Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1883-06-08
Some BrattlebOrO "reminiscences.
Thomas Green Fessenden and samuel


per published in his native village, and at that
time, as writer's Of the period assert by fat
the brightest literary sheet published in Am
erica. One of his earliest productions. an ode
to the new year, 1898, is quoted by Bucking
ham in his Newspaper "reminiscences, "
which he says filed whole page Of the Mu.
scum. 1t opens thus
"Od Time, a perseyering codger,
Like debtor duuncd, a uimble dodger,
Who, having scampered one inch by you,
WI never afterward come nigh you"
Another, published the same year and in the
same paper, was designed TO celebrate an
event which did not come of according to
the programme laid out. 1t also serves to il
lustrate the fact that our present tendency to
enjoy joke at the expense Of our modern
Athens was not lost upon Fesseudeu and his
contemporaries The old frigate Coastjtuti0H
was finished, and day appointed for her
launch. A large crowd assembled, expecting
to see her slide gently to her future home ;
but some defect in the apparatus designed to
assist her seaward held her fast to the stocks,
and the exhibition had to be postponed Fes.
sender thus refers to the circumstance:
But man is uudercoutribuuou
To sing the frigate Constitution,
Lest this plthy ode be lost on
Commercial wits and tars Of Boston.
Bostonians built a stately frigate,
And undertook TO man aud rig 1T;
The Aforesaid frigate, on day
Appointed, was to glide away.
The wished-for day arrived, when 10!
Miss Constitution would not CO.
For two years preceding 1901 he WAS con
stantly employed in his legal practice and as
a contributor to the columns Of tn Museum
In 1901 he became interested in a hydraulic
hosting machine, and, company having
been formed in this state, lie ac., pted the
foreign agency and Immediately sailed for
Europe. Arriving in London, be found that
his machine was in common use there. thus
at once destroying all prospect Of tue pecu.
mary reward be hoped to gain 10y it, intro.
duction. He very soon engaged in another
enterprise, which had been recently set on
foot by an American then in the city-name-
ly, the building Of mill to b4 run by tie wa
ters of the Thames. For wha, purpose this
mill was to be used l am unable to state: but
at the outset it was endorsed by leading capi.
talists, including the Lord Mayor, and Fessen-
den invested his entire fortune il the bgsi-
ness. He struggled along, barring a large
share of the embarrassing uts aud disappoint-
ments incident to the Inauguration Of new
mechanical contrivance, for nearly two years,
when the enterprise collapsed through lack of
funds to push it farther M-auRhile he had
become acquainted with Mr. Benjamin Per
kins, who had recently set all London agog
over the wonderful cures performed by his
metallic tractors. These tractors which, by
the way, were the invention OF Dr. Elisha
Perkins Of Norwich, Conn. born I1Il, died
1893 were metallic instruments shaped like
carpenters compass and whom allowed to
come in contact with the body, were, IN theo.
ry, capable Of attracting or drawing out all
disease, near and remote, that might be lurk.
ing in the system. The succ, = OF the trac-
tors in this country induced the son Of the in
ventor to cross the water with them, and it
was be whom F,ssruden net IN London The
tractors had proved to be- the fashionable nov
city of the day, and P,rkinss offcs was al
ways crowded with patients awaiting treat
ment at his hands As "a natural result be was
frowned upon 10y the members of the recog-
nized medical faculty, and his "qaaCkish
methods denounr in no measured terms
Fessenden, either from a friendly desire to de
fend Perkins against assaults he deemed un-
called for as It is evident he Lad faith in the
virtue OF the tractors or else seeing in the
doctors war an opportunity to reach the pub.
lie mind at a favorable moment, and thus Sc
cure what he probably ueeded-fuuds-di
in the summer of 1903, publish a volume en-.
titled Terrible Tracioratiou," poem in
four cantos. 1t proved success, and rapidly
passed through three editions, returning to
the author a compensation far beyond his ex-
pectations. OF the character and merits of
the work his friend Hawthorne says: The
poem processes to be poetical petition from
DIR. Christopher Caustic, medical gentleman
who has been ruined by the success of the
metallic tractors, and who applies to the Roy
al College of Surgeons for relief. The wits
of the poor doctor have been somewhat shat
tered by his misfortunes, and with crazy in
genuity he manages to heap ridicule on his
medical brethren while railing against Per
kinsism. The first canto is most characteristic
of the author. 1t is occupied with DR.. Caus-
tics description of his mechanical and scien-
tifc contrivances, embracing all sorts of pos
sible and impossible projects, every one of
which has a ridiculous plausibility. The in
exhaustble variety in which they flow forth
prove the author unrivalled in his way"
Daniel Webster, in reviewing the work in
1905, says of it In commencing it We are
only subscribing to the opinions expressed by
the people Of another country. To be behind
that country in our appreciation of his merit-
were "a stigma; it is pardonable to 60 beyond
Natio,sl -, ILL
tional ingratituds is a crime, 1t belongs to
that class of productions which have the good
fortune to escape what Johnson angrily but
too justly denominates the general conspiracy
of human nature against cotemporary merit.
It passed through three editions in this coun-
try, the last appearing in 1896
In 1904 Fessenden returned to New York,
and for the next four years was engaged in a
variety of literary enterprises His chief
work during this period published in Phila-
delphia) was a political satire entitled sc De-
mocracy Unveiled, or Tyranny Stripped of
the Garb of Patriotism. Like his previous
effort, "Terrible Trsctoraton, it at once be-
came popular. II lashed the Democrats with
an unsparing hand, and copious footnotes
In the latter part of the year lSOG he began
the publication in New York of lG page
quarto sheet This too was political in char
aoter and lived only about year. A quota
tion from this sheet, taken from his new year
ode for 1907, emphasizes the oftasserted fact
that history repeats itself, and shows that the
same material for political weapons that we
use now was in existence at that time. As
we are constantly hearing that our navy is a
mere cypher, that an English or Italian iron
clad could without special effort sweep the
strongest of our cruisers out of existence /;
| so Fessenden writes
''Of SHIPS Of war We cannot one float,
Save now and then a hOg-backsd gunboat;
With such, II bridged the Atlantic DER,
They could not match seventy-fouri
frigate blessed with any breeze
Would run down fleets Of them with easel
Nor could their means Of molestation
The least impede her navigation"
In 1900 he came to Rrattleboro and engag-