what that means, and suspects his neighbor accordingly. In Midway, Pinkerton in building up the church, established and nurtured a church for the black folk—preached for it until out of African darkness was evolved a light to shine for itself. He believed these slaves had souls, and somehow, he looked upon his labors for their salvation as a part of the practical good-doing that flowered in the Orphan School. If he could only believe these things to himself, and not say anything! But in that case, he would not have been Pinkerton. And so, after the year 1862—the year in which Oliver Carr preached his first sermon—no church-door was opened that L. L. Pinkerton might preach therein—never again was he to be thought "sound" enough.

Oliver heard much of "soundness" in those days, just as we do now. But happily for his peace of mind, he was not disturbed by the continuous jarring and clashing of orthodox and heretical opinions. He was too busy—too busy, almost to eat; there is no recreation for him save as he trudges to and fro between school and lodgings, with, or without, the poetical friend. For he is most irregular in his classes; mathematics—fine; Latin and Greek—nothing!—"Dead," his father had objected. Dead indeed, and buried so deep, that the boy must dig hard and late, to unearth the skeletons. The result of which exhausting excavation we hear announced in the language of Dr. Richardson: "If you don't improve in health I do not see how you can continue your studies—" And, a little later: "You had better go home!"

Dark days—a weary struggle for health—a conviction that this is consumption—a last futile fight for victory—back home goes the broken invalid, just as Mattie Myers had been forced to quit the field.

But there is a difference, since Oliver is obliged to stop in the midst of everything—and since he can ill afford a rest. He has had his chance and it seems all in vain. For three months he stays with his sister drinking mineral-water, filled with torturing regrets and inextinguishable hope. His sister—it is Mary—has married; we are to hear of her again. Three months—and he realizes that if he goes back, it will mean as severe a regime as before. The ground is hardly broken above those dead languages, and he has not the strength he had thought he possessed. However, if we could, later on, take a peep at the young men about the grounds, we would find Oliver Carr holding his own with Surber, Keith and Mountjoy and Albert Myles. For six years we find him studying—"as hard as anybody," in his opinion; but not again is ill-health to drive him home, though always hovering at his elbow. Let us take glimpses, here and there, at these years, with the happy privilege of the reader, of attending the school of his hero without being compelled to study his hero's lessons.

At the close of his full year he goes back to May's Lick. To rest? Yes, if to do what lies closest to the heart is rest. He borrows a horse, gets his saddlebags, arms himself with Bible and hymn-book, and starts out for Carter county where Henry Pangburn and Thomas Munnell have "started a meeting." He informs the girl who keeps the tollgate that he is a preacher; no doubt in this boy's mind as to what he is! He loses his way in the mountain trails—"Babe" will go to show him the school-house, if he will catch her old white horse with burrs in its tail; "Babe" is a young lady of two hundred pounds—what matter her other name? On they go, in and out among the hills—Babe's girth breaks and Oliver gives up his horse to her.

"Hello Babe!" thus the father of Frank Kibbey from his doorway, "who's that you have with you?"

"Oh, a little rebel I picked up on the way!"—a laughing matter to Babe, but not to Oliver, for he sees her drawn aside, and hears the whispered demand, "Is he a rebel?"—and wonders if he will be hung.

But they are all rebels together. Thomas Munnell says "Ollie, you must preach tonight!" And Oliver knows off-hand what he will preach, because he has only one sermon! So the benches are brought into the home of "Bro. Kibbey"—for in the morning the preaching had been in the woods,—and Oliver stood in a corner, the preacher's point of vantage in those days, and preached. "And some old women bragged on me," he said afterward.

These fledgling students—Kibbey and Carr—sent an appointment to preach in the mountains. As they rode along, talking about their faith,—for that is what these boys loved to talk about—they saw a beautiful pool sparkling among lordly oaks, and they said, "Here is where we will baptize!" Why not? Not a word had been preached, nor had they ever looked upon the faces of their prospective auditors; but did they not have the truth? So they preached to the mountaineers; and presently came back to the pool among the oaks, where they baptized four young men and four young women.

Another picture, brief, almost brusque in its bold coloring: the young man is called into the office of the Professor of Mathematics, Henry H. White. The teacher abruptly extends his hand, "This is for you; take it."

It is fifty dollars. Oliver, the tears springing to his eyes, would falter his thanks. "That will do sir!" says the Professor with mathematical dryness. "That will do sir! you're dismissed,"—so sharply, so conclusively, that nothing is to be done but go. There are two such scenes, precisely alike; fifty dollars each time, and, "That will do sir!" as an end to the incident.

Never were such kindnesses more gratefully received, or more sorely needed. For men have come down from the mountains, seizing upon the property of Southern sympathizers, and none too particular about your sympathies, if they can get away with horses and money. William Carr sees his hard-earned savings disappear in a night. The horses from his stables are spirited away; his hotel is looted; nor is there wanting the suspicion that some of his neighbors have pointed out the spoils to the enemy. To his sudden necessity is added the bitterness against injustice and ingratitude. Farther into the night his wife must sew, earlier in the morning they must rise; for though one son is away at college, and one daughter is married, there is little left to support the other five children. So here at May's Lick is a battle for daily bread, while Oliver, at Harrodsburg, battles for daily Latin and Greek.

Nor is this time of stress without its element of heroism. One might pause in the narrative to show the young University student in danger of his life, on the occasion of one of his home-comings. A drunken soldier, having robbed William Carr of his horse, is about to shoot the hotel-keeper because he is a "Southerner." Oliver leaps between, fastens his gaze upon the infuriated face, holds out his defenceless arms, and saves his father's life.

This is Oliver's experience of the war, this crushing blow upon his parents; this, and the booming of cannon at Perryville, and the long line of stragglers coming back from a beaten field; and then the wounded and the dead. Harrodsburg is taxed to the utmost in giving shelter to the fallen heroes. Daughters' College from which, as we have seen, the young ladies have been banished, is opened up as a hospital.

L. L. Pinkerton is no longer teaching; he has resigned to become surgeon in the Eleventh Kentucky Cavalry; just as he marched to the defense of orphan girls and negroes groping in spiritual darkness, so now he sallies forth for his country; leading the soldiers in prayer every evening, dressing the wounds of the blue or gray, and singing Northern battle hymns. And just as he always worked too hard for Midway Orphan School, or for the disciples' plea, or whatever he worked at—never resting till failing resources made him rest,—so now, he toils at regimental prayer-meeting and midnight diagnoses and presently finds himself bedfast. Too feeble to stand, he lies praying that the South may be conquered; and, so praying, he is carried to the home of an old friend, a Captain Carr, who is a Southerner to the core.

For weeks the friend of Lincoln lies at the point of death, cared for with all tenderness by the friend of Jefferson Davis. Then J. B. Bowman, he who turned Bacon College into Kentucky University, came up from Harrodsburg to Louisville; here the Professor of English lay, and, taking him in his strong arms, Bowman carried him out to the carriage and rode away with him. So, we have him back at Harrodsburg at last, where he may walk with Oliver again, and quote poetry. Of course he tells Oliver about his kind treatment in the home of Captain Carr, and speaks of the tender and faithful ministrations of Southern nurses. And then, quickly, lest he be misunderstood, he asserts his unalterable faith in the justice of the Union cause; he will have no doubts as to where he stands.

"I could scatter flowers over the graves of the Confederate dead," he says, "and even bedew them with my tears; but I must still say, if forced to it, 'These poor, brave young men fell in an unrighteous war against a beneficent government!'" He must still say it, later on, to the destruction of his peace of mind; to the dissolution of many a friendly tie; must still say it, if forced to it; and must say it, whether forced or not, such being the impetuosity of his character, which consumes prudence and policy in one blaze of enthusiasm.

In the meantime, Oliver is at war in his own way. That the South should prove its right to self-government appeared to him self-evident, but it did not rouse his fighting blood. Souls to be saved from sin and error—that is his ever-pressing consideration. That all religious bodies should take the name of Christian, and worship according to the Scriptures—could anything be simpler? That the six or seven denominations in small tows, instead of utilizing half their vitality in keeping themselves going, should all combine in one glorious purpose to exalt the Christ—could anything be more like Heaven on Earth? Oliver thought thus. He believed it might come to pass; and he was eager to do his part in bringing it about. So every summer he left the University halls to carry his message into the hills and valleys of Kentucky; and such was his youthful ardor, his enthusiastic conviction of success, that people for a time stopped talking about John Morgan and friends in Canada, and went to hear the boy from the village tavern.

The time came when he resolved to carry the war into his own country. So he packed his saddlebags and rode into the land of his youth. There was no building of the disciples of Christ, but Oliver was offered the Methodist meeting house.

When it was noised abroad that Oliver Carr was going to preach, hearts were stirred and the farmers, many miles away, began catching up their horses to take the family to meeting. Men who had not been to church for years expressed themselves to this effect: "Ol going to preach? Yes, I'll go to hear him."

The meeting began Thursday night; on Saturday he baptized fourteen. Sunday morning the church building was locked; an agitated congregation hovered in the yard. "Oliver has opened the doors of the church!" complained his aunt—meaning the spiritual church; she had taken care that the church of pine boards should be more closely guarded. Across the street from the inhospitable meeting house stood the school house. The audience moved thither. The women went within; the men remained outside. Oliver stood in the door, and preached on "Christian Union".

Mrs. O'Bannon was there, she and her school-girl sister, Mattie Myers. And Mattie led the singing, and listened to the young University student with unqualified approval. In after days she was to hear him preach many a sermon, and in many lands; "But that was the best sermon he ever preached!" she declared. For they were both so young, then, and both so fired with zeal for the same cause which to them seemed the supreme cause of earth and heaven. And they were both so confident that this cause must triumph—perhaps in their own lifetime!

Oliver went to Orangeburg to preach in another Methodist church, and people came from May's Lick to hear the boy, his father among the number. Very seldom, if ever, had Oliver seen William Carr at church before; here he baptized fourteen—but alas! his father was not one of them. Then ten days at Sardis, and forty baptized—but we need not follow the youth from point to point; it was everywhere the same indestructible faith, and many converts, and the beginnings of church life.

Daniel Carr, Oliver's grandfather, sent for him to come up to Lewis county and preach in his home. Daniel was a prominent class-leader of the Methodist church, 76 years old. Oliver responded gladly, entered the county of his birth, where his uncles and aunts all lived, faithful Methodists. His grandfather brought benches and chairs into his house, and called in neighbors and kinsfolk. Oliver saw before him the boys and girls with whom he had gone to school in the country before his father's removal to May's Lick. Here were Old-School Baptists and Presbyterians, come to hear what the "Campbellite" had to tell them. But they did not come in hostility; far from that. It was with wonder, rather, that they looked upon this young man and thought of his past—the hard work on the farm, the harder work in his father's hotel. They knew how he had been obliged to leave the University on account of ill-health, and how, since then, he had taxed his strength to the utmost in evangelistic campaigns among the hills. And now he had come to them, his old neighbors, to tell them about Christ!

His grandfather knelt down to open the meeting with prayer, but suddenly the wonder and the joy of it came upon him, and they heard nothing but his sobs. When he was able to utter words, they burst from a heart that throbbed with heavenly thanksgiving.

Then Oliver rose. At last, at last! the privilege was his to speak to these dear people, words of eternal life. As he looked into their kindly faces, he too, was overcome by emotion. Minute after minute passed by, and he could but weep, while the faces of his audience, bathed in tears, told him that the yearning of his heart was understood. It seems wonderful when a celebrated man rises to address an audience, and, for ten minutes, stands dumb before tireless applause. But what shall we say of this boy who stands ten minutes unable to speak for tears of joy, while his friends wait, unable to hear for weeping?

This we must say; that we have found here a youth who has given himself with all his soul to an idea; an idea that grips at the roots of emotions and desires and life itself. Will not he who weeps with joy at the opportunity to deliver his message, also fight for it? But though fighting, will not his valor be tempered with the tenderness of tears?