The Press.
London, England, 1858-10-02 00:00:00

THE PRESS, OcrotEtt 2, 1858.

served as a battle-field for the old and the new
inhabitants. The Cartwrights, after some indeci-
sion, finally settled in Logan County, better known
as " Rogues' Harbour "

Here ninny refugees, from almost all parts of the Union,
fled to escape justice or punishment; for although there
was law, yet it could not be executed, and it was a desperate
state of society. Murderers, horse thieves, highway rub-
bers, and counterfeiters fled here, until they combined, and
actually formed a majority.
- -

The more orderly and respectable citizens accor-
dingly determined upon taking the law into their
own hands, and adopting violent measures to put
down violence. They therefore enrolled them-
selves into a society denominated " The Regu-
lators," and after some hard fighting and much
bloodshed the ropes were at length driven out
of the district. " This," observes Peter, "is but
one view of frontier life," and he then goes on
to sketch a general outline of life in the back-
woods :

-- -
When my father settled in Logan County, there was not
a newspaper printed south of Green River, no mill short
of forty miles, and no schools worth the name Sunday
was a day set apart for hunting, fishing, horse racing, card-
playing, halls, dances, and all kinds of jollity and mirth.
We killed our meat out of the woods, wild; and beat our
meal and hominy with a pestle and mortar. We stretched
a deer-skin over a hoop, burned holes in it with the prongs
of a fork, sifted our meal, baked our bread, ate it, and it
was first-rate eating too. We raised, orgathered out of the
woods, our own tea. We had sage, hohea, cross-vine,
spice, and sassafras teas, in abundance. As for coffee, I am
not sure that I ever smelled it for ten years. We made
our sugar out of the water of the maple tree, and our
molasses too. These were great luxuries in those days.
We raised our own cotton and flax. We waterrotted our
flax, broke it by hand, scutched it; picked the seed out
of the cotton with our fingers; our mothers and sisters
carded, spun, and wove it into cloth, and they cut and
male our garments and bedclothes, &c. And when we got
on a new suit so manufactured ,and sallied out into company,
we thought ourselves as big as anybody."

Our hero, by his own confession, was " a wild,
" wicked boy, and delighted in horse-racing, card-
" playing, and dancing." his mother was a
piously disposed member of the Methodist Epis-
copal Church, but his father cared for none of
these things, and allowed him to act much as it
seemed good in his own eyes. One night, how-
ever, after returning home from a wedding-feast
at which he had drank a little and danced a great
deal, he sat down by the fireside, and, his nerves
being unstrung by the exhaustion consequent on
excessive exertion, he felt "guilty and con-
denmed." The blood rushed to his head, his
heart beat violently, and his eyes swam in dark-
ness. The impulsive, ignorant boy (for he was
barely sixteen) fancied he was going to die, and
under that impression fell on his knees and
prayed aloud for mercy. his mother, hearing
the unwonted cry, sprang out of bed, and, kneel-
ing by his side, tried to comfort and exhort him.
Next morning he gave up his cards and his rice-
horse, and some time afterwards at a great camp-
meeting the spirit fell upon him, and he seemed
to himself to be in heaven. his " mother raised
the shout," his Christian friends crowded around
and congratulated him, and he went on his way
rejoicing. At that time there were very few
regular itinerant preachers belonging to the
Western Conference, and even those few were
not altogether settled in their religious convic-
tions. Some turned Republican Methodists and
some Arians ; others became Universalists or
New Lights, and denied the existence of a hell ;
while others, again, adopted the tenets of the
Baptists, and held that, without total immersion,
there could be no remission of sins. One even of
the two earliest travelling preachers " backslid, quit
" preaching, kept a grog cry, and became wicked,
" and raised a family to hate Methodists." How-
ever, at a " glorious revival of religion " he
again " got under strong conviction," and " was
" saved by mercy, as all seceders from the Me-
" thodist Episcopal Church will be, if saved
"at all." If the preachers were indifferent, the
people were utterly ignorant on the subject of
religion, and both their hearts and understand-
ings afforded a tabula rasa for the reception of
any sort of impressions, however rude or even
grotesque. A Mr. Lee one day had earnestly
exhorted his congregation "to take up the Cross ;
"no matter what it was, take it up." Now,
among his hearers were "a very wicked Dutch-
man and his wife," the latter moreover being a
notorious scold and a very thorn in the side of
her unfortunate spouse. The words of the
preacher, however, opened the floodgates of their
eyes, aud, weeping bitterly, they " resolved to do
" better, and from that time forward to take up

963

" the Cross and bear it, be it what it might."
The congregation were much affected, and it was
some time before Mr. Lee was able to dismiss

them. Having taken some refreshment, he
mounted his horse, and started for an evening
appointment :
After riding some distance, he saw a little ahead of him
a man trudging along, carrying a woman on his hack.
This greatly surprised Mr. Lee. lie very nutarally sup-
posed that the woman was a cripple, or had hurt herself in
some way, so that she could not walk. The traveller was
a small man, and the woman large and heavy. lieforo he
overtook them, Mr. Lee begin to cast aliittit in his mind
how he could render them assistance. When he came up
to them, lo and behold, who should it be but the Duuthinan
and his wife that had been so affected under his sermon at
meeting! Mr. Lee rode up and spoke to ann, and inquired
of the man what had happened, or what was the matter,
that he was carrying his wife. The Dutchman turned to
Mr. Lee, and said, " ileeure you did tell us in your sermon
dat we must take up de cross and follow de Savionr, ur
dat we could not be saved or go to heaven ; and I does
desire to go to heaven so much as any poly ; and dish vile
is so pad, she scold and scold all de time, anal dish woman
is de createst cross I have iu ale whole world, and I does
take her up and pare her ; for I must save my soul."

This Dutchman and his wife were subsequently
taken into the Church, of which they became
shining ornaments, and the former often told
" his experience in love-feasts " with such thrill-
ing effect that his auditors melted into tears, and
on one occasion " broke out into a load shout."

Among other consequences of the " blessed re-
vival of religion " which took its rise in the year
1801, was the sudden appearance of "a new
" exercise, called the jerks, which was over-
" whelming in its effects upon the bodies and
" minds of the people " :
No matter whether they were 'saints orrsinners, they
would be taken tinder a warm song or sermon, and seized
with a convulsive jerking all over, which they could not
by any possibility avoid, and the more they resisted the
more they jerked. If they would not strive against it, and
would pray in good earnest, the jerking would usually
abate. 1 have seen more than five hundred persons jerking
at one time in my large congregations. Mold usually
persons taken with the jerks, to obtain relief, us they snit',
would rise up and dance. Some would run, but could nut
get away. Soule would resist ; on such the jerks were
generally very severe. To see those proud young gentlemen
and young ladies, dressed in their silks, jewellery, and
prunella, from top to toe, take the jerks, would often excite
my risibilities. The first jerk or so, you would see their
fine bonnets, caps, and combs fty ; and so sudden would he
the jerking of the head, that their long loose hair would
crack almost as loud as a U aggoner's whip.
A "drunken rowdy," having attended a meeting
with the intention of disturbing the devotions of
the pious, was seized with the jerks, and " started
" to run, but he jerked so powerfully he could
" not get away. . . . At length he fetched a
" very violent jerk, snapped his neck, fell, and
" soon expired, with his mouth full of cursing
" and bitterness." To do Mr. Cartwright jus-
tice, he appears to have discountenanced both
this and other " wild exercises," such as " the
" running, jumping, barking exercise." Ile is
very likely correct in regarding these extrava-
gances as involuntary, and as resulting from a
morbid state ofmental and spiritual exaltation. His
knowledge of mankind taught him that outra-
geous fanatics were not likely to be very staunch
adherents of any particular creed ; and that the
impulse which drove them into one fold would
lead them through a dozen before finally depo-
siting them in unbelief and despair. But, while
he disapproved of extravagant demonstrations,
he pushed his love of simplicity to the very verge
of rudeness and eccentricity. At a camp-meeting
near New Lancaster, he observed two fashionably-
attired young ladies, who " must have had in
" rings, earrings, bracelets, gold chains, lockets,
" &c., at least one or two hundred dollars' worth
"of jewellery about their person." To these
fair penitents Master Peter showed considerable
attention, praying for them himself, and calling
others to his aid. Ile wrestled not in vain :
They became deeply engaged; and about midnight. they
were both powerfully converted. They rose to their feet,
and gave some very triumphant shoats; and then very
deliberately took off ther gold chains, earrings, lockets,
&c., and handed them to me, saying, "We have no more
use for these idols. If religion is the glorious, good thing
you have represented it to be, it throws these idols into
eternal shade."
At another time a young man, " finely dressed,
" with his bosom full of ruffles," whenever there
was any excitement in the congregation, " would
" rise to his feet, and stand on the seats prepared
" for the occupancy of the ladies." The preacher
had more than once called him to order :
At length I reproved him personally and sharply, and
said, " I mean that young man there, standing on the seats
of the ladies with a ruffled shirt on." And added, " I doubt

964

not that ruffled shirt wits bprroweil." This brought him
off the seats in a mighty rage.

On another occasion an awkward young fellow
persisted in taking his seat on the benches re-
served for the female worshippers, although he
had been several times requested not to do so.
It was the fashion then for gentlemen to " roach
" their hair, and this young man had a mighty
" bushy roached head of hair." On this hint
our friend Peter acted, and induced some " row-
dies " to ask the fop to accompany them a little
way from camp to drink whisky with them.
When they had got him far enough away, they
held him tightly, and with a pair of scissors cut
and " haggled h►s hair all over at a masterly rate."
When Peter saw him afterwards in this state he
had very hard work, he tells us, to keep down
his risibilities. The rowdies, however, were not
always so well disposed to oblige him. The
brother of the very man who took the leading
part in the cheap hair-cutting movement, well
nigh succeeded in playing him a sorry trick. He
had been foiled in an attempt to run the
preacher's waggon into a creek, and only escaped
being roughly handled by plunging into a deep
hole of water and swinuning to the other side.
For this he swore to have satisfaction, and eagerly
watched for an opportunity to avenge his immer-
sion :

On Sunday night, our aliur was crowded with weeping
penitents. While I was in the altar, labouring with the
mourners, I saw William come up and lean on the pale,
on the outside of the altar. I kept my eye on him ; and
suddenly he leaped over into the altar, and fell at full
length, and roar.id like a bull in a net, and cried aloud for
mercy. While I was talking to and praying fur him aid
othere, I trod on something near where he had been
standing that felt scut. I stooped down and looked, and,
lo and behold, what should it be but a string of frogs,
strung on a piece of hickory-bark I I took them up and
carried them int) the tent, not knowing what it meant.
Just about daybreak, Monday morning, William P. raised
the shout of victory, after struggling hard all night. Our
meeting went on gloriously all that day, and fit several
days and nights, with very little preaching or intermission,
and many were the happy subjects of converting grace.
Some time on Monde) my notorious William came to me,
and told me that he gathered and strung that batch of
frogs, and brought them to the altar, intending, while I
was stooping and praying for the mourners, to slip them
over my head and round my neck; and while he was
seeking an opportunity to do this, the mighty power of
God fell on him. He said he never wanted to be any
nearer hell than he felt himself to be when the power of
God arrested him.

Though a man of peace, the worthy Peter was
an " awkward customer " when his blood was
roused by opposition. At a certain camp-meeting
he was frequently interrupted by a number of
rowdies, who were armed with dirks, clubs,
knives, and horsewhips. Sunday morning was
selected for their final operations, but, as will
be seen from the following extract, they had
reckoned without their host :

About the time I was half through my discourse, two
very fine-dressed young men marched into the congregation
with loaded whips, and hats on, and rose up and sto,,d in
the midst of the ladies, and began to laugh and talk. They
were near the stand, and I requested them to desist and get
ott the seats ; but they cursed me, and told me to mind my
own basin. as, and said they would nut get down. I
stopped trying to preach, and called for a magistrate.
There were two at hand, hilt I saw they were both afraid.
I ordered them to take these men Into custody, Lut they
acid they could not do it. I told them, as I left the stand,
to command me to take them, and I would do it at the
risk of my life. I advanced toward them. They ordered
me to stand off, but I advanced. One of them made a
pass at my head with his whip, but I closed in with him,
and jerked him off the seat. A regular scuffle ensued.
The congregation by this time were all in commotion. I
heard the magistrates give general orders, commanding all
friends of order to aid in suppressing the riot. In the
scuffle I threw my prisoner down, and held him fast; he
tried his best to get loose; I told him to be quiet, or!
would pound his chest well. The mob rose, and rushed to
the rescue of the two plisciiers, for they had taken the
other young man also. An old and drunken magistrate
c rine up to tne, and ordered me to let my prisoner go. I
t him I should not. He swore if I did not, he would
knock me down. 1 told him to clack away. Then one of
my friends, at my request, took hold of my prisoner, and
th i drunken justice made a pass at me; hut I parried the
stroke, and seized him by the collar and the hair of the
head, and, fetching hint a sudden jerk forward, brought him
t► the ground, and jumped on him. I told him to be quiet,
or I would pound him well. The mob then rushed to the
scene ; they knocked down seven magistrates, and several
preachers and others. I gave up my drunken prisoner to
another, and threw myself in front of the friends of order.
Just at this moment, the ringleader of the mob and I met;
he made three passes at me, intending to knock me down.
The last time he struck at me, by the force of his own
effort, he threw the side of his face toward me. It seemed
at that moment I had not power to resist temptation, and I
struck a sudden blow in the burr of the ear and dropped
him to the earth. Just at that moment the friends of order
rushed by hundreds on the mob, knocking them down in
every direction. In a few minutes, the place became too