Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

by Benjamin Franklin

  Going myself one morning to pay my respects, I found in his antechamber one Innis, a messenger of Philadelphia, who had come thence express, with a packet from Governor Denny, for the General. He delivered to me some letters from my friends there, which occasioned my inquiring when he was to return, and where he lodged, that I might send some letters by him. He told me he was ordered to call to-morrow at nine for the General’s answer to the Governor, and should set off immediately. I put my letters into his hands the same day. A fortnight after I met him again in the same place. “So, you are soon returned, Innis?” “Returned! no, I am not gone yet.” “How so?” “I have called here this and every morning these two weeks past for his lordship’s letters, and they are not yet ready.” “Is it possible, when he is so great a writer, for I see him constantly at his escritoire?” “Yes,” said Innis, “but he is like St. George on the signs, always on horseback, and never rides on.” This observation of the messenger was, it seems, well founded; for, when in England, I understood that Mr. Pitt, afterwards Lord Chatham gave it as one reason for removing this general, and sending Generals Amherst and Wolfe, that the minister never heard from him, and could not know what he was doing.

  In this daily expectation of sailing, and all the three packets going down to Sandy Hook, to join the fleet there, the passengers thought it best to be on board, lest by a sudden order the ships should sail, and they be left behind. There, if I remember, we were about six weeks, consuming our sea-stores, and obliged to procure more. At length the fleet sailed, the General and all his army on board, bound to Louisbourg, with intent to besiege and take that fortress; and all the packet-boats in company were ordered to attend the General’s ship, ready to receive his despatches when they should be ready. We were out five days before we got a letter with leave to part, and then our ship quitted the fleet and steered for England. The other two packets he still detained, carried them with him to Halifax, where he stayed some time to exercise the men in sham attacks upon sham forts, then altered his mind as to besieging Louisbonrg and returned to New York with all his troops, together with the two packets above mentioned, and all their passengers! During his absence the French and savages had taken Fort George on the frontier of that province, and the Indians had massacred many of the garrison after capitulation.

  On the whole, I wondered much how such a man came to be intrusted with so important a business as the conduct of a great army; but, having since seen more of the great world, and the means of obtaining, and motives for giving, places and employments, my wonder is diminished. General Shirley, on whom the command of the army devolved upon the death of Braddock, would, in my opinion, if continued in place, have made a much better campaign than that of Loudoun in 1756, which was frivolous, expensive and disgraceful to our nation beyond conception. For though Shirley was not bred a soldier, he was sensible and sagacious in himself, and attentive to good advice from others capable of forming judicious plans, and quick and active in carrying them into execution. Loudoun, instead of defending the colonies with his great army, left them totally exposed, while he paraded idly at Halifax, by which means Fort George was lost; besides, he deranged all our mercantile operations, and distressed our trade, by a long embargo on the exportation of provisions, on pretence of keeping supplies from being obtained by the enemy, but in reality for beating down their price in favour of the contractors, in whose profits it was said, perhaps from suspicion only, he had a share; and, when at length the embargo was taken off, neglecting to send notice of it to Charleston, where the Carolina fleet was detained near three months, and whereby their bottoms were so much damaged by the worm, that a great part of them foundered in their passage home.

  Shirley was, I believe, sincerely glad of being relieved from so burdensome a charge, as the conduct of an army must be to a man unacquainted with military business. I was at the entertainment given by the city of New York to Lord Loudoun, on his taking upon him the command. Shirley, though thereby susperseded, was present also. There was a great company of officers, citizens, and strangers, and, some chairs having been borrowed in the neighbourhood, there was one among them very low, which tell to the lot of Mr. Shirley. I sat by him, and perceiving it, I said, “They have given you a very low seat.” “No matter, Mr. Franklin,” said he, “I find a low seat the easiest.”

  While I was, as before mentioned, detained at New York, I received all the accounts of the provisions, &c., that I had furnished to Braddock, some of which accounts could not sooner be obtained from the different persons I had employed to assist in the business. I presented them to Lord Loudoun, desiring to be paid the balance. He caused them to be examined by the proper officer, who, after comparing every article with its voucher, certified them to be right; and his lordship promised to give me an order on the paymaster for the balance due to me. This was, however, put off from time to time; and, though I called often for it by appointment, I did not get it. At length, just before my departure, he told me he had, on better consideration, concluded not to mix his accounts with those of his predecessors. “And you,” said he, “when in England, have only to exhibit your accounts to the Treasury, and you will be paid immediately.”

  I mentioned, but without effect, a great and unexpected expense I had been put to by being detained so long at New York, as a reason for my desiring to be presently paid; and, on my observing that it was not right that I should be put to any further trouble or delay in obtaining the money I had advanced, as I charged no commission for my service, “Oh,” said he, “you must not think of persuading us that you are no gainer; we understand better those matters, and know, that every one concerned in supplying the army finds means, in the doing it, to fill his own pockets.” I assured him that was not my case, and that I had not pocketed a farthing; but he appeared clearly not to believe me; and indeed I afterwards learned, that immense fortunes are often made in such employments. As to my balance, I am not paid it to this day; of which more hereafter.

  Our captain of the packet boasted much, before we sailed, of the swiftness of his ship; unfortunately, when we came to sea, she proved the dullest of ninety-six sail, to his no small mortification. After many conjectures respecting the cause, when we were near another ship almost as dull as ours, which, however, gained upon us, the captain ordered all hands to come aft and stand as near the ensign staff as possible. We were, passengers included, about forty persons. While we stood there, the ship mended her pace, and soon left her neighbour far behind, which proved clearly what our captain suspected, that she was loaded too much by the head. The casks of water, it seems, had been all placed forward; these he therefore ordered to be moved further aft, on which the ship recovered her character, and proved the best sailer in the fleet.

  The foregoing fact I give for the sake of the following observation. It has been remarked, as an imperfection in the art of shipbuilding, that it can never be known till she is tried, whether a new ship will, or will not, be a good sailer; for that the model of a good-sailing ship has been exactly followed in a new one, which has been proved on the contrary remarkably dull. I apprehend, that this may partly be occasioned by the different opinions of seamen respecting the modes of loading, rigging, and sailing of a ship; each has his method, and the same vessel, laden by the method and orders of one captain, shall sail worse than when by the orders of another. Besides, it scarce ever happens, that a ship is formed, fitted for the sea, and sailed by the same person. One man builds the hull, another rigs her, a third loads and sails her. No one of these has the advantage of knowing all the ideas and experience of the others, and, therefore, cannot draw just conclusions from a combination of the whole.

  Even in the simple operation of sailing when at sea, I have often observed different judgments in the officers who commanded the successive watches, the wind being the same. One would have the sails trimmed sharper or flatter than another, so that they seemed to have no certain rule to govern by. Yet I think a set of experiments might be instituted, first, to determine the mos
t proper form of the hull for swift sailing; next, the best dimensions and most proper place for the masts; then the form and quantity of sails, and their position, as the wind may be; and lastly, the disposition of the lading. This is an age of experiments, and I think a set accurately made and combined would be of great use.

  We were several times chased in our passage, but outsailed everything; and in thirty days had soundings. We had a good observation, and the captain judged himself so near our port, Falmouth, that, if we made a good run in the night, we might be off the mouth of that harbour in the morning; and by running in the night might escape the notice of the enemy’s privateers, who often cruised near the entrance of the Channel. Accordingly all the sail was set that we could possibly carry, and the wind being very fresh and fair, we stood right before it, and made great way. The captain, after his observation, shaped his course, as he thought, so as to pass wide of the Scilly Isles; but it seems there is sometimes a strong current setting up St. George’s Channel, which deceives seamen and caused the loss of Sir Cloudesley Shovel’s squadron in 1707. This was probably also the cause of what happened to us.

  We had a watchman placed in the bow, to whom they often called, “Look well out before there;” and he answered, “Ay, ay”; but perhaps had his eyes shut, and was half asleep at the time; they sometimes answering, as is said, mechanically; for he did not see a light just before us, which had been hid by the studding-sails from the man at the helm, and from the rest of the watch, but by an accidental yaw of the ship was discovered, and occasioned a great alarm, we being very near it: the light appearing to me as large as a cartwheel. It was midnight, and our captain fast asleep; but Captain Kennedy, jumping upon deck, and seeing the danger, ordered the ship to wear round, all sails standing; an operation dangerous to the masts, but it carried us clear, and we avoided shipwreck, for we were running fast on the rocks, on which the light was erected. This deliverance impressed me strongly with the utility of lighthouses, and made me resolve to encourage the building more of them in America if I should live to return thither.

  In the morning it was found by the soundings that we were near our port, but a thick fog hid the land from our sight. About nine o’clock the fog began to rise, and seemed to be lifted up from the water like the curtain of a theatre, discovering underneath the town of Falmouth, the vessels in the harbour, and the fields that surround it. This was a pleasing spectacle to those who had been long without any other prospect than the uniform view of a vacant ocean, and it gave us the more pleasure, as we were now free from the anxieties which had arisen.[13]

  I set out immediately with my son for London, and we only stopped a little by the way to view Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, and Lord Pembroke’s house and gardens, with the very curious antiquities, at Wilton. We arrived in London, the 27th of July, 1757.[14]

  Примечания

  1

  Perhaps from the time, when the name of Franklin, which before was the name of an order of people, was assumed by them for a surname, when others took surnames, all over the kingdom.

  As a proof that Franklin was anciently the common name of an order or rank in England, see Judge Fortesue, De laudibus Legum Anglia, written about the year 1412, in which is the following passage, to show that good juries might easily be formed in any part of England—

  “Moreover, the same country is so filled and replenished with landed menne, that therein so small a Thorpe cannot be found wherein dwelleth not a knight, an esquire. or such a householder, as is there commonly called a Franklin, enriched with great possessions; and also other freeholders, and many yeomen able for their livelihoods to make a jury in form aforementioned.”—Old Translation.

  Chaucer, too, calls his Country Gentleman a Franklin, and, after describing his good housekeeping, thus characterizes him—

  “This worthy Franklin bore a purse of silk,

  Fixed to his girdle, white as morning milk.

  Knight of the Shire, first Justice at th’ Assize,

  To help the poor, the doubtful to advise.

  In all employments, generous, just, he proved;

  Renowned for courtesy, by all beloved.”

  Again— —

  “A spacious court they see,

  But plain and pleasant to be walked in

  Where them does meet a Franklin fair and free.”

  SPENSER’S Faery Queen.

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  2

  This grandson of Benjamin Franklin followed the trade of his father, which was that of a cutler. On the father’s sign, suspended over the shop door, was painted a crown. with his name, “Samuel Franklin, from London.” It had also some of the implements of his trade. This sign was retained by Samuel Franklin the younger. At the begin. ning of the Revolution, the “Sons of Liberty” took offence at this crown, and demanded the removal of the sign; but they finally contented themselves with daubing a coat of paint over the crown, leaving “Samuel Franklin, from London,” and the implements of cutlery. Time gradually wore off the paint from the crown, so as to make it faintly visible; and Mather Byles, who was noted for his loyalty as for his puns, used to lament to Mrs. Franklin, that she should live at the sign of the half-crown.

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  3

  He was born January 6th, 1706, Old Style, being Sunday, and the same as January 17th, New Style, which his biographers have usually mentioned as the day of his birth. By the records of the Old South Church in Boston, to which his father and mother belonged, It appears that he was baptized the same day. In the old public Register of Births, still preserved in the Mayor’s office in Boston. his birth is recorded under the date of January 6th, 1706 At this time his father occupied a house in Milk Street, opposite to the Old South Church, but he removed shortly afterwards to a house at the corner of Hanover and Union Streets, where it is believed he resided the remainder of his life, and where the son passed his early years.

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  4

  In the island of Nantucket.

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  5

  The poem, if such it may be called, of which these are the closing lines, extends through fourteen pages of a duodecimo pamphlet, entitled. “A Looking-Glass for the Times; or the former Spirit of New England revived in this generation; by PETER FOLOER.” It is dated at the end, “April 23rd, 1676.” The lines which immediately precede those quoted by Dr. Franklin, and which are necessary to complete the sentiment Intended to be conveyed by the author, are the following :—

  “I am for peace and not for war,

  And that’s the reason why

  I write more plain than some men do,

  That use to daub and lie.

  But I shall cease, and set my name

  To what I here insert,

  Because to be a libeller,” &c.

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  6

  The marble stone on which this inscription was en graved, having become decayed, and the inscription itse’f defaced by time, a more durable monument has been erected over the graves of the father and mother of Franklin. The suggestion was first made at a meeting of the building committee of the Bunker Hill Monument Association, in the autumn of 1826, and it met with universal approbation. A committee of management was organized, and an amount of money adequate to the object was soon contributed by the voluntary subscriptions of a large number of the citizens of Boston. The corner.stoue was laid on the 15th of June. 1827, and an address appropriate to the occasion was pronounced by General Henry A. S. Dearborn.

  The monument is an obelisk of granite, twenty.ooe feet high, which rests on a square base, measuring seven feet on each side, and two feet in height. The obelisk is composed of five massive blocks of granite placed one above another. On one side is the name of Franklin in large bronze letters, and a little below isa tablet of bronze, thirtytwo inches long and sixteen wide, sunk into the stone. On this tablet is engraved Dr. Franklin’s original inscription, as quoted in the text, and beneath it are the following sines


  The marble tablet,

  Bearing the above inscription,

  Having been dilapidated by the ravages of time,

  A number of citizens,

  Entertaining the most profound veneration