Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1878-01-11
TRE BATTLE or FORK AND BE&S.
S.
An Ancient I.ycm OF the Maumee.
MAehMNroN. pee. 20. 1s17.

denced on my last visit to Toledo, by in.
qnlries as 10 where copies could be pro-
cured. and especially by my long friend,
the Hon. Emery d. Potier-I nm con.
strai iied, with such tranquility Ms | can
bring to bear upon the subject, to consent
to its reproduction from the newspaper
slips which you have IN your custody /;
leaving such errors, Typographical or other,
rs may have crept into the text to be col.
reced by the readers II only remains to
me to relate the moving causes OF this, my
sole pOelical indisrelion.
The poem of "The Battle of Pork and
Benns,"--l am compelled to call it q
poem for the want Of better word OF
ription-muN have been written, ]
think, in the winter Of 1888 8. The fnan-
cinl cyclone which had swept the country
the year before had Frustrated everybody
and everything. Business was dead, spec.
ulaIion overwhelmed, industry paral, zcd
enterprise discouraged, aud ambition looked
IN vain for field in which to invest its en-
crgics. There was no credit, no confidence,
next To no trade there were sick for the
doctors; but for the lawyers little litga-
ton except OF that sort in which the fees
are in perennial expectancy. The Great
West was as poor as the whole country is
now, aud before thousands OF worthy Peo-
pie stood the grim phantom OF want whis-
pcrng OF impending starvation.
In these days rrysburg-where this
poem was written-was the principal town
of the Maumee river, aud had among it's
population, an unusually large number of
Young men OF intellectual promise and ac-
tiyity Samuel B. Campbell, Oliver A.
Morse, Joseph j. Bingham, Henry &. Stow
ell, Joseph Utley and others, the most OF
whom made names elsewhere and were
heard OF afterwards. During the years OF
gloom which succeeded the great Catastro-
phe OF 1887, there was little field for profit
able occupation, and the means of amnse.
meni were limited to such as they them
selves could devise. During the winter in
which The Battle of Pork and Beans was
produced, tendency set in to versc-mak
ing, and nearly ali the parties named
above, and perhaps Others initiated Silas
Wegg, and from time to time, dropped
into poetry" After John II. Mcbride, the
publisher OF the Miami Of the Lake, the sole
newspaper OF the vicinage, had Indignantly
closed his columns against them, on account
OF some effusiOn which he imagined CON
tained covert satire upon himself, these
literati were compelled to conhne them
selves to foOlscap; aud that long-suffering
and long enduring epic, The Battle Of Pork
and Beans, like the shades of the unburied
whom Charon abhOrs was compelled to
wander for years, disconsolaely in manu-
script, from hand to hand, before its acces-
sion to the honors of typography.
1t came to pass, i'll those days, that An
drew COtenbury-known among his friends
rs The Count "-one of the most genial
and amiable of men, a lawyer who had, tor
many years, ridden the northern and north
western circuits of Ohio, traversing wilder
neSses and tOrding rivers in pursuit oil prac-
tlce and fees, came to Perryshurg to reside.
lhe Count was poet; rhymes;er OF I'M
common facility, but without high de-
gree of inspiration. Evidently he had not
studied the poetical productions of others
very extensively; but lie had read "The
Lady OF the Lake" had become thoroughly
permeated with its octo. syllable jingle, and
had acquired an almost automatic aptitude
Tor ills imitation. lie resolved TO write II
poem which should constitute his cOntrbu-
tion to the literature Of the world, and
this design he proceeded to put in eXecn-
ton. His poem was entitled "The Forest
Rangers" 1t was story of western adj
venture, rustic love and Indian dcprada-
tion and warfare. its catastrophe coming
in the signal conflict between the whites
and savages ut the rapids OF the Miami
river OF the Lakes ut which the latter were
defeated Upon the, whole, il was a most
surprising production; funnier inhnitly
than its author could have imagined. No
body but Count Cuffenbury-not another
human being in the whole wide world,
could have done it. In ono sense it was
original no father ever stamped the fIuit
of his IONS more distinctly his own than
this time-hOmorcd jurisprudent-Of Mo-
hawk German extraction-fxed the pa
ternal impress upon this child Of his i'm
agination. In another sense il was other
wise; for the uncouth docility with which
the poet ambed on IN octo-syllabic meas
ure, after his original, seemed to react upon
the latter and to render the likeness and
the unlikenesS both more distinct and pal
pahle. 1t was funny, ludicrous, and the
cause of abundant wit in others and yet i
never laughed over The Forest Rangers
without spasm in my conscience, as | re-
called to mind the good amiable, simple
hearted old Count the faithfnlness Of his
labors, and the iondncss with which he re-
garded the bantling which, he hoped, was
destined TO transmit his name along the
current OF the centuries.
II am unnecessarily proliX in these
"reminiscences, il is probably because l feel
something of the fOndne's of an ancient
while revisting, in recollection, the scenes
of his younger and livelier days, This WAS
nearly forty years ago. Jesnp W. Scott,
an almost nr;aled conversalionalist, was
| in the zenith of his vigor aud iatellect
John IIollisler, Henry Bennett, Daniel ii,
! Wheeler and Gilbert Beach were men oil
! business and men of ideas. John {. Sphinx
was lawyer and wit combined az kind in
heart as careless in his idioms. The times
were LA I'd and money not easy to-be come
at but there were few artificial wants
Manners were simple, society level, and
men and women inclined 10 symrathist
with and help each other.
| In the course OF time The Forest Ran
gers was finished and, as the Count wa'
AN universal favorite with the legal hreth
rcn, dollars flowed in to delray the cost q
its publication. II was handsomely print
ed; but that il has been highly appreci
ated by the diSinteresed lovers of poetr,
cannot be affirmed. Like Millions incom
parable epic, il suffered under the noglec
Of the contemporaries OF its author but mn
like that production, no Addison has ap
peared to point the world to it's beauties o
To shame il into admiration Of its magnifi
uence. Sorry | am to record that il ha
never reached II second edition; and c0pie
Of il arc almost as hard to procure as cop
les Of the essay Of John Ceves Symme
on the polar npcrIures.
Nevertheless every bullet has it's bill
let" and no man can say that anything
that ever was, passed away leaving nothing
The Forest Rangers had mission of whic
no forecast was vouchsafed. TlrSughOu
Northwestoru Ohio, alike its place uf hirt
and OF sepullure, in the Battle OF Pork an
Beans-haunting the memories Of the pi
opeers aud lingering In the ears OF the vi
circdit.riding lawyers who yet remain upO
the outer verge OF that dark valley whc
We must soon enter-it survives. In Till
il is known. in Canton quoted. in NOrwal
retained, and in Mansfield remembered.
have been reused from reverie 10y il
lines in Gilead, had my sleep invaded b
ils couplels in Custar, and heard is sianau
, I 4 a. 4 "a 4 ~ ~