# Israel Potter

Published in 1855.
ISRAEL POTTER
His Fifty Years of Exile
BY HERMAN MELVILLE
AUTHOR OF “TYPEE,” “OMOO,” ETC.
1855
Dedication
TO HIS HIGHNESS THE Bunker-Hill Monument
Biography, in its purer form, confined to the ended lives of the true and brave, may be held the fairest meed of human virtue—­one given and received in entire disinterestedness—­since neither can the biographer hope for acknowledgment from the subject, nor the subject at all avail himself of the biographical distinction conferred.
Israel Potter well merits the present tribute—­a private of Bunker Hill, who for his faithful services was years ago promoted to a still deeper privacy under the ground, with a posthumous pension, in default of any during life, annually paid him by the spring in ever-new mosses and
I am the more encouraged to lay this performance at the feet of your Highness, because, with a change in the grammatical person, it preserves, almost as in a reprint, Israel Potter’s autobiographical story. Shortly after his return in infirm old age to his native land, a little narrative of his adventures, forlornly published on sleazy gray paper, appeared among the peddlers, written, probably, not by himself, but taken down from his lips by another. But like the crutch-marks of the cripple by the Beautiful Gate, this blurred record is now out of print. From a tattered copy, rescued by the merest chance from the rag-pickers, the present account has been drawn, which, with the exception of some expansions, and additions of historic and personal details, and one or two shiftings of scene, may, perhaps, be not unfitly regarded something in the light of a dilapidated old tombstone retouched.
Well aware that in your Highness’ eyes the merit of the story must be in its general fidelity to the main drift of the original narrative, I forbore anywhere to mitigate the hard fortunes of my hero; and particularly towards the end, though sorely tempted, durst not substitute for the allotment of Providence any artistic recompense of poetical justice; so that no one can complain of the gloom of my closing chapters more profoundly than myself.
Such is the work, and such, the man, that I have the honor to present to your Highness. That the name here noted should not have appeared in the volumes of Sparks, may or may not be a matter for astonishment; but Israel Potter seems purposely to have waited to make his, popular advent under the present exalted patronage, seeing that your Highness, according to the definition above, may, in the loftiest sense, be deemed the Great Biographer: the national commemorator of such of the anonymous privates of June 17, 1775, who may never have received other requital than the solid reward of your granite.
Your Highness will pardon me, if, with the warmest ascriptions on this auspicious occasion, I take the liberty to mingle my hearty congratulations on the recurrence of the anniversary day we celebrate, wishing your Highness (though indeed your Highness be somewhat prematurely gray) many returns of the same, and that each of its summer’s suns may shine as brightly on your brow as each winter snow shall lightly rest on the grave of Israel Potter.
Your Highness’ Most devoted and obsequious,
THE EDITOR.
JUNE 17th, 1854.
CONTENTS.

## CHAPTER

I. The birthplace of Israel
II. The youthful adventures of Israel
III. Israel goes to the wars; and reaching Bunker Hill in time to be of service there, soon after is forced to extend his travels across the sea into the enemy’s land
IV. Further wanderings of the Refugee, with some account of a good knight of Brentford who befriended him
V. Israel in the Lion’s Den
VI. Israel makes the acquaintance of certain secret friends of America, one of them being the famous author of the “Diversions of Purley.” These despatch him on a sly errand across the Channel
VII. After a curious adventure upon the Pont Neuf, Israel enters the presence of the renowned sage, Dr. Franklin, whom he finds right learnedly and multifariously employed
VIII. Which has something to say about Dr. Franklin and the Latin Quarter
IX. Israel is initiated into the mysteries of lodging-houses in the Latin Quarter
X. Another adventurer appears upon the scene
XI. Paul Jones in a reverie
XII. Recrossing the Channel, Israel returns to the Squire’s abode—­His adventures there
XIII. His escape from the house, with various adventures following
XIV. In which Israel is sailor under two flags, and in three ships, and all in one night
XV. They sail as far as the Crag of Ailsa
XVI. They look in at Carrickfergus, and descend on Whitehaven
XVII. They call at the Earl of Selkirk’s, and afterwards fight the ship-of-war Drake
XVIII. The Expedition that sailed from Groix
XIX. They fight the Serapis.
XX. The Shuttle
XXI. Samson among the Philistines
XXII. Something further of Ethan Allen; with Israel’s flight towards the wilderness
XXIII. Israel in Egypt
XXIV. Continued
XXV. In the City of Dis
XXVI. Forty-five years
XXVII. Requiescat in pace
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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