New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-07-31
MILLIONS "PRETTY BOYv And pENNS
CRAZE
From The 81. Jancs's Gazette


Next year will be the two-hundrcdth anniversary
OF the founding of Pennsylvania and it has oc
that the transfer of the remains of William penn
rom Jordans to Philadelphia might be an agreeable
noataafe IN me hcentenary celebration. The report
caused good deal of excitement in the quiet Cal
ION ION valleys when it reached them at last.
+hensnf, got as testy as Friends ever allow
Americans; and-the Stewart mystery being re-
openicd Just az that time-it was thought advisable
eye to the remains of the Founder of Pennsvivania
Una, no one did them violence To disturb his bones
t"pv nf 90 Tearing page ont of that interesting his
LOFTY OF early Quakerlsm which lies open in Jordaps
SStavS!ard LOT any one to read. But only one page
otainnlnG among tho little regiment of headstoncs
meadow of graves, and reading the nan es and dates
tneIeon inscribed, yon can find little to choose be-
a%d o r@nn ana ms company They we're all men
VINO had all to lose-houses lands and social nosi
hon--by the publication of new and strange reli-
ne tein,hingt9ns, husband and wife-who are laid
side 10y side with Penn and his two wives in Jordans
lame ga. OF stitt-necked stock. MaEys father, Sir
John Proude of the officers of the Prince of
C Crahge, and was killed at the siege of Grol in
SSmG;iderland. Her first husband Sir William
oPringeit, was Parliamentary captain who fought
at Edgehill and Newbury, and died of q "calen-
W contracted at the siege of Arundel in 1913
we nave 10 thank this uncompromisng iconoclast
i i the loss of many saint in marble and fresco
be they eyer so rich" writes Lady Sprngett he
ness or costly workmanship" Pity that his life and
death occurred before orans was set apart from the
Chaiiont meadows for his right place is here, and
hot Ill hingmer Church In all the peculiar tenets
OF the sect, IN all but the name, he was Quaker
good score of years before George Fox enjoyed the
distinction OF inyenting Quakcrsm. Mary Spring
ett, on the other hand, seems by her own description
70 have been little unstable in the early days OF
Der Der, wishood and yidowhood After Sir William
went after recreation" as she expressed it, into
many excesses and vanities, as foolish mirth card
whole round of the popular sects of the day and it
was in this condition of weary seeking and not
father was member of the High Court OF Justice
that condemned Charles l., although he did not sign
secured him from the death penalty at the Restora-
ton. AT his fathers death he succeeded to a good
property at Chaliont ST. Peters; but tins was sub
sequenty coniscated aud made over to the Duke of
tiraiton and abont 1870 he is found purchasing a
house near Amersham for fifty pounds Thomas
es af y wi Of WIFI s msa behind eh
dren-iearned his first lessons in Quakersm from the
PenDingtons
Beaconsiied on side and Chalfont st. Giles on
the other, and an easy distance also from Chalfont
of William Penn is buried--a son of that 1homas
Penn who married Lady Juliana Fermoi, and was
proprietor OF Pennsy lvania IN his day. The meet
ipg-house was therefore conveniently situated for
the requirements of tins early band of Quakcrs.
BESIDES being close 10 the early and later nome of
the Pcnningtons, II was only six miles from Rick
mansworth, where William Penn took Gull Springett
on her honeymoon. This part of the country was,
in fact, very hotbed of Dissent. In the Bucks
Records we lind " General Fleetwood lived at the
Nache, in Chalfont and Russell on the opposite hill;
and Mrs. Cromwell, divers wife, and her daugh-
ter> ut Woodrow High House; so the whole country
was kept IN awe and became exceedingly zealoms
and very tanatical.' greater than amy of these
came into the nelghborhood of Jordans in 1868.
Thomas Elwood had made MiltOn's acquaintance in
London some years before, when hunted out of
house and home by the Aylesbury Justices, and read
Latin to him in his lodging i'll JewIn-st. When the
plague grew hot in the city, the blind poet be-
Thought hun OF his quondam sccretary, AID asked
Elwood took pretty box for him IN Giles Chal-
font ~ and II was here that he suggested 20 him the
Idea OF " Paradise Regained." Milton had given
hun the manuscript OF " Paradise Lost 10 pass his
Quaker relates in his Life, Thou hast said much
here Of Paradise lost, but what hast thou TO say 10
Paradise foundT lie made me no answer, but sato
some time In muse then broke OF that discourse,
was over. ana the city well cleansed, he returned
thither and when afterward | went to wait on
hun tn re he showed his second poem, called
Paradise Regaincd, and i'll pleasant tone said to
head by the question you put to me at Chaliont
winch before had not thought OFF,
save on rare occasions, " hen he came to see the
Penningtons or ElwOods, w iiamienn was not much
years OF his hrst marriage His Pennsy wanna home
iatierly Kept him much abroad aud after his
second marriage with Hannah Callowhll, the
daughte OF merchant of Bristol, he TO have
mark tho graves of the Penns PcnnngUons Ell
woods, Rules and other Friends in J0rdans are of
comparatively recent introduction. They seem to
nav been oftencr used than not in the infancy of
marked out, and to have been prohibited only
owing to some members of the society gong beyond
the simple practice OF nscribing merely the name
and GATE upon the stone. About thirty years ago
the prohibition was withdrawn and the Friends of
this meeting had tombstoncs placed TO mark such
graves as could be Identified from the register.