My Friends at Brook Farm | Page 4

front was so built--and the Van Antwerp legend was that these bricks were imported from Antwerp, the native town of their family. The last descendant was Juferouw Cornelia Van Antwerp who kept a little school in the basement of her dwelling, the family fortune having dwindled until this home was about the only property left to the Juferouw. In this school my sister Althea and I were taught the three R's and not much else. The ancient Dutch spinster was a lady, well-bred, dignified and courteous, who held a high place in the elect circle or Old Colonie society, and was not the less esteemed because of her straitened circumstances. Her walk and conversation were no doubt edifying, but the curriculum of her scholastic institute possibly left something to be desired in the departments of higher education. She had one available qualification for her position, however,--being an expert in making and mending quill pens. She spent much of her time during school hours in shaping these writing instruments, and I imagine she eked out her slender income by supplying pens to the neighbors.
The public schools were, in those days, looked upon as public charities, and these were not attended by children whose parents or guardians could afford to pay for private instruction which, whether better or worse, did not at all events, suggest poverty. So it came about, that father, on returning from one of his journeys eastward, brought home the idea of sending Althea and myself to school at Brook Farm.
CHAPTER II
FRIEND GREELEY
When Mr. Greeley first came to our house, I was not very favorably impressed by his appearance. He was tall and strongly built with broad shoulders somewhat bent forward, a smooth face, fair complexion and very light hair worn rather long. He was near-sighted and, like other near-sighted folk had a way of peering forward as he walked, and this with his heavy lurching gait, gave him a very awkward, countrified carriage. He remarked in my presence at a later time, "I learned to walk in the furrows of a New Hampshire farm and the clogging clay has stuck to my feet ever since."
His voice was thin and high-pitched, a small voice for such a big man, as we thought, and he had an abrupt manner of withdrawing attention that was to us rather disconcerting until we got used to it. His pockets were bulging with newspapers and memoranda, scrawled in the curiously obscure handwriting which I subsequently found much difficulty in learning to read, though it was plain enough when the meaning of the strange hieroglyphics intended for letters was once fully understood. He was pressed with business during his brief visits but found time to make friends with the juveniles of the family and we learned to welcome him with real pleasure. My mother noted that we made him smile, and that went far in establishing intimacy. Horace Greeley's rare smile revealed beauty of character and that charity commended by St. Paul as greater than faith or hope; a smile more nearly angelic than we often see in this mundane environment.
His peculiarities of dress have been, I think, much exaggerated by common gossip. He wanted his clothes made big and easy, and he wore them a long time and somewhat negligently, but that was because he had other things to mind and not in the least because he affected singularity. I was with him a good deal as a boy and as a young man and I am sure he spoke truly when in response to some friendly advice concerning these matters, he said "I buy good cloth, go to a good tailor and pay a good price, and that is all I can do about it."
The popular phrase about Greeley's old white coat had some foundation in fact, but not much. He did wear a light drab overcoat when I first saw him, with the full pockets spreading out on each side. As it suited him he wore it many years afterward, and when it was quite worn out he had another one made just like it which he wore many years more. I doubt if he ever had more than two of these famous garments, but it is true that these two, always supposed to be the same old white coat, were known all over the Northern part of the country. As late as the first Grant presidential campaign, Elder Evans, inviting him to make an address before the Shaker community at Harvard, Mass., asked him to please bring "the old white coat, that our folk may know it is you, for sure."
It is possible there may have been some little feeling of resentment against this sort of patronage expressed in the dragging on of the old white coat with the sleeves awry