Everyone has leisure moments which are apt to hang heavy upon one's hands unless employed in some sort of recreation. One turns to golf and outdoors, another goes forth with gun or rod, a third arms himself with a camera. Many dabble a little in science. Some take to the telescope and star-gazing, while the microscope claims others, who haunt scummy ponds with jars and bottles in search of diatoms, and other denizens of a drop of stagnant water. One goes in for bugs, another for ferns or fungi. Others, of a bookish turn of mind, do their hunting in the dark corners of second-hand bookstores, hoping to stumble upon a first edition or some other treasure.
But it is doubtful if the whole range of hobbies can produce anything half so fascinating as the hunt for one's ancestry. This combines the charm and excitement of every other pastime. What sportsman ever bagged such royal game as a line of his own forebears? What triumph of the rod and reel ever gave the thrill of ecstasy with which we land an elusive ancestor in the genealogical net? If any proof be needed of the fascination of this pursuit, behold the thousands who are taking it up! The nooks and[Pg 10] crannies of civilization are their hunting-grounds—any corner where man has left a documentary trace of himself. Behold them, eager enthusiasts, besieging the libraries, poring over tomes of deeds and wills and other documents in State and county archives, searching the quaint and musty volumes of town annals, thumbing dusty pages of baptismal registers, and frequenting churchyards to decipher the fast-fading names and dates on mossgrown tombstones, yellow and stained with age, or cracked and chipped by the frosts and rains of many seasons!
A tidal wave of ancestry-searching has indeed swept over the country. Genealogical and biographical societies have been organized. Periodicals have sprung up which confine themselves exclusively to this subject. Newspapers are devoting departments to it. The so-called patriotic societies and orders have become a host, with branches in nearly every State. They count their members by tens of thousands, their rolls are steadily increasing, and new societies are constantly being organized. There is scarcely an achievement in which our ancestors took part which has not been made the rallying-point of some flourishing society. All these draw life and nourishment from the mighty stream of genealogical research. We must prove that we have had ancestors, and that one or more of them had the distinction celebrated by the particular organization at whose door we knock for admission.
Librarians and the custodians of public records[Pg 11] bear witness to this great movement. The libraries have become wonderfully popular, thronged by multitudes who have enrolled themselves in the army of amateur genealogists. So onerous has become the work of handing out historical and genealogical books that in some large libraries such works have been gathered into alcoves which are thrown open to the public, where the ancestry-hunter may help himself.
Formerly such public records as deeds and wills constituted the special preserve of the lawyer. But his monopoly is a thing of the past. The genealogist has invaded this domain and established equal rights. He still leaves to the lawyer the dry searching of titles to property, choosing for himself the pleasanter task of sifting out important data for the biography of an ancestor, or for the proofs of a line of descent.
Old church record books, with their marriage and baptismal registers, have acquired an extraordinary value. In many cases these volumes have been rescued out of dark corners and from beneath accumulations of dust and débris where they had been tossed as ecclesiastical junk. But the pastors and church secretaries who unearthed them, at the instance of inquiring genealogists, have now discovered a profitable occupation for their leisure in transcribing items for correspondents. Indeed, a number of societies are now engaged in collecting these old registers, or in making transcripts for their archives.
What is the subtle attraction which draws these multitudes—the fascination which lures so many into[Pg 12] genealogical research? We have hinted that the pursuit of ancestry yields the exhilaration both of the chase and the stillhunt, kindling the suspense of expectation into sudden thrills of discovery, as keen as those when the wary canvas-back flies low over the blind, or a pair of antlers comes crashing through the brush.
But while genealogical research affords all the excitement of the chase, it is followed by no reproach for having taken life, but by the permanent satisfaction peculiar to the benefactor of mankind. The ancestry-hunter does not kill, but brings to life. He revives the memories of the dead, and benefits the world with an honorable contribution to the science of history. For a trophy he does not show a string of fish, nor a few birds and skins to distribute among friends, but a genuine historical work of ever-increasing value, which hands down his name to an appreciative posterity.
We have compared the peculiar delight of establishing a family link, long shrouded in mystery or attended with harassing doubts, to the angler's joy in landing a notable catch. In both cases the issue may long hang in the balance between skilful manipulation and a possible stroke of bad luck, which no skill can guard against. The fish may be reeled in or given his head without a single mistake of judgment. But who can foresee the sharp rock, the hidden snag, which cuts or entangles the line? And so, too, is skill most richly rewarded in searching for[Pg 13] ancestors; but what can it avail against the positive wiping out of indispensable records?
We recall one of these genealogical tragedies, which cast its shadow over a remarkable record of successes in tracing a number of interesting lines for a gentleman who could start us off with no more than the names and birth-places of his parents. Two lines remained which pointed back by strong evidence to European connections of the titled class. All that was needed in one case was a clue to show to which of several branches of the family in Great Britain, the first American ancestor belonged. But to this day that clue has eluded every attempt to pick it up by research here or abroad.
Cases which are parallel up to this point are not uncommon. But the tragedy has yet to be told. At the colonial homestead of this ancestor we learned that his personal papers had, indeed, been preserved from generation to generation. Their last owner, a maiden lady, had carefully kept them in an old trunk, which was itself an ancient heirloom. But she had never taken the pains to examine their contents, and only a short time before our investigation brought us upon the scene, these hoary documents, after surviving the vicissitudes of seven generations, had been destroyed in a fire which reduced the old house to ashes!
Who can express the sorrow of it? No finder............