MARTHA'S VINEYARD

martha's vineyard, an island including the greater part of dukes county, massachusetts, u.s.a., lying about 3 m. off the southern coast of that state. its extreme length (east to west) is about 20 m., and its extreme width (north to south) about 91⁄2 m. along its north-west and a portion of its north-east shore lies vineyard sound. its principal bays are vineyard haven harbor, a deep indentation at the northernmost angle of the island; and, on the eastern coast, edgartown harbor and katama bay, both formed by the juxtaposition of chappaquiddick island. the surface is mainly flat, excepting a strip about 2 m. broad along the north-western coast, and the two western townships (chilmark and gay head), which are hilly, with several eminences of 200 to 300 ft.--the highest, prospect peak, in chilmark township, 308 ft. gay head light, a beacon near the western extremity, stands among picturesque cliffs, 145 ft. above the sea. along the southern coast are many ponds, all shut off from the ocean by a narrow strip of land, excepting tisbury great pond, which has a small outlet to the sea. others are sengekontacket pond on the eastern coast; lagoon pond, which is practically an arm of vineyard haven harbor; and, about a mile east of the harbor, chappaquonsett pond. martha's vineyard is divided into the following townships (from east to west): edgartown (in the south-eastern part of the island), pop. (1910), 1191; area, 29.7 sq. m.; oak bluffs (north-eastern portion), pop. (1910), 1084; area, 7.9 sq. m.; tisbury, pop. (1910), 1196; area, 7.1 sq. m.; west tisbury, pop. (1910), 437; area, 30.5 sq. m.; chilmark, pop. (1910), 282; area, 19.4 sq. m.; and gay head, pop. (1910), 162; area 5.2 sq. m. the population of the county, including the elizabeth ids. (gosnold town, pop. 152), n. w. of martha's vineyard; chappaquiddick island (edgartown township), and no man's land (a small island south-west of martha's vineyard), was 4561 in 1900 (of whom 645 were foreign-born, including 79 portuguese and 72 english-canadians, and 154 indians), and in 1910, 4504. the principal villages are oak bluffs on the north-east coast, facing vineyard sound; vineyard haven, in tisbury township, beautifully situated on the west shore of vineyard haven harbor, and edgartown on edgartown harbor--all summer resorts. no man's land, included politically in chilmark township, lies about 61⁄2 m. south of gay head. it is about 11⁄2 m. long (east and west) and about 1 m. wide, is composed of treeless swamps, and is used mainly for sheep-grazing; the neighbouring waters are excellent fishing ground. martha's vineyard is served by steamship lines from wood's hole and new bedford to vineyard haven, oak bluffs, and edgartown. the martha's vineyard railway (from oak bluffs to the south-east extremity of the island, by way of edgartown), opened in 1874, was not a financial success, and had been practically abandoned in 1909, but an electric line from oak bluffs to vineyard haven provides transit facilities for that part of the island. for more than a century whale fishing was practically the sole industry of martha's vineyard. it was carried on at first from the shore in small boats; but by the first decade of the 18th century vessels especially built for the purpose were being used, and by 1760 shore fishing had been practically abandoned. the industry, seriously crippled by invasions of british troops during the war of american independence--especially by a force which landed at holmes's hole (vineyard haven) in september 1778--and again during the war of 1812, revived and was at its height in 1840-1850, only to receive another setback during the civil war. in the last part of the 19th century its decline was rapid, not only because of the increasing scarcity of whales, but because of the introduction of the mineral oils, and by the end of the century whaling had ceased to be of any economic importance. herring fishing, on both the north and the south shore, occupies a small percentage of the inhabitants, and there is also some deep-sea fishing. sheep-raising, especially for wool, is an industry of considerable importance, and dukes county is one of the three most important counties of the state in this industry. martha's vineyard was discovered in 1602 by captain bartholomew gosnold, who landed (may 21) on the island now called no man's land, and named it martha's vineyard,[1] which name was subsequently applied to the larger island. captain gosnold rounded gay head, which he named dover cliff, and established on what is now cuttyhunk island, which he called elizabeth island, the first (though, as it proved, a temporary) english settlement in new england. the entire line of sixteen islands, of which cuttyhunk is the westernmost of the larger ones, have since been called the elizabeth islands; they form the dividing line between buzzards bay and vineyard sound, and in 1864 were incorporated as gosnold township (pop. in 1905, 161) of dukes county. the territory within the jurisdiction of the council for new england was parcelled in 1635 among the patentees in such terms--owing to insufficient knowledge of the geography of the coast--that both william alexander, earl of stirling, and sir ferdinando gorges, proprietor of maine, claimed martha's vineyard. in 1641 stirling's agent, forrett, sold to thomas mayhew (1592-1682),[2] of watertown, massachusetts, for $200, the island of nantucket, with several smaller neighbouring islands, and also martha's vineyard. it seems probable that forrett acted without authority, and his successor, forrester, was arrested by the dutch in new amsterdam and sent to holland before he could confirm the transfer. in 1644 the commissioners of the united colonies, apparently at the request of the inhabitants of martha's vineyard, annexed the island to massachusetts, but ten years later the islanders declared their independence of that colony, and apparently for the next decade managed their own affairs. meanwhile mayhew had recognized the jurisdiction of maine;[3] and though the officials of that province showed no disposition to press their claim, it seems that this technical suzerainty continued until 1664, when the duke of york received from his brother, charles ii., the charter for governing new york, new jersey, and other territory, including martha's vineyard. in 1671 governor francis lovelace, of new york, appointed mayhew governor for life of martha's vineyard; in 1683, the island, with nantucket, the elizabeth islands, no man's land, and chappaquiddick island were erected into dukes county, and in 1695 the county was re-incorporated by massachusetts with nantucket excluded. under the new charter of massachusetts bay (1691), after some dispute between massachusetts and new york, martha's vineyard became a part of massachusetts. there is a tradition that the first settlement of martha's vineyard was made in 1632, at or near the present site of edgartown village, by several english families forming part of a company bound for virginia, their ship having put in at this harbour on account of heavy weather. it is certain, however, that in 1642, the year after thomas mayhew bought the island, his son, also named thomas mayhew (c. 1616-1657), and several other persons established a plantation on the site of what is now edgartown village. this settlement was at first called "great harbor," but soon after mayhew was appointed governor of the island it was named edgartown, probably in honour of the only surviving son of the duke of york. the younger mayhew, soon after removing to martha's vineyard, devoted himself to missionary work among the indians, his work beginning at about the same time as that of john eliot; he was lost at sea in 1657 while on his way to secure financial assistance in england, and his work was continued successfully by his father.[4] the township of edgartown was incorporated in 1671, and is the county-seat of dukes county. in 1783 several edgartown families joined the association made up of martha's vineyard, nantucket, providence and newport whalers, who founded hudson, on the hudson river, in columbia county, new york. oak bluffs had its origin as a settlement in the camp meetings, which were begun here in 1835, and by 1860 had grown to large proportions. as the village expanded it took the name of cottage city. in 1880 the township was incorporated under that name, which it retained until january 1907, when the name (and that of the village also) was changed to oak bluffs. tisbury township was bought from the indians in 1669 and was incorporated in 1671. its principal village, vineyard haven, was called "holmes's hole" (in honour of one of the early settlers) until 1871, when the present name was adopted. west tisbury township was set off from tisbury, and incorporated in 1892. chilmark township was incorporated in 1694. gay head township was set off from chilmark, and incorporated in 1870. see c. gilbert hine, _the story of martha's vineyard_ (new york, 1908); charles e. banks, "martha's vineyard and the province of maine" in _collections and proceedings_ of the maine historical society, 2nd series, vol. ix. p. 123 (portland, maine, 1898); and walter s. tower, _a history of the american whale fishery_ (philadelphia, 1907). (g. g.*) footnotes: [1] in the 17th century both "martha's vineyard" and "martin's vineyard" were used, and the latter appears in a book as early as 1638 and in another as late as 1699, and on a map as late as 1670. it seems probable that the original form was _martin_ the name of one of gosnold's crew; according to some authorities the name martha's vineyard was adopted by mayhew in honour of his wife or daughter. [2] mayhew was born at tisbury, wiltshire, was a merchant in southampton, emigrated to massachusetts about 1633, settled at watertown, mass., in 1635; was a member of the massachusetts general court in 1636-1644, and after 1644 or 1645 lived on martha's vineyard. [3] it appears from a letter from mayhew to governor andros in 1675 that about 1641 mayhew obtained a conveyance to martha's vineyard from richard vines, agent of gorges. see f. b. hough, _papers relating to the island of nantucket, with documents relating to the original settlement of that island, martha's vineyard, &c._ (albany, n.y., 1856). [4] in 1901, a boulder memorial was erected to the younger mayhew on the west tisbury road, between the village of that name and edgartown, marking the spot where the missionary bade farewell to several hundred indians. the martha's vineyard indians were subject to the wampanoag tribe, on the mainland, were expert watermen, and were very numerous when the whites first came. nearly all of them were converted to christianity by the mayhews, and they were friendly to the settlers during king philip's war. by 1698 their numbers had been reduced to about 1000, and by 1764 to about 300. soon after this they began to intermarry with negroes, and now only faint traces of them remain. marti, juan jose (1570?-1604), spanish novelist, was born at orihuela (valencia) about 1570. he graduated as bachelor of canon law at valencia in 1591, and in 1598 took his degree as doctor of canon law; in the latter year he was appointed co-examiner in canon law at valencia university, and held the post for six years. he died at valencia, and was buried in the cathedral of that city on the 22nd of december 1604. marti joined the valencian _academia de los nocturnos_, under the name of "atrevimiento," but is best known by another pseudonym, mateo lujan de sayavedra, under which he issued an apocryphal continuation (1602) of aleman's _guzman de alfarache_ (1599). marti obtained access to aleman's unfinished manuscript, and stole some of his ideas; this dishonesty lends point to the sarcastic congratulations which aleman, in the genuine sequel (1604) pays to his rival's sallies: "i greatly envy them, and should be proud that they were mine." marti's book is clever, but the circumstances in which it was produced account for its cold reception and afford presumption that the best scenes are not original. it has been suggested that marti is identical with avellaneda, the writer of a spurious continuation (1614) to _don quixote_; but he died before the first part of _don quixote_ was published (1605). martial (marcus valerius martialis), latin epigrammatist, was born, in one of the years a.d. 38-41, for in book x., of which the poems were composed in the years 95-98, he is found celebrating his fifty-seventh birthday (x. 24). our knowledge of his career is derived almost entirely from himself. reference to public events enables us approximately to fix the date of the publication of the different books of epigrams, and from these dates to determine those of various important events in his life. the place of his birth was bilbilis, officially augusta bilbilis, in spain. his name seems to imply that he was born a roman citizen, but he speaks of himself as "sprung from the celts and iberians, and a countryman of the tagus;" and, in contrasting his own masculine appearance with that of an effeminate greek, he draws especial attention to "his stiff spanish hair" (x. 65, 7). his parents, fronto and flaccilla, appear to have died in his youth (v. 34). his home was evidently one of rude comfort and plenty, sufficiently in the country to afford him the amusements of hunting and fishing, which he often recalls with keen pleasure, and sufficiently near the town to afford him the companionship of many comrades, the few survivors of whom he looks forward to meeting again after his four-and-thirty years' absence (x. 104). the memories of this old home, and of other spots, the rough names and local associations which he delights to introduce into his verse, attest the enjoyment which he had in his early life, and were among the influences which kept his spirit alive in the routine of social life in rome. but his spanish home could impart, not only the vigorous vitality which was one condition of his success as a wit and poet, but the education which made him so accomplished a writer. the literary distinction obtained by the senecas, by lucan, by quintilian, who belonged to a somewhat older generation, and by his friends and contemporaries, licinianus of bilbilis, decianus of emerita, and canius of gades, proves how eagerly the novel impulse of letters was received in spain in the first century of the empire. the success of his countrymen may have been the motive which induced martial to remove to rome when he had completed his education. this he did in a.d. 64, one year before the fall of seneca and lucan, who were probably his earliest patrons. of the details of his life for the first twenty years or so after he came to rome we do not know much. he published some juvenile poems of which he thought very little in his maturer years, and he laughs at a foolish bookseller who would not allow them to die a natural death (i. 113). martial had neither youthful passion nor youthful enthusiasm to make him precociously a poet. his faculty ripened with experience and with the knowledge of that social life which was both his theme and his inspiration; and many of his best epigrams are among those written in his last years. from many answers which he makes to the remonstrances of friends--among others to those of quintilian--it may be inferred that he was urged to practise at the bar, but that he preferred his own lazy bohemian kind of life. he made many influential friends and patrons, and secured the favour both of titus and domitian. from them he obtained various privileges, among others the _semestris tribunatus_, which conferred on him equestrian rank. he failed, however, in his application to the latter for more substantial advantages, although he commemorates the glory of having been invited to dinner by him, and also the fact that he procured the privilege of citizenship for many persons in whose behalf he appealed to him. the earliest of his extant works, that known by the name of _liber spectaculorum_, was first published at the opening of the colosseum in the reign of titus, and relates to the theatrical performances given by him; but the book as it now stands was given to the world in or about the first year of domitian, i.e. about a.d. 81. the favour of the emperor procured him the countenance of some of the worst creatures at the imperial court--among them of the notorious crispinus, and probably of paris, the supposed author of juvenal's exile, for whose monument martial afterwards wrote a eulogistic epitaph. the two books, numbered by editors xiii. and xiv., and known by the names of _xenia_ and _apophoreta_--inscriptions in two lines each for presents,--were published at the saturnalia of 84. in 86 he gave to the world the first two of the twelve books on which his reputation rests. from that time till his return to spain in a.d. 98 he published a volume almost every year. the first nine books and the first edition of book x. appeared in the reign of domitian; and book xi. at the end of a.d. 96, shortly after the accession of nerva. a revised edition of book x., that which we now possess, appeared in a.d. 98, about the time of the entrance of trajan into rome. the last book was written after three years' absence in spain, shortly before his death, which happened about the year a.d. 102 or 103. these twelve books bring martial's ordinary mode of life between the age of five-and-forty and sixty very fully before us. his regular home for five-and-thirty years was rome. he lived at first up three pairs of stairs, and his "garret" overlooked the laurels in front of the portico of agrippa. he had a small villa and unproductive farm near nomentum, in the sabine territory, to which he occasionally retired from the bores and noises of the city (ii. 38, xii. 57). in his later years he had also a small house on the quirinal, near the temple of quirinus. at the time when his third book was brought out he had retired for a short time to cisalpine gaul, in weariness, as he tells us, of his unremunerative attendance on the levees of the great. for a time he seems to have felt the charm of the new scenes which he visited, and in a later book (iv. 25) he contemplates the prospect of retiring to the neighbourhood of aquileia and the timavus. but the spell exercised over him by rome and roman society was too great; even the epigrams sent from forum corneli and the aemilian way ring much more of the roman forum, and of the streets, baths, porticos and clubs of rome, than of the places from which they are dated. so too his motive for his final departure from rome in a.d. 98 was a weariness of the burdens imposed on him by his social position, and apparently the difficulties of meeting the ordinary expenses of living in the metropolis (x. 96); and he looks forward to a return to the scenes familiar to his youth. the well-known epigram addressed to juvenal (xii. 18) shows that for a time his ideal was realized; but the more trustworthy evidence of the prose epistle prefixed to book xii. proves that his contentment was of short duration, and that he could not live happily away from the literary and social pleasures of rome. the one consolation of his exile was the society of a lady, marcella, of whom he writes rather as if she were his patroness--and it seems to have been a necessity of his being to have always a patron or patroness--than his wife or mistress. during his life at rome, although he never rose to a position of real independence, and had always a hard struggle with poverty, he seems to have known everybody, especially every one of any eminence at the bar or in literature. in addition to lucan and quintilian, he numbered among his friends or more intimate acquaintances silius italicus, juvenal, the younger pliny; and there were many others of high position whose society and patronage he enjoyed. the silence which he and statius, although authors writing at the same time, having common friends and treating often of the same subjects, maintain in regard to one another may be explained by mutual dislike or want of sympathy. martial in many places shows an undisguised contempt for the artificial kind of epic on which statius's reputation chiefly rests; and it seems quite natural that the respectable author of the _thebaid_ and the _silvae_ should feel little admiration for either the life or the works of the bohemian epigrammatist. martial's faults are of the most glaring kind, and are exhibited without the least concealment. living under perhaps the worst of the many bad emperors who ruled the world in the 1st century, he addresses him and his favourites with the most servile flattery in his lifetime, censures him immediately after his death (xii. 6), and offers incense at the shrine of his successor. he is not ashamed to be dependent on his wealthy friends and patrons for gifts of money, for his dinner, and even for his dress. we cannot feel sure that even what seem his sincerest tributes of regard may not be prompted by the hope of payment. further, there are in every book epigrams which cannot be read with any other feelings than those of extreme distaste. these faults are so unmistakable and undeniable that many have formed their whole estimate of martial from them, and have declined to make any further acquaintance with him. even those who greatly admire his genius, and find the freshest interest in his representation of roman life and his sketches of manners and character, do not attempt to palliate his faults, though they may partially account for them by reference to the morals of his age and the circumstances of his life. the age was one when literature had either to be silent or to be servile. martial was essentially a man of letters: he was bound either to gain favour by his writings or to starve. even statius, whose writings are in other respects irreproachable, is nearly as fulsome in his adulation. the relation of client to patron had been recognized as an honourable one by the best roman traditions. no blame had attached to virgil or horace on account of the favours which they received from augustus and maecenas, or of the return which they made for these favours in their verse. that old honourable relationship had, however, greatly changed between augustus and domitian. men of good birth and education, and sometimes even of high official position (juv. i. 117), accepted the dole (_sportula_). martial was merely following a general fashion in paying his court to "a lord," and he made the best of the custom. in his earlier career he used to accompany his patrons to their villas at baiae or tibur, and to attend their morning levees. later on he went to his own small country house, near nomentum, and sent a poem, or a small volume of his poems, as his representative at the early visit. the fault of grossness martial shares with nearly all ancient and many modern writers who treat of life from the baser or more ridiculous side. that he offends more than perhaps any of them is not, apparently, to be explained on the ground that he had to amuse a peculiarly corrupt public. although there is the most cynical effrontery and want of self-respect in martial's use of language, there is not much trace of the satyr in him--much less, many readers will think, than in juvenal. it remains to ask, what were those qualities of nature and intellect which enable us to read his best work--even the great body of his work--with the freshest sense of pleasure in the present day? he had the keenest capacity for enjoyment, the keenest curiosity and power of observation. he had also a very just discernment. it is rare to find any one endowed with so quick a perception of the ridiculous who is so little of a caricaturist. he was himself singularly free from cant, pedantry or affectation of any kind. though tolerant of most vices, he had a hearty scorn of hypocrisy. there are few better satirists of social and literary pretenders in ancient or modern times. living in a very artificial age, he was quite natural, hating pomp and show, and desiring to secure in life only what really gave him pleasure. to live one's own life heartily from day to day without looking before or after, and to be one's self without trying to be that for which nature did not intend him, is the sum of his philosophy. further, while tolerant of much that is bad and base--the characters of crispinus and regulus, for instance--he shows himself genuinely grateful for kindness and appreciative of excellence. he has no bitterness, malice or envy in his composition. he professes to avoid personalities in his satire;--"ludimus innocui" is the character he claims for it. pliny, in the short tribute which he pays to him on hearing of his death, says, "he had as much good-nature as wit and pungency in his writings" (_ep._ iii. 21). honour and sincerity (_fides_ and _simplicitas_) are the qualities which he most admires in his friends. though many of his epigrams indicate a cynical disbelief in the character of women, yet others prove that he could respect and almost reverence a refined and courteous lady. his own life in rome afforded him no experience of domestic virtue; but his epigrams show that, even in the age which is known to modern readers chiefly from the _satires_ of juvenal, virtue was recognized as the purest source of happiness. the tenderest element in martial's nature seems, however, to have been his affection for children and for his dependents. the permanent literary interest of martial's epigrams arises not so much from their verbal brilliancy, though in this they are unsurpassed, as from the amount of human life and character which they contain. he, better than any other writer, enables us to revive the outward spectacle of the imperial rome. if juvenal enforces the lesson of that time, and has penetrated more deeply into the heart of society, martial has sketched its external aspect with a much fairer pencil and from a much more intimate contact with it. martial was to rome in the decay of its ancient virtue and patriotism what menander was to athens in its decline. they were both men of cosmopolitan rather than of a national type, and had a closer affinity to the life of paris or london in the 18th century than to that of rome in the days of the scipios or of athens in the age of pericles. the form of epigram was fitted to the critical temper of rome as the comedy of manners was fitted to the dramatic genius of greece. martial professes to be of the school of catullus, pedo, and marsus, and admits his inferiority only to the first. but, though he is a poet of a less pure and genuine inspiration he is a greater epigrammatist even than his master. indeed the epigram bears to this day the form impressed upon it by his unrivalled skill. authorities.--the mss. of martial are divided by editors into three families according to the recension of the text which they offer. of these the oldest and best is represented by three mss. which contain only selected extracts. the second family is derived from an inferior source, a ms. which was edited in a.d. 401 by torquatus gennadius; it comprises four mss. and contains the whole of the text. the third family, of which the mss. are very numerous, also contains the whole of the text in a recension slightly different from that of the other two; the best representative of this family is the ms. preserved in the advocates' library at edinburgh. the best separate edition of the text is that of lindsay (oxford, 1902); earlier editions of importance are those of schneidewin (1842 and 1853), and of gilbert (leipzig, 1886). the best commentary is that of l. friedlander (leipzig, 1886) in two volumes with german notes) and in the same scholar's _sittengeschichte roms_ much will be found that explains and illustrates martial's epigrams. there is a large selection from the epigrams with english notes by paley and stone (1875), a smaller selection with notes by stephenson (1880); see also edwin post, _selected epigrams of martial_ (1908), with introduction and notes. the translation into english verse by elphinston (london, 1782) is famous for its absurdity, which drew an epigram from burns. (w. y. s.)