The First Gubernational Visit to Nantucket
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transportation by tip-cart. There are some personalities which seem to supply their own pageantry. After the 'Sconset visit, the Governor had an informal reception at the Pacific Club, then known as the Insurance Office, where he met a number of the leading citizens. Many of these were old whaling men, "simple and intelligent, yet with that air of authority which the habit of command, exercised in difficult situations, is sure to give."Josiah Quincy goes on to describe these old gentlemen: Their ruddy health, strong nerves, and abundant energy made one suspect that there were some of the finest human qualities which are not to be tested by the examinations of Harvard College. I was introduced to several of these men who had never been on the continent of North America, though they had visited South America and the Pacific Islands. I have noted also talking with one Quaker gentleman of sixty, who had seen no other horizon than that which bounds Nantucket. It is to be noted that Hezekiah Barnard, the Treasurer of the State, one of the Governor's party, was a native of the island, and he remarked to a member of the group, "If thou really wished to tarry on our island, thou has only to persuade one of these young women to put a black cat under a tub, and surely there will be a head wind tomorrow." This was an old sailors' anecdote which was unknown to the other members of the party and brought about a round of chuckles. Quincy relates that the young ladies present united in declaring there was not a black cat in all Nantucket because they had all been smothered under tubs, to retain husbands and brothers who were bound for the southern seas. "At last," Quincy continues, Miss Baxter ("the prettiest girl in the room," says my record) confessed to the possession of a black kitten. But, then, would this do? Surely, a very heavy and mature pussy, perhaps even two of them, would be required to keep a governor against his will. Yes; but then an aide-de-camp could certainly be kept by a kitten, even if it were not weaned, and Miss Baxter had only to dismiss the Governor
