Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1917-05-25
THIRD INSTALLMENT.


in the artillery, sir"
And this is q part of the story where
all the legends agree; that the commo-
dore said:
81 see you do, and thank you, sir;
and l shall never forget this day, sir,
and you never shall, sir"
And after the whole thing was over,
and he had the Englishman's sword,
in the midst of the state and ceremony
of the quarterback, he said:
"Where is Mr.. Nolan? Ask Mr.. No
Ian to come here"
And when Nolan came, the captain
said:
Mr.. Nolan, we are all very grateful
to you today; you are one of US today;
you will be named in the dispatches"
And then the old man took off his
own sword of ceremony, and gave it to
Nolan, and made him put it on. The
man told me this who saw it. Nolan
cried like a baby, and well he might.
He had not worn a sword since that
Internal day at Fort Adams. But al
ways afterward, on occasions of cere-
mony, he wore that quaint old French
sword Of the commodore's.
The captain did mention him in the
dispatches. 1t was always said he
asked that he might be pardoned. He
wrote a special letter to the secretary
of war. But nothing ever came of it.
AS l said, that was about the time
when they began to ignore the whole
transaction at Washington, and when
Nolan's Imprisonment began to carry
itself on because there was nobody to
stop it without any new orders from
home.
have heard it said that he was with
Porter when he took possession of the
Nukahiwa islands. Not this Porter,
you know, but old Porter, his father,
Essex Porter, that is, the old Essex
Porter, not this Essex. AS an artil
lery officer, who had seen service in
the West, Nolan knew more about for
tifications, embrasureS, ravelineS,
Stockades, and all that, than any of
them did; and he worked with a right
good will in fixing that battery all
right. / have always thought it was
a pity Porter did not leave him in
command there with Gamble. That
would have settled all the question
about his punishment. We should
have kept the islands, and at this mo-
ment we should have one station in
the Pacific ocean. Our French friends,
too, when they wanted this little wa
tering place, would have found it was
Virginians, of course, flung all that
away.
All that was near fifty years ago.
If Nolan was thirty then, he must
have been near eighty when he died.
He looked sixty when he was forty.
But he never seemed to me to change
a hair afterWard. AS | imagine his
life, from what 1 have seen and heard
of it, he must have been in every sea,
and yet almost never on land. He
must have known in a formal way,
more officers in our service than any
man living knows. He told me once,
with grave smile, that no man in the
world lived so methodical a life as he.
"YOu know the boys say l am the
Iron Mask, and you know how busy
he was" He said it did not do for
anyone to try to read all the time, more
than to do anything else all the time /;
but that he read just five hours a day.
"Then," he said, Il keep up my note
books, writing in them at such and
such hours from what | have been
reading; and 1 include in them my
scrapbooks." These were very curious
indeed. He had six or eight, of differ
ent subjects. There was one of his
tory, one of natural science, one which
he called "Odds and Ends" But they
were not merely books of extracts
from newspapers. They had bits of
plants and ribbons, shells tied on, and
carved scraps of bone and wood, Which
he had taught the men to cut for him,
and they were beautifully illustrated.
He drew admirably. He had some of
the funniest drawings there, and some
OF the most pathetic, that L have ever
seen in my life. / wonder who will
have NOlan's scrapbooks.
Well, he said his reading and his
notes were his profession, and that
they took five hours and two hours
respectively Of each day. Then"
said he, "every man should have a di-
version as well as profession. My
natural history is my diversion" That
took two hours a day more. The men
used to bring him birds and fish, but
on long cruise he had to satisfy him
self with centipedes and cockroaches
and such small game. He was the only
naturalist / ever met who knew any
thing about the habits Of the house fly
and the mosquito. All those people
can tell you whether they are Lepi-
doptera or Steptopotera; but as for
telling how you can get rid Of them,
or how they get away from you when
you strike them, why, Linnaeus knew
as little of that as John Foy, the idiot,
did. These nine hours made Nolan's
regular daily Occupation" The rest
of tho timo ha toIkad or waIlyad TIL