Albert Gallatin
commerce were to be the foundation and support of the settlement in the
wilderness where they would realize their political Utopia.
From Geneva the young adventurers hurried to Nantes, on the coast of
France, where Gallatin soon received letters from his family, who seem
to have neglected nothing that could contribute to their comfort or
advantage. Monsieur P. M. Gallatin, the guardian of Albert, a distant
relative in an elder branch of the family, addressed him a letter
which, in its moderation, dignity, and kindness, is a model of
well-tempered severity and reproach. It expressed the pain Mademoiselle
Pictet had felt at his unceremonious departure, and his own affliction
at the ingratitude of one to whom he had never refused a request.
Finally, as the trustee of his estate till his majority, the guardian
assures the errant youth that he will aid him with pecuniary resources
as far as possible, without infringing upon the capital, and within the
sworn obligation of his trust. Letters of recommendation to
distinguished Americans were also forwarded, and in these it is found,
to the high credit of the family, that no distinction was made between
the two young men, although Serre seems to have been considered as the
originator of the bold move. The intervention of the Duke de la
Rochefoucauld d'Enville was solicited, and a letter was obtained by him
from Benjamin Franklin--then American minister at the Court of
Versailles--to his son-in-law, Richard Bache. Lady Juliana Penn wrote in
their behalf to John Penn at Philadelphia, and Mademoiselle Pictet to
Colonel Kinloch, member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina.
Thus supported in their undertaking the youthful travelers sailed from
L'Orient on May 27, in an American vessel, the Kattie, Captain Loring.
Of the sum which Gallatin, who supplied the capital for the expedition,
brought from Geneva, one half had been expended in their land journey
and the payment of the passages to Boston; one half, eighty louis
d'or--the equivalent of four hundred silver dollars--remained, part of
which they invested in tea. Reaching the American coast in a fog, or bad
weather, they were landed at Cape Ann on July 14. From Gloucester they
rode the next day to Boston on horseback, a distance of thirty miles.
Here they put up at a French cafe, "The Sign of the Alliance," in Fore
Street, kept by one Tahon, and began to consider what step they should
next take in the new world.
The prospects were not encouraging; the military fortunes of the
struggling nation were never at a lower ebb than during the summer which
intervened between the disaster of Camden and the discovery of Arnold's
treason. Washington's army lay at New Windsor in enforced inactivity;
enlistments were few, and the currency was almost worthless. Such was
the stagnation in trade, that the young strangers found it extremely
difficult to dispose of their little venture in tea. Two months were
passed at the cafe, in waiting for an opportunity to go to Philadelphia,
where Congress was in session, and where they expected to find the
influential persons to whom they were accredited; also letters from
Geneva. But this journey was no easy matter. The usual routes of travel
were interrupted. New York was the fortified headquarters of the British
army, and the Middle States were only to be reached by a detour through
the American lines above the Highlands and behind the Jersey Hills.
The homesick youths found little to amuse or interest them in Boston,
and grew very weary of its monotonous life and Puritanic tone. They
missed the public amusements to which they were accustomed in their own
country, and complained of the superstitious observance of Sunday, when
"singing, fiddling, card-playing and bowling were forbidden." Foreigners
were not welcome guests in this town of prejudice. The sailors of the
French fleet had already been the cause of one riot. Gallatin's letters
show that this aversion was fully reciprocated by him.
The neighboring country had some points of interest. No Swiss ever saw a
hill without an intense desire to get to its top. They soon felt the
magnetic attraction of the Blue Hills of Milton, and, descrying from
their summit the distant mountains north of Worcester, made a pedestrian
excursion thither the following day. Mr. Gallatin was wont to relate
with glee an incident of this trip, which Mr. John Russell Bartlett
repeats in his "Reminiscences."
"The tavern at which he stopped on his journey was kept by a man
who partook in a considerable degree of the curiosity even
now-a-days manifested by some landlords in the back parts of New
England to know the whole history of their guests. Noticing Mr.
Gallatin's French accent he said, 'Just from France, eh! You are a
Frenchman, I suppose.' 'No!' said Mr. Gallatin, 'I am not from
France.' 'You can't be from England, I am sure?' 'No!' was the
reply. 'From Spain?' 'No!' 'From Germany?' 'No!' 'Well, where on
earth are you from then, or what are you?' eagerly asked the
inquisitive landlord. 'I am a Swiss,' replied Mr. Gallatin. 'Swiss,
Swiss, Swiss!' exclaimed the landlord, in astonishment. 'Which of
the ten tribes are the Swiss?'"
Nor was this an unnatural remark. At this time Mr. Gallatin did not
speak English with facility, and indeed was never free from a foreign
accent.
At the little cafe they met a Swiss woman, the wife of a Genevan, one De
Lesdernier, who had been for thirty years established in Nova Scotia,
but, becoming compromised in the attempt to revolutionize the colony,
was compelled to fly to New England, and had settled at Machias, on the
northeastern extremity of the Maine frontier. Tempted by her account of
this region, and perhaps making a virtue of necessity, Gallatin and
Serre bartered their tea for rum, sugar, and tobacco, and, investing the
remainder of their petty capital in similar merchandise, they embarked
October 1, 1780, upon a small coasting vessel, which, after a long and
somewhat perilous passage, reached the mouth of the Machias River on the
15th of the same month. Machias was then a little settlement five miles
from the mouth of the stream of the same name. It consisted of about
twenty houses and a small fortification, mounting seven guns and
garrisoned by fifteen or twenty men. The young travelers were warmly
received by the son of Lesdernier, and made their home under his roof.
This seems to have been one of the four or five log houses in a large
clearing near the fort. Gallatin attempted to settle a lot of land, and
the meadow where he cut the hay with his own hands is still pointed out.
This is Frost's meadow in Perry, not far from the site of the Indian
village. A single cow was the beginning of a farm, but the main
occupation of the young men was woodcutting. No record remains of the
result of the merchandise venture. The trade of Machias was wholly in
fish, lumber, and furs, which, there being no money, the settlers were
ready enough to barter for West India goods. But the outlet for the
product of the country was, in its unsettled condition, uncertain and
precarious, and the young traders were no better off than before. One
transaction only is remembered, the advance by Gallatin to the garrison
of supplies to the value of four hundred dollars; for this he took a
draft on the state treasury of Massachusetts, which, there being no
funds for its payment, he sold at one fourth of its face value.
The life, rude as it was, was not without its charms. Serre seems to
have abandoned himself to its fascination without a regret. His
descriptive letters to Badollet read like the "Idylls of a Faun." Those
of Gallatin, though more tempered in tone, reveal quiet content with the
simple life and a thorough enjoyment of nature in its original wildness.
In the summer they followed the tracks of the moose and deer through the
primitive forests, and explored the streams and lakes in the light
birch canoe, with a woodsman or savage for their guide. In the winter
they made long journeys over land and water on snowshoes or on skates,
occasionally visiting the villages of the Indians, with whom the
Lesderniers were on the best of terms, studying their habits and
witnessing their feasts. Occasional expeditions of a different nature
gave zest and excitement to this rustic life. These occurred when alarms
of English invasion reached the settlement, and volunteers marched to
the defence of the frontier. Twice Gallatin accompanied such parties to
Passamaquoddy, and once, in November, 1780, was left for a time in
command of a small earthwork and a temporary garrison of whites and
Indians at that place. At Machias Gallatin made one acquaintance which
greatly interested him, that of La Perouse, the famous navigator. He was
then in command of the Amazone frigate, one of the French squadron on
the American coast, and had in convoy a fleet of fishing vessels on
their way to the Newfoundland banks. Gallatin had an intense fondness
for geography, and was delighted with La Perouse's narrative of his
visit to Hudson's Bay, and of his discovery there (at Fort Albany, which
he captured) of the manuscript journal of Samuel Hearne, who some years
before had made a voyage to the Arctic regions in search of a northwest
passage. Gallatin and La Perouse met subsequently in Boston.
The winter of 1780-81 was passed in the cabin of the Lesderniers. The
excessive cold does not seem to have chilled Serre's enthusiasm. Like
the faun of Hawthorne's mythical tale, he loved Nature in all her moods;
but Gallatin appears to have wearied of the confinement and of his
uncongenial companions. The trading experiment was abandoned in the
autumn, and with some experience, but a reduced purse, the friends
returned in October to Boston, where Gallatin set to work to support
himself by giving lessons in the French language. What success he met
with at first is not known, though the visits of the French fleet and
the presence of its officers may have awakened some interest in their
language. However this may be, in December Gallatin wrote to his good
friend, Mademoiselle Pictet, a frank account of his embarrassments.
Before it reached her, she had already, with her wonted forethought,
anticipated his difficulties by providing for a payment of money to him
wherever he might be, and had also secured for him the interest of Dr.
Samuel Cooper, whose grandson, young Johannot, was then at school in
Geneva. Dr. Cooper was one of the most distinguished of the patriots in
Boston, and no better influence could have been invoked than his. In
July, 1782, by a formal vote of the President and Fellows of Harvard
College, Mr. Gallatin was permitted to teach the French language. About
seventy of the students availed themselves of the privilege. Mr.
Gallatin received about three hundred dollars in compensation. In this
occupation he remained at Cambridge for about a year, at the expiration
of which he took advantage of the close of the academic course to
withdraw from his charge, receiving at his departure a certificate from
the Faculty that he had acquitted himself in his department with great
reputation.
The war was over, the army of the United States was disbanded, and the
country was preparing for the new order which the peace would introduce
into the habits and occupations of the people. The long-sought
opportunity at last presented itself, and Mr. Gallatin at once embraced
it. He left Boston without regret. He had done his duty faithfully, and
secured the approbation and esteem of all with whom he had come in
contact, but there is no evidence that he cared for or sought social
relations either in the city or at the college. Journeying southward he