The principal person of the reënforcement, and one whom it was expected would supply the great need of the Mission, was Elijah White, M. D., from Tompkins County, New York. Dr White was little more than thirty years of age, with light complexion, blue eyes, and dark hair, and of slight, elastic frame. He was thin, too, when he landed from his long voyage, though not so thin as Daniel Lee, to whose shoes the leaden soles of Philetas would scarcely have been out of place.
His manners were of that obliging and nattering kind which made him popular, especially among women, but which men often called sycophantish and insincere. He was fond of oratorical display and of society, affectedly rather than truly pious, not altogether a bad man, though a weak one.[1] Yet we shall see that in such a society an effeminate man may be of no less consequence than a masculine woman, for here, as elsewhere, we find, as La Fontaine says, a "bon nombre d'hommes qui sont femmes." He had no talent, as Heinrich Heine would declare, but yet a character. And strange to say, the longer he dwelt upon this coast, the more he became smooth and slippery like glass, and flat withal, yet he could be round and cutting on occasions, particularly when broken on the wheel of adversity. He was accompanied by his wife, an infant son, and a lad of fourteen years named George Stoughtenburg, whom he had adopted. Mrs White was a cheerful, amiable young woman, and devoted to her husband.
Next we will mention Alanson Beers, a blacksmith from Connecticut, a man of low stature, dark complexion, thin features, and rigid alike in his views of religion and social propensities, an honest, worthy character, entitled to respect. He also brought his wife, a woman of comfortable physique and yielding temper, together with three children.
Another, W. H. Willson, a ship-carpenter, had
- ↑ Moss' Pioneer Times, MS., 3.
