unmarried lady who made it and they amounted to twenty-two hundred." To this picture illustrating how a woman of Mrs. Bache's standing found means to aid the struggling country may be added the commendatory words of Marquis de Marbois to Dr. Franklin, in the succeeding year—who speaks thus of the distinguished man's daughter: "If there are in Europe any women who need a model of attachment to domestic duties and love for their country, Mrs. Bache may be pointed out to them as such. She passed a part of the last year in exertions to rouse the zeal of the Pennsylvania ladies, and she made on this occasion such a happy use of the eloquence which you know she possesses, that a large part of the American army was provided with shirts, bought with their money or made by their hands. In her applications for this purpose, she showed the most indefatigable zeal, the most unwearied perseverance, and a courage in asking which surpassed even the obstinate reluctance of the Quakers in refusing."
Such is the outside impression of the worthy and charming daughter of Benjamin Franklin. Her own letters to her father and others show much force of character and an ardent, generous and impulsive nature. When in 1764 her father was sent to Europe in a representative capacity, she writes girlish, light-hearted observations and clever chatter, but in 1777, when the British army's approach had driven her and her young husband from their Philadelphia home, her letters to Dr. Franklin, then sent to France by the American Congress, are strong accounts of events, sound philosophy, and even some correct prophecy on the Nation's future—letters which must have been really helpful to the statesman abroad.
Mrs. Bache lived through stirring experiences, for the Revolution did not spare those of gentle breeding or station. On the 17th of September, 1777, four days after the birth of her second daughter, Mrs. Bache left town, taking refuge at first in the home of a friend near Philadelphia but afterward going up into the state, where they remained until the evacuation of the Quaker City by the British forces. The letters written to her father after her return to the Franklin house which had been used in the meantime as headquarters for Captain Andre, give a splendid picture of the prohibitive prices that existed in the Colonies at this time. "There is hardly such a thing as living in town, everything is so high," she writes. "If I was to mention the prices of the common necessaries of life, they would astonish you. I have been all amazement since my return; such an odds have two years made, that I can scarcely believe that I am in Philadelphia. They really ask me six dollars for a pair of gloves, and I have been obliged to pay fifteen pounds for a common calamanco petticoat without quilting that I once could have got for fifteen shillings."
These prices were owing to the depreciation of the Continental money; it subsequently was much greater. The time came when Mrs. Bache's domestics were obliged to take two baskets with them to market, one empty, to contain the provisions they purchased, the other full of Continental money to pay for them.
It has been said that every woman is a brief for womankind, and surely Mrs. Bache may be considered a composite reflection of the fate of the sheltered woman during the Revolution, and of how they bore their unaccustomed hardships and turned their talents to the benefit of the humble defenders of the nation.
