The Literl OP TH: LouisianaTeffitOfy DfeMa / '^■.'i^A. (JJotttell Httioerattg library attrara, 2?;w fork BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1891 PS 275 D37"'" ""'"""">' '-""■"■y ^'"*iii','™te.„S!,.*'^^ Louisiana terrltor 3 1924 021 985 852 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924021985852 The Literature of the Louisiana Territory THE LITERATURE OF THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY BY ALEXANDER NICOLAS DeMENIL A.M., Ph.D., LL.b' ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI THE ST. LOUIS NEWS COMPANY, PUBLISHER 1904 Copyright, 1904 ALEXANDER NICOLAS DeMKNIL March Nixor-JbneB Pig. Co., 215 Pine St., St. Louis. TO THE HONORABLE MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE EXPOSITION COMPANY, THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED AS A TESTIMONIAL OF THE MANY PLEASANT AND PROFITABLE HOURS PASSED IN THEIR COMPANY BY A FELLOW-DIRECTOR. PREFACE. A large number of histories of the Louisiana Territory have been published within the past year, and several new ones are announced as shortly forthcoming. But no one has written a history of the literature of the Territory and the states and territories that have been carved out of Jefferson's great and wise purchase. Indeed, I do not believe that in our numerous reviews, magazines, literary journals and daily news- ^papers, a single article has appeared on the subject. This book, is, therefore, a pioneer study. I have blazed the trail through old bookshops and public and private libraries from Minnesota to Louisiana, huated in many a virgin field hitherto unexplored, and used the newspaper reporter's art of interviewing. I therefore do not hesitate to assert that a large amount of the data and the facts contained in this work, is placed before the reading public for the first time. Furthermore, I have traveled the old paths and availed myself of such information as could be gleaned from encyclopaedias, biographical, critical and literary works, besides devoting almost a year to the examination of hundreds of books by the writers of the Territory, past and (vii) vm PREFACE. present, and the bound files of many newspapers published in the thirties, forties and fifties. By the term "Louisiana Territory " is meant not only that section of the United States which was formerly known as the Louisiana Territory, but also the fourteen states and territories that have been created out of the Louisiana Territory. After a lapse of one hundred and one years, these states and territories are once more bound together in one common brotherhod of purpose and achievement by the great Exposition of the present year, where in brotherly contention and friendly rivalry they will strive to demonstrate to the world the wisdom of the timely and mag- nificent purchase of Thomas Jefferson. In this demonstration — nay, proof, shall their intellectual development, as exemplified by their literature, of which they have a just right of pride, be excluded? No claim is made of the presentation of a com- plete and conclusive I'ecord. Indeed, so wide and extensive is the field, that after gathering my material, I deemed it wise not to avail my- self of a considerable portion of it. I have striven to preserve only what, in my judgment, is most important or most typical of the great section of the country of which I write. I only regret that the carelessness, or indiiference — whichever it may be — of some of the more prominent authors, has deprived me of furnish- ing the reader with a more intimate view of their inner lives. PREFACE. IX Many prominent writers will seem to the reader as unjustly omitted from the list drawn upon for this work. The names of Hamlin Garland, Lafcadio Hearne, Winston Churchill, Edgar Wilson Nye, Jessie Benton Fremont, Clara Erskine Waters, Kate Field and a num- ber of others, will present themselves in this connection. In answer I will state that I have carefully — and even laboriously — investigated the status, as to birth and residence, of every writer of any prominence who had even as much as the shadow of a claim to be considered as belonging to any of the fourteen states and territories carved out of the Louisiana Territory, and in no case have I excluded anyone until firmly convinced that he, or she, as the case might be, had no just claim to representation, — a position whose correctness was confirmed by the writers themselves in some twenty cases in which I wrote to them personally, submitting my doubts on the subject. Before closing this already too lengthy pero- ration, I desire to make acknowledgment of my indebtedness, and to convey my sense of appre- ciation for the courtesies extended to me by Mr. Thomas P. Thompson, a private book collec- tor, and Mr. William Beer, the librarian of the Howard and the Fisk libraries, both of New Orleans, — for information readily furnished me and the use of books consulted; and also, to the proprietors of the Mercantile Library of St. Louis, and Mr. Henry H. Goedeke, one of the /9 PREFACE. eflSicient clerks of the said library, for books and rare magazines loaned to me with commendable liberality. If this book will stimulate others to make fur- ther and deeper researches into the literature of the Western and Southern states which were combined in the Louisiana Territory, I shall feel fully repaid for the time and labor it has required at my hands. Alexander Nicolas De Menil. St. Louis, March 22, 1904. TABLE OF CONTENTS HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY 17 EDUCATION IN THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY . 34 THE EARLIEST BOOKS 40 THE FRENCH AUTHORS 44 JOHN JAMES AUDUBON Biographical Sketch . 53 The Regulators . . . 55 The Mocklng-Bird 57 TIMOTHY FLINT Biographical Sketch .... .... 59 The Shores of the Ohio 62 Personal Appearance of Boone 64 THOMAS H. BENTON Biographical.Sketch ... 65 Character of Nathaniel Macon ... . . 68 The Duel between Randolph and Clay .... 69 BEVERLY TUCKER Biographical Sketch . 71 The Partisan Leader .... 73 HENRY M, BRACKENRIDGE Biographical Sketch , . 77 St. Genevieve, Close of 18th Century . . . . 80 HENRY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT Biographical Sketch ..... ... .84 Hobbomok 87 ANGUS UMPHRAVILLE Biographical Sketch . . . ... 90 Birth of Missouri .... .92 (xi) Xii TABLE OF CONTENTS. ANGUS UMPHRAVILLE — OoJitfmied To the Mississippi 93 The Old Woman's Eemonstrances 93 SOLOMON FRANKLIN SMITH Biographical Sketch" 95 An Execution . . 97 Anecdotes of Andrew Jaclcson Allen .... 98 Reply to the Rev. W. G. Elliot of St. Louis ... 100 CHARLES GAYARRfi Biographical Sketch 101 The Tree of the Dead . . 104 HUGH A. GARLAND Biographical Sketch 107 Jefferson's Influence on Randolph 109 Randolph at Roanoke 110 ANNA PEYRE DINNIES Biographical Sketch 112 The Wife 115 Wedded Love 116 Song 117 ALBERT PIKE Biographical Sketch 118 To the Mocking-Bird 121 To Diana , 122 FRANCOIS DOMINIQUE ROUQUETTE Biographical Sketch 124 Le Soir 125 A Mme. Adele C*** 126 ADRIEN EMMANUEL ROUQUETTE Biographical Sketch 127 Souvenir de Kentucky 130 The Nook 131 To Nature, my Mother 132 NATHANIEL HOLMES Biographical Sketch ... 133 Our Early Common School System 135 TABLE OF CONTENTS. Xlll THOMAS B. THOBfB Biographical Slsetch 138 Tom Owen, tlie Bee -Hunter ,140 EDMUND FLAGG Biograpliical Sbetcii . . 144 Our Early Commercial Helatioiis 146 Tbe Ancient Mounds of the West 148 THE AUGUSTINS Biographical Sketch 150 The St. Louis Cathedral 151 Jacljson Square 153 EDWARD D. NEILL Biographical Sisetch 165 Pocahontas 157 The Legand of Scarlet Dove 158 Oanktayhee 159 MRS. SARAH A. DORSBIY Biographical Sketch ... .... 161 Governor Allen Going Into Exile . . ... 163 JULIA AMANDA WOOD Biographical Sketch 166 Moonbeams 167 There is a Light .169 LOGAN URIAH REAVIS Biographical Sketch 171 The Pacific Coast _. 173 The Grave of Benton ....'. 174 IGNATIUS DONNELLY Biographical Sketch 176 Reform Needed .... 178 The Forest Fountain .179 WILLIAM TOD HELMUTH Biographical Sketch ... 182 Two Views of Japan . 184 JAMES K. HOSMER Biographical Sketch .... 186 Berlin In Peaceful Times 189 XIV TABLE OF CONTENTS. WILLIAM T. HARRIS Biographical Sketch 191 The Educative Work at Missions 193 SAMUEL L. CLEMENS Biographical Sketch 197 The Compositor 200 MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND Biographical Sketch 203 Creed 205 The Bather 206 DENTON J. SNIDER Biographical Sketch 209 The Tall Apple Tree 212 Conscience or Constitution? . . 213 The Home of Diana 214 GEORGE W. CABLE Biographical Sketch 216 STANLEY WATERLOO Biographical Sketch 220 Mother Coon 222 JOHN R. MUSICK Biographical Sketch 224 An Adventure of Audubon 226 MRS. E. J. NICHOLSON Biographical Sketch 229 Singing Heart 231 Hagar 281 JAMES W. BUEL Biographical Sketch 234 Man 236 Columbus 238 MRS. HENRY L. PRESTON Biographical Sketch 240 Satisfied 242 Will He give His Beloved Sleep? 242 Is Literature Remunerative? 243 TABLE OF CONTENTS. XV ALCfiE FORTIER Biographical Sketch 245 The Voudoux 247 Napoleon 248 Laroartine 249 The French Language in Louisiana 249 EUGENE FIELD Biographical Sketch 251 In the Firelight 264 Sharps and Flats 255 Wonnn's Ways 256 KATE CHOPIN Biographical Sketch 257 The Incendiary 259 A Harbinger 261 EDGAR W. HOWE Biographical Sketch ... 263 Early Recollections . . . , 265 The Professor 266 Globe Philosophy 267 WILLIS GEORGE EMERSON Biographical Sketch 269 Dedicated to My Old. Sweetheart 270 The Conflagration 271 ALICE FRENCH Biographical Sketch 373 The Short Story 276 Miss Conway's Horse 277 EMERSON HOUGH Biographical Sketch 280 The American Rifle 282 RUTH McENERY STUART Biographical Sketch 286 Lady: A Monologue 288 An Easter Symbol 290 MART N. MURFREE Biographical Sketch 292 Ike Hooden's Heroism 295 XVI TABLE OF CONTENTS. MBS. M. E. M. DAVIS Biographical Sketch ^^^ Counsel ... 300 The Passing of the Rose 301 lEVINS B. BICHMAN Biographical Sketch 303 MBS. SHEPPABD STEVENS Biographical Sketch 306 The Hermit of Fouche 307 LOUISIANA AUTHOBS 310 MISSOURI AUTHORS 319 IOWA AUTHORS 331 MINNESOTA AUTHOBS 337 KANSAS AUTHORS 342 COLOBADO, NEBRASKA, AND OTHER STATE AUTHORS 319 HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY. The success of Pizarro and Cortez in the new woi-ld discovered by Christopher Columbus a little more than a century previously, in 1492, filled all Spain with boundless dreams of wealth and ag- grandizement. The New World was a land of unlimited possibilities where untold and hitherto undreamt of mines of gold and silver were only awaiting the ownership of the discoverer. Aye, more than bounteous wealth awaited the discov- erer; the fountain of perpetual youth held out its alluring fascination to the Spanish imagina- tion. Ponce de Leon, in search of the great human desideratum, on the 8th of March, 1512, discovered, and landed on, the eastern coast of Florida. He did not find the fountain of eternal youth and rejuvenescence, but a grave in Cuba. Fernando De Soto, a military commander and wealthy cavalier, armed with the royal authority of Charles V. to seize and take possession of the land of Florida, sailed from Spain with a fleet of nine ships and a retinue of more than six hun- dred followers. This was early in April, 1538. The women attached to the expedition were landed at Havana where they were to remain until after the conquest of Florida. The fate of an expedition that carried in its train courtly women, $ (17) 18 LITERATURE OF- LOUISIANA TERRITORY. gaily-caparisoned horses, trained bloodhounds to hunt down the rightful owners of a land on their own soil, and chains with which to bind them, could not be a matter involved in any degree of doubt. On the 25th day of May, 1539, De Soto anchored in the bay of Spiritu Santo (now Tampa Bay). In the fall of the following year he reached Mobile and began the enforcement of his policy of subjugation by slaughtering the natives. After many vicissitudes, and losses and suffer- ing on their inward march into the country, in 1541 they reached the banks of the Mississippi which they ascended to a point near where the present town of New Madrid, Missouri, is situated. From there they went westward and camped on the banks of the Washita river during the win- ter. In spring they descended the Mississippi to its junction with the Red river. Here, over- taken by malaria, and hopelessly discouraged, De Soto pined away and died. His successor, Moscosco, after a year of painful effort, suc- ceeded in reaching the Gulf of Mexico, and with three hundred and twenty-two of the original band, sailed for Spain in 1543. De Soto's expedition was the last attempt at exploration and aggrandizement made by a Span- iard on the North American continent. During the succeeding one hundred and twenty-nine years no further attempt at explora- tion on the North American continent was made by any of the European nations. France then HISTpEICAL SKETCH. 19 undertook the role in which Spain had so signally failed. Louis Joliet, the son of an humble wagon-maker of Quebec, carried civilization and the cross into the domain which De Soto had invaded with the firebrand and the bloodhound. His retinue — four woodsmen and an humble priest, Jacques Marquette. Louis XIV. had dreams of a vaster new France than Canada, and Count Frontenac, the governor of Canada, was ordered to have the Mississippi river followed in its downward course and explored to its outlet. Joliet and his five companions started on an ex- pedition designed to meet the requirements of the royal command, on December 8, 1672. They embarked on the Wisconsin river and on June 17, 1673, they entered the Mississippi river. Some weeks later on they came across a band of Arkansas Indians, and from them learned that the Mississippi river emptied into a still larger body of water (the Gulf of Mexico). This in- formation they carred back to Governor Fron- tenac in the fall. Father Marquette's account of the tour led to his being commissioned by his spiritual superior to establish 'a Catholic mission on the site of the present town of Kaskaskia, Illinois. But he did not live long to exert his beneficent influence upon the Indian tribes and the rough Canadian trappers and fur-traders within the compass of his mission; the hard- ships and privations ot the rude life he had led during many years had broken his constitution, and he died a few months later. 20 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Next upon the scene comes Robert Cavelier, Sieur de LaSalle, who, from his very youth, was haunted by a dream of North American explora- tion and conquest. In 1666, at a little less than twenty-three years of age, he sailed from France to Canada, and in 1669 he started on an explor- ing tour. The same year he discovered the Ohio river, and in 1670 he ascended to the head of Lake Michigan. In 1677 he laid before the French government a plan for the conquest of the valley of the Mississippi and the extension of New France to the Gulf of Mexico. The plan was approved by the king, Louis XIV. So, he returned to this continent, fitted out an expedi- tion, discovered Niagara Falls, explored Lake Ontario, and after a number of other journeys of inland exploration, he built a fort near the site of the present town of Peoria, Illinois. In May, 1681, he was joined by his lieutenant, Henri de Tonti, from whom he had been separated since some time. This same Tonti, the Italian explorer, was in every respect worthy of being associated with a man of the ability, energy and hardihood of the Sieur de LaSalle. On April 6, 1682, after having floated down the Missis- sippi river for some time, they reached the point where it divides into three branches or forks. LaSalle took the branch heading towards the west, D'Austray (one of his men) the one head- ing towards the east, and Tonti the middle one. Three days subsequently they all three reached the Gulf of Mexico. HISTORICAL SKETCH. 21 The Mississippi was no longer an uniinown stream! It had been explored to its mouth. The dream of LaSalle — the dream that had haunted him from boyhood, was realized ! He had added a new and vast territory to his be- loved France ; in the name of la belle France he took possession of this territory along the great river; he caused a commemorative column to be erected, — the Te Deum was sung, the men fired volleys of musketry, and he proclaimed aloud — " In the name of the most high, mighty, in- vincible and victorious prince, Louis the Great, by the grace of God King of France and of Navarre, Fourteenth of that name, I, this ninth day of April, one thousand six hundred and eighty-twd, in virtue of the commission of his Majesty, which I hold in my hand, and which may be seen by all whom it may concern, have taken, and do now take, in the name of his Majesty and his successors to the crown, posses- sion of this country of Louisiana, the seas, the harbors, ports, bays, adjacent straits, and all the nations, peoples, provinces, cities, towns, villages, mines, minerals, fisheries, streams and rivers, within the extent of the said Louisiana, from the mouth of the great river, St. Louis, other- wise called the Ohio, as also along the River Colbert, or Mississippi, and the rivers which dis- charge themselves thereinto, from its source be- yond the country of the Nadouessioux as far as its mouth at sea, or Gulf of Mexico, and also to the mouth of the River of Palms, upon the assur- 22 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. ance we have from the natives of these countries that we are the first Europeans who have de- scended or ascended the said River Colbert ; here- by protesting against all who may hereafter under- take to invade any or all these aforesaid countries, peoples, or lands, to the prejudice of the rights of his Majesty, acquired by the consent of the nations dwelling herein. Of which, and of all else that is needful, I hereby take to witness those who hear me, and demand an act of the notary here present." The Louisiana Territory was born ! Want of space forbids the further pursuance of the careers of LaSalle and Tonti. Suffice it to say that the former was assassinated, on the banks of the Trinity river, in 1687, by one of his own men, who shot him from an ambush in the high grass. Tonti died of the yellow fever, in Mobile, in 1704. Writing of LaSalle, Bancroft says : " Such was the end of the daring adventurer. For force of will and vast conceptions; for vari- ous knowledge and quick adaptation of his genius to untried circumstances; for a sublime magnan- imity, that resigned itself to the will of heaven, and yet triumphed over affliction by energy of purpose and unfaltering hope, he had no superior among his countrymen" ("History of the United States", Vol. 3, p. 173). Joliet, Marquette, LaSalle, Tonti — had blazed the trail to the Gulf of Mexico. Behind them soon followed the Canadian trapper with his HISTORICAL SKETCH. 23 trusty rifle and his traps, and the Catholic mis- sionary with the Bible and the crucifix. Then came the fur-trader and built his post for barter and exchange among white men and red alike. Next followed the upward push from the mouth of the great river — the settlements and posts at Ship Island, Dauphin Island, and others established by Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville, and his two brothers, all Canadians of French parentage, acting under the authority of Louis XIV., misnamed Le Grand, who turned his eyes away from his mistresses long enough to see an empire for France in the gift of LaSalle. Iberville sailed to France, and in 1701 returned with two ships filled with colonists and loaded with the supplies necessary to anew colony. He then went on colonizing the land as far north as the site of the present town of Mankota, Minne- sota. In 1704, the French government sent another ship, carrying seventy -five soldiers, a number of colonists, supplies, etc. And so on through the succeeding years, colonists came from the mother country, new posts and garri- sons were established, — John Law sprang into public notice with his famous and hollow Missis- sippi Bubble (1720) which, nevertheless, bene- fited the infant colony commercially, — Natchez, New Orleans almost leaped into existence, — and peace, progress, prosperity seemed assured for the future. But it was not to be so. France claimed all of 24 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. North America, by right of discovery and con- quest; so did England, and Spain also. Petty jealousies, misunderstandings, personal ambi- tions, aggressive measures, clashes between the settlers themselves, national gain — brought on the Seven Years' War (1756-1773). Louis XIV. 's mistresses were more precious than the great Eichelieu's beloved dream of. a gigantic New France across the ocean, and so, there was not sufficient money for troops, armaments and military supplies to uphold the honor of France worthily and becomingly. * « * Xhe war over, England was sole mistress of Canada and eastern Louisiana, and Spain of western Louisi- ana and the Island of New Orleans. The popu- lation of Louisiana at this time was about seven thousand. But the people of the Island of New Orleans were French by birth, by -sympathy, and by their love for France. They heard with sorrow and morti- fication that their domain had been transferred to Spain. They protested, they petitioned to be restored to France — but the mother-country turned a deaf ear: Louisiana had already cost her twenty millions of dollars — the national treasury was depleted (how could it be other- wise when the national treasury had been squan- dered on a horde of hussies — the La Valliferes, the Mont^spans, the Fontanges, the Soubises, the Maintenops ? ) — There was no alternative ; aban- doned by the mother country, independence only remained to them. HISTOKICAL SKETCH. 25 On the twenty-second day of October, 1768, Nicolas Chauvin de Lafrenifere led the revolt. The Spanish garrison surrendered, Lafrenifere was named Protector, and the first republic on American soil was born ! But what could this little band of patriots do against powerful Spain? They were in the right, — but they had acted hastily. In their just anger they had forgotten how helpless they were. So, when the Spanish general. Count Alexander O'Keilly, on July 24, 1769, arrived , from Spain with four thousand troops, they met him at the mouth of the Mississippi river and told him that they would submit to his authority, and recognize him as Viceroy of Louisiana. General O'Eeilly received them politely, spoke them fairly, and they returned home believing that they would not be prosecuted and that the incident was closed. On the 17th day of August, General O'Eeilly landed his troops at New Orleans, and had the leaders of the insurrection seized; they were tried by court-martial and found guilty ; five of them were condemned to be hanged until dead, and the remainder to serve terms of imprison- ment. When he was informed of this decree, the public executioner heroically cut off his right hand that he might not be forced to execute the sentence. This act touched the hard and sordid heart of O'Keilly, and he changed the sentence to death by shooting. And so, in the public square, with their backs to a wall, were mur- 26 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. dered Nicolas Chauvin de Lafreniere, Jean Bap- tiste Moyan, Pierre Caresse, Joseph Milhet and Pierre Marquis. Joseph Villeare had priorly been brutally slain by the Spanish guards for disobeying orders in speaking to his wife. He was beyond the bru- tality of Count O'Eeilly, so the latter could only content himself with proclaiming that: "The late Joseph Villeare, standing likewise convicted of having been one of the most obstinate promo- ters of the aforesaid conspiracy, I condemn in like manner his memory to be held forever infa- mous." "Infamous?" To the people of Louisiana, to this day, it is " sacred". It is the memory of the Weyler of the 18th century that is infa- mous. But while these occurrences were transpiring in New Orleans, in the upper part of the Terri- tory, there had sprung into existence another trading post that was destined with time to be- come a great and flourishing city — the most important one in the Territory. The treaty of peace made at Paris in 1763, established the Mississippi river as the boundary line between the possessions of France and En- gland. This did not prevent the Indians from crossing the river for the purposes of trade from points in what are now the States of Illinois and Missouri. Pierre Laclede Liguest, who had been a resident of New Orleans since 1755, on account of losses occasioned by the inter-colonial war HISTORICAL SKETCH. 27 between the French and the English, found his commercitil house on the eve of bankruptcy; in consideration of services rendered the French government during the war, he received tlie grant of the exclusive privilege of carrying on the fur trade in the Missouri river country. He ascended the Mississippi with a party from New Orleans, among which was his lieutenajit, Auguste Chouteau, and his brother, Pierre, and in February, 1764, established a trading post which was later on named after a king of France of sainted memory, Louis IX. From a trading post in 1764, to a settlement, then to a village in 1778, the progression was rapid. That was the third year of the Ameri- can Eevolution, — the year that the indomitable, indefatigable George Rogers Clark with his hardy band of patriots, flashes across the pages of our Western history, and the British posts at Kaskaskia, Vincennes and Sackville fall into his hands one after another. In St. Louis, Clark was welcomed and aided by Frenchmen and Spaniards alike, for, did they not both hate the English? And, after all, were not these Americans fighting for their free- dom? — for the liberty of their land, too? Did they dream that when they were aiding that little band of heroic Americans, they were aid- ing themselves? That the country that George Rogers Clark was wrenching from the hands of England would one day be a part of their heritage? But in lower Louisiana the Spanish arms were 28 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. not idle. In 1779, Don Bernardo Galvez, the young governor of Louisiana, invaded west Flor- ida and captured the British forts, and not only defeated the British in their attempt on New Orleans, but took more than five hundred prisoners of war, besides capturing eight vessels. He next captured Fort Charlotte and the garri- son at Mobile, on March 14, 1780, and the fol- lowing year he took Pensacola and eight hun- dred prisoners. In 1783, the American Revolution came to a close — the American colonies had achieved their independence. The spirit of republicanism was in the very air of the New World. It began to invade Louisiana. These Frenchmen governed by Span- iards, and forced to be Spaniards to all intents and purposes, while they were French in heart and soul, cast longing eyes across the border line on the free and independent Amer- icans whose ownership of their own country, and whose right to enjoy their freedom they envied. Nor were these same Americans them- selves adverse to the thought that one day the Stars and Stripes might float over Spanish America. Free America was a standing threat to the Spanish possessions ; it was only a ques- tion of time when the vast territory west of the Mississippi river would either be American, or its inhabitants would do what their neighbors across the great river had done — proclaim their independence. HISTORICAL SKETCH. 29 Later on, in the fall of 1802, Senator Jackson, of Georgia, on the floor of the United States Senate, voiced the opinion of the people when he said: "No other people can long exist in the vicinity of the United States without intermixing and ultimately joining them." In 1800, Spain ceded back to France her Louisiana possessions. This was done through the influence of Napoleon Bonaparte, First Con- sul. The following year Thomas Jefferson was elected President of the United States. Since some years the commerce of the United States had suffered through depredations committed on the ocean by French, English and Spanish ships, and injuries had been done to some of her citi- zens. Jefferson urged a claim of $4,000,000 against the French government as indemnity for damages sustained. The Treaty of San Ilde- fonso had not been made public, but was pur- posely kept secret by both France and Spain. Its existence, however, was known to both England and the United States. President Jefferson dispatched Kobert E. Liviiigston and Charles C. Pinckney as ministers plenipotentiary to France and Spain to urge the claims of the United States against both countries. But neither for some time obtained any practical results. In 1802, Napoleon sent a large army to San Domingo for the purpose of restoring order in that French colony, it was alleged; this action awakened a strong war spirit in the United 30 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. States where the general belief prevailed that New Orleans, and not San Domingo, was the objective point. On April 18, President Jeffer- son sent a rnemorable letter to Minister Living- ston, the contents of which were to be communi- cated to Napoleon. In it occurs this warn- ing: " The daj that France takes possession of New Orleans fixes the sentence which is to restrain her forever within her low-water mark. It seals the union of two nations which in conjunc- tion can maintain exclusive possession of the ocean. From that moment we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation. We must » * * make thfe first cannon that is fired in Europe the signal for tearing up any settlement she (France) may have made, and for holding the two continents of America in sequestration for the common purposes of the United British and American nations." Napoleon at once reahzed the danger to France foreshadowed in this' letter. France was not in a position to prevent England and the United States from taking possession of Louisiana. The United States Congress, in secret session, voted an appropriation of $2,000,000 to be used by Jefferson " in the foreign intercourse of the United States." James Monroe was then nom- inated by Jefferson (and confirmed by the Senate) as envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to France, Spain and England. On March 8, 1803, he sailed for Europe, taking HISTORICAL SKETCH. 31 with him the $2,000,000 voted by Congress in January. Before Monroe landed on French soil, in April, Napoleon had promised Livingston that $3,750,- 000 of the spoliation claims of the United States would be paid, and Livingston, acting under the instructions he had received, urged the transfer of New Orleans and the Floridas to the United States in lieu of the money. On April 8, Monroe landed on the coast of France; that day. Napoleon, speaking of the English, said to his ministers of state : " They shall not have the Mississippi which they covet. I have not a moment to lose in putting it out of their reach, and I think of ced- ing it to the United States. They only ask of me one town in Louisiana, but I already consider the colony as entirely lost ; and it appears to me that, in the hands of the growing power, it will be more useful to the policy and even the commerce of France, than if I should attempt to keep it." To this Talleyrand found objection, as did also Joseph and Lucien Bonaparte; butMarbois con- curring, the negotiations were placed in his hands. Napoleon said to him privately : "It is not only New Orleans that I will cede, but the whole colony, without any reservation. To attempt to retain it would be folly. I direct you to negotiate this offer with the envoy of the United States. I shall be moderate in consid- eration of the necessity in which I am making a sale. But keep this is to yourself." 32 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKRITORT. Livingston, with the approval of Monroe, who arrived in France on April 12, conducted the negotiations with Marbois. On April 30, the treaty ceding Louisiana to the United States was signed. France conceded $3,750,000 as spolia- tion claims and was to receive $11,250,000. " We have lived long," said Livingston seizing Monroe by the hand, "but this is the noblest work of our lives. From this day, the United States take their place among the powers of the first rank." The treaty was ratified by President Jefferson on the 11th day of November, and on the 20th of December, the Spanish governor, Don Julian de Salco, formally ceded the territory- to Citizen Pierre Clement de Laussat, Colonial Prefect and Commissioner of the French government, and he in turn transferred it to William C. C. Claiborne and James Wilkerson, as Commission- ers or Agents of the United States. The prophecy of Napoleon still remains to be fulfilled: " I have just given to England a mari- time rival that will sooner or later humble her pride." A few words in conclusion. With the excep- tion of about one-third of Minnesota and Colo- rado, and a small portion of Wyoming and Montana, the following states and territories have been formed from the Louisiana Territory : Louisiana, admitted to the Union as a state, in 1812; Missouri, admitted in 1821; Arkansas, in 1836; Iowa, in 1845; Minnesota, in 1858; HISTOKICAL SKETCH. 33 Kansas, in 1861 ; Nebraska, in 1867 ; Colorado, in 1867; Wyoming, in 1890; Montana, and North and Soutli Dakota, in 1899. Indian Territory and Oklaiionia Territoiy, as their names indicate, have not yet reached statehood. 3 EDUCATION IN THE LOUISIANA TEERITOKY. Education, wealth and leisure are absolutely necessary to culture, refinement and literary accomplishment. Without their pre-existence, literary production is virtually an impossibility. They may not all be combined in the writer, but they must all necessarily exist in the encompas- sing community. Without recognition, without appreciation, the literary history of the world would be a record of " mute, inglorious Miltons " only. • Scattering villages and hamlets of " houses of posts" and rude log cabins, cannot reasonably be expected to harbor poets, essayists, historians and novelists. They may do so in isolated cases, but like the cicade, such cases are perforce voiceless; uncongenial environments strangle utterance. In 1803, when the Louisiana Territory was ceded to the United States, with the exception of a very few towns, it was a howling wilderness speckled only here and there by a living, throb- bing, building humanity, rude and unpolished in the main. Very little culture and refinement could be expected from the primitive class that lived by hunting, fishing, trapping and trading on a small scale, and that principally with the (34) EDUCATION IN THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 35 red man. There were no public schools ; prac- tically, it may be said that there were no schools. Those who were sufficiently wealthy — that is to say, the very few — emploj^ed private tutors for their children. Still it seems that far more education and cul- ture existed than the conditions really justified. Of book-making, of course, there was none; original production was not dreamt of, — why should it have been? Who would have read a book emanating from the Louisiana Territory? Furthermore, what need would there have been for such? Were not the masterpieces of French literature — the literature of the mother country — to be readily had from France or from New Orleans? Toque indeed would have been deemed the gerfius who would have sent his MS. by slow stages, to the publisher in Boston, in New York, or in Philadelphia. Possibly there would have been but one man in all that land to the east who would have looked with benevolent eyes on such a bold proceeding — one Benjamin Franklin, an old printer way far up in Phila- delphia. But Brackenridge, in his " Eecollections of Persons and Places in the West," tells us that a considerable degree of education and literary culture did exist in several quarters of the Terri- tory. In private families in Baton Eouge, New Orleans, New Madrid, St. Genevifeve, and St. Louis, and in the Jesuit colleges scattered here and there — atKaskaskia and other points, there 36 LITEEATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEREITOKY. were valuable and reasonably large collections of standard and instructive works in law, science, and general literature, and these books in French, Latin and Greek, were read and appreciated by ecclesiastics, lawyers, doctors, fur traders, and commercial and other business men. But then, of course, they were the exceptions, and not the rule. Let us bear in mind that when the Louisiana Territory became American, it possessed but few educational advantages, and these were almost inaccessible to the large majority of the popula- tion. Glancing East, we find that Harvard College, in Massachusetts, had been opened to the youth of the American land since one hundred and sixty-five years ; Mary and William , College, in Virginia, was in the one hundred and eleventh year of its existenfje; Yale College, in Connecticut, was in its one hundred and third year; the Theological College of New Jersey was fifty -five years old, and Columbia College, in New York, lacked only one year of being half- a-century old. As to literature. Mistress Anne Bradstreet, the Tenth Muse, had sung in her cracked voice and passed from the stage of life since one hundred and thirty-one years; Roger Williams, the im- mortal apostle of religious freedom, had come, fled for conscience's sake from the civilized white man — who in turn had fled from tyranny so that he might tyrannize himself — to the open arms of the Indian barbarian, had put forth his printed protests against tyranny and EDUCATION IN THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 37 religious persecution, and had been gathered to his forefathers since one hundred and twenty years ; Increase and quaint Cotton Mather had come and gone in an atmosphere of learning and among the fumes of burning witches ; Jon- athan Edwards had ceased teaching eternal damnation and Princeton College since forty- five years; the body of Benjamin Franklin, printer, " like the cover of an old book, its con- tents torn out", had- been abandoned to the mercy of book-worms and earth-worms since thirteen years, — but his memory and his works were then as of yesterday, just as they are to- day; Tom Paine had taught patriotism in " Common Sense " and infidelity in " The Age of Reason", and an old and" worn-out man was rapidly nearing the time when, like Rabelais, he could say, " Je vas querir un grand peul- eti-e" ! Since eight years the youths of Amer- ica were daily nodding over their " English Grammar " and blessing Lindley Murray; Fran- cis Hopkinson had sung "The Battle of the Kegs" and John Trumbull of " M'Fingal" ; Joel Barlow had piped his " Columbiad " and Philip Freneau had told of " The Rising Glory of America", and scores of others had eulo- gized and loved in verse and argued in prose, and — the Louisiana Territory was only begin- ning its existence, was only entering on the in- tellectual and physical struggle that was, with time, to make it a great factor in the American Union ! 38 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Under the absolute, monarchical governments of France and Spain, in which the union of Church and State prevailed, and education meant but little more than religious training, a system of free public instruction, based upon social equality, would have been an impossibility. After the purchase of the Territory by the American government, education progressed fast. Public and private schools, and private colleges, sprang up in the land wi>th astonishing rapidity, while printing offices and newspapers pressed hard in their wake. Through one hundred and one years the school and the printing press have kept pace in the' race for education and enlight- enment. The East has more than one hundred years the start in intellectual advantages and achieve- ment. Does it surpass the Louisiana Territory States in the number and efficiency of its public schools? — is it ten years in advance of them in its private colleges and great universities? In literature, have we not vastly diminished that more than a century of prior advantages? What country has produced a greaterornithologist than Audubon? Is there living, to-day, a humorist who ranks higher among the masses of American readers than ' ' Mark Twain " ? — a novelist w;ho outranks Cable? — two writers of short stories who surpass Miss Murfree and Miss French? — an educational authority greater than Doctor Harris ? EDUCATION IN THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 39 But why continue this subject? Let us be judged by our past achievements, — and further- more, let us trust that in that judgment lies the prophecy of a still greater and vaster future ! THE EARLIEST BOOKS. ' The first book printed in La Louisiane (subse- quently the Louisiana Territory), as far as num- ber of pages, binding, size, etc., are taken into consideration, was in French, and bore the following title: " Medicaments, at Precis de la Methode de M. Masdevall, Docteur Medfecin du Roi d'Espaygne Charles IV.", etc. (Nouvelle Orleans. M.DCC.L.XXXXVI). This is evi- dently a reprint. Doctor Masdevall never resided in the " new world". As the title page states, he was physician to Charles the Fourth of Spain. James Adair, an English trader with the In- dians, and " a resident in their country for forty years", as he tells us, published in London, MDCCLXXV, "The History of the American Indians. Particularly those Nations adjoining to the Mississippi, East and West Florida, South Carolina, Georgia, and Virginia". The author is of the opinion that the North American Indians descend from the Hebrews. A part of the forty years were spent by Mr. Adair in Louisiana. Mr. Adair was not a Louisiana author, and his book was not published in Louisiana. I mention it as the first book of any consequence about Louisiana. "Acts Passed at the First Session of the First Legislature of the Territory of Orleans. Begun (40) THE EARLIEST BOOKS. 41 and Held in the City of New Orleans, on Mon- day, the Third Day of December in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and Four and of the Independence of the United States the Twenty -ninth. Published by Author- ity. New Orleans. Printed by James M. Brad- ford, Printer to the Territory. 1805." This was the first book written and published in the Territory, but it was not the first original publi- cation. I use the word "book"; it was ante- dated by a pamphlet, " La Prise du Morne du Baton Rouge " (mentioned in the chapter, " The French Authors "). "Code Noir. Approuve le 7 Juin, 1806. Guilaume C. C. Claiborne, Gouverneur du Ter- ritoire d' Orleans. (Jean Watkins) (Pierre Sauve.) A la Nouvelle Orleans. Chez Jfean Eenard, rue de Chartres No. 8, 1806." " The Constitution of the United States. In English and French, with the Treaty between France and England and the Acts for the Gov- ernment of the Northwest Territory, etc. New Orleans, 1806." " Acts passed at the Second Session of the First Legislature of the Territory of Orleans. Begun and held in the City of New Orleans, on the 12th day of January, in the year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and Seven and of the Independence of the United States of Amer- ica the Thirty-first. Published by Authority. New Orleans. Printed by Bradford and Ander- son, Printers to the Territory. 1807." 42 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. ' ' The Laws of the Territory of Louisiana, Com- prising all those which are now Actually in Force within the same. Published by Authority. St. Louis (L. ) Printed by Joseph Charless, Printer tor the Territory. 1808." It contains'the earliest laws enacted by our republican ancestors for the government of the land we inhabit, beginning in 1804 and ending in 1808. (The term "re- publican" ancestors is used, as prior to its cession to the United States, the Louisiana Terri- tory belonged to monarchical powers, Spain and France). This was the first book published in what was then called, " upper Louisiana Terri- tory ". The first St. Louis publication. " Lafon's Annuaire " was a Directory of the city of New Orleans, published in 1808. " The Laws of the Territory of Louisiana, passed by the Governor and Judges Assembled in Legislature, in the month of October, 1810. Published by Authority. St. Louis (L.) Printed by Joseph Charless, Printer for the Territory. 1810." Joseph Charless was born in Ireland. He was a printer by trade. He became involved in Robert Emmet's attempt at revolution, and fled from Ireland to the United States after the execution of Emmet. In 1807, he removed from Philadelphia to St. Louis, and in 1808 he founded the first newspaper published west of the Mississippi river, The Missouri Gazette (now The 8t. Louis Republic. ) He died in 1834. Alexander Latil of New Orleans, in 181,4, THE EARLIEST BOOIC8. 43 published, " EpWm^res, Essais Poetiques " (Nouvelle Orleans). Mr. Latil was a prophet — his poems were "ephemeral ". ' ' Poucha-Houmma ' ' by LeBlanc de Vil- leneufve (Nouvelle Orleans, 1814), is a tragedy of Indian life and manners. The author was an ex-officer of the French army and was eighty- seven years of age when he wrote the book. It was his first and last work. THE FRENCH AUTHORS. The first booklet (or more properly speaking, pamphlet) published in the Louisiana Territory of which I can find any record, is "La Prise du Morne du Baton Rouge. Par Monseigneur de Galvez. Chevalier pensionne de I'Ordre Royal distingue de Charles Trois, Brigadier des Armees de Sa Majeste, Intendant, Inspecteur et Gouver- neur General de la Province de la Louisiana, etc. A la Nouvelle Orleans, Chgz Antoine Boud- ousquie, Imprimeur du Roi, et du Cabildo. M.DCC.L.XXIX." It contains a" Pofeme " and a' ' ' Chanson " . It makes two hundred and seven lines of absolutely worthless and alleged poetry. Only one copy of it is extant ; Professor Fortier borrowed it and. had it reproduced. The author, Julien Poydras de Lallande, was a planter and a merchant, and was born in Brittany, France, about 1740. He emigrated to Louisiana about 1768. He laid the foundation to a fortune in peddling from plantation to plantation. He afterwards carried on manufacturing and trading on a. large scale. He died in New Orleans in June, 1824. He bequeathed $130,000 in chari- ties, of which $30,000 was left to each of the West Baton Rouge and Pointe Coupd parishes, the interest of which was to be paid every year to the young women without fortune who had (44) THE FRENCH AUTHORS. 45 married during the year. Reading of this I can almost forgive Monsieur Poydras de Lallande the quality of his " poetry ". " La Prise du Morne du Baton Rouge" is a " folder " consisting of two leaves; the "Pofeme " occupies the first, second, third and fourth pages, and the " Chanson " the seventh page; the fifth and sixth pages are blank. Mr. Henri L. Favrot of New Orleans, has the only copy of this pamphlet known to be in existence. Peter John De Smet (Father De Smet, the famous Catholic misssonary) was the author of several books, originally written in French, but since translated into the language of the country. I do not believe that these works were ever pub- lished in French. Their English titles are: " Letters and Sketches, with a Year's Residence among the Indian Tribes of the Rocky Moun- tains " (New York, 1843); "Oregon Missions and Travels over the Rocky Mountains, 1845-46 " (New York, 1847); "Western Missions and Missionaries" (New York, 1857); and, "New Indian Sketches ". He published two works in French, "Missions de I'Amerique du Nord " (St. Louis, 1849), and " Voyages dans I'Amer- ique Septentrionale. Oregon" (3e ed. Bruxelles et Paris, 1874), Father De Smet was born in Termonde, Bel- gium, in 1801, and died in St. Louis, in 1872. In 1821, he came to the United States and entered the Jesuit novitiate In Whitemarsh, Maryland, and afterwards went to Missouri, to 46 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. complete his theological course. In 1828, he was ordained and removed to St. Louis, which ever afterwards was his home. In 1838, he went among the Pottawattamies to establish a mission. From that time to the year of his death, the amount of good he accomplished among the various Indian tribes can never be over-estimated. He was a noble, self-sacrificing man who bore sickness, suffering and danger heroically for the cause of religion and humanity. A. Lussan, in 1839, published at Donaldson- ville, Louisiana, " Les Martyrs de la Louisiane", which is a drama on the popular subject, the revolution of 1768. Louis Eichard Cortambert was born in France in 1808, and emigrated to the United States early in life. He located in St. Louis early in the thirties, and a few years later he married Suson Chouteau, daughter of Colonel A. P. Chouteau. Mr. Cortambert was highly edu- cated, a profound thinker and an able writer. His philosophy, in many respects, resembled that of Thoreau. He was a social Republican and one of the early abolitionists. He wrote as he believed, and he boasted that his pen was not for sale. From 1855 to (about) 1858, he edited La Revue de L' Quest, a St. Louis weekly, and from 1864 to 1881, Le Messager Franco-Ameri- can, the New York daily newspaper. Mr. Cortambert published several of his books in Paris. Martin the historian, wrote a preface to his " Histoire Universelle selon la Science THE FRENCH AUTHORS. 47 Moderne" (Paris, 1879), and Victor Hugo praised his " Religion du Progress " (New York, 1884). Among his other works are: "Voyage aux Pays des Osages " (Paris, 1847); " Les Trois Epoques du Catholicisme " (Paris, 1849) ; " Le Cat^chisme Rationaliste " (St. Louis, 1855); the following he wrote jointly with F. de Tranaldos, " Le General Grant: Esquisse Biographique " (New York, 1868) and " L'His- toire de la Guei-re Civile Americaine " (Paris, 1867). He died at Bloomfield, New Jersey, March 28, 1881. He was the brother of Eugene Cortambert, the noted French Geographer, and the uncle of Richard Cortambert, the promising young author who died in his early thirties. Doctor Alfred Mercier was born in Louisiana June 3rd, 1816, and died in New Orleans, May 12, 1894. During a number of years prior to his death he was Perpetual Secretary of the Athenee Louisianais. In 1885, he was named as Officier d'Academie by the French government in recognition of his zealous labors in encourag- ing the study and the practice of the French language in Louisiana. Doctor Mercier is the author of : " La Rose de Smyrne", " L'Ermite de Niagara " and " Erato " (Paris, 1842) ; " Le Fou de Palerme " (1873), ' ' La Fille du Prfetre " , a novel in three volumes aimed at the celibacy of the priesthood (1877), " L'Habitation St. Ybars " (1881), " Lidia " (1887), and "Johnelle" (1891),— all of these published at New Orleans. He has also written 48 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. several pamphlets, among others a " Biographie de Pierre Soule " (Paris, 1848). As a miscel- laneous writer, M. Mercier ranks among the best of the Louisiana authors. Charles Testut, who is still pleasantly remem- bered as an author, published at New Orleans : " Les Veillees Louisianaises " (1849); " Les fichos", a poem (1849) ; '' Portraits Litteraires de la Nouvelle Orleans" (1850); " Le Vieux Salomon " (1872) ; and, " Les Filles de Monte' Cristo" (1876). General Baron Phillippe Regis de Trobriand, was in command at New Orleans in 1875-'79. After 1879 he maintained a residence at New Orleans until a few months prior to his death, which occurred at Long Island, July 15, 1897. He was born in France, June 4, 1816; his father was General Baron Joseph de Trobriand. In his boyhood he was one of the pages of Charles X. ; he was educated at New Orleans and Poitiers, graduating in 1834 and 1838. In 1841 he came to the United States on a pleasure voyage. In 1843, he married a Miss Mary Mason. They lived several years in Italy. In 1848, he pub- lished La Revue du JSTouveau Monde in New York. In 1851 the Revue was discontinued, and in 1854, he became one of the editors of Le Courier des Etats-Unis. About the latter part of the thirties he published a novel, "Les Gentilshommes de I'Ouest " (Paris), and in 1867, his reminiscences of the Civil War, THE FRENCH AUTHORS. 49 " Quatre ans de Campagnes a TArm^e du Poto- mac " (Boston). In 1861, he enlisted in the volunteer army and was elected Colonel of the 55th New York regi- ment. He served throughout the Civil War, and remained in the army after its close. At the date of his retirement, March 20th, 1879, he was a brigadier-general in the regular army. Every time that I heard his name mentioned in New Orleans, last December, it was with the profoundest respect and admiration. He seems to have won the love of the people of New Orleans, as fully as General Butler acquired their hatred. Charles Oscar Dugue was bora in New Orleans, May 1, 1821. His parents were Americans by birth, and both of French descent. He was educated in France, in Auvergne and in Paris. He began writing early; Chateaubriand spoke kindly and encouragingly of his school-boy verses. He praised them for their truthfulness to art and their natural simplicity. His college days over, he returned to New Orleans, and in 1847 he published his first book, his " Essais Po^tique ", in that city. The " Essais " are principally de- scriptions of Southern scenery and customs. In 1852 he edited the short-lived daily paper, L' OrUanais. The same year he published, at New Orleans, two dramas founded on the legend- ary history of Louisiana, "Mila; ou La Mort de La Salle ' ' and ' ' Le Cygne ; ou Mingo ' ' . I have been informed by a former friend that 4 50 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. he read extracts to him from a MS. treatise on "La Philosophic Morale". I cannot find that the MS. was ever published in book form. The last work of his that I can find any record of is a poem, " Homo", published in Paris in 1872. Mr. Dugu^ died in Paris. Victor Debouchel published, " Histoire de la Lpuisiane, depuis les Premiferes D^couvertes jusqu'en 1840" (Nouvelle Orleans, 1841). Two other historical works by New Orleans writers, published in New Orleans, are: " Es- quisses Locales", by Cyprien Dufour (1847), and " E^flections sur la Politique des Etats- Unis," etc., by Bernard de Marigny (1854). Urbain David of Cette, is the author of an epic poem, '*Les Anglais a la Louisiane en 1814 et 1815 " (Nouvelle Orleans, 1845). Camille Thierry sung of " Les Vagabondes " (Paris), and Joseph Dejacque versed the praises of socialism in <' Les Lazar^ennes " (Nouvelle Orleans, 1857). L. Placide Canonge is the author of two dramas, " Qui Perd Gagne " (1840) and " Le Comte de Carmagnola " (1856), and three books of poetry, " TuUius St. C^ran ", " Eien ou Moi" (1837), and '< Mille Cent Quatorze etMille Huit Cent Quinze" (1838). These were all pub- lished in New Orleans, and in French as their titles indicate. Mr. Canonge was at one time the editor of the old French newspaper, L'Abeille de la Nouvelle Orleans. He was made Officier THE FRENCH AUTHORS. 51 d'Acad^inie in 1855 by the French government, in recogaition of his services in encouraging and fostering the use of the French language in Louisiana by his writings and personal influence. He was born in New Orleans, June 22nd, 1822, and died in that city, January 22nd, 1893. Doctor J. C. Faget wrote on medical subjects. His "Etudes sur le Basis de la Science Medi- cale " appeared in New Orleans in 1855, and " La Fifevre Jaune " in 1860. His other book was, "Notice Scientifique sur Eouan^t de Saint- Pons " (Paris, 1866). Doctor Fag^t was well known in New Orleans. He died some years ago. Alexandre Barde of Saint-Jean-Baptiste, Lou- isiana, published, in his town, " Histoire des Comites de Vigilance aux Attakapas " (1861). It is a history of the doings of the Vigilance Committee in the Attakapas region. It also narrates numerous legends and traditions of a very interesting nature. Doctor Charles Delery is the author of several books and pamphlets published in New Orleans : "Le Dermier Chant" (1861); " Le Spectre Noire" (1868); and, " L'Ecole du Peuple " (1877). " Les Nemesciennes Confed^rees " was published at Mobile, Alabama, in 1863, and "Les Yankees Fondateurs de I'fisclavage aux Etats-Unis " etc., in Paris, in 1864. The late Madame D. Girard is the authoress 52 LITEEATUEB OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. of " Histoire des Etats-Unis suivi de I'Histoire de la Louisiane " (Nouvelle OrMans, 1881), and Madame Laure Andry of " L' Histoire de la Louisiana " (Nouvelle Orleans, 1882). JOHN JAMES AUDUBON. Twenty miles from New Orleans, on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain, in the village of Mandeville (where I'Abbe Eouquette afterwards established an Indian mission) in the Parish of St. Tammany, Louisiana, John James Laforest Audubon was born. The exact date is not known; his granddaughter, Maria E. Audubon says, "he may have been born anywhere be- tween 1772 and 1783, and in the face of this uncertainty the date usually given, May 5, 1780, may be accepted, though the true one is no . doubt earlier " (^vide " Audubon and his Jour- nals," vol. 1). Of his mother, but little is known, except that she was of Spanish descent, very handsome and haughty; she died when Audubon was too young to remember her. His father took him to France, where, having remarried, he left him in charge of his stepmother and returned to the United States, acting as an officer under Gen- eral Count Eochambeau, and later on under LaFayette. His stepmother believed he should be brought up like a gentleman, "fine clothes and filled pockets were the only requisites needful to attain this end ", Audubon tells us, but his. father " spoke of the stores of the mind " and he was (53) 54 LITEEATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEKEITORY. sent to school and had teachers at home. All the same, his stepmother spoiled him; she con- cealed his faults, boasted of his merits, and pro- claimed him the handsomest boy in France. His father was in the French Navy and wished him to either follow in his footsteps, or become an engineer. So he studied geography, mathe- matics, drawing, fencing and music; but his father being very frequently absent from home on duty and his stepmother permitting him to do pretty much as he pleased, instead of going to school he spent his days in the woods hunting, fishing and robbing birds' nests. When his father, upon his return from sea, found this state of affairs prevailing he took him to Eochefort where he was forced to study. Afterwards, he was returned to Nantes and later he went to La Gerbettiere — but always, and everywhere, he longed for Nature and the free woods. When he was seventeen, he was sent back to the United States. He lived with his father's agent, one Miers Fisher, near Philadel- phia. From there he shortly went to live on his father's estate. Mill Grove, which wa» a few miles off. Here he was in an earthly paradise — he hunted, fished, idled, rode about, played music, drew sketches from nature, and was " as happy as happy could be" (his own words). Next he falls in love with and marries his neigh- bor's daughter, Lucy Bakewell, who made him an estimable wife and companion. But we must hasten on. In 1810 he removed JOHN JAMES AUDUBON. 55 to Henderson, Kentucky. That year he met Alexander Wilson, the Scotch ornithologist. The next year he was in the swamps of Florida with rifle and pencil. From then on, he yearly gath- ered material for his great work. In 1824 he went to Philadelphia and New York, and in 1826 to England, to make arrangements for the pub- lication of his books. He secured one hundred and seventy-five subscribers at $1,000 each, nearly one-half of the number being from En- gland and France. "The Birds of America" was published in numbers, each number contain- ing five colored plates of large folio size . The first number appeared in 1825, and the first volume in 1829. The fourth and last volume was completed in June, 1838. A smaller edition of the work, with the plates reduced in size, was published in 1844, in seven volumes. He projected a work on " The Quadrupeds of America ' ' , but old age compelled him to abandon it after the publication of the first volume in 1848. He died in New York, January 27, 1851. THE KEGULATOES. The population of many parts of America Is derived from the refuse of every other country. I hope I shali elsewhere prove to you, kind reader, that even in this we have reason to feel a certain degree of pride, as we often see our worst denizens becoming gradually free from error, and at length changing to useful and respectable citizens. The most de- praved of these emigrants are forced to retreat farther and farther from the society ot the virtuous, the restraints im- 56 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. posed they find incompatible with their habits, and the grati- fication ol their unbridled passions. On the extreme verge ol civilization, however, their evil propensities find more free scope, and the dread of punishment for their deeds, or the infliction of that punishment, are the only means that prove effectual in reforming them. In those remote parts, no sooner Is it discovered that an individual has conducted himself in a notoriously vicious manner, or has committed some outrage upon society, than a conclave of the honest citizens takes place, for the purpose of investigating the case, with a rigour without which no good results could be expected. These honest citizens, selected from among the most respectable persons In the district, and vested with powers suited to the necessity of preserving order on the frontiers, are named Regulators. The accused person is arrested, his conduct laid open, and if he is found guilty of a first crime, he ia warned to leave the country, and go farther from society within an appointed time. Should the individual prove so callous as to dis- regard the sentence, and remain in the same neighborhood, to commit new crimes, than woe be to him ; for the Hegu - lators, after proving him guilty a second time, pass and execute a sentence, which, if not enough to make him perish under the affliction is at least for ever impressed upon his memory. The punishment infiicted is generally a severe castigation, and the destruction by fire of his cabin. Sometimes in cases of reiterated theft or murder, death is considered necessary; and In some Instances, delinquents of the worst species have been shot, after which their heads have been stuck on poles, to deter others from following their example. The punishment' of castigation is performed in the fol- lowing manner. The individual convicted of an offence is led to some remote part of the woods, under the escort of sometimes forty or fifty Regulators. When arrived at the chosen spot, the criminal is made fast to a tree, and a few of the Regulators remain with him, whilst the rest scour the for- ests, to assure themselves that no strangers are within reach ; after which they perform an extensive ring, arranging them- selves on their horses, well armed with rifles and pistols, at equal distances, and in each other's sight. At a given signal that " all's ready," those about the culprit, having provided JOHN JAMES AUDUBON. 57 themselves with young twigs of hickory, administer the number ol lashes prescribed by the sentence, untie the snt- ferer, and order him to leave the country immediately. Probably at the moment when I am copying these notes respecting the early laws of the frontier people, few or no regulating parties exist, the terrible examples that were made haviug impressed upon the new settlers a salutary dread, which restrains them from the commission of flagrant crimes. It is in some of his descriptions of birds that Audubon is specially felicitous. At times, his enthusiasm carries him to a poetic height which virtually leads him unconsciously into the realm of the prose-poem. See whole sentences in the following, in confirmation of this statement : THE MOCKING-BIRD. (^From " The Birds of America.") It is where the great magnolia shoots up its majestic trunk, crowned with ever green leaves, and decorated with a thousand beautiful flowers, that perfume the air around ; where the forests and the fields are adorned with blossoms of every hue; where the golden orange ornaments the gardens and groves; where bignonias of various kinds in- terlace their climbing stems around the white-flowered Stuartia, and, mounting still higher, cover the summits of the lofty trees around, accompanied with innumerable vines, that here and there festoon the dense foliage of the mag- nificent woods, lending to the vernal breeze a slight por- tion of the perfame of their clustered flowers; where a genial warmth seldom forsakes the atmosphere; where berries and fruits of all descriptions are met wif] at every step; in a wordj kind reader, it is where Nature seems to have paused, as she passed over the earth, and, opening her stores, to have strewed with unsparing hand the diver- sified seeds from which have sprung all the beautiful and splendid forms which I should in vain attempt to describe, 58 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEBRITOET. that the mocking-bird should have fixed his abode, there only that Its wondrous song should be heard. But where is that favored land? It is in that great con- tinent to whose distant shores Europe has sent forth her adventurous sons, to wrest for themselves a habitation from the wild inhabitants of the forest, and to convert the neg- lected soil into fields of exuberant fertility , It is, reader, la Louisiana that these bounties of nature are in the greatest perfection. It is there that you should listen to the love-song of the mocking-bird, as I at this moment do. See how he files around his mate, with motions as light as those of the butterfly ! His tail is widely expanded, he mounts in the air to a small distance, describes a circle, and, again alighting, approaches his beloved one, his eyes gleaming with delight, for she has already promised to be his and his only. His beautiful wings are gently raised, he bows to his love, and, again bouncing upwards, opens his bill and pours forth his melody, full of exultation at the conquest which he has made. They are not the soft sounds of the flute or of the haut- boy that I hear, but the sweeter notes of Nature's own music. The mellowness of the song, the varied modula- tions and graduations, the extent of its compass, the great brilliancy of execution, are unrivalled. There is probably no bird in the world that possesses all the musical qualifi- cations of^ this king of song, who has derived all from Nature's self. Yes, reader, all! No sooner has he again alighted, and the conjugal con- tract has been sealed, than as if his breast was about to be rent with delight, he again pours forth his notes with more softness and richness than before. He now soars higher, glancing around with a vigilant eye to assure himseK that none has witnessed his bliss. When these love -scenes, visible only to the ardent lover ot nature, are over, he dances through the air, full of ani- mation and delight, and as if to convince his lovely mate that to enrich her hopes he has much more love in store, he that moment begins anew and imitates all the notes which Nature has imparted to the other songsters of the grove. TIMOTHY FLINT. Timothy Fliat was born in Reading, Massa- ciiusetts, in 1780, and graduated at Harvard College tlaree years before the cession of the Louisiana Territory to the United States. Two years later he was the pastor of the Congrega- tional Church at Lunenburg, Massachusetts. Ill health necessitating a change in climate., in Octo- ber, 1815, he left for the West. He spent the winter of 1815-16 at Cincinnati and in the spring of the latter year he removed to St. Louis where he resided for some time. He next located at St. Charles, Missouri, and remained there three years as a missionary. He then went to Arkan- sas, but after a few months returned to St. Charles. He spent the winter and spring of the year 1822 in New Orleans and the summer in Coving- ton, Florida. In the fall, for a short time, he returned to New Orleans, from where he went to Alexandria; he then returned North. In his "Recollections of the last Ten Years passed in occasional Residences and Journeyings in the Valley of the Mississippi, in a Series of Letters to the Reverend James Flint, of Salem, Massachusetts," published at Boston in 1826, he describes his wanderings in the West and the South and what he saw and heard. He also (59) 60 LITERATUKE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. published in 1826, "Francis Berrian; or, The Mexican Patriot," a novel of adventures in Mexico. In 1827, appeared "The Geography and History of the Mississippi Valley," in two volumes (Philadelphia); "George Mason, the Young Backwoodsman " (1829); "The Shosho- nee Valley," a novel in two volumes (Cincinnati, 1830) ; "Lectures on Natural History, Geology, Chemistry, the Application of Steam and Inter- esting discoveries in the Arts" (Boston, 1832) ; " Indian Wars of the West " (1833), etc. He edited The Knickerbocker Magazine dur- ing several months in 1833, and the same year translated from the French, Droz's " L'Art d'Stre Heureuse," to which he made additions of his own. The following year we find him in Cincinnati editing The Western Magazine. He held the editorship of this periodical during three years. "Celibacy Vanquished," a translation from the French, appeared in 1834 (Philadel- delphia) ; a "Biographical Memoir of Daniel Boone" (Cincinnati, 1834), completes the list of his published works. His " Sketches of the Literature of the United States," which he con- tributed to The AthencBUfn of London during 1835, have never been published in book form. Diligently as I have sought, I have been able to procure only one of Mr. Flint's books. As I have not had time to examine it, I will call on Judge Hall to testify for me as to the quality of Mr. Flint's work. Judge James Hall, the foremost literary critic in TIMOTHY FLINT. 61 the West in the thirties and forties, in 1830 was the editor of The Illinois Monthly Magazine, the first magazine published in the West, and which, strange to say, was issued from the village of Vandalia, Illinois. Judge Hall edited the maga- zine from Cincinnati, where he practiced law. In the December, 1830 (Vol. I, No. 3), issue of The Illinois Magazine, is a notice of several of Mr. Flint's books, from which I make the following extract : " We are pleased with most of the writings of this gentle- man, and would be glad to see them more extensively circulated in the West. < Francis Berrian ', his first novel, has been much read ; and, we think, justly admired. As a mere love story, it is not worth a farthing * » • The plot has but little interest; and those who read the book with most pleasure are precisely the persons who care least to remember the hero. The descriptive and didactic parts contain all that is valuable, and upon which the author would be willing, as we suppose, to rest his claim of popu- larity. And in this view his pretensions are of high order. As a describer of nature, he has few equals. Few can sketch out with so masterly a hand the gorgeous scenery of our Western solitudes. He has the heart and the eye of the poet for the beauties of the mountain, the forest, and the stream^ and for the sublimities of the cataract and the storm. The account of the valley of the Comanches has all the beauty of truth, with all the wildness of romance, and may be quoted as a specimen of felicitous description. There are few better things of the kind in the English lan- guage; and we are proud to claim its author, as one of the pioneers of literature in the west. ■' ' Arthur Clenning ' is, to us, a work of much higher in- terest. The fable is unpromising, but the genius of the writer has invested it with attractions which are the more pleasing, as they are unexpected. The plan is new; and as we read, we feel indebted to the author for turning aside from the beaten path, and treating us to a repast of novel- 62 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. ties. It is refreshing to escape from the oft repeated tales of mawkish sentimentality, and to breathe the untainted atmosphere of nature and feeling. * * * ' The Shoshonee Valley ' has all the characteristic beauties of its writer. The elevated and meditative cast of thought — the graphic descriptions of nature — the fondness for escaping from the abodes of civilized men, and tracing out the footsteps of the aboriginal — and the peculiar imagery, which distinguish the writings of this author. It has its defects too, we dare say ; but we leave the task of pointing these out, to those who may choose to take the trouble; being satisfied that if Mr. Flint has his faults as a writer, he has many excellent qual- ities to redeem them, and that his Industry, his genius, and his zeal in the cause of letters, entitle him to the cordial support of the literary and patriotic." In the latter part of the thirties he removed to New Orleans and finally returned to New En- gland in May, 1840. On his way north he was buried for several hours in the debris of a house in Natchez which was demolished by a tornado. He died from the effects of this accident, August 18th, 1840. THE SHORES OF THE OHIO. (From " The Geography and History of the Mississippi Valley."') It was now the middle of November. The weather up to this time had been, with the exception of a couple of days of fog and rain, delightful. The sky has a lighter and milder azure than that of the northern states. The wide, clean sand-bars stretching for miles together, and now and then a flock of wild geese, swans, or sand-hill cranes, and peli- cans, stalking along on them ; the infinite varieties of form of the towering bluffs ; the new tribes of shrubs and plants on the shores ; the exuberant fertility of the soil, evidencing itself in the natural as well as cultivated vegetation, In the TIMOTHY FLINT. 63 height and size ol the corn, of Itself alone a matter of as- tonishment to an inhabitant of the northern states, In the thrifty aspect of the young orchards, literally bending under their fruit, the surprising size and rankness of the weeds, and, in the enclosure where cultivation had been for a while suspended, the matted abundance of every kind of vegeta- tion that ensued, — all these circumstances united to give a novelty and freshness to the scenery. The bottom forests everywhere display the huge sycamore, the king of the western forest, in all places an interesting tree, but particu- larly so here, and in autumn, when you see its white and long branches among its red and yellow fading leaves. You may add, that in all the trees that have been stripped of their leaves, you see them crowned with verdant tufts of the Viscus or mistletoe, with its beautiful white berries, and their trunks entwined with grapevines, some of them in size not much short of the human body. To add to this union of pleasant circumstances, there is a delightful tem- perature of the air, more easily felt than described. In New England, when the sky was partially covered with fleecy clouds, and the wind blew very gently from the south- west, I have som'etimes had the same sensations from the temperature there. A slight degree of languor ensues; and the irritability that is caused by the rougher and more bracing air of the north, and which Is more favorable to physical strength and activity than enjoyment, gives place to a tranquillity highly propitious to meditation. There is something, too, in the gentle and almost imperceptible mo- tion, as you sit on the deck of the boat, and see the trees apparently moving by you, and new groups of scenery still opening upon your eye, together with the view of these ancient and magnificent forests, which the axe has not yet despoiled, the broad and beautiful river, the earth and the sky, which render such a trip at this season the very element of poetry. Let him that has within him the bona indoles, the poetic mania, as yet unwhipt of justice, not think to sail down the Ohio under such circumstances, without venting to the genius of the river, the rocks, and the woods, the swans, and perchance his distant beloved, his dolorous notes. 64 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. PERSONAL APPEARANCE OF BOONE. {From " Biographical Memoir of Daniel Boone.") Here, on a river (in northern Missouri) with a course of something more than a thousand leagues, all through wilder- ness, an ample, and ajpleasant range was open to his imag- ination. We saw him on those banks. With thin gray hair, a high forehead, a keen eye, a cheerful expression, a singu ■ larly bold conformation of countenance and breast, and a sharp commanding voice ; and with a creed for the future embracing not many articles beyond his red rival hunters, he appeared to us the same Daniel Boone, if one may use the expression, jerked and dried to high preservation, that we had figured as the wanderer in the woods, and the slayer of bears and Indians. He could no longer well descry the wild turkey on the trees, but his eye still kindled at the hunter's tale ; and he remarked that the population on that part of the Missouri was becoming too dense, and the farms too near each other for comfortable range ; and that he never wished to reside in a place, where he could not fall trees enough into his yard to keep up his winter's fire. Dim as was his eye, with age, it would not have been difficult, we apprehend, to have obtained him as a volunteer on a hunting expedition over _ the Rocky Mountains. 'No man ever ex- emplified more strongly, " the ruling passion strong in death." THOMAS H. BENTON. • Thomas Hart Benton, Missouri's greatest son, and whose public career in the United States Senate during thirty years, forms so notable a part of the history of Missouri in the national Congress, was a close and enthusiastic student, ambitious to be known for erudition. Bracken- ridffe tells us in his " Eecollections of Persons and Places in the West ", that he found, in St. Louis, that Benton was taking lessons in French from Herr Shewe and given much to the mid- night lamp. (This is the same Herr Shewe who, according to Brackenridge, was " a scholar, a chemist, a painter, a divine, a philosopher, a professor of languages," etc.; he was a Prus- sian by birth and had six diplomas, " von from de Elezias Acatemy from Baris, von from de Gollege aus Berlin", etc. And this prodigy of learning was content to reside in St. Louis in those primitive days ! ) But to resume: Thomas H. Benton was born near Hillsborough, North Carolina, March 14, 1782. His father died when he was only .eight years old, and his early education was not all it might have been. His mother removing to Tennessee, to occupy a piece of land belong- ing to the estate left by his father, young Ben- ton began the study of law. After being ad- (65) 6 66 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. mitted to practice, he opened an office and soon acquired a reputation as a promising young law- yer which brought him a goodly patronage. He was elected to the state legislature and served one term, during which he advocated and secured the passage of an enactment giv- ing slaves the benefit of trial by jury. About this time, he formed the friendship of Andrew Jackson, who, when he became a major-general during the War of 1812, made Benton one of his aides-de-camp. Benton afterwards became col- onel of a volunteer regiment and served with his regiment through the war. In 1815, Colonel Benton removed to St. Louis, where he engaged in the practice of law. He soon took active part in politics, and began the publication of a daily newspaper, The Missouri Enquirer. So pronounced was his influence in politics that when Missouri was admitted to the Union in 1821, he was chosen as one of her two national senators. During the succeeding thirty years, he was one of the giant figures of the country. The peer of his associates, Webster, Clay, Calh'oun — he has left a name that will endure as long as the memory of those historic days shall -continue part and parcel of the heritage of every true American. I will pass over the succeeding years of Sena- tor Benton's life. The ingratitude of his adopted state, is not a thing that Missourians can recall with pride. He may have been an egotist ; he may have been autocratic in his ways, but the THOMAS H. BENTON. 67 great commonwealth of Missouri was infinitely safer in his hands that it proved to be, after his downfall, in the hands of the pigmies who hurled the giant from his pedestal. Senator Benton, wielded an able pen, as is shown in his " Thirty Years' View; or, a History of the Working of the American Gov- ernment for Thirty Years from 1820 to 1850 " (New York, 1855-56). Sixty-five thousand cop- ies of each of these two volumes were sold within thirty days of their publication. William Cullen Bryant considered it one of the greatest works in American literature. His other published works were: " An Historical and Legal Exam- ination of that part of the Decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the Dred Scott case ", etc. (New York, 1857) ; and, " An Abridgment of the Debates of Congress from 1789 to 1856 ", etc. In sixteen volumes. Twenty-five or thirty years ago, I saw a good- sized pamphlet in a private library (since de- stroyed by fir^) which is never mentioned by writers on Senator Benton. I made a copy of the title page at the time; here it is: " Selec- tions of Editorial Articles from the St. Louis ' Enquirer ' on the Subjects of Texas and Oregon, with a speech on the occupancy of the Columbia River. St. Louis, 1844." Senator Benton died in Washington, April 10, 1858. He is buried in St. Louis. 68 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. CHARACTER OF JSATHANIEL MACON. {From " Thirty Years^ View.") Philosophic in his temperament and wise in his conduct, governed in all his actions by reason and judgment, and deeply Imbued with Bible images, this virtuous and patriotic man (whom Mr. Jefferson called "the last of the Romans ") had long fixed the term of his political existence at the age which the Psalmist assigns for the limit of manly life: " The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow, for it is soon cut ofi, and we fly away." He touched that age In 1828; and true to all his purposes, he was true to his resolve in this, and executed It with the quietude and indifference of an ordinary transac- tion. He was in the middle of a third senatorial term, and in the full possession of all his faculties of mind and body ; but his time for retirement had come — the time fixed by himself, but fixed upon conviction and for well considered reasons, and inexorable to him as if fixed by fate. To the friends who urged him to remain to the end of his term, and who insisted that his mind was as good as ever, he would answer, that it was good enough yet to let him know that he ought to quit office before his mind quit him, and that he did not mean to risk the fate of the Archbishop of Grenada. He resigned his senatorial honors as he had worn them — meekly, unostentatiously, in a letter of thanks and gratitude to the General Assembly of his State; — and gave to repose at home that interval of thought and quietude which every wise man would wish to place between the turmoil o£ life and the- stillness of eternity. He had nine years of this tranquil enjoyment, and died without pain or suffering June 29lh, 1837, — characteristic in death as in life. It was eight o'clock in the morning when he felt that suprerfie hour had come, had himself full-dressed with his habitual neatness, walked in the room and lay down upon the bed, by turns conversing kindly with those who were about him, and show- ing by his conduct that he was ready and waiting, but hurrying nothing. It was the death of Socrates, all but the hemlock, and in that full filth of which the Grecian sage THOMAS H. BENTON. fi9 had only a glimmering. He directed his own grave on the point of a sterile ridge (where nobody would wish to plough), and covered with a pile of rough flint-stone (which nobody would wish to build with) deeming this sterility and the uselessiess of this rock the best security for that undisturbed repose of the bones which is still desirable to those who are indifferent to monuments. In almost all strongly marked characters there is usually some incident or sign, in early life, which shows that char- acter, and reveals to the close observer the type of the future man. So It was with Mr. Macon, His firmness, his patriotism, his self-denial, his devotion to duty and disre- gard of ofiBce and emolument; his modesty, integrity, self- control, and subjection of conduct to the convictions of rea- son -and the dictates of virtue, all so steadily exemplified in a long life, were all shown from the early age of eighteen, in the miniature representation of individual action, and only confirmed In the substquent public exhibitions of a long, beautiful, and exalted career. THE DUEL BETWEEN RANDOLPH AND CLAY. {From " Thirty Years'" View.") Saturday, the 8th of April (1826) — the day for the duel — had come, and almost the hour. It was noon, and the meet- ing was to take place at 4 :30 o'clock. I had gone to see Mr. Randolph before the hour, and for a purpose; and, besides, it was far on the way, as he lived half-way to Georgetown, and we had to pass through that place to cross the Potomac into Virginia at the Little Falls Bridge. I had heard noth- ing from him on the point of not returning the fire since the first communication to that effect, eight days before. I had no reason to doubt the steadiness of his determination, but felt a desire to have fresh assurance of it after so many' days' delay, and so near approach of the trying moment. I knew it would not do to ask him the question — any ques- tion which would imply a doubt of his word. His sensitive feelings would be hurt and annoyed at it. So IlftU upon> scheme to get the inquiry without seeming to get it. I told him of my visit to Mr. Clay the night before — of the late 70 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. sitting — the child asleep — the unconscious tranquillity of Mrs. Clay ; and added, I could not help reflecting how dif- ferent all that might be the next night. He understood me perfectly, and immediately said, with a quietude of look and expression which seemed to rebuke an unworthy doubt, I shall do nothing to disturb the sleep of the child or the repose of the mother, and went on with his employment » * * which was, making codicils to his will, all in the way of re- membrance to friends, • * » I withdrew a little way into the woods, and kept my eyes fixed on Mr. Randolph, who I then knew to be the only one in danger. I saw him receive the fire of Mr. Clay, saw the gravel knocked up in the same place, saw Mr. Kaudolph raise his pistol — discharge it in the air ; heard him say, I do not fire at you, Mr. Clay; and immediately advancing and offering his hand. He was met in the same spirit. They met halfway, shook hands, Mr. Randolph saying, jocosely, You owe me a coat, Mr. Clay — (the bullet had passed through the skirt of the coat, very near the hip') — to- which Mr. Clay promptly and happily replied, / am glad the debt is no greater. I had come up and was prompt to proclaim what I had been obliged to keep secret for eight days. The joy of all was extreme at this happy termination of a most critical affair, and we Immediately left, with lighter hearts than we brought. » * » Oa Monday the parties exchanged cards, and social rela- tions were formally and courteously restored. It was about the last high-toned duel that I have witnessed, and among the highest-toned that I have ever witnessed; and so hap- pily conducted to a fortunate issue — a result due to the noble character of the seconds as well as to the generous and heroic spirit of the principals. Certainly, duelling is bad, and has been put down, but not quite so bad as its substitute — revolvers, bowie-knives, black-guarding, and street assassinations under the pretext of self-defense. BEVERLY TUCKER. A writer who could win the encomiums of Poe and Simms, is certainly worthy of our close attention. N. Beverly Tucker, at one time one of the Judges of the St. Louis County Court, was the author of " The Partisan Leader ".published in 1836, and in which he virtually outlined the programme of the rebellion of 1861 ; he wrote this work while living on his farm in Florissant, St. Louis County, Missouri, where he resided from 1815 to 1831. He was an original, and is said to have had his office, his library and his study in the stump of a hollow tree. In this stump he also wrote, "George Balcombe", a thoroughly Western novel descriptive of early border times. William Gilmore Simms says of it that " it is one of the most vigorous of Amer- ican novels as a narrative of action and the delin- eation of mental power ' ' . Poe, in the following notice of " George Balcombe ' ' , does exactly one of the two things that he was notorious for doing — either over- lauding or over-condemning: "'George Bal- combe ', we are induced to regard, upon the whole, as the best American novel. There have been few books of its peculiar kind, we think, written in any country, much its superior. Its (71) 72 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. interest is intense from beginning to end. Talent of a lofty order is evinced in every page of it. Its most distinguished features are invention, vigor, almost audacity, of thought — great variety of what the German critics term intrigue, and exceeding ingenuity and finish in the adapta- tion of its component parts . ' Nothing is want- ing to a complete whole, and nothing is out of place, or out of time. Without being chargeable in the least degree with imitation, the novel bears a strong family resemblance to the ' Caleb Williams' of Godwin. Thinking thus highly of ' George Balcombe ' , we still do not wish to be understood as ranking it with the more brilliant fictions of some of the living novelists of Great Britain", etc. (" Marginalia ", CCXXV). Poe wrote this in the face of the fact that Cooper had published " The Spy " in 1821, and "The Pilot" in 1823! Judge Beverly Tucker was the son of the dis- tinguished poet and jurist, St. George Tucker, author of " Days of My Youth ", " Slavery ", " Alien and Sedition Laws ", and other works, and the half-brother of John Randolph of Roanoke who was ' ' afraid of insanity ' ' . From Missouri he moved to Virginia where he was professor of Jurisprudence in William and Mary College from 1834 to 1851. He was born in Matoax, Virginia, September 6th, 1784, and died in Winchester, Virginia, August 20, 1851. His other published works are: " Discourse on the Importance of the Study of Political Science BEVERLY TUCKEE. 73 as a Branch of Academic Education in the United States" (Eichmond, 1840); " Discourse on the Dangers that threaten the Free Institutions of tlae United States" etc. (Eichmond, 1841) ; these are both pamphlets; "A Series of Lec- tures intended to prepare the Student for the Study of the Constitution of the United S ates ' ' (Philadelphia, 1845), and " Principles of Plead- ing " (Boston, 1846). "Gertrude", a novel which appeared in The Southern Literary Mes- senger in 1844-45, has never been issued in book form. Many papers of his remain uncollected in the pages of The Southern Review and The Southern Literary Messenger. At the time of his death he was engaged on a " Life ' ' of John Eandolph , his half-brother. THE PARTISAN LEADER. {From " The Partisan Leader.") Toward the latter end of the month ol October, 1849, about the hour of noon, a horseman was seen ascending a ^row valley at the Eastern foot of tJie Blue Ridge. His road nearly followed the course of a small stream, which, 'issuing from a deep gorge of the mountain, winds its way between lofty hills, and terminates its brief and brawling course in one of the larger tributaries of the Dan. A glance of the eye took in the whole of the little settlement that lined its banks, and measured the resources of its Inhabitants. * * * At length he heard a sound of voices, and then a shrill, whistle, and all was still. Immediately, some half a dozen men, leaping a fence, ranged themselves across the road 74 LITEKATUBE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. and faced him. He observed that each, as he touched the ground, laid hold of a rifle that leaned against the enclosure, and this circumstance drew his attention to twenty or more of these formidable weapons, ranged along in the same position. * * * As the traveler drew up his horse, one of the men, speaking in a low and quiet tone, said, " We want a word witb you, stranger, before you go any farther." " As many as you please," replied the other, "for I am tired and hungry, and so is my horse ; and I am glad to find some one at last, of whom I may hope to purchase something for both of us to eat." " That you can have quite handy," said the countryman, " for we have been gathering corn, and were just going to our dinner. It you will only just 'light, sir, one of the boys can feed your horse, and you can take such as we have to give you." The invitation was accepted; the horse was taken in charge by a long-legged lad of fifteen, without hat or shoes ; and the whole party crossed the fence together. At the moment a man was seen advancing toward them, who, observing their approach, fell back a few steps, and threw himself on the ground at the foot of a large old apple tree. Around this were clustered a motley group of men, women and boys, who opened and made way for the stran- ger. He advanced, and bowing gracefully took off his for- age cap, from beneath which a quantity of soft curling flaxen hair fell over his brow and cheeks. Every eye was now fixed on him, with an expression rather of interest than of mere curiosity. Every countenance was serious and com- posed, and all wore aa air of business, except that a slight titter was heard among the girls, who, hovering behiud the backs of their mothers, peeped through the crowd, to get a look at the handsome stranger. As the youth approached, the man at the foot of the tree arose, and returned the salutation, which seemed unheeded by the rest. He advanced a step or two aad invited the stranger to be seated. This actioa, and the looks turned toward him by the others, showed that he was in authority of some sort among them. With him, therefore, our trav- eler concluded that the proposed conference was to be held. * * " BEVERLY TUCKER. 75 He was at length asked whence he came, and answered, from the neighborhood ot Richmond. — From which side ot the river? — From the north side. — Did he know anything of Van Courtlandt? — His camp was at Bacon's branch, just above the town. — What force had he? ' ' I cannot say, certainly," he replied, "but common fame made his numbers about tour thousand." " Is that all, on both sides of the river? " said his inter- rogator. " O, no! Col. Loyal's regiment it at Petersburg, and Ool. Cole's at Manchester ; each about five hundred strong ; and there is a piquet on the Bridge Island." " Did you cross there ? " "I did not." " Where, then? " he was asked. " I can hardly tell yon," he replied, " it was at a private ford, several miles above Cartersville." " Was that not mightily out of the way? What made yon come so far around? " "It was safer traveling on that side of the river." "Then the people on that side of the river are your friends? " " No. They are not. But, as they are all of a color there they would let me pass, and ask no questions, as long as I traveled due west. On this side, if you are one man's friend you are the next man's enemy; and I had no mind to answer questions." "You seem to answer them now mighty freely." "That is true. I am like a letter that tells all it knows as. soon as it gets to the right hand; but it does not want to be opened before that." " And how do you know that you have got to the right hand now,? " " Because I know where I am." " And where are you? " "Just at the foot of the Devil's Backbone," replied the youth. " Were you ever here before? " "Never in my life." " How do you know then where you are? " asked the mountaineer. " Because the right way to avoid questions is to ask 76 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. none. So I took care to know all about the road, and the country, and the place, before Heft home." " And who told you all about it? " " Suppose I should tell you," answered the young man, " that Van Courtland had a map of the country made, and gave it to me." " I should say you were a traitor to him, or a spy upon us," was the stern reply. At the same moment, a startled hum was heard fi-om the crowd, and the press moved and swayed for an instant, as if a sort of spasm had pervaded the whole mass. " You are a good hand at questioning," said the youth, with a smile, " but without asking a single question, I have found out all I wanted to know." "And what was that? " asked the other. " Whether you were friends to the Yorkers and Yankees, or to poor old Virginia." "And which are we for?" added the laconic moun- taineer. " For old Virginia forever," replied the youth * » * It was echoed in a shout, * * * their proud war-cry of " old Virginia forever." HENRY M. BEACKENRIDGE. The first writer of historic importance was Henry M. Brackenridge, the still more distin- guished son of a distinguished father. His father was Hugh Henry Braclcenridge, the author of "Bunker's Hill" and " Modern Chivalry " . Henry M. Brackenridge was born in Pittsburg, May 11th, 1786. His education was begun at a very early age by his father, and at seven years of age he was sent to a French school at the old Missouri village of St. Genevieve, then in Upper Louisiana. Here he learned French so rapidly that in six months' time he had for- gotten what English he knew. At ten years of age he returned to Pittsburg, where his edu- cation was resumed at his father's house by his father and the tutors who were under his direction. When he was fifteen years of age his father received the appointment of judge of the Penn- sylvania Supreme Court, and young Bracken- ridge was placed for two years in the office of the clerk of the court as a preparation for the subsequent study of the law. At twenty he was admitted to the bar and removed to Carlisle, where his father then resided. At twenty-one he removed to Baltimore, Maryland, to engage in practice, but failing to secure clients he (77) 78 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. shortly took up his residence in Somerset, a small town where there was but one lawyer. While he succeeded fairly well he still had time, he tells us in his "Recollections of Persons and Places in the West", for the reading of the great English historians and the study of Italian and German. In 1810, Brackenridge revisited St. Genevieve, and then St. Louis, where he lingered during the sittings of the courts, and finally concluded to remain and collect material for a history of the country. He contributed articles to The Mis- souri Gazette (now The /St. Louis Republic) which were afterwards used as the basis of his work on Louisiana, published in Pittsburg in 1812. While in St. Louis he also studied Span- ish. In the fall of 1811, he removed to New Or- leans, making the trip on a keel-boat, and was shortly afterwards appointed Deputy Attorney- General for the Territory of Orleans, which subsequently became the state of Louisiana. The following year he was appointed District Judge. His leisure time he devoted to the study of Spanish law and Spanish literature. In 1814, he once more took up his residence in Baltimore, where he wrote a " History of the Late War between the United States and Great Britain" , which had just ended. His next literary work was a pamphlet of one hundred pages in favor of the acknowledgment of the independence of the South American Republics. In 1817, he was HENRY M. BRACKENRIDGE. 79 appointed secretary to the government Commis- sioners to the South American Republics. In 1818 he published, " A Voyage to South America" (in two volumes), the result of his observations and inquiries during his trip to South America. Humboldt says that these vol- umes contain " an extraordinary mass of infor- mation replete with philosophic views." Having returned to Baltimore, he resumed the practice of the law, and served two terms in the Legislature of Maryland. His want of suiScient clients to net him a reasonable income for his daily exist- ence, induced him to return to St. Louis in the fall of 1820, but in April, 1821, he took passage for New Orleans intending to finally settle in that city. However, meeting General Andrew Jackson on the boat, he landed with him in Florida as his secretary, negotiator and counsel- lor, General Jackson having been appointed Governor in Florida. In these capacities, his knowledge of the Spanish and the French laws and languages was invaluable. In May, 1821, he was appointed United States Judge for the Western District of Florida, which office he held until 1832, when, failing at reappointment, he removed with his wife, a wealthy Philadelphia lady, to Pittsburg. Here he engaged actively in politics and devoted much of his time to litera- ture, writing frequently for the reviews and the papers, and publishing a number of pamphlets. In 1834, appeared his " Recollections of Persons and Places in the West ", his principal work. 80. LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. In 1840, Mr. Brackenridge was elected to congress. In 1841, President Harrison appointed him a Commissioner under the Mexican Treaty ; in 1844 he served a term in the Pennsylvania State Legislature. In 1842, he published, "An Essay on Trusts and Trustees". The balance of his life was devoted to literary pursuits. He died January 18th, 1871. ST. GENEVIEVE, CLOSE OF THE 18TH CENTURY. {From " Mecollections of Persons and Places in the W^esi!.") My guardian carried me directly to tlie liouse of M. Bau- vais, a respectable and comparatively wealthy inhabitant of the village, and then took his departure the same evening. Not a soul ia the village, except the curate, understood a word o£ English, and I was possessed of but two French words, oui and non. I sallied into the street, or rather highway, for the houses were far apart, a large space being occupied for yards and gardens by each. I soon found a crowd of boys at play; curiosity drew them around me, and many questions were asked by them, which I answered alternately, with the aid of the before mentioned monosylla- bles, "Where have you come from?" "Yes." "What is your name? " "No." To the honour of their parents who had taught them true politeness — instead of turning me into ridicule, as soon as they discovered I was a strange boy, they vied with each other in showing me kindness. M. Bauvais was a tall, dry, old French Canadian, dressed in the costume of the place: that is, with a blue cotton hand- kerchief on his head, one corner thereof descending behind and partly covering the eel-skin which bound his hair ; a check shirt; coarse linen pantaloons on his hips; and the Indian sandal or moccasin, the only covering to the feet worn here by both sexes. He was a man of a grave and serious aspect, entirely unlike the gay Frenchmen we are accustomed to see; and this seriousness was not a little heightened by the fixed rigidity of the maxillary muscles, occasioned by having HENRY M. BRACKENRIDGE. 81 his pipe continually in his month, except while in bed, or at mass, or during meals. Let it not be supposed I mean to speak disrespectfully, or with levity, of a most estimable man; my object in describing him is to give an idea of many other fathers of families of the village. Madame Bauvais was a large fat lady, with an open cheerful countenance, and an expression of kindness and affection to her numerous off- spring, and to all others excepting her coloured domestics, toward whom she was rigid and severe. She was, notwith- standing, a most pious and excellent woman, and, as a French wife ought to be, completely mistress of the family. Her eldest daughter was an interesting young woman; two others were nearly grown, and all were handsome. I will trespass a little on the patience of the reader, to give some account of the place where I was domiciled; that is, of the house in which I lived, and of the village in which it was situated. The house of M. Bauvais was a long, low building, with a porch or shed in front, and another in the rear; the chimney occupied the centre, dividing the house in two parts, with each a fire-place. One of these served for dining-room, parlor and principal bed-chamber; the other was the kitchen; and each had a small room taken off at the end for private chambers or cabinets. There was no loft or garret, a pair of stairs being a rare thing in the village. The furniture, excepting the beds and the looking-glass, was of the most common kind, consisting of an armoire, a rough table or two, and some coarse chairs. The yard was enclosed with cedar pickets, eight or ten inches in diameter, and six feet high, placed upright, sharpened on the top, in the manner of a stockade fort. Id front, the yard was narrow, but in the rear quite spacious, and containing the barn and stables, the negro quarters, and all the necessary offices of a farm yard. Beyond this, there was a spacious garden enclosed with pickets, in the same manner with the yard. It was, indeed, a garden — in which the greatest variety, and the finest vegetables were cultivated, intermingled with flowers and shrubs; on one side of it there was a small orchard con- taining a variety of the choicest fruits. The substantial and permanent character of these inclosures is in singular contrast with the slight and temporary fences and palings of 6 82 LITEEATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEBRITOKT. the Americans. The bouse was a ponderous wooden frame, which, instead of being weather boarded, was filled in with clay, and then whitewashed. As to the living, the table was provided in a very different manner from that of the generality of Americans. With the poorest French peas- ant, cookery is an art well understood. They make great use of vegetables, and prepared in a manner to be wholesome and palatable. Instead of roast and fried, they have soups and fricassees, and gumbos (a dish supposed to be derived from the Africans), and a variety of other dishes. Tea was not used at meals, and cofEee for breakfast was the pi:ivilege of M. Baavais only. From the description of this house, some idea may be formed of the rest of the village. The pursuits of the in- habitants were chiefly agricultural, although all were more or less engaged in traffic for peltries with the Indians, or in working the lead mines in the interior. But few of them were mechanics, and there were but two or three small shops, which retailed a few groceries. Poultry and lead constituted almost the only circulating medium. All politics, or discussions of the affairs of government, were entirely unknown: the commandant took care of all that sort of thing. But instead of them, the processions and ceremo- nies of the church, and the public balls, furnished ample matter for occupation and amusement. Their agriculture was carried on In a field of several thousand acres, in the fertile river bottom of the Mississippi, inclosed at the com- mon expense, and divided into lots, separated by some natural or permanent boundary. Horses or cattle, depas- tured, were tethered with long ropes, or the grass was cut and carried to them la their stalls. It was a pleasing sight, to mark the rural population going and returning morning and evening, to and fro from.the field, with their working cattle, carts, old-fashioned wheel ploughs, and other implements of husbandry. Whatever they may have gained in some respects, I question very much whether the change of government has contributed to increase their happiness. About a quarter of a mile off, there was a vil- lage of Klckapoo Indians, who lived on the most friendly terms with the white people. The boys often intermingled with those of the white village, and practised shooting with the bow and arrow; an accomplishment which I HENRY M. BRACKENBIDGE. 83 acquired Tvith the rest, together with a little smatteriog of the lodian language, which I forgot on leaving the place. Such were the place and the kind of people, where, and among whom, I was about to pass some of the most im- portant years of my life, and which would naturally ex- tend a lasting Influence over me. HENRY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT. For the preservation of a large and valuable amount of information as to the geology, geog- raphy, Indian occupants and general history of several sections of the Louisiana Territory, we are indebted to the keen judgment and the in- defatigable researches of Henry Rowe School- craft. Henry Rowe Schoolcraft descended from the Calcrafts (so the name was written originally), an English family that emigrated to the United States in the 17th Century. He was born in Albany County, New York, March 28th, 1793! He received a good education, his inclinations being principally for poetry, mineralogy and languages. In 1817, he published a book on " Vitreology " ; in 1818, he made a mineralogi- cal survey of the lead mines of Missouri, and the following year he published an account of his labors. In 1820, he published a full account of his trip to the Mississippi and the Missouri rivers under the title of, " Scenes and Adven- tures in the Semi-Alpine Region of the Ozark Mountains of Missouri and Arkansas, which were first traversed by De Soto, in 1541 ". His "Narrative Journal of Travels from Detroit to the Source of the Mississippi River ", published in 1821, is a record of his trip with General (84) HENKY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT. 85 Lewis Cass in his survey of tlie copper mines and regions, and exploration of tlae Upper Mis- sissippi river. In 1821, he examined the Wabash and Illinois rivers and reported his observations in " Travels in the Central Portions of the Mississippi Val- ley". The following year he was appointed agent for Indian Affairs on the Northwestern frontiers, and removed his residence to Michili- mackinaoii where he resided until 1841. During this period of his life, he acquired a thorough knowledge of Indian history, languages and customs. In 1827 he pubhshed a poem, "The Rise of the West; or, A Prospect of the Mississippi Valley ". From 1828 to 1832, he served in the Territorial Legislature of Michigan. The former year he organized and had incorporated the Michigan Historical Society, and in the latter year he founded the Algic Society of Detroit. "Indian Melodies" was issued in 1830. His "Narrative of an Expedition to Itasca Lake, the Actual Source of the Mississippi Eiver", published in 1834, is the record of a second ex- ploring tour to the Upper Mississippi under the auspices of the national government. In this work he announces the discovery of the rise of the great Father of Waters in Lake Itasca. "Algic Researches" (1839) is a collection of Indian tales of legends in which he proves that the Indians had an unwritten literature, poetic and humorous, and possessing some ability. 86 LITEKATUKE OF LOUISIANA TERRITOKY. In 1841, Mr. Schoolcraft removed to New York. In 1845, he published " Notes on the Iroqupis ", the result of a commission from the New York legislature to take a census of the Six Nations. In 1845, he published a work on the characteristics of the red race of America, under the title of " Onedta ", which he revised in 1848 under the title of «' The Indianin his Wigwam ". ' ' Personal Memoirs of a Eesidence of Thirty Yeais with the Indian Tribes on the American Fontiers" (from 1812 to 1842) appeared in 1851. This is a delightful diary of frontier and early Western experiences, observations, cus- toms, manners, characters, etc., etc., and con- tains much of historical interest as a picture of border and pioneer times. His next work — in five quarto volumes — was prepared at the in- stance of the national government; its title is, "Ethnological Researches respecting the Red Man of America. Information respecting the History, Condition and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States " . A sixth volume was added to the work in 1857. Since several years, Mr. Schoolcraft had suf- fered from a rheumatic affection which had par- alyzed his hands and rendered him incapable of work except by dictation. During this period , of his lifcj the services of his wife were inval- uable to him. Other works of his not heretofore mentioned, are : " Transallegania " , a mock heroic poem on mineralogy (1819) ; " Remarks on Native Silver HENRY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT. 87 from Michigan" (1825); " Alhalla, a Tale of the Creek War, and some Miscellaneous Poems ", a collection of his poems (1843), — Mr. School- craft was not happy as a poet ; — " Historical Considerations on the Siege and Defense of Fort Stanwix in 1777 " ; a life of General Lewis Cass; "Notices of Antique Earthen Vessels from Florida" (1847); "The Bronze Man", and a number of other books and pamphlets too numerous to mention here. He died at Wash- ington, December 10th, 1864. HOBBOMOK. Neo created this continent for the use of the redmen. There was not room enough for the nations without It. He pushed it up from the bottom of the sea, with a strong arm, and this is the reason why some of the mountains reach so high toward the clouds as the Andes and the Appalaches. Sea-shells and fish can still be seen on the rocks on some of the highest peaks of these mountains. But the redmen were very much troubled in these early periods by evil spirits, giants, and weendigoes or cannibals. Every high cliff, mountain and deep valley had its manetoes, who were jealous of men and often led them astray in bogs, or over- turned their canoes and drowned them in the water ; they also gave us bad dreams at night, which surely betoken mis- fortune. Night and day we were beset by these evil spirits ; and our Medas and Jossakeeds were continually kept at their arts to defend us from these evil influences. When the Wabishkizzee, or white men, first came in ships to these coasts, they were inhabited by these bad spirits. Hobbomok was a great sagamore, and had authority over many bands; he was a great hunter and warrior, but he was also a prophet, at whose voice the people trembled. He lived on that part of the coast called Massachusetts, and being out a-flshing one day in his canoe, far from shore, he was driven out to sea and landed on an island called Nan- 88 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. tucket. He was so pleased with the island that he deter- mined to live there, and built a prophet's high-pointed lodge. He then took out of his smoking-pouch, some to- bacco, and lit his pipe. The fumes rolled up toward the clouds, and this is the reason why there are so many fogs and mists along that part of the coast to this day. He was the first man that settled on this island ; others followed him soon, and he became a very celebrated chief and prophet, whose fame extended far and wide. He found by his incan- tations, that there were many Monetoes there, so that he could do wonders In the sight of the people. The red- headed wood-pecker and the turtle were two of his chief messengers. There was no man so famous among all the tribes as Hobbomok. He was a magician, and not only knew all the arts of his people, but also the secret arts of a Meda. He had a small, brown dog, with white paws, which he appeared to be in communication with. Some thought that this little dog was a spirit in disguise. Almost every- thing in his lodge was covered with hieroglyphics; he had a little kind of music-board, marked in bright colors with these devices, which he could both read over and sing. He had a curious pipbigwun, with small holes in it like a flute, which he played when he sang,-for he was a naigamood, or poet. There were two serpents that lived in the back part of his lodge, with whom he appeared to be on familiar terras. These serpents went away in the fall, before the weather became cold, and came back again in the spring. He also had a living rattlesnake in one of his large drums, which he used on solemn occasions. Hobbomok had a power over all animals and birds and other forms of creation. He possessed a peculiar way of drawing flsh to the shore. Ordinarily, he hunted small quadrupeds, partridges and other birds ; and when he had a mind for flsh, he took his drum and rattles and went dowa to the water and commenced an incantation. At this the flsh came out of the deep water, and became so enamored with his songs, that he seized them and pitched them ashore. Everything that happened was revealed to him in dreams. One night he dreamed that angels from heaven visited him. They had beautiful faces and were clothed in colored robes, with long, bright hair. He had often seen the GREAT SPIRIT riding on the clouds, but he did not know how to interpret this dream. HENRY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT. 89 One day the people, who had now become numerous, saw a great wonder on the sea. Large wings appeared to drop down from the clouds and tall trees to be growing on the surface of the water. Some thought it was a giant bird. It came rapidly toward the land. It proved to be a nabe- quon, or ship, .When it came near the shore, it sent out a tiny little vessel or canoe, with men in it, having the ogima or captain of the nabequon with them. These strangers went up to Hobbomok's lodge and asked him what they called the country. The prophet said it was Neo's land; Neo had made it for the redmen; he had made it with many rivers and lakes and mountains, plains and forests, and filled them with game and fish and birds of all kinds. ' And what do you come here for? ' said Hobbomok, fiercely looking at them. ' Does the GREAT SPIRIT send you? ' ' I come,' said the ship -master, ' on an adventure. I have information for you and your people from the GREAT SPIRIT. I wish to land on your shores, and have a small piece of land to build a house on. I will teach you many things and make your people happy.' At this moment the little brown dog with the white paws sat up, and looked straight in Hobbomok's face, and said: ' Master, open your eyes and behold. This man is not what he prof esses to be; he is not directly sent here from Neo; he is a magician, who is seeking gold and pearls on these shores. He will kill and destroy all your animals from the forest; he will take all the fish from your streams; he will dam up all your large rivers, so as to prevent the fish from coming up from the sea; he will cover your plains with grain; he will build high pointed houses, where men will call on the GREAT SPIRIT to injure you; he will overturn all your wigwams and Meda lodges. Especially will he destroy all your priests and prophets and seers . Look at his hair, it is red ! Look at his eyes, they are blue ! Look at his face, it is white! He is none of our kin, nor are any of his race. I take the film from your eyes. He is an enemy ; see, he has a drawn arrow pointed at your heart. Raise a tempest and scout him from your coasts,' The dog ceased. All at once it began to rain and hail, and a terrible tempest of wind arose. In this tempest the Wabishkizzee and his ship and men were engulfed in the sea, and their cries as they went down can still be heard in every loud tempest. ANGUS UMPHRAVILLE. Twenty-five years ago, every well-equipped second-hand bookshop in St. Louis (the good old time " second-hand bookshop " has gone out of date — we have " antiquarian bookstores " now) had a rickety, three-legged box table propped up on the sidewalk, standing against the front of the store. This paraphernalia of trade was classically known as the »' sheol box" (only, " sheol" was not the exact designative word) ; the sheol box contained the odds and ends of the bookseller's gatherings — volumes from broken sets, worn-out volumes, school books out of date, old numbers of magazines, old pamphlets, etc., etc. Generally a notice scratched on an old piece of brown or yellow paper informed the passer-by that he could take his pick for "5c."; or, if the bookseller was opulent, he scorned such small transactions and a bold and reckless placard, " 25c. the Lot ", appeared in evidence. Altogether the " sheol box " was about as uninviting and disreputable looking an adjunct of the bookseller's invention as human brain could devise, but every connoisseur, or experi- enced book buyer, knew that if a "bargain"* was to be had in that bookshop, it laid right in that sheol box. (90) ANGUS UMPHKAVILLE. 91 One day as I was about passing by a bookshop, my attention was arrested by the sheol box. I stopped and examined its contents; with a start my eye fell on the title page of a little book that was minus its cover. The bookseller's eye was on me from behind his spectacles ; I dared not trust my voice, so, I quietly handed him a silver quarter. Pocketing it, he said "Take 'em along, doctor ". But I did not " take 'em along"; I picked up the little book, put it in my pocket, and left the other books untouched. This is a copy of the title page of that book : " Missourian Lays, an I Other Western Ditties. By Angus Umphraville, Author of ' The Siege of Baltimore, and other Original Poems 'f St. Louis: Printed by Isaac N. Henry & Co. At the Enquirer Office. 1821." And that is the first book of English poetry printed west of the Mississippi river and' the first English literary book printed in the West. The poems (if, by courtesy, they may be called "poems") in "Missourian Lays" are nearly all on local or suburban themes; "To the Mississippi", " The Recluse of Florissant", " Sketches in Illinois ", " Birth of Missouri; an Ode ", and " The Old Maid of St. Louis" are some of the titles. In the "Preface", Mr. Umphraville says : ' ' Do not look for the genius of a Byron, a Moore, a Scott, a Campbell, or a Barlow, in 'the wood-notes wild ' of Missouri ". I have granted his plea long, long ago. The book contains seventy -two pages, of which 92 LITEEATUEE OF LOUISIANA TERKITOEY. number the title-page, the preface, the dedica- tion and the table of contents occupy nine. The dedication is to, " His Excellency William Clarke, late Governor of the Territory • of Missouri". As to Mr. Umphraville, I have not been able to obtain the slightest information. His poetry is simply wonderful ! BIETH OF MISSOURI. In pride when Missouri arose, Like the flow'r which blooms in the snows ; Columbia beheld her infancy's morn, And her bright star the goddess's crown did adorn. States beheld the morning star, Streaming radiance from afar. lio! the sons of heav'n rejoice. Hark! I hear their sweetest voice. And their soft harmonious strain, Echoing heav'ns repeat again ; Hail, sister born I Hail, lov'd Missouri ! Glory gilds thy destiny ! Matchless grandeur waits on thee ! Powerful, opulent, and free! Let not the sons of Genius droop, Bid not thy soaring minstrels stoop ; Oh! bid them not to pine and die, Uncherish'd in their poverty. Cherish the Muse! the Muse inspires Whate'er exists of patriot fires; 'Tis she who fans the hero's flame. And lights him to a glorious name ; She shronds the vict'ry of a day With Glory's everlasting ray. To modest worth she gives its due, And ever is to merit true ; And when provok'd she in her rage Lashes the vices of her age. ANGUS UMPHRAVILLE. 93 Did heroes Greece and Borne make great? No, but from oblivious fate, Illustrious minstrels snatch'd their name, And sung them an eternal fame I Neglect the Muse! what woes await For such foul crime an Impious state; There av'rice dwells, there honor hides And chasteless meanness scnllsing bides. Neglect the Muse I Britanla's shame Which dy'd of yore her brightest fame; She sees her folly nor deplore Her Campbell, Rodgers, Scott and Moore. And why may not Missouri claim Illustrious bards of equal fame? Why may she not with Albion vie, Ib such a gen'rous rivalry? 'Twas thus the pasaning angels sung, While their bright harps harmonious rung. TO THE MISSISSIPPI. (An Illinoisian Ditty.) Roll, roll thj turgid tide To lave her shores in pride. Thou father of the waters of the West ; Though Illinois be wild, She's Columbia's fav'rlte child. And loveliest are her daughters and the best. Roll, roll thy turgid tide To lave her shores in pride, For sure more fertile never river prest; And Illinois is great, A growing, glorious state, O! be her Great Guardian Giver blest. THE OLD WOMAN'S REMONSTRANCES, A Pastoral Ditty. Fie Robin 1 leave the girl alone, And don't be always fooling so; 94 LITEKATUEB OF LOUISIANA TERKITOKT. Consider she bas work to do In time to go to schooling, O. I scarce set down upon the stool, A spinning at my spinning wheel, Than Jenny bawls " Come ! mother Do speak to this here saucy de'il! Now Robin, if you don't leave ofl. For sure, I'll tell her father, O, And If so be he gets right mad He'll give you a sound lather, 0. Why, I declare before I've done. What signifies my talking, O? The fellow's at the girl again, There, after her he's stalking, O. O Robin 1 leave the girl alone, You good-for-nothing fellow, O, The old man's coming, don't you hear, He'll make you loudly bellow, 0. SOLOMON FRANKLIN SMITH. Sol Smith, otherwise Solomon Franklin Smith (his signature on " state occasions "), the well- known Western actor, wrote pleasantly and entertainingly about the American stage of any- where from one-half to three-quarters of a cen- tury ago, and at the same time furnished some very useful information as to its more practi- cal and every-day aspect. He published • ' The Theatrical Apprenticeship and Anecdotical Rec- ollections of Sol Smith, Comedian, Attorney- at-Law, etc.", in 1845 (Philadelphia). In 1854, his second book appeared under the title of, " The Theatrical Journey- Work and Anecdoti- cal Recollections of Sol Smith", etc. His last book was, " Theatrical Management in the West and South for Thirty years ; interspersed with Anecdotical Sketches, Autobiographically Given; by Sol Smith, Retired Actor", etc (New York, 1868). Sol Smith was born in Norwich, New York, April 20th, 1801. He had very little schooling, and early in life became a clerk in Albany, New York. Three years later, he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, where he apprenticed himself to a printer. In 1820 he abandoned printing and became a member of a local dramatic company, but at the (95) 96 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. end of the season, he went to Cincinnati, then the metropolis of the West, and studied law. The years 1822 and 1823 must have been very busy ones to him, as he published, edited and printed The Independent Press, and at the same time, managed the Globe Theater. To- wards the end of 1823, he organized a dramatic company, of which he was the comedian, and traveled in the West and the South. He had found his true sphere — he was eminently suc- cessful in comedy parts; he "made a hit " as Mawworm in "The Hypocrite ", Sheepf ace in " The Village Lawyer ", and in other roles. Drifting South, he edited The Mercantile Ad- vertiser, of Mobile, Alabama, in 1837-38. At the time of his -death, in February, 1869, I heard old citizens of St. Louis say that he was much in that city in the latter part of the thirties. The encyclopsedias state that he took up his residence in St. Louis in 1852. This is incorrect. Beginning with June 6, 1842, he was manager of Smith and Ludlow's Theater, St. Louis {vide advertisement in the People's Organ of June 7, 1842), and continued in that position for a number of years. His card as a candidate for Recorder appears in the Organ from March 12 to April 9, 1845. (He did not receive the nomination of his party). In 1853 he retired from the stage and kept up a sort of desultory law practice for some years there- after. I find many uncollected articles of his in the New York Spirit of the Times, the SOLOMON FRANKLIN SMITH. 97 St. Louis Daily Reveille, the St. Louis daily People's Organ, and other papers published in the forties, fifties and early sixties. The excerpts following this notice are all taken from " The Theatrical Journey Work and Anec- totical Recollections " etc. AN EXECUTION. On Friday, the twenty-second of November, I witnessed tlie execution of the Eev. Mr. Johnson, convicted of murdering his wife's sister, a child about twelve years of age, by hang- ing her on a hackbury tree. His guilt appeared undoubted, although the evidence was circumstantial. On the gallows he seemed quite unconcerned. He had evidently made up his mind to die, all intercessions to the legislature on his behalf for a pardon having proved unavailing. His wife, who was mainly, instrumental in proving his guilt, was on the gallows with him, and seemed anxious that her hus- band should forgive her before he suffe'red. The poor man, whose hands were fast tied, could not embrace his wife, but allowed her to embrace him, and appeared rather pleased when she got through with her caresses. Mr. Johnson was then asked if he had anything to say before he suffered the extreme penalty of the law? he turned and looked around on the crowd and said mildly, " I have nothing to say, except that I hope all of you, my friends, who came to see this sight, when your time comes to die, may be as ready to meet your God as I am. I die innocent." In less than a minute after these words were uttered, his body was hanging a lifeless corpse, and the people were returning to their homes, wondering how any man — particularly a minister of the Gospel — could be so hardened as to die with a lie upon his lips ; for probably not one in that large crowd gave credit to his dying words. Reader, he did die innocenti Fourteen years afterward, a negro was hung in Mississippi, who on the gallows con- fessed that he committed the crime ^f or which Mr. Johnson paid the terrible penalty. 7 98 LITEEATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKKITOKY. ANECDOTES OF ANDREW JACKSON ALLEN. Having paid all his debts in Albany, he proceeded to New York, where he engaged in the Park Theatre, and was moderately successful in his slouched-hat, broad-buckle, and short sword characters, until his creditors — for he had a way of getting into debt perfectly surprising to young beginners — became somewhat impatient and troublesome. One in particular determined to try the virtue of a capias ad respondendam, and employed a well-known and afterward celebrated constable, by the name of Hays, to execute the same on the body of Father Allen. I may as well here state two things; first, my hero was and is, partially deaf; secondly, he has a way of speaking which conveys the idea that he is always laboring under the effects of a bad cold in Ms head, without a pocket-handkerchief to help himself with. The reader will please bear these things in mind. Young Hays (he was then young) found Father Allen on the Park Theatre steps. " Goodmornlng," said he, salut- ing the actor very civilly, but speaking in a very loud voice, for he knew the actor's infirmity, and pulling out a small bit of paper. "Your name is Allen, I believe? " "Yes, Andrew Jackson Allen, at your service," replied the debtor, supposing the ofllcer was an applicant for a front seat in the dress circle: "What cad I do for you, my friend? " continued he, patronizingly, as he gently tapped the ashes from his segar. " It is by bedeflt, you see — Battle of Lake Erie, Sir, with real water — great expedse; fide play — 'we huve met the edeby, add they are ours,' you kdow; lots of doble ships, flags, guds, and sboke: look at the bill. Sir." " That's just what I want you to do," replied the oflBcer: " here is a bill I want you to examine, and here is a writ requiring that I shall take your body forthwith before a squire." It was useless to attempt to misunderstand this plain ex- planation; for if he could not hear very well, he could see as well as anybody, and it was equally useless to attempt to escape; so after quietly examining the papers, the benefi- ciaire of the evening gave a puff or two at his segar, and SOLOMON FRANKLIN SMITH. 99 then, with a nod of the head, intimated that he understood the whole affair. "Let's see; yes, sevedty-two dollars exactly; cursed ill-datured of by friedd Thobson to trouble yon with this busidess: I idteded to pay it out of by bedeflt-bodey to- borrow; but dever bind, step idto Bister Sibsod's roob with be, and I'll hadd you the aboudt." " Certainly, Sir," answered Hays, and he followed the defendant into the theatre through a private-door. I shall not attempt to describe the route they took, but it is said the officer was led up and down numerous stairways, over divers stagings, and through many dark passages and under- ground vaults, until he was completely bewildered. At length, 1q the midst of darkness, he was requested by his conductor to 'hold on a minute.' ' Here's Bister Sibsod's room,' said he; "wait here till I see if he is atleisure." The officer stopped stock-still, as desired, for he had no idea which way to move, and waited patiently for the return of his prisoner, whose retreating steps told him that Mr. Simpson's room was not so near to where he stood as he supposed. After waiting for about ten minutes, he began to call the name of his prisoner in a loud voice. Suddenly a trapdoor opened iminediately above his head, and looking up, he distinctly saw Allen's face, lit up with a most benev- olent smile. " Well," Inquired the officer, " have you found Simpson?" "Do, by friedd, I havd't yet foudd that worthy gedtlebad, but I do not despair of beidg able to beet with hib sobe tibe this evedidg; be so good as to wait there, by idterestidg friedd, while I take a good look for hib : it is bore thad likely I shall see hib sobewhere betweed here add Philadelphia, for which city I ab about ebbark- idg." "Embarking for Philadelphia!" fiercely exclaimed the officer: " no you don't! you are my prisoner, and must not move." "By dear friedd," replied Allen, who had not heard a word the officer had said, but saw by his movements that he was inclined to leave the place where he had located him, "you'd better dot stir f rob that spot till sobe of thelabp- lighters arrive ; for if you do, idasbuch as there are trap- doors all around you, you'll fall forty feet or so, a.dd that bight hurt you, you kbow." The trap-door was closed with 100 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERKITOEY. a loud noise, and the next that was heard of Father Allen, he was gettins; up an immense nautical piece, called ' The Battle of Lake Champlain,' in Philadelphia. I have never learned how the constable got out of the theatre, but I presume he was turned out. The return on his writ was, " Executed by taking in custody the defend- ant, who escaped by misleading me into the devil's church, and leaving me to get out the best way I could." REPLY TO THE REV. W. G. ELLIOT, OF ST. LOUIS. " It is Slid that the theatre is too 'exciting.' " Now, it appears to me that if the tendency of stage representations be for good, they cannot be 'too exciting;' but it for evil, then the gentleman Is right. When the heart throbs with feelings of patriotism and virtuous indignation against tyranny and oppression ; when the eye of youth fills with tears of sorrow for suffering virtue; when the cheek burns wiih indignation at successful villainy — all the effect of the poet's language and the actor's power — will it be said that these aroused feelings are to be suppressed, because they are ' exciting? ' So far from the amusement of the theatre being ' too exciting ' for the young, it would be better for the moral condition of the world it the excellent sentiments promulgated from the stage could be more universally dis- seminated than they are. That the teachings of the pulpit have their uses, is not denied; but the practical lessons acted before the auditor at the theatre, from the very fact that they are more ' exciting,' are more lasting, and conse- quently more usetal. A play cannot be ' too exciting,' it the moral be good, and the tendency of the sentiment ennobling to human nature. Let the pulpit therefore confine its cen- sures and strictures to immoral stige representations, and cherish those which tend to rsfioe, ttmeliorate, and improve society. CHAELES GAYAEEE. Charles Etienne Arthur Gayarre is pre-emi- nently the historian of the Louisiana Territory. By descent, habitation and inclination, no one could possibly be more of a Louisianan than Mr. Gayarre was. He was born in New Orleans, ■ January 9, 1805, less than two years after the cession of the Territory to the United States. He came from an historical family; he was the grand- son — on the side of his father — of Estavan Gayarre who took possession of the colony of Louisiana for Spain in 1766, and on his mother's side, the grandson of Etienne de Bore, the first mayor of the city of New Orleans. He gradu- ated at the College of New Orleans in 1825, and went to Philadelphia to study law. He was admitted to the bar in 1829, returned to New Orleans, and was elected to the State Senate of Louisiana in 1830. He received the appoint- ment of Deputy Attor.ney-General of the state in 1831, and was Presiding Justice of the City Court of New Orleans in 1832. He was elected United States Senator in 1835, but never took his seat, preferring to go to Europe for medical treatment which the state of his health ren- dered absolutely necessary. Mr. Gayarre spent eight years in Europe (101) 102 LITERATURE OP LOUISIANA TERRITORY. collecting data and making minute researches and investigations for material for a history of Louisiana which he desired to write. In 1844, he returned to New Orleans, and during that year and the year 1846, he served in the State Legislature of Louisiana; from 1846 to 1853 he was Secretary of State. In 1861, he was about ready to depart for Spain for several years' residence to be devoted to collecting material for a history of that country, when the Civil War breaking out, he concluded to change his plans and remain at home to aid the Southern Confederacy, in which he was a firm believer. After the war he served several years as a Reporter of the Supreme Court of Louisiana. In 1825 he published his first work, a pam- phlet in opposition to some of the views con- tained in Mr. Edward Livingston's criminal code, which had been prepared at the instance of the Louisiana State Legislature. Mr. Gayarre particularly opposed the clause recommending the abolition of capital punishment. The pam- phlet had a large circulation and created a great sensation, particularly as the author of it was only twenty years of age. The code was never adopted by the Legislature. In 1830 he pub- lished, "An Historical Essay on Louisiana" in French — he was a master of three languages, French, Spanish and English. The same year he wrote the ' ' Address ' ' for the Legislature compliaientiug the French Chambers on the CHARLES GAYARRB. 103 Revolution of 1830. This address was warmly received in France. His next publication was in French, "A His- tory of Louisiana", in two volumes. A trans- lation of this he published in English in 1847. "The Romance of the History of Louisiana" next succeeded in 1848. In his next work, "The Spanish Domination of Louisiana" (1854) are some remarkable disclosures, made public for the first time, of Spanish intrigues in the West, from 1786to 1792, to disrupt the American Union. General Wilkinson is accused of co-operating in this scheme. In 185.4 he published "The School for Politics", a dramatic novel, which was a humorous satire on the party frauds and polit- ical dishonesty of the day; in 1866 appeared, "Philip II. of Spain"; in 1872, " Fernando de Lemos, Truth and Fiction," and in 1882 its sequel, " Albert Dubayet ". His last work was, "Dr. Bluff", a comedy. He died in New Orleans, February 11, 1895. Mr. Gayarre's true sphere was that of the his- torian. He was thoroughly at home in all that related to Louisiana and the Louisiana Terri- tory. It is a pity that he did not leave us only the best that was in him. As a dramatic writer and as a novelist, he was not felicitous. His histories of the great Louisiana Territory will live — this ground was peculiarly and emphat- ically his own, nobody can dispute his suprem- acy here; his diligent and careful methods, his indefatigable researches, the semi-romantic tint 104 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. that lies over his subject, his enthusiastic hand- ling of his materials, his almost painful ac- curacy — all point to a long life for his work, which, we do not hesitate to say, is not as yet appreciated at its full value by either the critic or the average reader. A new edition of his " History of Louisiana " was issued late in 1903. It contains the best and most authentic biographical and critical sketch of Mr. Gayarre as yet given the reading world. It is from the accomplished pen of Miss Grace King. I regret that the sketch came to my notice too late to enable me to avail myself of selections from its pages. THE TREE OF THE DEAD. {From " The History of Louisiana.") Iq a lot situated at the corner of Orleans and Dauphine streets, in the city of New Orleans, there is a tree which nobody looks at without curiosity and without wondering how it came there. For a long time it was the only one ofr its kind known in the state, and from its isolated position it has always been cursed with sterility. It reminds one of the warm climes of Africa or Asia, and wears the aspect of a stranger of distinction driven from its native country. Indeed with its sharp and thin foliage, sighing mournfully under the blast of one of our November northern winds, it looks as sorrowful as an exile. Its enormous trunk is nothing but an agglomeration of knots and bumps, which each passing year seems to have deposited there as a mark of age, and as a protection against the blows of time and of the world. Inquire for its origin, and every one will tell you that it has stood there from time immemorial, A sort of vague but CHARLES GATARRE. 105 impressive mystery is attached to It, and it Is as supersti- tiously respected as one of the old oaks of Dodona. Bold would be the axe that would strike the first blow at that foreign patriarch; and if it were prostrated to the ground by a profane hand, what native of the city would not mourn over its fall, and brand the act as an unnatural and criminal deed? So, long live the date-tree of Orleans street — that time-honored descendant of Asiatic ancestors! In the beginning of 1727, a French vessel of war landed ■ at New Orleans a man of haughty mien, who wore the Turkish dress, and whose whole attendance was a single servant. He was received by the governor with the highest distinction, and was conducted by him to a small but com- fortable house with a pretty garden, then existing at the corner of Orleans and Dauphine'streets, and which from the circumstance of its being so distant from other dwellings, might have been called a rural retreat, although situated in the limits of the city. There the stranger, who was under- stood to be a prisoner of state, lived in the greatest seclu- sion ; and although neither he nor his attendant could be guilty of indiscretion, because none understood their language, and the Governor Perier severely rebuked the slightest inquiry, yet it seemed to be the settled conviction in Louisiana, that the mysterious stranger was a brother of the Sultan, or some great personage of the Ottoman empire who had fled from the anger of the Yiceregent of Mohammed, and who had taken refuge in France. The Sultan had peremptorily demanded the fugitive, and the French government, thinking it derogatory to its dignity to comply with that request, but at the same time not wishing to expose its friendly relations with the IWoslem monarch, and perhaps desiring for political purposes, to keep in hostage the imported guest it had in its hands, had recourse to the expedient of answering that he had fled to Louisiana, which was so distant a ouatry, that it might suggest, the fugitive might be suffered to wait in peace for actual death, without danger or offencs to the Sultan. Whether this story be true or not is now a manner of so litt'e consequence that it would not repay the trouble of a strict historical investigation. The year 1727 was drawing to its close, when on a dark stormy night the howling and barking of the numerous dogs 106 LITERATUKE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. in the streets ol New Orleans were observed to be fiercer than usual, and some of that class of individuals who pretend to know everything, declared that by the vivid flashes of the lightaiag, they had seen swiftly and stealthily gliding toward the residence of the unknown a body of men who wore the scowling appearance of malefactors and ministers of blood. There afterwards came also a report that a pirati- cal-looking Turkish vessel had been hovering a few days previous in the bay of Barataria. Be it as it may, on the next morning the house of the stranger was deserted. There were no traces of mortal struggle to be seen; but in the gar-, den the earth had been dug, and there was the unmistakable indication of a recent grave. Soon, however, all doubts were removed by the finding of an inscription in Arabic characters, engraved on a marble tablet, which was sabsequently sent to France. It ran thus : "The justice of the heaven is satisfied, and the date-tree shall grow on the traitor's tomb. The Sublime Emperor of the faithful, supporter of the faith, the omnipotent master and Sultan of the world, has redeemed his vow. God is great, and Mohammed is his prophet. Allah! " Some time after this event, a foreign looking tree wa) seen to peep out of the spot where a corpse must have been deposited in that stormy night, when the rage of the elements yielded to the pitiless f ary of man, and it thus explained in some degree this part,of the inscription, " the date-tree shall grow on the traitor's grave." Who was he, or what had he done, who had provoked such relentless and far-seeking revenge? Ask Nemesis, — or at that hour when evil spirits are allowed to roam over the earth and magical invocations are made go and Interrogate the tree of the dead. HUGH A. GARLAND. Hugh Garland's " Life of John Randolph, of Roanoke", in two volumes (New York, 1850), has since its publication gone through several editions and is still to be found on the catalogue of an Eastern publishing house. In the latter part of the forties, and the early part of the fifties, Mr. Garland was a well-known member of the St. Louis Bar, and his " John Randolph " is one of the best — and probably the most ac- curate — of the many " lives " of that great and eccentric American statesman ever published. Hugh A. Garland was born in Nelson County, Virginia, in 1805. After his graduation at Hampden-Sidney College, he became professor of Greek in that learned institution, and a few years later married a Miss Anna P. Burwell. In 1830, he attended the law department of the University of Virginia, and in 1831 he began practicing in Boydtown. From 1833 to 1838 he represented the Mecklenburg district in the Vir- ginia State Legislature. He next was elected Clerk of the House of Representatives, Twenty- sixth Congress. On the second day of Decem- ber, 1839, when the House met for the first time, there were present one hundred and nineteen Democrats and one hundred and eighteen Whigs, besides five Whigs from New Jersey whose seats ^107) 108 LITERATUKE OF LOUISIANA TBREITORY. were contested by their Democratic opponents ; Mr. Garland, although they had certificates of election, did not call the names of the five. in calling the roll, insisting that it was not his place to pass in judgment upon the question of who had been elected from New Jersey. Pandemo- nium reigned in the House until John Quincy Adajms was elected chairman pro tempore on December 5. " In 1840, he retired to the country, in his native state, and devoted much of his time to literary studies. In 1845 — having lost his prop- erty through unwise speculations — he emigrated to St. Louis, and resumed the practice of the law. Besides his life of John Randolph, of Eoanoke, Mr. Garland is the author of two other works of which the authoritative encyclopaedists are totally igQorant. " Opochancanough. The Massacre of Jamestown, Virginia, 1622. A Tragedy iil Five Acts. By Hugh A. Garland, Esq., St. Louis. 1853," and a " Life of Thomas Jeffer- son " (New York) which was in the press at the time of his death in 1854. His " Life " of Jefferson is inferior to his other biography ; one reason for this is that he did not have the use and advantage of private documents and letters as was the case in his " John Randolph ". Mr. Garland was a scholar, but he was not a poet . His " Opochancanough ' ' is a failure. The Indian is poor material for the tragic. Cooper has made him heroic in fiction. HUGH A. GARLAND. 109 but every writer who has made him pace the stage ill tragedy has scored a failure. Besides, Mr. Garland's lines are harsh and stilted ; they jar on the ear, — he is reckless of his metre. Such lines as the following are of frequent occurrence : " Will grace each town in Powhattan's great empire, . The expedition that your wisdom has planned," etc. Mr. Garland's reputation must rest on his "Life of John Randolph of Roanoke". The encyclopaedists killed him off in 1850; neverthe- less, he managed to live until October 14, 1854. JEFFERSON'S INFLUENCE ON RANDOLPH. {From " The Life of John Randolph of Boanoke".) Jefferson conceived a theory of government that embbdied the growing sentiments of the people, aadfulfllled their idea of what a free Republic should be. He stands in relation to the Constitution as Aristotle to the Iliad ; Homer wrote the poem, the philosopher deduced thence the rules of poetry. Ma«on and other sages made the Constitution, the states- man abstracted from it the doctrines of federative, repre- sentative, republican government; and demonstrated that they alone are adapted to a widespread and diversified country, and suited to the genius of a free and enlightened people. Were the cfuestion asked. What has America done for the amelioration of mantJind? The answer would not be found in her discoveries in science or improvements in art, but in her political philosophy, as conceived by JefEer- son, and developed by his disciples. Though he was the acknowledged leader of what may be called the great American movement, he never spoke In public, and never wrote an essay for the newspapers. His great skill lay in infusing his sentiments into the minds of others by conver- 110 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. sation, or Gorrespondence, and making them the instruments of their propagation. Gathering about him the influential men of the new party, he imparted to them more compre- hensive views of their own doctrines, and made them the enthusiastic defenders of those principles, the importance of which they had but dimly perceived. Over no one did he exert a greater influence than the young and ardent sub- ject of this memoir. His connection with the family of Edmund Randolph, and his near relationship to Mr. Jeffer- son himself, brought him frequently within the sphere of that fascinating conversation which was never spared in the propagation of his opinions. But John Randolph, although a youth, was not the character to yield a blind allegiance to any leader. The disciple differed widely ia many doctrines from the master. The grounds of that difference may be found In the writings of another great statesman that begun about that time to take hold of his mind, and deeply impress his character. So great was their influence in after life, that the writings of Edmund Burke became the key to the political opinions of John Randolph. With him Edmund Burke was the great master of political philosophy. RANDOLPH AT ROANOKE. (From " The Life of John Randolph of Moanoke".) In 1810 he removed to Roanoke, his estate in Chailotte county, on the Roanoke river, some thirty-five or forty miles south of Bizarre; "a savage solitude," says he, " into which I have been driven to seek shelter." Shortly before the recent election, on Sunday, March 21, 181.S, the house at Bizarre took fire — the family were at church, and very little saved. " I lost," says he, " a valuable collection of books. In it was a whole body of inidelity, the Encyclopedia of Diderot and D'Alembert, Voltaire's works, seventy volumes, Rous- seau, thirteen quartos, Hume, &c., &c." By this calamity, if calamity it may be called (some of his friends congratulated him on the event), he was de- prived of the chief source of pleasure and amusement in this comfortless home. The only companion of his solitude HUGH A. GARLAND. Ill was Theodore Bland Dudley, a youup; relation he had taken to live with him in 1800. He educated this young man with much care and at great expense. He manifested towards him the solicitude and affection of a fond father — his letters are models of parental instruction, Dudley had recently graduated in medicine at Philadelphia, and returned to con- sole the solitary hours of his best and most constant friend * * • (To Dr. Broclienbrough, the President of the Banis of Virginia, he writes as follows) : "It is indeed a life of seclusion that I live here, unchequered by a single ray of enjoyment. I try to forget myself in books; but that ' pliabilty of man's spirit ' which yields him up to the illusions of the ideal world, is gone from me for ever. The mind stiffened by age and habit refuses to change its career. It spurns the speculative notions which hard experience has exploded; it looks with contempt or pity, in sorrow or in anger, upon the visionary plans of the youthful and san- guine. My dear sir, ' there Is another and a better world,' and to it alone can we look without a certainty of disap- pointment, for consolation, for mercy, for justice." On another occasion he says: "I passed but an indifferent night, occasioned, in a great measure, by the regret I feel at leaving such friends as yourself and Mrs. Brockenb rough, and at the prospect of passing my time in that utter solitude of my comfortless habitation, where I have pre- pared for myself, by my own folly, many causes of uneasi- ness. If I had followed old Polonius's advice, and been ' to mine own self true,' I might have escaped the lot which seems to be in reserve for me." To another friend, Francis S. Key, of Washington City, he writes more cheerfully. His letters to that gentleman about this time were very frequent and copious; they show more fully the workings of his mind. In one of his letters he gives a description of his habita- tion, the log cabins and the boundless primeval forest by which they were surrounded. In reply. Key says, " I could not help smillDg at the painting you have given me of Roanoke — laudat diversa sequentes. To me it seems just such a shelter as^ I should wish to creep under, 'A boundless contiguity of shade. Where rumor of oppression and deceit Might never reach me more ' ." ANNA PEYEE DINNIES. Anaa Peyre Shackleford was born in Charles- ton, South Carolina, in 1807, according to her adopted daughter, now Mrs. Louis Grunewald, of New Orleans, and not in 1811, aS appears in all the printed sketches and accounts of Mrs. Dinnies . She was one of the several daughters of Mr. Justice Shackleford and was educated in Charleston, in a seminary kept by the daughters of Dr. David Kamsay, the author of the still well-considered "Life" of Washington and a history of the American Revolution. In 18.30, Miss Shackleford became the wife of John C. Dinnies, a popular bookseller of St. Louis, and rerBoved with him to that city. According to Mrs. Sara Josepha Hale (who had the misfortune to perpetrate " Mary Had a Little Lamb !") , the marriage of Mr. Dinnies and Miss Shackleford was brought about by a correspondence of some four years, and they never met until a very short time before their marriage {vide "The Ladies' Wreath"). In the Daily People's Organ, of St. .Louis (May 14, 1843), I find that Dinnies and Radford were the publishers of The /St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal, a monthly which is still in existence. In 1847, Mrs. Dinnies published, " The Floral (112) o ANNA PEYKE DINNIES. 113 Year ", a volume of poems. Of this book, Gris- wold ("Poets and Poetry of America ", Phila- delphia, 1848), says, " Her pieces illustrative of the domestic affections are marked by unusual grace and tenderness." This book is now ex- tremely rare. Mrs. Grunewald permitted me, last December, to examine a copy of it which was given to her by Mrs. Dinnies. The follow- ing is its correct title: "The Floral Year, Embellished with Bouquets of Flowers, Drawn and Colored from Nature. Each Flower illus- trated with a Poem. By Mrs. Anna Peyre Din- nies. Boston: Benjamin B. Mussy, Publisher, 1847." The book contains two hundred and fifty-six pages, illustrated by thirteen full-page colored plates. It was what was called in its day a " gift book". Mr. and Mrs. Dinnies (I find in the St. Louis Daily Herald) left St. Louis for New Orleans in 1849. There, in 1853, Mrs. Dinnies lost her only child, a daughter, and a few years later on, adopted a little girl, who is now Mrs. Louis Grunewald of New Orleans. In December, 1903, I obtained the following information from this lady : In New Orleans, John CHfford Dinnies engaged in journalism : he wrote special articles for some of the daily newspapers, and for sev- eral years edited The Price Current. On account of an editorial. General Benjamin F. Butler suspended The Price Current during the Civil War and had Mr. Dinnies imprisoned. Mr. Dinnies died in 1882. * * * Mrs. Dinnies 1-14 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. had light grey eyes and light brown hair ; she was about five feet and two or three inches in height, and was rather slimly built until late in life. She had a distinguished appearance. She died August 4, 1886. As to the controversy over the authorship of ' ' The Conquered Banner ' ' , the popular Southern hymn, after diligent investigation, I find the following facts : Mrs. Dinnies, in the thirties, adopted the nom-de-plume of ' ' Moina ' ' ( see The Illinois Monthly Magazine, Vandalia and Bloomington, Illinois); this name she used ever afterwards. In the sixties, Father Abram J. Eyan also used the pseudonym, not aware (I am perfectly satisfied) of Mrs. Dinnies' prior claim to it. " The Conquered Banner " was published under the signature, "Moina". The corre- spondence that took place between Mrs. Dinnies and Father Eyan was as to the use of the name "Moina" — not as to the authorship of "The Conquered Banner". I can find no evidence that Mrs. Dinnies ever claimed the poem. Father Eyan graciously apologized and never after used the signature, "Moina". The correspondence is in the possession of a lady who resides in Milwaukee. William D . Gallagher, one of the pioneers of Western literature, in 1839, wrote of two of Mrs. Dinnies' poems, "The Wife" and "Wedded Love " : " They gush warm and glowing from the human heart — a deep which calleth unto the deep of another century as well as to that of ANNA PEYRE DINNIE8. 115 its own day — and they are as green and beau- tiful and touching now, as when they first sparkled in the light — ^nay, more so, for that which Cometh of the* True reveals itself fully only in the lapse of time." Both these poems are given below. THE WIFE. I could have stemm'd misfortune's tide, And borne tlie ricli one's sneer, Have braved the haughty glance of pride, Nor shed a single tear. I could have smiled on every blow From life's full quiver thrown, While I might gaze on thee and know I should not be " alone." I could — I think I could have brook'd, E'en for a time, that thou Upon my fading face hadst look'd With less of love than now; For then I should at least have felt The sweet hope still my own To win thee back, and, whilst I dwelt On earth, not been " alone." But thus to see, from day to day. Thy brightening eye and cheek, And watch thy life-sands waste away, Unnumber'd slowly, meek ; To meet thy smiles of tenderness, And catch the feeble tone Of kindness,^ ever breathed to bless, And feel, I'll be " alone." To mark thy strength each hour decay, And yet thy hopes grow stronger, As, filled with heavenward trust, they say "Earth may not claim thee longer; " 116 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Nay ; dearest, 'tis too much — this heart Must break when thou art gone ; It must not be ; we may not part : I could not live " alone." WEDDED LOVE. Come, rouse thee, dearest 1 — 'tis not well To let the spirit brood Thus darkly o'er the cares that swell Life's current to a flood. As brooks and torrents, rivers, all Increase the gulf in which they fall, Such thoughts, by gathering up the rills Of lesser griefs, spread real ills. And, with their gloomy shades, conceal. The land-marks Hope would else reveal. Come, rouse thee, now — I know thy mind, And would its strength awaken ; Proud, gifted, noble, ardent, kind, — Strange thou should be thus shaken ! But rouse afresh each energy. And be what Heaven intended thee ; Throw from thy thoughts this wearying weight. And prove thy spirit firmly great : I would not see thee bend below The angry storms of earthly woe. Full well I know the generous soul Which warms thee into life, Each spring which can its powers control, Familiar to thy wife, — For deem'st thou she had stoop'd to bind Her fate unto a commoa mind? The eagle-like ambition, nursed From childhood in her heart, had first Consumed, with its Promethean flame. The shrine — than sunk her soul to shame. Then rouse thee, dearest, from the dream That fetters now thy powers : ANNA PETKE DINNIE8. 117 Shake off this gloom — Hope sheds a beam To gild each cloud which lowers ; And though at present seems so far The wished- for goal — a guiding star, With peaceful ray, would light thee on. Until its utmost bounds be won : That quenchless ray thou 'It ever prove In fond, undying Wedded Love. SONG. I could not hush that constant theme Of hope and revery; For e\ ery day and nightly dream Whose lights across my dark brain gleam, Is flU'd with thee. I could not bid those visions spring Less frequently; For each wild phantom which they bring, _Moving along on fancy's wing. But pictures thee. I could not stem the vital source Of thought, or be Compell'd to check its whelming force, As ever in its onward course It tells of thee. I could not, dearest, thus control My destiny. Which bids each new sensation roll, Pure from its fountain in my soul, To life and thee. ALBERT PIKE. Albert Pike was born in Boston, December 29th, 1809. When he was four years old, his family removed to Newburyport. Here he attended the public schools until he entered Har- vard College in 1825, at the age of sixteen. Through want of the necessary means to com- plete his education, he was forced to leave Har- vard and accept a position in the Newburyport Academy, of which institution of learning, in a few years, he became the principal. In the spring of 1831, he started for the West. He arrived in St. Louis early in the sum- mer — having made most of the distance on foot — and in August, he there joined an expe- dition to Santa F^, which arrived in that city in November. Here he secured a position in a store. In September, 1832, he joined a com- pany of trappers, visited the head-waters of the Eed and the Brazos rivers, and with four others left the band to head for Arkansas. They ar- rived in Fort Smith in November in almost des- titute circumstances. He taught school during this winter, but failed to establish a permanent school in the settlements near the fort . On the invitation of the proprietor of The Arkansas Advocate of Little Rock, to which paper he had previously contributed several (118) ALBERT PIKE. 119 poems, he became his partner, and the fol- lowing year (1834) became the sole proprietor of the paper. His editorial duties leaving him leisure time on hand, he studied law by himself, and was admitted to the bar in 1836. The Ad- vocate not being a very remunerative property, he sold it, and the same year began practicing law. In 1831, he published his first book, " Hymns to the Gods ' ' , which consisted of poems he had written while teaching school at Newburyport. This book, which contains some of the best poems he has left us, I find republished in its entirety in Blackwood's Edinburg Magazine for June, 1839 — a very remarkable compliment, indeed, to an American "backwoods" poet from so critical and exclusive a magazine as Blackwood's then was. In 1834, he published, at Boston, " Prose Sketches and Poems Written in the Western Country ", which contained an account of his wanderings during the past years, and descrip- tions of the scenery he had passed through. • In 1835, he published an Indian romance, " illustrative of the habits of the Comanche and Navajo Indians, and of Mexican life at an early period of the incursions of the Spaniards ' ' . In 1854, appeared " Nugse " which was ' ' printed for private distribution ' ' . This vol- ume is a republication of the " Hymns to the Gods " with a number of additional poems. As to the ' ' Hymns ' ' , Professor Wilson ( ' ' Chris- 120 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. topher North") says {Blackwood's, June, 1839) : " These fine Hymns entitled their author to take his place in the highest order of his country's poets". In 1859, he added to his books, "The Stat- utes and Regulations, Institutes, Laws, and Grand Constitutions of the Ancient and Ac- cepted Scottish Rite", etc., etc. Other books by him are : " Reports of . Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court of the State of Arkansas in Law and Equity ' ' (Little Rock, 1840-45), in five volumes, and "The Arkansas Form-Book" (Little Rock, 1845). Albert Pike is still remembered as a poet. His best known minor poems — he wrote only minor poems — which one still meets with now and then in the newspapers, are the " Ode to the Mocking Bird ", " The Old Canoe ", " Spring ", " Every Year ", some of the " Hymns to the Gods", and three or four others. From 1866 to 1868, he was the edit r of The Daily Appeal of Memphis, Tennessee. He died in Washing- ton, April 2nd, 1891. I remember, when a boy, just before the breaking out of the Civil War of 1861-65, of seeing on the streets of St. Louis, one summer day, a middle-aged man, in a black alpaca coat and white duck pantaloons, with long hair that almost fell on his shoulders from under a broad- brimmed panama hat. People turned and looked back at him as he went down the street, and ALBERT PIKE. 121 said, " That's Albert Pike, the fine old Arkansaw gentleman! " TO THE MOCKING-BIRD. (From "Nug(B.") Thou glorious mocker of the world! I hear Thy many voices ringing through the glooms Of these green solitudes; and all the clear, Bright joyance of their song enthralls the ear And floods the heart. Over the sphered tombs Of vanish'd nations rolls thy music-tide. No light from history's starlike page illumes The memory of these nations — they have died. None care for them but thou, and thou may'st sing, Perhaps, o'er me — as now thy song doth ring Over their bones by whom thou once wast deified. Glad scorner of all cities ! Thou dost leave The world's mad turmoil and never-ceasing din, Where one from others no existence weaves, Where the old sighs, the young turns gray and grieves, Where misery gnaws the maiden's heart within : And thou dost flee into the broad, green woods, And with thy soul of music thou dost win Their heart to harmony — no jar intrudes Upon thy sounding melody. O, where, Amid the sweet musicians of the air, Is one so dear as thou to these old solitudes? Ha! What a burst was that ! the ^olian strain Goes floating through the tangled passages Of the lone woods — and now it comes again — A multitudinous melody — like a rain Of glassy music under echoing trees, Over a ringing lake; it wraps the soul With a bright harmony of happiness — Even as a gem is wrapt, when round it roll Their waves of brilliant flame — till we become. E'en with the excess of our deep pleasure, dumb, And pant like some swift runner clinging to the goal. 122 LITERATDKE OF LOUISIANA TEBEITOEY. I would, sweet bird, that I might live with thee, Amid the eloquent grandeur of these shades. Alone with nature — but It may not be; I have to struggle with the tumbling sea Of human life, until existence fades Into death's darkness. Thou wilt sing and soar Through the thick woods and shadow-checker'd glades, While naught of sorrow casts a dimness o'er The brilliance of thy heart — but I must wear As now, my daily garments of pain and care — As penitents of old their sackcloth wore. Yet why complain? — What though fond hopes deferr'd Have overshadow'd Youth's great paths with gloom ! Still joy's rich music is not all onheard, — There is a voice sweeter than thine, sweet bird, To welcome me, within my humble home ; — There is an eye, with love's devotion bright. The darkness of existence to illume ! Then why complain? — When death shall cast his blight Over the spirit, then my bones shall rest Beneath these trees — and from thy swelling breast, O'er them thy song shall pour like a rich flood of light. TO DIANA. (From "Hymns to the Gods,") Most graceful Goddess ! — whether now thou art Hunting the dun deer in the silent heart Of some old quiet wood, or on the side Of some high mountain, and, most eager-eyed. Dashing upon the chase, with bended bow An arrow at the string, and with a glow Of wonderous beauty on the cheek and feet Like thine own silver moon — yea, and as fleet As her best beams — and quiver at the back Battling to all thy steppings ; if some track In distant Thessaly thou followest up. Brushing the dews from many a flower- cup And quiet leaf, and listening to the bay Of thy good bounds, while in the deep woods they, ALBERT PIKE. 123 Strong -limb'd and swift, leap on with eager bounds, And with their long, deep note each hill resounds. Making thee music:— Goddess, hear our cry. And let us worship thee, while far and high Goes up thy Brother — while his light is full Upon the earth; for, when the night-winds lull The world to sleep, then to the lightless sky Dian must go, with silver robes of dew. And sunward eye. Perhaps thou liest on some shady spot Among the trees, while frighten'd beasts hear not The deep bay of the hounds ; but, dropping down Upon green grass, and leaves all sere and brown, Thou pillowest thy delicate head upon Some ancient mossy root, were wood-winds run Wildly about thee, and thy fair nymphs point Thy death-wing'd arrows, or thy hair anoint With Lydian odours, and thy strong hounds lie Lazily on the earth and watch thine eye. And watch thine arrows, whilst thou hast a dream. Perchance, in some deep bosom'd, shaded stream Thou bathestnow, where even thy brother Sun Cannot look on thee — where dark shades and dun Fall on the water, making it most cool. Like winds from the broad sea, or like some pool In deep dark cavern : Hanging branches dip Their locks into the stream, or slowly drip With tear-drops of rich dew: Before no eyes But those of flitting wind-gods, each nymph hies Into the deep, cool, running stream, and there Thou pillowest thyself upon its breast, O Queen, most fair! FEANgOIS DOMINIQUE EOUQUETTE. Fran§ois Dominique Rouquette, the elder brother of the Abbe Rouquette, was born in New Orleans, January 2, 1810, and was educated at Orleans College, continuing his classical stud- ies at Nantes, France. He returned to the United States in 1828 and studied law at Philadephia with Counsellor Rawle, afterwards well known at the bar through his book 'on the Constitution of the United States. Alike his brother, he soon abandoned the law for literature ; but unlike him, he returned to Paris to live and adopt a literary life. In Paris, in 1839, he published a volume of poetry, " Les Meschacebeennes ", which received the encomiums of Victor Hugo, Beranger and other eminent litterateurs. Other works of his are: " The Arkansas " (Fort Smith, Arkansas, 1850), a pamphlet, and " Fleurs d'Amdrique: Po&ies Nouvelles " (Nouvelle Orleans, 1857). He contributed extensively to French papers pub- lished in the United States — L'Abeille de la N'ouvelle Orleans, Le Propagateur ■ Gatholique, and others. When Francois and Adrien Rouquette ' ' write about prairies, and the forests and the In- dians * » * it seems to us that we see the beautiful Chactas girl in her canoe, * * * (124) FRAN9OIS DOMINIQUE ROUQUETTE. 125 that we hear the cry of the whippoorwill, and that we are permeated with the perfume of the meleze, of the boisfort and of the resinous pine tree " (" Louisiana Studies ", page 52). Early in the seventies he was said to have in MS. a worlc on the Choctaws, which was to be published both in French and English. Beyond this time I can find no further record of Frangois Rouquette, except that he died in Paris in May, 1890. Some of the French critics consider him the best of the Franco- American poets. LE SOIB. {From " Fleurs d'Amerique.") D^ja dans les buissons dort la grive b^tarde : La voix da bucheron, qui dans les bois s'attarde, A travers les grands pins se fait entendre au loin; Aux boeufs libres du joug ayant donn^ le foin, Slfflant une chanson, le charretier regagne Sa cabane ou I'attend une noire compagne, Et fume tacitnrne, accroupi sur un banc, Sa pipe, aux longs reflets du m^lfize flambant. Loin de I'humide abri des joncs qu'elle abandonne, La moustiqne partout et voltige et bourdonne, Et nocturne taureau cacM dans le limon, La grenouille bovine enfle un rauque poumon * Un silence imposant et formidable plane Sur les eaux, la f orfit et la noire savane ; La nui't, comme I'upas, sous une ombre de mort, Semble couvrir au loin la terre qui s'endort. 126 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. A MME. ADELE Q * * * (From " Fleurs d'Amerique."') Dites, avez-vous vu, comme souvent je vols, Sur les pieuz vermoulus, au rebord des vieux toils Une plante fl^trie et rddnite en poassi^re? Dites, avez-vous vu la sauvage fougfire, Dess^cli^e aux rayons de nos soleils d'^t^, Sur un Iiangard croulant, tombant de v^tust^? — La p'ante qu'a regret guelque pieu tremblaut porte, Fan^e, 6toil6e, §, nos yeux sembie morte ; Balanc^e au rebord du vieux Iiangard mouvant, Ce n'est qu'un peu de poudre abandonn^e au vent; Mais qu'une fralche ond^e inattendue arrive, Laissant couler sur elle une gouette d'eau vive; La plante, b^nissant le torrent bienf aiteur, Recouvre sa verdure et toute sa f ralcheur ; Ainsi, dans notre coeur qu'un tourbillonemporte, Dans nos coeurs oublieux, I'amiti^ sembie morte, Mais le doux souvenir, la ranimant parfois, Lui donne la beauts, la fratcheur d'autrefois. ADRIEN EMMANUEL ROUQUETTE. On a warm day in February, 1874, 1 was stand- ing on Rue Royal, New Orleans, industriously engaged in idling away time and youth, when I was startled by a voice that came from an open doorway just behind me. " C'est I'Abb^ Rou- quette — un vrai saint ! ' ' and the commfere crossed herself. I looked across the narrow street: a man old in years but yet strong and active, of about medium height, a little stooped, long black hair streaked with gray, and clad in the simple black clothes of a Catholic priest, was leisurely passing down the street. " L'Abbd Rouquette" — ' ' a real saint ! " — the words have often recurred to my memory since then. A few years later, I was delighted to learn that I'Abbe Rouquette had written several books and was — a poet ! In December, 1903, while again in New Orleans, I gathered all the information I could possibly obtain about Father Rouquette, whose large, solemn eyes and serious face I can still see after the lapse of nearly thirty years. Adrien Emmanuel Rouquette, or as I have heard him generally called by the French and Creole people of New Orleans, I'Abb^ Rouquette, was a Catholic priest of French and American parent- age. Born in New Orleans in 1813, he descended from an old and wealthy family and began life (127) 128 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. with all the advantages of education and social position. His boyhood days were passed largely among the Indians on Bayou Lacombe. He was educated in Transylvania University, Kentucky, the College Royal of Paris, and at Nantes and Rennes, finally receiving his baccalaureate degree at Rennes, March 26, 1833. He came home to New Orleans the same year, but had been home again but a short time, when his family growing alarmed at his love for the open-air and unconventional existence he began to lead with his Indian friends and acquaint- ances, persuaded him to return to Paris and study law. The dry details of Montesquieu and other legal authorities proved uncongenial to him, and he soon abandoned the law. Return- ing home, he turned his attention to the study of literature, especially poetical literature. In 1841, he published his first book, " Les Savanes, Poesies Americaines " (Paris, 1841), which is a book of nature poems that remind us at the same time of Chateaubriand and Wil- liam Cullen Bryant. In 1842, he began his studies for the priesthood at Bayou Lacombe, and in 1844 he passed his examination at the Catholic seminary at Assumption Parish, and the following year was ordained. Until 1859, he was attached to the Cath^drale at New Orleans. During this period (1842-1859) he published: ' ' Discours prononce a la Cath^drale de Saint Louis a rOccasion de I'Anniversaire du 8 Jan- vier, 1846" (Nouvelle Orleans, 1846), a pam- ADRIEN EMMANUEL ROUQUETTE. 129 phlet of forty pages; "Wild Flowers: Sacred Poetry " (New Orleans, 1848) ; " La TWbiade en Amerique, ou Apologie de la Vie Solitaire et Contemplative" (Nouvelle Orleans, 1852); in this apology for a solitary and contemplative life, is a prose defense of the religious retreats from the world of the Catholic Church. Four more works issued from his pen: " L'Antoniade, ou la Solitude avecDieu; Po^mes eremetique " (Nou- velle Orleans, 1860); " Po^mes Patriotiques " (Nouvelle Orleans, 1860); "St. Catherine Te- gehkwitha " (the Indian Saint of Canada), and " La Nouvelle Atala " (Nouvelle Orlc^ans, 1879). Father Eouquette was a wonderful linguist; he was thoroughly acquainted with the' French, Italian, Spanish, Latin, Greek, English and Choctaw languages. His books were written, some in French and some in English, but his French poems are far superior to his English poems. In 1859, he realized the dream of his life by establishing a mission in the village of the Choc- taw Indians at the head springs of Bayou La- combe. From then on, the remainder of his life, up to 1886, the year before his death, was spent among his Indian proteges of Bayou La- combe, and in several missions in St. Tammany Parish which he had established. He was virtu- ally the temporal, as well as the spiritual, head of these remnants of the Choctaw tribes. At New Orleans, I saw a copy of a pamphlet by I'Abbe Rouquette which is known to but very 130 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. few people. Mr. Cable's stories so stirred up to arms the New Orleans Creoles, that even the solemn, sedate Abbe Eouquette could not resist the temptation of putting forth a pamphlet in rejoinder — even if it was done anonymously. The f ollowiiig is the title of this brochure which , 1 regret to say, is entirely unworthy of its author : ' ' Critical Dialogue between Aboo and Caboo on A New Book or a Grandissime Ascension. Edited by E. jJunius. Mingo City Great Publish- ing House of Sam Slick Allspice. 12 Veracity Street 12.1880." Father Rouquette died at New Orleans," July 15, 1887, honored, respected, and beloved. SOUVENIR DE KENTUCKY. [From " Les Savanes.") Le Seigneur dit k Os6e: " Aprfes cela, n^aomoins, je I'at- tirerai doucement A, moi, je I'am&nerai dans la solitude, et je lui parleral au coeur." — {La Bible Osie.) Enfant, je dis un seir : Adieu, ma bonne m^re I Et je quittai galment sa maison et sa terre. Enfant, dans mon exil, una lettre, un matin, (O Louise!) m'apprit que j'^tais orphelin! Bnfant, je vis les bois du Kentucky sauvage, Et I'homme se souvient des bois de son jeune &ge! Ah ! dans le Kentucky les arbres sont blen beaux : C'est la terre de sang, aux indiens tombeaux, Terre aux belles forSts, aux s^culaires chgnes; Aux bois suivis de bois, aux magnifiques scenes; Imposant cimeti&re, ou dorment en repos Tant de rouges-tribus et tant de blanches -peaux; 04 I'ombre du vieux Boon, immobile g^nie, Semble 6couter, la nuit, I'^ternelle harmocie, ADRIEN EMMANUEL ROUQUETTE. 131 Le murmure 6ternel des Immenses deserts, Ces mlUe bruits confus, ces mille bruits divers, Cet orgue des for§ts, cet orcbestre sublime, O Dleu! que seul tu flSj que seul ton sou£Se auime! Quand au vastevClavier p^se un seul de tes doigts, Soadain, roulent dans I'air mille flats d. la fois: Soudaiu, au fond des bois, sonores basiliques, Bourdonne un oc^an de sauvages musiques; Et I'homme, &, tous ces sons de Torgae universal, L'homme tombe k genoux, en regardent le ciel! II tombe, il croit, il prie; et, Chretien sans 6tude, II retrouve, 6tonn6, Dieu dans la solitude! THE NOOK. {From " Wild Flowers.") Tbenook! O lovely spot of land, Where I have built my cell ; Where, with my Muse, my only friend. In peacefulness I dwell. The nook I O verdant seat of bliss, My shelter from the blast Midst deserts, smiling oasis, Where I may rest at last. The nook ! O home of birds and flowers. Where I may sing and pray ; Where I may dream, in shady bowers, So happy night and day. The nook! O sacred, deep retreat. Where crowds may ne'er intrude ; Where men with God and angels meet In peaceful solitude; O paradise, where I have flown ; O woody, lovely spot, Where I may live and die alone. Forgetful and forgot! 132 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. TO NATURE, MY MOTHER. Dear Nature is the kindest mother still. — Byron. O nature, powerful, smiling, calm. To my unqaiet heart, Thy peace, distilling as a balm, Thy mighty life impart. nature, mother still the same. So lovely, mild with me. To live in peace, unsung by fame — Unchanged, I come to thee; 1 come to live as saints have lived, I fly where they have fled, By men unholy never grieved, In prayer my tears to shed. Alone with thee from cities far, Dissolved each earthly tie, By some divine, magnetic star, Attracted still on high. Oh ! that my heart, inhaling love And life with ectasy. From this low^orld to worlds above, Could rise exultantly! NATHANIEL HOLMES. Nathaniel Holmes was born in Peterboro, New Hampshire, in 1814. In 1825, he began the study of Latin at Chester Academy, and a few years later, he returned to Peterboro, where he attended school. He next was sent by his parents to the Academy at New Ipswich, New Hampshire, from which he graduated in 1830. We next find him at Philips Exeter, from 1830 to 1833, and then at Harvard College. In 1837 he graduated at Harvard, and the same year went south and was employed as a private tutor in Maryland. He then returned to Cambridge and spent a year in the Harvard Law School . He was admitted to the bar in Boston, in 1839. Removing to St. Louis, he opened a law office in that city in 1841, continuing in practice until 1865. In June of that year, he was appointed one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri. He held this position until 1868, when he resigned to accept a professor- ship in the Harvard Law School. In 1871, he returned to St. Louis, where he resumed the practice of law. Early in the eighties, he re- moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, wherq he lived quietly, spending the time mostly in reading and study. Later on, he- removed to Boston, where he died on February 27th, 1901. His (133) 134 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. remains have since been interred at Peterboro, New Hampshire, the place of his birth. Judge Holmes was one of the founders of the St." Louis Academy of Science in 1856 (an insti- tution which is still flourishing — an honor and a credit to St. Louis), and during a number of years — from 1870 until the day of his death — was a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He published three works : " The Authorship of Shakespeare's Plays", in two volumes (New York, 1866), in which, following in the footsteps of Delia Bacon, he undertook to prove that Lord Bacon wrote the plays that are credited to Shat:espeare. The theory was not a new one, but Judge Holmes' arguments are far more logical and plausible than those ad- vanced by any other supporter of Lord Bacon's claim, even to this day. While Ignatius Don- nelly, Doctor Orville W. Owen and others ran- sacked the Shakespeare folios for hidden ciphers, internal evidences, etc.. Judge Holmes (true to his legal training) argues the question and seeks to produce only such evidence as is in favor of his client. ' ' The Authorship of Shakespeare ' ' is by far the most intellectual work in the Shakes- peare-Bacon controversial literature. Its appear- ance created quite a literary sensation in the East and in England. .He next published, "Realistic Idealism in Philosophy Itself", in two voluaies (Boston, 1888). I have heard him insist that this is his best work. His last contribution to literature NATHANIEL HOLMES. 135 was a large volume on " The Philosophy of the Universe ' ' . A tall, silent, gloomy man, he was a brave young lawyer, indeed , who could stand up before him in court and argue his case without trepida- tion and fear ! OUR EARLY COMMON SCHOOL SYSTEM. (Prom The Teacher. 1833.) When our ancestors, more than two centuries ago, took possession of a new continent and laid the foundations of a new empire in America, one of their first cares was to pro- vide for a system of public education. Local with the first settlement of New England, a public school was established at Newton by public and private means, with a zeal that did not stop with money, but contributed silver tea-spoons from the family cupboard. Under the protection of laws and charters, it grew into Harvard College; and, by the Con- stitution of the State of Massachusetts, its legal existence has been confirmed and perpetuated as a public University. Local with the settlement of Jamestown, ten thousand acres of land were set apart by public authority in Virginia, and moneys contributed by private Individuals were invested by the Treasurer of the Colony, for the purpose of founding a school for the education of Indians as well as Colonists. And as early as 1691, the people of Virginia sent a commis- sioner to England to procure a charter and money from the Crown in aid of funds appropriated by the Assembly and contributed by individuals, for the purpose of establishing a school in Virginia, which afterwards became William and Mary College. This care for education was an impulse of thfi people rather than the policy of the English Government. Attorney- General Seymour opposed the wishes of the Com- missioner Blair. " But," says he, '■ have we not souls to be saved?" The reply of this early enemy of education in America was: " Damn your souls ! make tobacco." In 1649, a system of common schools was established by 136 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. law in all the existing colonies of New England. They were supported by taxation. A free school instituted in Western Massachusetts, in 1755, soon grew into Williams College. As early as 1694, the legislative authority in Maryland provided for a system of common schools to be organized in every county in the Colony, and " one especially at Annap- olis ". In 1720-3, this system of schools was carried more fully into effect by duties on imports and exports. These schools were continued on the colonial footing by the State Constitution, after the Revolution; and, in 1784, two Colleges, " Washington " and " St. John's ", constituting together the University of Maryland, were founded by act of Assembly and an annual appropriation made of ten thou- sand dollars for their support. In Pennsylvania, an academy and free school were pro- jected by Franklin in 1746, which was fostered by public authority and became, at length, the University of Pennsyl- vania. Immediately after the Revolution, two Colleges were established in this State by Legislative authority. In 1748, " King's", now " Columbia" College, was founded by the Legislature in New York by means of a lottery. Before the Revolution schools bad become more numerous in this State : and, in 1787, the Regents of the University of New York were by law entrusted with the "visitation and pversight " of all the Schools and Colleges in the State. In 1746, a school was established in New Jersey, which was chartered as Princeton College in 1748,- and Rutger's College was founded in 1770. In the more Southern Colonies, sparseness of population and other adverse circumstances, in these early times, ren- dered the establishment of the common school system, in those Colonies, more or less impracticable. And it was for reasons of this nature, rather than from any lack of zeal on the part of the people, in the cause of public education, that an effort made by Thomas Jefferson in 1779-1783, to organize a general systm of com mon schools in Virginia, proved un- successful. By his exertions, however, in 1783, professor- ships of Anatomy, Medicine, Chemistry, Law and Modern Languages, were instituted in " William and Mary College " ; and the University of Virginia, founded by his patriotic efforts in behalf of knowledge and learning, was his especial care in the decline of life. Hampden Sydney Academy NATHANIEL HOLMES. 137 founded in Virginia in 1774, was by public cliarter raised into a College in 1783; and early steps were taken by the Legislature to provide for public education in the future State of Kentucky, by the establishment of Transylvania Seminary in that new Territory. We have not space for more detail. Nor dees the student of American history need to be reminded of these facts, nor of the uniform spirit of colonial legislation, which they most clearly manifest in favor of common schools and public education. The principle of providing for general educa- tion by authority of law was universally recognized and acted upon. "More than a century ago," says Bancroft, "the charter governments were celebrated for promoting letters by erecting free schools and Colleges." THOMAS B. THOKPE. Tom Owen, the Bee-Hunter was a famous character in the ante-bellum fiction of the coun- try. His creator, Thomas Bangs Thorpe, was born in Westfield, Massachusetts, on March 1st, 1815. His father was the Keverend Thomas Thorpe, a man of literary tastes and ability. The son attended the Wesleyan University at Middletown, Connecticut, during three j'ears, but on account of delicate health, in 1836 moved to New Orleans where he resided until 1853. He was an artist in his early career, but a change in inclination led him to abandon painting for literature. His first book, "The Mysteries of the Back- woods", was published in Philadelphia in 1846. In New Orleans, and at Baton Kouge, he edited in succession several Whig papers. ' He was a warm admirer and political supporter of Henry Clay. The Mexican War breaking out, he en- listed in the volunteer army, and served through- out the war. He sent a regular correspondence from the field to a New Orleans newspaper, the letters being largely recopied by the press throughout the [Jnited States. Two books from his pen sprung from the Mexican campaign: " Our Army on the Eio Grande " (New York, 1846), and " Our Army at Monterey" (Phila- - (138) THOMAS B. THORPE. 139 delphia, 1847) ; both works are rich with histori- cal material. Mr. Thorpe removed to New York in 1853, and from that city, in 1854, he published " The Hive of the Bee-Hunter " , a collection of sketches and stories of Southwestern backwoods scenery, customs, manners, characters, rural sports, etc. The same year, there also appeared, " Lynde Weiss, an Autobiography" (Philadelphia). In 1855, he issued a very serious work, "A Voice to America ; the Model Eepublic : its Glory or its Fall" (New York). In 1857 he was co-propri- etor of the Spirit of the Times, the then well- known New York weekly devoted to sports, amusements, etc. To this paper he was a fre- quent contributor for many years, as also to Harper's Magazine. His last published book was " Scenes in Arkansas ", published some time in the sixties. " No one enters more heartily into all the whims and grotesque humors of the backwoodsman, or brings him more actually and clearly before us", says Griswold, in his " Prose Writers of America ' ' . During the Civil War, Mr. Thorpe served as a staff officer in the Union Army, and was Surveyor of the Port of New Orleans in 1862-63. In 1869 he was appointed chief clerk in the Ware- house Department of the New York Custom House, which position he held until his death, which took place on September 21st, 1878. 140 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKKITORT. TOM OWEN, THE BEE-HUNTEK. (From " Tom Owen, the Bee-Hunter.") As a country becomes cleared up and settled, bee-hunters disappear, consequently they are seldom or never noticed beyond the immediate vicinity of their homes. Among this backwoods fraternity, have flourished men of genius in their way, who have died unwept and unnoticed, while the heroes of the turf, and of the chase, have been lauded to the skies for every trivial superiority they may have displayed in their respective pursuits. To chronicle the exploits of sportsmen is commendable — the custom being as old nearly as the days of the antedilu - vians, for we read, that " Nimrod was a mighty hunter be- fore the Lord ". Familiar, however, asNlmrod's name may be — or even Davy Crockett's — how unsatisfactory their records, when we reflect that Tom Owbn, the bee-hunter, is comparatively unknown! Tes, the mighty Tom Owen has " hunted ", from the time that he could stand alone until the present time, and not a pen has inked paper to record his exploits. " Solitary and alone " has he traced his game through the mazy labyrinth of air; marked, I hunted; — I found; — I conquered; — upon the carcasses of his victims, and then marched home- ward with his spoils ; quietly and satisfied, sweetening his path through life; and by its very obscurity, adding the principal element of the sublime. It was on a beautiful southern October morning, at the hospitable mansion of a friend, where I was staying to drown dull care, that I first had the pleasure of seeing Tom Owen. He was, on this occasion, straggling up the rising ground that led to the hospitable mansion of mine host, and the difference between him and ordinary men was visible at a glance ; perhaps it showed Itself as much in the perfect con- tempt of fashion that he displayed in the adornment of his outward man, as it did in the more elevated qualities of his mind, which were visible in his face. His head was adorned with an outlandish pattern of a hat — his nether limbs were encased by a pair of inexpressibles, beautifully fringed by THOMAS B. THORPE. 141 the briar -bushes through which they were often drawn; coats and vests, he considered as superfluities ; hanging upon his neck were a couple ol palls, and an axe in his right hand, formed the varieties that represented the corpus of Tom Owen. As is usual with great men, he had his followers, who, with a courtier-like humility, depended upon the expression of his face for all their hopes of success. The usual salutations of meeting were sufficient to draw me within the circle of his influence, and I at once became one of his most ready followers. " See yonder! " said Tom, stretching his long arm into infinite space, " see yonder — there's a bee." We all looked in the direction he pointed, but that was the extent of our observations. " It was a fine bee," continued Tom, " black body, yellow legs, and went into that tree," — pointing to a towering oak blue In the distance. " In a clear day I can see a bee over a mile, easy! " When did Coleridge "talk" like that I And yet Tom Owen uttered such a saying with perfect ease. After a variety of raeanderlngs through the thick woods, and clambering over fences, we came to our place of des- tination, as pointed out by Tom, who selected a mighty tree containing sweets, the possession of which the poets have likened to other sweets that leave a sting behind. The felling of a mighty tree is a sight that calls up a variety of emotions ; and Tom's game was lodged in one of the finest trees in the forest. But " the axe was laid at the root of the tree", which in Tom's mind was made expressly for bees to build their nests in, that he might cut them down, and obtain possession of their honeyed treasure. The sharp axe, as it played in the hands of Tom, was replied to by a stout negro from the opposite side of the tree, and their united strokes fast gained upon the heart of their lordly victim. There was little poetry in the thought, that long before this mighty empire of States was formed, Tom Owen's "bee-hive " had stretched its brawny arms to the winter's blast, and grown green in the summer's sun. Yet "such was the case, and how long I might have moral- ized I know not, had not the enraged buzzing about my ears 142 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. satisfied me that the occupants of the tree were not going to give up their home and treasure, without showing consid- erable practical fight. No sooner had the little insects sat- isfied themselves that they were about to be invaded, than they began, one after another, to descend from their airy abode, and fiercely pitched into our faces; anon a small company, headed by an old veteran, would charge .with its entire force upon all parts of our body at once. It need not be said that the better part of valor was dis- played by a precipitate retreat from such attacks. In the midst of this warfare, the tree began to tremble with the fast repeated strokes of the axe, and then might have been seen a "bee-line" of stingers precipitating themselves from above, on the unfortunate hunter beneath. Now it was that Tom shown forth in his glory, for his partisans — like many hangers-on about great men, began to desert him on the first symptoms of danger; and when the trouble thickened, they, one and all, took to their heels, and left only our hero and Sambo to fight the adversaries. Sambo, however, soon dropped his axe, and fell into all kinds of contortions; first he would seize the back of his neck with his hands, then bis legs, and yell with pain. " Never holler till you get out of the woods ", said the sub- lime Tom, consolingly ; but writhe the negro did, until he broke, and left Tom " alone in his glory ". Cut, — thwack 1 sounded through the confused hum at the foot of the tree, marvellously reminding me of the inter- ruptions that occasionally broke in upon the otherwise monotonous hours of my school-boy days. A sharp crack finally told me the chopping was done, and looking aloft, I saw the mighty tree balancing in the air. Slowly, and majestically, it bowed for the first time towards its mother earth, — gaining velocity as it descended, it shivered the trees that interrupted its downward course, and falling with thundering sounds, splintered its mighty limbs, and buried them deeply in the ground. The sun for the first time in at least two centuries, broke uninterruptedly through the chasm made in the forest and showed with splendor upon the magnificent Tom, standing a conqueror among his spoils. As might be expected, the bees were very much aston- ished and confused, and by their united voices proclaimed THOMAS B. THORPE. 143 death, had it been in their power, to all their foes, not, of course, excepting Tom Owen himself. But the wary hunter was up to the tricks of his trade, and, like a politician, he knew how easily an enraged mob could be quelled with smoke; and smoke he tried, until his enemies were com- pletely destroyed. We, Tom's hangers-on, now approached his treasure. It was a rich one, and, as he observed, "contained a rich chance of plunder". Nine feet, by measurement, of the hollow of the tree, were full, and this aSorded many pails of honey. Tom was liberal, and supplied us all with more than we wanted, and " toted ", by the assistance of Sambo, his share to his own home, soon to be devoured, and soon to be re- placed by the destruction of another tree, and another nation of bees. Thus Tom exhibited, within himself, an unconquerable genius which would have immortalized him, had he directed it in following the sports of Long Island or New Market. We have seen the great men of the southern turf glorying around the victories of their favorite sport — we have heard the great western hunter detail the soul-stirring adventures of a bear-hunt — we have listened with almost sufEocatlng interest, to the tale of a Nantucket seaman, while he por- trayed the death of a mighty whale — and we have also seen Tom Owen triumphantly engaged in a bee hunt — we beheld and wondered at the sports of the turf — the field — and the sea — because the objects acted on by man were terrible, indeed, when their instincts were aroused. But, in the bee-hunt of Tom Owen, and its consumma- tion, — the grandeur visible was imparted by the mighty miud of Tom Owen himself. ■EDMUND FLAGG. Edmund Flagg was born in Wincasset, Maine, November 24, 1815. He graduated from Bow- doin College in 1835, and, the same year, went to Louisville, Kentucky, where he taught the classics and wrote for The Louisville Journal, which was under the editorial control of George D. Pren- tice. In 1836, he removed to St. Louis,, and studied law under Hamilton E. Gamble, after- wards one of the judges of the Supreme Court of Missouri, and finally, governor of the state. In 1838, while editing the St. Louis Daily Uommercial Bulletin, Mr. Flagg published " The Far West", in two volumes (New York), which is a journal of his wanderings over the prairies of Illinois and Missouri. The same year, he re- turned to Louisville and became connected with Prentice's Louisville Literary News-Letter. In 1840, he formed a law partnership with the bril- liant advocate, Sargent S. Prentiss, and removed to Vicksburg, Mississippi. His legal career there was of short duration, for, in 1842, he was edit- ing The Gazette at Marietta, Ohio. The same year, he published, in New York, two novels, ' ' Carrero ; or , The Prime Minister " , and " Fran- cois of Valois ". In 1844-45, he returned to St. Louis where he assumed the editorial charge of The Evening Gazette, and shortly after, held (144) . EDMUND FLAGG. 145 during many years, the position of reporter pf the courts of St. Louis County. About this time , the plays, " Blanche of Valois " and " The How- ard Queen ", both from his pen, were played successfully in the theaters of New York, Cin- cinnati, St. Louis, Louisville and New Orleans. Mr. Flagg wrote a long paper on " The Spirit of the Age ", which he delivered as a public lec- ture in 1844 and 1845 in several Western cities to large audiences. This lecture was very favor- ably reviewed by many papers. I can find no evidence of its ever having been published. In 1848, Mr. Flagg was secretary to the Amer- ican Minister to Berlin, and in 1850, he was again practicing law in St. Louis. The same year. President Tyler appointed him American Consul at Venice. In 1852, he published a history of that city in two volumes, under the .title of, "Venice, the City of the Sea" (New York); the period he covers is from 1797 to 1849. In 1853, he was under Secretary Marcy in the Bureau of the Department of State at Washington, and in 1856-57, as Chief of Statistics, he published his famous "Report on the Commercial Relations of the United States with all Foreign Nations ' ' (Washington). M, Rouher, the famous French Minister of Commerce, has pronounced these two large volumes as unsurpassed by any similar work evefprinted, an opinion which has been indorsed by several European commercial authorities. In the latter part of the sixties, he published, " North Italy since 1849 ", which continues his "Venice ". 10 146 LITEKATDEE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. "De Molai,the Last of the Military Templars ", a novel, his last work, was issued in 1888. In the St. Louis Daily People's Organ, No- vember 5, 1844, the opening chapters of an his- torical novelette, "The Duchess of Ferrara", by Mr. Flagg, appears. The story was continued daily and concluded in the issue of November 15th. This story has never been published in bookform. CUB EARLY COMMERCIAL RELATIONS. The following extract is from the first volume of Mr. Flagg's " Report on the Commercial Re- lations of the United States " (1857) : At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, the col- onies enioyed the privilege of trading with England, the British West Indies, and that part of Europe south of Cape Finibterre; and though oppressed by unjust exactions, and burdened with illiberal restrictions, they not only contributed to the wealth and material prosperity of the mother country, but " gave every promise of thriving, and achieving a name of their own ". During the Revolutionary War, all commercial operations were suspended, and the peace of 1783 found the trade of the new thirteen independent sovereignties in a most feeble and languishing condition. Their Independence made them a foreign country to North American and West India colonies ; and, by a rigorous system of colonial non-intercourse, they were cut off from all trade with those who were their natural commercial neighbors, and, prior to the revolution, their most profitable customers. The exhausted condition to which the several States were now reduced rendered the first few years after the close of the war a period of the most intense solicitude. The confed- erated states were fully sensible of the absolute necessity of EDMUND FLAGG. 147 opening a foreiga trade, and especially of recovering their lost intercourse with the British West Indies ; but every prop- osition to that end, urged through their accredited ministers was met by a decided refusal. As early as 1783, Mr. Pitt, then chancellor of the excheq- uer, proposed a bill in the British Parliament based upon the liberal principle of " admitting to all the parts of the British dominion American vessels loaded with goods, the growth or produce of these (the United States'), on the same terms as British vessels and goods"; but the proposition at once startled the fears of the British merchants, who, with the aid of Lord North, Mr. Fox, and Lord Sheffield, suc- ceeded in transferring the whole subject to the discretion of the King and his council. The consequeoce was, that an order was immediately issued, not only excluding American vessels from all participation in the colonial trade, but pro- hibiting the exportation from the United States of provisions and flsh, even in British bottoms. Two years after Mr. Pitt's unsuccessful motion for recip- rocal trade between the dominions of Great Britain and the United States, John Adams, American minister at the court of St. James, was instructed to renew the proposition ; but it met with no more favorable reception than it did in 1783, Lord Liverpool declaring " that it could not be admitted even as a subject of negotiation ". ■ In 1789, another effort was made by the United States to negotiate with Great Britain a commercial treaty, particu- larly with reference to the colonial trade, based upon prin- ciples of a more liberal reciprocity. Mr. Morris, then in London, was especially instructed to effect, if possible, a negotiation admitting American pro- ductions, in American bottoms, into British North American possessions, and bringing, in return, the productions of those colonies to our own ports and markets. The result of these renewed efforts was communicated to the government of the United States by Mr. Morris in his dispatch of September 18, 1790, and was, in effect, that no arrangement by tre5,ty could be made. From this period to the year 1822, the ports of the British American colonies were virtually closed against the com- merce of the United States, some slight relaxations having been granted, abating, however, to no perceptible extent. 148 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. the stringency of the measures adopted by the British Par- liament, with a view to confine, within the very narrowest limits, the commercial enterprise of a country in which, even at that early period, she descried a future rival for maritime supremacy. THE ANCIENT MOUNDS OF THE WEST. {From The Louisville Literary News-Letter.") Ages since — long ere the first son of the Old World had pressed the fresh soil of the New — long before the bright region beyond the blue waves had become the object of t.he philosopher's reverie by day, and the enthusiast's vision by night — in the deep stillness and solitude of an unpeopled land, these vast mausoleums rose as they now rise, in lonely grandeur from the plain ; and lool^ed down even as now they look, upon the giant floods rolling their dark waters at their base, hurrying past them to the "deep. So has it been with the massive tombs of Egypt, amid the sands and barrenness of the desert. For ages untold have the gloomy pyramids been reflected by the inundations of the Nile; an hundred generations, they tell us, have arisen from the cradle, and reposed beneath their shadows, and like autumn leaves have dropped into the grave ; but, from the midnight of by- gone centuries, comes forth no daring spirit to claim these kingly sepulchres as his ownl And shall the dusky piles, on the plains of distant Egypt affect so deeply our reverence for the departed, and these mighty monuments, reposing in daik sublimity upon our own magnificent prairies, vailed in mystery more inscrutable than they, call forth no solitary throb? Is there no hallowing interest associated with these aged relics — these tombs, and temples, and towers, of an- other race, to elicit emotion? Are they indeed to us no more than the dull clods we tread upon? Why then does the wanderer from the far land gaze upon them with wonder and veneration? Why linger fondly around them, and meditate upon the power which reared them, and is departed? Why does the poet, the man of genius and fancy, or the philoso- pher of mind and nature, seat himself at their base, and with strange and undeflaed emotions, pause and ponder, EDMUND FLAGG. 149 amid the loneliness that slumbers around ? And surely, if the far traveller, as he wanders through this Western Valley, may linger around these aged piles, and meditate upon a power departed— a race obliterated — an influence swept from the earth forever — and dwell with melancholy emo- tions upon the destiny of man, is it not meet, that those into whose keeping they seem by Providence consigned, should regard them with interest and emotion? — that they should gather up and preserve every incident relevant to their origin, design, or history, which may be attained, and avail themselves of every measure, which may give to them per- petuity, and hand them down, undisturbed in form or char- acter, to other generations? That these venerable piles are of the workmanship of man's hand, no one, who with unprejudiced opinion has examined them, can doubt. But with such an admission, what is the cloud of reflections, which throng and startle the mind? What a series of unanswerable inquiries suc- ceed! When were these enormous earth-heaps reared up from the plain? By what race of beings was the vast un- dertaking accomplished? What was their purpose? — what changes in their form and magnitude have taken place? — what vicissitudes and revolutions have, in-the lapse of cen- turies, rolled like successive waves over the plains at their base? As we reflect, we anxiously look around us for some tradition — sometime-stained chronicle — some age-worn record — even the faintest and most unsatisfactory legend, upon which to repose our credulity, and relieve the inquir- ing solicitude of the mind. But our research is hopeless. The present race of Aborigines can tell nothing of these tumuli. To them as to us they are vailed in mystery. Ages since — long ere the white-face came — while this fair land was yet the home of his fathers — the simple Indian stood before the venerable earth -heap, and gazed, and won- dered, and turned away. THE AUGUSTINS. The Augustins of New Qrleans have a decided penchant for literature. The family originally came from Chinnon, France. Jean Augustin fled from France with his wife during the Eeign of Terror, and settled in San Domingo. One son was born to them on that island, J. B. Donatieu Augustin. During the insurrection of the slaves in the beginning of the 19th century, the family were saved from the general massacre through the agency of a faithful servant and escaped to Santiago de Cuba. About in 1816 they removed to New Orleans. J. B. Donatieu Augustin married a Mademoi- selle La Branche, a descendant of one of the old colonial families. He was a soldier, jurist and litterateur. He contributed, in prose and verse, to the New Orleans newspapers and literary journals. His son, James Donatieu, inherited his father's talents and was a prolific contribu- tor, in both prose and poetry, to home and Southern daily papers and magazines. His brother, John, was a soldier, journalist and musician. From 1869 to 1888, he was con- nected with the New Orleans daily press and wrote numerous sketches of local traditions and legends; he published a volume of poems, " War Flowers " (1865), written while serving in the (150) THE AUGUSTINS. 151 Confederate army. Some of the verses were actually written on battlefields, the caissons of cannons doing duty as desks. Marie Augustin, sister of John Augustin> pub- lished, " Le Macondal ", founded on an episode in the slave insurrection in San Domingo. George Augustin, one of the sons of James Donatieu, is a journalist, poet and general writer. He is at present (February, 1904), secretary of the Orleans Parish Medical Association. He has published a volume of miscellaneous poems ; ' ' Ro- mances of New Orleans" (1891); "The Vigil of a Soul" (1899) ; " Yetta the Nun, and Other Stories", and " The Haunted Bridal Chamber". These were all published in New Orleans. James Mi Augustin, another son of James Do- natieu, and brother of the preceding, began his newspaper career when he was sixteen (he is now forty-six) . He is a linguist — having contributed to the press of New Orleans in English, French, Italian, Spanish and German. Since eighteen years he has been on the staff of the Picayune, alternating from reporter to literary reviewer. He has a special inclination for historical re- searches and literary history. He has published two pamphlets, "Sketch of the Roman Catholic Church, in Connection With the Centennial of the St. Louis Cathedral" (New Orleans, 1893) (86 pp.) ; and, " Official Souvenir Programme of the Transfer of Louisiana " , etc . ( New Orleans ,1903). He contemplates issuing a volume of essays during the present year. 152 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. THE ST. LOUIS CATHEDRAL. {From J. M. Augustin's "iSouvenir Programme," etc.) The first edifice was called the Parish Church of St. Louis. It was a structure of wood and abob^and was built by Bien- ville shortly after he founded the city. That primitive struc- ture was destroyed in a fearful hurricane which visited this city in 1728. A new church was built of brick in 1724, and it was consumed in the memorable fire, which on Good Friday, March 21, 1788, burned nearly the entire city. That conflagration was so disastrous that the colonists could not rebuild the church, and it was at this crisis that Don Andres Almonaster y Boxas erected, at his own expense, a church for New Orleans on condition that a mass be said every Sun- day, in perpetuity, for the repose of his soul. He built the church at a cost of f 50,000. The design was of the usual heavy Spanish style, with three round towers in front, like the church buildings erected in Mexico and South America by the Spaniards. In 1793, when New Orleans was detached from the Diocese of Havana, and erected into a distinct Episcopal See, the beautiful church was raised to the dignity of a cathedral. In 1851 the building was remodeled, and steeples were added to the towers. The fa9ade was con- siderably changed. The present portico, with its columns and pilasters, dates from that time. In 1892 the interior was elaborately frescoed with portraits of saints and Biblical scenes. Beneath the main altar is a large crypt, in which many of the ancient prelates, and some of the latter-day archbishops, are buried. Several distinguished personages of colonial times are buried under the side altars. Don An- dres Almonaster y Roxas, founder of the Cathedral, sleeps under St. Joseph's altar, and several members of the Mande- ville de Marigny family repose in a crypt under the altar of Mary. Many notable events have taken place in the Cathedral. Bishop Dubourg celebrated the solemn high mass in thanks- giving for the victory of General Jackson over the British at Chalmette. It was attended by General Jackson and his soldiers, and at" the close a " Te Deum " was sung. The anniversary of the centennial of the Cathedral, in April, 1893, THE AUGUSTIN8. 153 was a memorable event, and was attended by all the bishops and archbishops of the Louisiana Purchase Territory ; all the priests of the diocese, the Governor of the State ; the members of the State Supreme^and City courts, the foreign consuls, the military, etc. Another imposing occasion was In 1896, when, for the first time in American history, two cardinals united at the offering of the pontifical high mass, which marked the opening of the Catholic Winter School. The most recent event was the joint consecration on July 2, 1899, of the Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba, and the Bishop of Porto Rico, the first appointed to these ancient Sees after the close of the Spanish-American War. The St. Louis Presbytery, which adjoins the Cathedral, is also an ancient building. The other building, like the Cabildo, on the St. Ann Street side of the church, is occupied now by the Civil District Courts. It was formerly the monastery of the Capuchin monks. JACKSON SQUARE. (From J. M. Augustin's " Souvenir Programme " etc.) This also is an historic spot. It was originally called the " Place d'Armes ", or rendezvous and parade ground for the troops. When the Jackson equestrian statue, which now adorns it, was placed, the name of the victor of Chalmette was given to , the square. On the spot occupied by the statue, there upraised in olden times a huge flagstaff from which, in turn, the colors of France, Spain and the United States were unfurled in the breeze. It was In the "Place d'Armes" that Don Ulloa received the keys of the city, and took possession of Louisiana, in the name of the King of Spain, in 1766. There met the band of patriots under La- frenifere to renounce the authority of Spain, and declare the independence of Louisiana. It was in the same "Place d'Armes " that Don Bernardo de Galvez, one of the most heroic figures in Louisiana's history, first appeared in 1779, before a great meeting of citizens, and won their hearts. Though but a youth of 21, he held a commission as Captain - General and Governor of the province, but he told the citl- 154 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. zens that be would not accept the office without their consent, and loyalty. They confirmed his appointment with enthusiasm, and from the same spot he led an army of 1,500 young Creoles against the British. The two long rows of brick buildings on each side of the "Place d'Armes" were erected early in the nineteenth century, by the Baroness de Fontalba, daughter of Don Andres Almonaster y Boxas, and are still owned by her descendants. EDWARD D. NEILL. The Reverend Edward Duiiield Neill is the author of a " History of Minnesota from the Earliest French Explorations to the Present Time" (Philadelphia, 1858), and a pamphlet, ' ' Maryland not a Roman Catholic Colony ' ' . He contributed to the " Annals of the Minnesota Historical Society" (1850), a paper on "The Discoveries of the North-West", and to the " Annals " for 1853, " Dakota Land ". Jointly with W. W^. Warren, he published a" History of the Ojibways based upon Traditions and Oral Statements" (1885). I copy the following from a London booksel- ler's catalogue: "Neill, Reverend Edward D. (Dakota writer). The English Colonization of America during the Seventeenth Century. Lon- don, 1871". I cannot find that this work has ever been published in the United States. No mention is made of it in biographical sketches of Mr. Neill. Another historical work by the Reverend Doc- tor Neill is, a " History of the Virginia Com- pany of London, with Letters to and from the first Colony, never before printed " (Albany, New York, 1869) ; this work contains much new mat- ter which throws some light on the lives, views, pursuits, etc., of our early ancestors ; the same (155) 156 LITERATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEEKITOKY. may be said of his "Founders of Maryland, as portrayed in Manuscripts, Provincial Records and Early Documents " (Albany, New York, 1876). Edward D. Neill was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1823, and was educated prima- rily at Amherst College, and later on at the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania, from which he gradu- ated early in the forties. He then studied for the ministry, and after being ordained, he re- moved to Minnesota, where, in 1849, he was the first Protestant clergyman in the State. He died in St. Paul, September 26, 1893. Doctor Neill's "History of Minnesota" hf,s gone through ten editions. It is still the stand- ard history of that state. He was extremely painstaking and conscientious in his work; a gentleman who knew him intimately told me of his searching through cyclopaedias and back files of newspapers for hours daily, sometimes for a full week, to find the exact day of an occurrence (for his ' ' History of Minnesota " ) of no large im- portance. He knew the month and the year, but that would not do — he must have the exact day. Doctor Neill's histories have one glaring de- feet — they are too diffuse. He was too anxious to say all that could be said on the subject he treated, and so failed to realize that many small facts were of so little — if of any — importance that they were best unnoticed. I must not forget to mention two more works of his, "Terra Marise "and " The Fairfaxes of England and America ' ' . EDWARD D. NBILL. 157 POCAHONTAS. I^From " The Virginia Company of London.") In the first relation of the colony of Virginia, published in 1608, and attributed to Captain Smith, Pocahontas is briefly noticed in these words : " Powhatan understanding we detained certain saluages sent his daughter a child of tenne yeares old, which not only for feature, countenance, and proportion much ex- ceedeth any of the rest of his people but for wit and spirit the only non-pareil of hisconntrie." In the same narrative Smith states that he was treated with kindness by Powhatan, who wished him to live in his village, and afterwards, he adds, " hee sent me home with 4 men, one that usually carried my Gowne and Knapsacke after me, two other loded with bread, and one to accom- panie me " (Deane's edilion of True Eelation, p. 38). In 1608 Smith was sent to England to answer some mis- demeanors, and never again lived in Virginia; but in his General History, published more than fifteen years after- wards, he transforms Powhatan to a savage wretch ready to beat out his brains, until " Pocahontas the king's dearest daughter got his head into her arms, and laid her owne upon his to saue hiiU from death " {Smithes History, folio, 1632, p. 49), which statement is perpetuated in a sculpture by Capellano, which may be seen over one of the doors of the Capitol at Washington. * * * The extravagant statements of John Smith in the General History, first published in 1624, called forth criticism, and he was charged with having written too much and done too little. In the preface to his Travels and Adventures, pub - lished in 1629, he states that "they have acted my fatal tragedies upon the stage, and racked my relations at their pleasure ". Ben JoDSon noticed his heroine, Pocahontas, in the Staple of News, first played in 1625. The following dialogue there occurs between Picklock and Pennyboy Canter : Pick. " A tavern's as unfit too for a princess." P. Cant. "No, I have known a princess and a great one, Come forth of a tavern." 158 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Pick. "Not go in Sir, though." P. Cant. "She must go in, if she came forth: the blessed Fokahontas, as the historian calls her, And great king's daughter of Virginiaj Hath been in womb of tavern." Smith in his dedication of the General History to the Duchess of Richmond, says: "In the utmost of many ex- tremities that blessed Fokahontas, the great king's daughter of Virginia oft saved my life." THE LEGEND OF SCARLET DOVE. (From " The History of Minnesota.") Eagle-Eye, the son of a great war prophet, who lived more than one hundred years ago, was distinguished for bravery. Fleet, athletic, symmetrica], a bitter foe and warm friend, he was a model Dabkotah. In the ardour of his youth, his affections were given to one who was also attract- ive, named Scarlet Dove. A tew moons after she had became an inmate of his lodge, they descended the Mississippi, with a hunting party, and proceeded east of Lake Fepin. One day, while Eagle-Eye was hid behind some bushes, watching for deer, the arrow of a comrade found its way through the covert, into his heart. With only time to lisp the name Scarlet Dove, he expired. For a few days the widow mourned and cut her flesh, and then, with the silence of woe, wrapping her beloved in skins, she placed him on a temporary burial scaffold, and sat beneath. When the hunting party moved, she carried on her own back the dead body of Eagle -Eye. At every encampment she laid the body up in the manner already mentioned, and sat down to watch it and mourn. When she had reached the Minnesota river, a distance of more than a hundred miles, Scarlet Dove brought forks and poles from the woods, and erected a permanent scaSold on that beautiful hill opposite the site of Fort Snelling, in the rear of the little town of Mendota, which is known by the EDWARD D. NBILL. 159 name of Pilot Knob. Having adjusted the remains of tlie un- fortunate object of her love upon this elevation, with the strap iy which she had carried her precious burden, Scarlet Dove hung herself to the scaffold and died. Her highest hope was to meet the beloved spirit of her Eagle-Eye, in the world of spirits. OANKTAYHEE. {From " The History of Minnesota.") The Jupiter Maxim us of the Dahkotahs is styled Oank- tayhee. As the ancient Hebrews avoided speaking the name of Jehovah, so they dislike to speak the name of this deity, but call him " Taku-wakan ", or " That which is supernatural "- This mighty god manifests himself as a, large ox. His eyes are as large as the moon. He can haul in his horns and tail, or he can lengthen them as he pleases. From him proceed invisible influences. In his extremities reside mighty powers. He is said to have created the earth. Assembling in grand conclave all of the aquatic tribes, he ordered them to bring up dirt from beneath the water, and proclaimed death to the disobedient. The beaver and others forfeited their lives. At last the muskrat went beneath the waters, and, after, a long time, appeared at the surface nearly ex- hausted, with some dirt. From this Oa»ktayhee fashioned the earth into a large circular plain. The earth being finished, he took a deity, one of his own offspring, and grinding him to powder, sprinkled it upon the earth, and this produced many worms. The worms were then collected and scattered again. They matured into infants; and these were then collected and scattered and became full-grown Dahkotahs. The bones of the mastodon, the Dahkotahs think, are those of Oanktayhee, and they preserve them with the greatest care in the medicine bag. It is the belief of the Dahkotahs that the Eev. E. Hopkins, who was drowned at Traverse des Sioux, on July 4th, 1851, was killed by Oanktayhee, who dwells in the waters, because he had preached against him. 160 LtTEEATURE OI* LOUISIANA TERRITORY. This deity is supposed to have a dwelling-place beneath the falls of Saint Anthony. A few years ago, by the sadden breaking up of a gorge of ice, a cabin near Fort Suelling, containing a soldier, was swept off by the flood. The Dahkotahs supposed that this great god was descending the river at the time, and, being hungry, devoured the man. MRS. SARAH A. DORSET. "Dorsey? Mrs.Dorsey — did you say? Never heard of her. What books did she write? — Oh, yes, yes — she's the lady who gave Jeff Davis Beauvoir, his last home." This was said by one of the most intelligent gentlemen I met in New Orleans in December of last year. My curiosity was piqued ; within the next few days I mentioned Mrs. Dorsey to several other persons, of both sexes; always the same identi- fication — ' ' the lady who gave Jeff Davis Beau- voir." With the first breath, with the last breath, the people of New Orleans tell you that story. They know her for that action — and not by the books she has written. And yet, some of Mrs. Dorsey 's books are worthy of consideration. Assuredly, o?te is eminently so. What book has ever given us, who are not of the South, a more intimate and realistic picture of the South after the Civil War, — of what defeat has meant to the South, than has Mrs. Dorsey's "Recollections of Henry Watkins Allen ", Louisiana's War Gov- ernor, who — all politics aside — was a grand and noble man? Let the people of New Orleans correct them- selves: Mrs. Dorsey is not " the lady who gave Jeff Davis Beauvoir" ; she is " the woman who wrote the life of Governor Allen ' ' . 11 (161) 162 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Sarah A. Ellis was born in Natchez, Missis- sippi, February 16, 1829. She receiveda good education in her youth, and then traveled abroad extensively. She was the niece of Catharine Anne Warfield, the popular authoress, and be- came her literary executor after her death. On January the 19th, 1853, she married Samuel W. Dorsey of Ellicott's Mills, Maryland, who at that time was engaged in the practice of law in Ten- sas Pai'ish, Louisiana. Mr. Dorsey was consid- erably older than she was, but being an educated, accomplished and wealthy gentleman, and of high social standing, the union proved to be a happy one. Mr. Dorsey died in 1875. Mrs. Dorsey had no children and devoted the larger part of her time to study and travel. She was well versed in several modern languages, as well as in Latin and Greek, and is said to have corresponded during many years with Carlyle, Herbert Spencer, the Rosettis, and other English celebrities, besides several French, German, and Italian scholars. Besides her " Life" of Governor Allen, Mrs. Dorsey published several novels : ' ' Lucia Dare ' ' (New York, 1867); "Agnes Graham" (New York); "Panola; a Tale of Louisiana" (Phil- adelphia, 1877), and " Athalie". These books are very disappointing. A stranger in New Or- leans hears so much about Mrs. Dorsey 's high education and great abilities, that he turns to her novels with expectations that prove to be only disappointments. Alike Margaret Fuller, she was MRS. SARAH A. DORSEY. 163 no doubt greater as a conversationalist than as an authoress. There is only one of her books that is worthy of her reputation. GOVERNOR ALLEN GOING INTO EXILE. (From '' Becollections of Henry Watkins Allen" etc.') The people wept over Allen's departure. They tollowed him with tears and blessings, and would have forced on him more substantial tokens of regard than words of regret. They knew he had no money, his noble estates had long been in possession of the enemy, hundreds of hogsheads of sugar had been carried ofl from his sugar-house; his house was burned, his plantation, a wide waste of fallow-fields, grown up in weeds. He had nothing but Confederate and State money. One gentleman begged him to accept f 5,000, in gold, as a loan, since he refused it as a gift. Allen accepted five hundred. With this small amount, his ambulance and rid- ing-horse, he started to Mexico. His journey through Texas was a complete ovation, instead of a hegira. Everybody, rich and poor, vied with each other in offering him attention and the most eager hospitality. The roof was deemed hon- ored that sheltered his head for the night. He stopped at Crockett, to say "goodbye". * * * This conversation occurred whilst we were returning from a visit to Gov. Moore's family. I had driven over to their cottage in a buggy, to invite them to join us at dinner. Allen had accompanied me. * * * These exiles were personal friends of mine. I suffered in parting with them: for some I suffer still — for those who are still absent and still living! Everything was very quiet and still, nothing audible but the low murmur of our voices, when suddenly arose from the prairie beyond us, one of the beautiful, plaintive, cattle or " salt" songs of Texas. These wild, simple melodies had a great attraction for me. I would often check my horse on the prairies, and keep him motionless for a half- hour, listen- ing to these sweet, melancholy strains. Like all cattle-calls they are chiefly minor. I thought them quite as singular and oeautlful as the Swiss Banz des Vaches, or the Swedish cat- 164 LITERATURE OP LOUISIANA TERRITORT. tie-calls. They consisted of a few chanted words, with a cadence and a long yodel. Sometimes the yodling was aided by what the Texan boys call " quills " — two or more pipes made of reed cane (arundinaria macrosperma) . This made a sort of limited syrinx, which g ive wonderful softness and flute-like clearness to the prolonged tones of the voice, as it was breathed into them. The boy sang one of his saddest "calls ". I looked to see if Gov. Allen had noticed the mel- ancholy words and mournful air. I saw he had. He ceased talking, and his face was very grave.; The boy sang : " Going away to leave you, Ah-a-a-a — Going away to leave you, Ah-a-a-a — Going away to-morrow, Ah-a-a-a — Going away to-morrow, Ah-a-a-a — Never more to see you, Ah-a-a-a — Never more to see you, Ah-a-a-a — " This had always been an affecting strain to me ; it was doubly so under the existing circumstances. The song died mournfully away. We drove on in silence for a few mo- ments. Gov, Allen roused himself, with a sigh: "That boy's song is very sad," " Yes, but he sings it very frequently. He knows nothing about you. It is neither a prophecy nor intended to be sympathetic, — you need not make special application of it I " " No; but it may prove a strange coincidence," "You shan't say that. I won't listen to such a thought. You'll only spend a pleasant summer traveling in Mexico. We'll see you at the opera in New Orleans next winter." " I hope so." Our conversation reverted now to past years. Allen spoke of his early friends among my relatives ; of his whole career in Louisiana; of his wife, with tenderness, — (she had died in 1850), of her beauty and her love for him. His future was so uncertain — that he scarcely alluded to that — MRS. SARAH A. DORSET. 165 never with any hopefulness. It was only in the past that he seemed to find repose of spirit. The present was too sad, the future too shadowy for any discussion of either. * * * During this last visit, I never renewed my arguments against his quitting the country, I had already said and written all that I had to say on that subject. * * * Besides, our minds were in such a confused state, we scarcely knew what any of us had to expect from the vic- torious party, or what would become of our whole people. So that in urging him not to leave Louisiana, I argued more from instinct, which revolted at anything like an abandon- ment of a post of duty, and from a temperament which always sought rather to advance to meet and defy danger, than to turn and avoid it, than from any well-grounded as- surance or hope of security for him, or any one else. I felt more anxiety for his reputation, for his fame, than for his life and freedom. His natural instincts would have Induced similar views; but his judgment and feelings were over- powered by the reasonings and entreaties of his friends. JULIA AMANDA WOOD. Julia Amanda Sargent, well known in Minne- sota as " Minnie Mary Lee ", was born in New London, New Hampshire, in 1830. Her parents removing to Covington, Kentucky, she was not long afterwards married to William Henry Wood, a practicing lawyer of that place. This was in 1849 ; two years later, they removed to Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, where Mr. Wood, the following year, received the appointment of government Land Eeceiver. In 1860, the Woods edited a weekly newspaper called, The JVew Era. Mrs. Wood has con- tributed generously to Eastern ladies' magazines like Arthur's and Godey's Lady's Book, and Jane Gray Swisshelm's paper. The St. Cloud Visitor. Mrs. Swisshelm says that Mrs. Wood's married life was a very happy one — that she " was one of the very few literary women who are happy in their domestic relations." " Minnie Mary Lee " was an indefatigable worker, and produced an astonishing amount of poems, stories, sketches and novels. She began writing very early in life, but did not publish in bookform until she was in her forties. " Myrrha Lake; or, Into the Light of Catholicity " (New York, about 1871; 2nd edition, 1873); " Hubert's Wife: a Story for You" (Baltimore, 1875); (166) JULIA AMANDA WOOD. 167 ' ' The Brown House at DuiEeld : a Story of Life without and within the Fold" (Baltimore, 1877); "The Story of Annette and her Five Dolls: Told to dear little Catholic Children" (Baltimore, 1880), I believe, is all that she left the reading world in bookform. Minnesota peo- ple tell you that " she had an intense love for Nature ' ' . Her poems , however, are never nature poems. I have not been able to ascertain the year of her death. I remember of reading poems of hers in the St. Paul Pioneer-Press in the eighties. MOONBEAMS. {From Arthur's Home Magazine. 1859,) These gentle moonbeams, falling in Upon my shadowed floor, Oh, how they fill my dreaming heart With scenes that are no more. They have their thrilling language low, Like all of God's sweet things, That to the loneliest saddened hour A joy and beauty brings. Like soft blue skies, and purple clouds, Like birds, and like the flowers. They gently carry me away To earlier, sweet home-hours, When these same silver moonbeams played Upon the lyall and floor, Where all our household band shall meet, Shall love, in life, no more. They used to paint within my room. The leaves upon the trees, That floated in their lustrous light, Like ships upon the seas ; 168 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. My childish fancy freighted them With wealth of untold toys, That brought me, then, as dreams have since. Unnumbered hopes and joys. Or when the gentle winds awoke Some music on the pane, They were my fays, whose flying feet Won slumber to my brain ; And then I dreamed again the dreams, I saw the mellow light. So that to me, my brightest day Was what we call the night. I often used to fondly long For coming of the eve ; For coming of the visions fair The moonbeams love to weave ; How sweetly I would glide away, In gentle, rosy dreams, The leaves, my ships, a -dancing Amid the silver beams. Oh, I love, I love the moonbeams ; While I sit here alone, They are floating on the dear old wall, Within my early home ; And I wonder, Oh, I wonder Who gazes on them now, And if they bless some dreamer there, As they bless my heart and brow. Their pale, pale light is resting still Upon the flowery sod, 'Neath which the cherished idol lies I loved more than my God. The little one of golden hair — Alas my eye grows dim, And my wrung heart turns wild to prayer, Whene'er T think of him. Gently, gently-gliding moonbeams I love your spirit well ; I bless you for your presence. Your soft, your fairy spell; JULIA AMANDA WOOD. 169 While radiance, from the glory born, la o'er the Present cast, Ye wrap me In sweet thoughts and dreams Delicious, of the Past. THERE IS A LIGHT. There Is a light within my soul, A beauteous gush of light. That lately o'er me sweetly stole, Most wondrously and bright — That wraps me in delicious gleams Most purely, softly, tender, Than e'er came o'er me in the dreams That had their dawn in splendor. 'T is not the sun, or moon, or stars, All glorious though they be ; It breaketh not from the world afar This blessed light on me — It is more Soft, subduing, clear, Entrancing in its flow, Most like that light of spirit-sphere Which dawneth not below. Clouds never lower in that pure clime. The rain- drops never fall. But steadily and ever shines That light most bright of all. It is the light that each fond heart Doth kindle by its love, And who shall say this is not part Of all the bliss above? earth, and sea, and sky, and air, Are lighter for this light. And even birds and flowers fair Are more than ever bright. 1 tremble in its presence sweet That every ill doth banish, Lest 'mid all things so frail and fleet, This, too, should darkly vanish. 170 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Thou chosen one, who giv'st this light O'er all my being thrown, Without each day ts darkest night. Thou — beautiful — my own — O wilt thou, in the coming years, Be my soul light as now, And all the way through smiles and tears, Give sunshine to my brow? LOGAN URIAH RE AVIS. Logan Uriah Reavis (and not Uric as is gen- erally stated) was born in Sangamon Bottom, Mason County, Illinois, March 26, 1831. He received a common school education, then taught school for four years. He next removed to Beardstown, Illinois, and became connected with the Craze^te of that place. He afterwards bought out his associate and changed the name of the paper to The Gentr-al Illinoian and published it until 1866, when he sold it and removed to St. Louis. In St. Louis, in 1883, he began the publication of a weekly. The American Tribune, which ap- peared regularly during a few months, and after several suspensions and temporary resumptions of publication, was finally abandoned. Mr. Reavis was haunted with the idea that St. Louis was destined to become the capitol of the United States, and that he was foreordained to bring about its removal from Washington ; so he spent several years publishing books and pamphlets on the subject, and lecturing pretty much anywhere where anybody would listen to him — even in England, where he made two lecturing tours. Another hobby of Mr. Reavis' was his intense admiration of Horace Greeley, which he carried even to the extent of out-Heroding his slovenly (171) 172 LITEKATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEKEITOKY. appearance. What with his flaming beard, his baggish clothes, his dirty shirts, and his lame- ness, he was a noted character on the streets of St. Louis in the seventies and eighties. His loud, assertive ways, furthermore, made him many enemies. He published: "The New Kepublic ", (St. Louis, 1867); "St. Louis the Future Great City of the World" (St. Louis, 1867); "A Change of National Empire, or Arguments for the Removal of the National Capitol from Wash- ington to the Mississippi Valley" (St. Louis, 1869) ; this book won him the soubriquet of the ' ' Capitol Mover ' ' , which ever afterwards clung to him. " A Eepresentative Life of Horace Greeley" (New York, 1872), the best of his works ; it is generally believed to have been largely the work of the late D. H. McAdam, an able writer on the local press; " Thoughts for Young Men and Women of America" (1873); " The Life of General William S. Harney " (St. Louis, 1875); "The Railway and River Sys tems " (St. Louis, 1879), and two pamphlets, " The North and South " (St. Louis, 1878), and " An International Railway to the City of Mex- ico " (St. Louis, 1879). Several of these works were mere compilations. Late in life he married the poetess, Rebecca Morrow, who was much younger than himself. He died in St. Louis, March 26, 1889. The national capitol is still at Washington. LOGAN URIAH REAVIS. 173 THE PACIFIC COAST. In mountain grandeur, majestic water (alls, beautiful landscapes, pure air and wild romance, upon which the imag- ination can feast ; the Pacific slope far transcends the country of the Alps, the Apenniaes, the iEj<;ian and Adriatic, while its flowing waters, its gushing streams give forth a purer inspiration than comes from Caucassian caves and Pierian springs. Then, such a country, with such natural advan- tages for bringing out the higher nature of man, is destined, at no distant period, to become the birthplace and residence of the highest civilization in the world. Not only will it bring forth a higher order of a chivalrous populace, with a society embellished with wealth and refinement, and highly skilled in the arts and pursuits of life, but it will bring forth greater poets, seers, sages, philosophers and statesmen than ever before walked upon the earth — men before whose genius and verse, Plato, Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, Swe- denborg, Davis, Newton, Hamilton, Webster, Poe and Par- ker, would bow with reverence as the citizen does to the sage. But a few years more, and the charms will be lost from Saratoga, the White Hills, Key East, Long Branch and other places of fashion and fame on the Atlantic side of the continent, to be found amid the romantic scenery of the Sierra Nevadas and upon the golden shores of the Pacific. Persons of wealth, who seek health, pleasure and refinement, will journey westward to the Geyser, Soda, Carson and Steamer springs. Larger and grander will be the capacities, demands and uses, for summer resorts amid the beautiful scenery of the Pacific mountains. The genii of art, science, and literature will plant their rosy grottoes on the evening side of the continent. Granting, then, that such a trans- cendent growth of the mental and spiritual nature of man, is destined to be the ripe fruit of the mountain system of the Pacific side of the continent, what must be its infiuence for good, upon the future millions of our people, destined to Inhabit this country aod be impelled to deeds of honor, of happiness and fame? If man thus far in his career upon the earth has been guided and directed through the ages by mental and spiritual minded teachers, who here and there 174 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. have arisen along the highway of time, what must be the beneficent inflaence ol a whole constellation of more exalted intellects — greater poets, greater philosophers, greater teachers and greater spiritual minded men, succeeding each other on this continent, and treading the misty mazes of life, where mind communes with the infinite and illumines the intellect of man with wisdom and knowledge brought down from the Higher Life? THE GRAVE OF BENTON. (From the Inland Monthly. 1882.) To-day, I visited a strange city, one which my eyes had never before beheld, and yet I know that my friends and fel- low-citizens were constantly going to and from that city. It is a city of the dead. Bellefontaine Cemetery, where from out this living human hive friends and lovers have " thither gone " from the palace to the mausoleum. Bellefontaine Cemetery is a growing city. It is beauti- fully situated, and its attractions readily awaken in the vis- itor a strange delight, and especially when a joyous spring day gives It life and beauty. The town site of the Necrop- olis is beautiful, and the new residents who are constantly going there to dwell add to the adornment and solemnity of the city. But my visit to that strange city was for seeing the tomb of Benton. This was in compliance to a determination of many months standing, and its accomplishment was not satisfactory. A stranger in the city I was compelled to in- quire for his place of abode. I was told at the gate that his grave had no adornment, and was only marked by a plain stone. When I had well entered the city I began to inquire for the object of my visit, as well as to go in search of it. After repealed inquiries, I could find no visitor who knew where the grave was ; and having given up in despair and about to leave the city, I met an attendant, who, after re- peated inquiry, was enabled to find the grave of the great Mis- souri statesman ; and to my astonishment it, still more than the scarcity of the Inscriptions on the tombs, was an object that excited regret. In no way is it becoming the character LOGAN URIAH REAVIS. 175 and greatness of the man whose earthly remains moulder beneath in the bosom of the Mother earth. In no way does it reflect the respect which the living have for the dead. Ye people of IMissouri, ye citizens of St. Louis, ye who once admired the living, and ye who do not envy the dead, go looi: at the grave of Benton, and ask why it should be shrouded in obscurity — why Is it that he who gave laws to you, and to your fathers before many of you were born, is so neglected among the graves of your friends? His name still lives in the history of this country, and will out-live the polished marble ; why do you neglect him 1 IGNATIUS DONNELLY. Ignatius Donnelly is probably the best known writer Minnesota can claim. He has pubhshed a number of books, but, somehow, he has always narrowly escaped giving the world a really great book. He had originality, inventive power, and a good command of language, but his books are not over-interesting. Not that he lacks learn- ing, not that his themes were not of high port — but simply because he had not the genius of absorbing his reader's attention and carrying him. on with him, page after page, even unconsciously to himself. Besides, the majority of his books are imbued with many of the new theories of the past fifteen or twenty years, which the sound judgment of the majority of the American peo- ple will never permit of their practically adopting. Ignatius Donnelly was born in Philadelphia, November 3, 1831. He graduated at the Cen- tral High School in 1849. He then studied law, and three years later, was admitted to the bar. In 1856, he practiced his prof ession .in St. Paul, and in 1859, at the early age of a little less than twenty-eight, he was elected Lieutenant-Gover- nor of Minnesota. In 1863, he was elected to the national Congress, and re-elected in 1865 and 1867. His services in Congress are best remem- bered by his unswerving support of the measure (176) IGNATIUS DONNELLY. 177 for creating a National Bureau of Education and his advocacy of the planting of trees by the government. In 1889, he failed at re-election. Up to this time he had been a Repubhcan, but in 1872, being at variance with his party on national questions, he actively supported Horace Greeley for the Presidency and became a Democrat. From 1873 on, he served a number of years in both houses of the Minnesota legislature. Some years later, he joined the ranks of the Populists, and in 1898, was the candidate of the People's party for Vice-President of the United States . During five years he published The Anthnonopolist, a weekly paper in the interests of the Greenback party. In 1882, he published, "Atlantis, the Antedi- luvian World" (New York), in which he re- vamped the old theory of the long lost island of Atlantis; " Eagnarok, the Age of Fire and Gravel " (New York), followed in 1883; " The Great Cryptogram" (Chicago, 1888), a ridicu- lous contribution to the Shakespeare-Bacon con- troversy, came next. His other works are: " Csesar's Column" a visionary story (Chicago, 1890) ; " The Golden Bottle", a political novel (1892); and, "Dr. Huguet ". He is also the author of a pamphlet, " The American People's Money". He died in Minneapohs, January 1, 1901. For some years prior to his death he edited and published The Reformer, a weekly paper. Several of his books were published under the nom-de-plume of Edmund Boisgilbert. 12 178 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. REFORM NEEDED. (From " Coss'ar's Column."') I seek to preach into the ears oJ the able and rich and powerful the great truth that neglect of the sufferings of their fellows, indifference to the great bond of brotherhood which lies at the base of Christianity, and blind, brutal and degrading worship of mere wealth, must — given time and pressure enough — eventuate in the overthrow of society and the destruction of civilization. I come to the churches with my heart filled with the pro - foundest respect for the essentials of religion; I seek to show them why they have lost their hold upon the poor, — upon that vast multitude, the best beloved of God's king- dom, — and! point out to them how they may regain it. I tell them that if Religion is to reassume her ancient station, as crowned mistress of the souls of men, she must stand, in shining armor bright, with the serpent beneath her feet, the champion and defender of mankind against all its oppres- sors. The world, to-day, clamors for deeds, not creeds; for bread, not dogma; for charity, not ceremony; for love, not intellect. Some will say the events herein described (in " Csesar's Column ") are absurdly impossible. Who is it that is satisfied with the present unhappy con- dition of society? It is conceded that life is a dark and wretched failure for the great mass of mankind. The many are plundered to enrich the few. Vast combi- nations depress the price of labor and increase the cost of the necessaries of existence. The rich, as a rule, despise the poor; and the poor are coming to hate the rich. The face of labor grows sullen; the old tender Christian love is gone; standing armies are formed on one side, and great commun- istic organizations on the other; society divides itself into two hostile camps; no white flags pass from the one to the other. They wait only for the drum-beat and the trumpet to summon them to armed conflict. These conditions have come about in less than a century ; most of them in a quarter of a century. Multiply them by IGNATIUS DONNELLY. 179 the years of another century, and who will say that the events I depict are impossible? There is an acceleration of move- ment In human affairs even as there is in the operations of gravity. The dead missile out of space at last blazes, and the very air takes fire. The masses grow more intelligent as they grow more wretched ; and more capable of co-op6ration as they become more desperate. The labor organizations of to-day would have been impossible fifty years ago. And what is to arrest the flow of effect from cause? What is to prevent the coming of the night if the earth continues to re- volve on its axis? The fool may cry out: " There shall be no night! " But the feet of the hours march unrelenting toward the darkness. In St. Paul, I was told that Mr. Donnelly had written poetry for the Eastern magazines while he was a young man, but that none of his poems could be found. I examined several volumes of Graham's, The Knickerbocker, Godey's, Ar- thur's, and other popular magazines published in the early fifties, and found the following in Graham's Magazine for April, 1852 : THE FOREST FOUNTAIN. Here the sinking sun hath broken through a forest close as night ; Plashing all the deepened darkness with its thick and wine- like light. Shivered lies the broad, red sunbeam slant athwart the withered leaf, Laughing back the startled shadows from their high and holy grief; Down yon dusk- pool, slant, obliquely, shoots a line like sparry splinter. As the waking flush of spring-time lightens up the eyes in winter : 180 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Dimming as it straineth downward .melts the red light of the sun, Darkling pool and piercing beamlet mingling whitely into one. Fallen rays, like broken crystals, spangle thick the shadowy ground, Bagged fragments, glorious gushes sca'te"red richly, redly round. Where the lazy lilies languish, one intruding sunbeam creeps ; la the arms of slumberous shadow like a child it sinks and sleeps; And the quiet leaves around it seem to think it all their own, 'Mid the grass and lightened lilies sleeping silent and alone. Here the dew-damp lingers longest mid the plushy mountain moss ; Here the bergamot's red blossom leans the stilly stream across; Here the shad* is darkly silent; here the breeze is liquid cool, And the very air seems married to the freshness of that pool. See, where down its depths pellucid. Nature's purest waters well. Breaking up in curving current, wimpled line and bubbly swell; While in swift and noiseless beauty, through the deep and dewy grass. O'er the rock and down the valley, see the hurrying waters pass. Oh, how dreamy grow my senses, as I couch me mid the flowers. Oh, how still the blue sky looketh, oh, how noteless creep the hours; Oh, how wide the silence seemeth, not a sound disturbing comes, Save a drowsy, sleepy buzzing, that around continuous hums; And I seem to float out loosely on weak slumber's languid breast. With a kind of half reluctance that sinks gradually to rest. Distant faces group around me, kindly eyes look in my own, IGNATIUS DONNELLY. 181 And I hear, though indistinctly, voices ol the lost and gone : His whose bark went down in tempest; his whose life and death were gloom ; His whose hopes and young ambitious tell and faded on the tomb; Oh, again his earnest language breaks upon my dreaming ear, And I catch the tones that waking I shall never, never hear. WILLIAM TOD HELMUTH. William Tod Helmutli, the well-known sur- geon and homeopathist, was born in Philadelphia, October 30, 1833. He was educated at St. Timothy's College, Baltimore, and in 1850 began studying medicine. He graduated in 1853 and began practice in Philadelphia, leaning towards surgery more than towards medicine . He removed to St. Louis in 1858 and was one of the founders of the Missouri Homeopathic Medical College, in which college he became professor of anatomy. He was also surgeon of the Good Samaritan Hos- pital. In 1859, he married a Miss Pritchard of St. Louis. Later on, in 1869, he organized the St. Louis College of Homeopathic Physicians and Surgeons, of which he became the dean and professor of surgery, but the following year he removed to New York where he became professor of surgery in the Homeopathic Medical College and surgeon to the Hahnemann and New York Surgical hospitals. He published several medical and humorous books. His first work was, " Surgery, and its Adaptation to Homeopathic Practice" (1855). I am informed that this book called the attention of the homeopathic physicians of St. Louis to him, and led to his shortly afterwards taking up his habitation in the Mound City. His other (182) WILLIAM TOD HELMUTH. 183 books are: "Medical Pomposity"; "How I was cured by a Female Physician " , a poem ; " Humanity " and " With the Pouss^ Caf^ ", both in verse; and, " The Arts in St, Louis". Doctor Helmuth died of heart disease, in New York, May 15, 1902. He was the head surgeon of the Flower Hospital at the time of his death. He could be very pleasant, or sarcastic, as the mood moved him. But he was a kindly, genial gentleman who had little of gall in his composi- tion, and more of humor than his face in its calm dignity would lead one to suppose. I remember him well when he lived in St. Louis. A slim, impressive-looking sort of a man, always well-dressed, and with a magnificent, full beard that could not but attract attention. He had a large practice and was well known about town. He had a reputation as a writer on medical topics in those days; it was only after he removed to New York that he took to rhyming. Other books by Dr. Helmuth are : " Scratches of a Surgeon" (Chicago, 1879), prose and poetry; " The Doctor Woman, by Aiken Hart" ; " A Steamer Book, or a City on the Sea " ; and " Various Verses " (New York, 1901), published the year before his death. From this book (Copyrighted, Boericke and Tafel) I copy the following : 184 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKEITORY. TWO VIEWS OF JAPAN. The Optimistic. The following lines were written with the moonlight shilling full upon the Bay of Tokio, after a good dinner at the Grand Hotel. The writer had just returned from a delightful excursion to Kamakara, on a beautiful day in July. Oh, fair Japan; Oh, rare Japan! Thou land of ancient trees, Where lotos blossoms fringe thy paths And perfume every breeze. Where lilUes bend their fragrant heads To kiss thy plashing streams, And dark-skinn'd Musumees, almond-eyed. Wake long-forgotten dreams. Thy hills crown-capp'd with sacred groves Inclose thy gilded shrines ; In grottos where the iris blooms Droop sweet wisteria vines, Mysterious languors seem to hang O'er mountain, plain and rill; An unreality of life Does all the senses fill. Thine ancient shrines to Buddha blest, With Shinto's gilded spires, Proclaim a soul-sustaining rest, And wake poetic flres. Oh, sweet it is to dwell with thee! " Land of the Rising Sun " — Where beauty, age and mystery Combine themselves in one. The Pessimistic. These verses were composed while the author was lying in bed at Miyanoshlta, during the drying of his clothes in the kitchen, after five hours' exposure in a hurricane of rain and wind (a portion of the typhoon of July 22), upon one WILLIAM TOD HELMUTH. 185 of the highest passes in Japan (Otometoge). Discouraged, cold, and drenched to the skin, shrivelled and dispirited he came to the Fngeia Hotel, at Miyanoshita, and thought in his misery : Ob, hang Japan; Oil, dang Japan! A land of gnats and fleas. Where noisome odors fill the air And float on every breeze. Where men run naked in the streets, Wear spectacles for clothes. And old and young and rich and poor Eschew the use of hose. Oh, land devoid of knives and forks, Of tables, chairs and beds! Where women black their teeth and shave Their little babies' heads — I've had enough, I have no use (A quiet New York man) For all this nude simplicity Careering round Japan. I've had enough of cloisonne. Of ivory carvings, too; Of ancient, rare Satsuma jugs (Which probably are new) ; I hate the sight of Buddha fat, He's too infernal calm! And temples, shrines, red lacquer ware And damios, I damn! Boy, bring my clothes up from the wash As quickly as you can. Sir Edward Arnold writes a lot Of bosh about Japan. I'm shivering cold, I'm ringing wet, I've been an idle dreamer; To Yokohama let me get. And there — thank God — a steamer ! JAMES K. HOSMER. Professor James K. Hosmer was born in North- field, Massachusetts. While he was very young, his father, the Reverend Doctor Hosmer, moved to Buffalo, New York, to assume the Pastorate of the Unitarian church of that city. Here the boy grew up for some years, then entered Harvard College, from which he graduated in 1855. Fol- lowing in the footsteps of his venerable father, he studied for the ministry, was ordained, and be- came the pastor of the Unitarian church at Deer- field, Massachusetts. In 1861, when the Civil War broke out," he re- signed his pastorate, and enlisted as a common private in the 52d Massachusetts Regiment. Men of Mr. Hosmer's education and ability are soon " known at headquarters", and General Natha- niel P. Banks — of whose brigade his regiment formed a part — offered him a place on his staff, which was declined. The superior of his officers in education, and, no doubt, in conduct and re- finement, he considered himself as only " one of the corporals intrusted with the defense of the colors of his regiment". And so, in the ranks, he served through the war. But, if he refused promotion in the Army of the United States, he was predestined to promotion in the army of the Republic of Letters. Before the war was over (186) JAMES K. HOSMEE. 187 the corporal was an author. In 1864, he pub- lished, "The Color Guard: Being a Corporal's notes of Military Service in the 19th Army Corps " (Boston, 1864), and at the close of the war, came " The Thinking Bayonet ", a romance of the war (Boston, 1865). Shortly after the Civil War, Mr. Hosmer be- came a professor at Antioch College, and in 1868 he filled the chair on history in the University of Missouri, at Columbia, Missouri. From 1870 to 1888, he was professor of German and English literature in Washington University of St. Louis. Since 1888, he has been the librarian of the Pub- lic Library of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Professor Hosmer has therefore resided in two of the Louis- iana Territory states, thirty- six years, and we sin- cerely hope that he will continue with us another thirty-six. Professor Hosmer's third book was, " A Short History of German Literature" (St. Louis, 1878). A new edition of this work was issued in New York, in 1890. " Samuel Adams, the Man of the Town Meeting " and " The Story of the Jews " appeared in 1885 (New York), and were followed by: " Sir Harry Vane" (Boston, 1888); " A Short History of Anglo-Saxon Free- dom " (New York, 1890) ; " How Thankful was bewitched " (New York, 1894), — a quaint and charming romance of the French and Indian in- vasion of Massachusetts during Queen Ann' s War ; " Thomas Hutchison " (Boston, 1896) — a biog- raphy of the old Massachusetts Governor. 188 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. During the succeeding five years, Professor Hosraer was silent. Then he turned his attention to that great section of the United States that had been his home for more than thirty years, and gave us " A Short History of the Mississippi Val- ley " (Boston, 1901) ; " A History of the Louis- iana Purchase ' ' (New York, 1902) ; and, an " In- troduction " and " Index" for a new edition of " The Expedition of Lewis and Clarke ", pub- lished in Chicago, in 1902. "A History of the Mississippi Valley" is a condensed, well-proportioned story of the great Valley. After sketching its vastness and fitness for a great history. Professor Hosmer tells of the coming into it of the Spaniards, the French, and the English ; and describes the conflicts and changes of control until the Americans were masters of the Valley. The narrative includes brilliant individual actors, Coronado, LaSalle, Boone, George Rogers Clarke, Jackson, Farra- gut and Grant; and it embraces the immense industrial and commercial activities which give the Mississippi Valley to-day an interest for the world as keen as it had in its romantic days of exploration and conquest. The book is written from full knowledge and with much enthusiasm and literary skill. " His writings have not been excelled in permanent worth by many authors of his generation in America", writes Mr. J. N. Larned, the author of "History for Eeady Eef erence ' ' . JAMES K. HOSMEE. 189 BERLIN IN PEACEFUL TIMES. (From The Atlantic Monthly. 1871.) There never was a place with aspect more military than Berlin even in peaceful times. In many quarters tower great barracks for the troops. The public memorials are almost exclusively in honor of great soldiers. There are tall col.- umns, too, to commemorate victories or the crushing out of revolutionary spirit; rarely, indeed, in comparison, a statue to a man of scientific or literary or artistic eminence. Frederick sits among the tree-tops of Unter den Linden, and about his pedestal are life-size figures of the men of his age whom Prussia holds most worthy of honor. At the four corners ride the Duke of Brunswick and cunning Prince Heinrich, old Ziethen and fiery Leydlitz. Between are a score or more of soldiers of lesser note, only soldiers, spurred and sabre-girt — except at the very back; and there justwhere the tail of Frederick's horse droops over, stand — whom think you? — no other than Lessing, critic and poet, most gifted and famous; and Kant, peer of Plato and Bacon, one of the most gifted brains of all time. Just standing room for them among the hoofs and uniforms at the tail of Frederick's horse! Every third man one meets in Berlin is a soldier on duty. Batteries of steel guns roll by at any time, obedient to their bugles. Squadrons of Uhlans in uniforms of green and red, the pennons fluttering from the ends of their lances, ride up to salute the king. Each day at noon, through the roar of the streets, swells the finest martial music; first a grand sound of trumpets, then a deafening roll from a score of brazen drums. A heavy detachment of infantry wheels out from some barracks, ranks of strong brown-haired young men stretching from sidewalk to sidewalk, neat In every thread and accroutrement, with the German gift for music all, as the stride tells wiih which they beat out upon the pavement the rhythm of the march, dropping sections at in- tervals to do the unbroken guard duty at the various posts. Frequently whole army corps gather to manoeuvre at the vast parade-ground by the Kreuzberg in the outskirts. On Unter den Linden is a strong square building, erected, after the model of a Koman fortress, to be the quarters of the 190 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. main guard. The oflScers on duty at Berlin come here daily at noon to hear military music and for a halt hour's talk. They come always in full uniform, a collection of the most brilliant colors, hussars in green, red, blue, and black, the king's body-guard in white with braid of yellow and silver, in helmets that flash as if made from burnished gold, crested with an eagle with outspread wings. The men themselves are the handsomest one can see; figures of the finest sym- metry and stature, trained by every athletic exercise, and the faces often so young and beautiful! Counts and barons are there from Pomerania and old Brandenburg, wheie the Prussian spirit is most intense, and no nobility is nobler or prouder. They are blue-eyed and fair-haired descendants perhaps of the chieftains that helped Herman overcome Varus, and whose names may be found five hundred years back among the-Deutsch Ritters that conquered northern Europe from heathendom, and thence all the way down to now, occurring in martial and princely connection. Ii is the acme of martial splendor. " But how do you bear it all? " you say to your Prussian friend, with whom you stand looking on at the base of Bulow's statue. " Is not this enormous preparation for bloodshed something dreadful? Then the tax on the coun- try to support it all, the withdrawing of such a multi- tude from the employments of peace." Your friend, who had been a soldier himself, answers: " We bear it be- cause we must. It is the price of our existence, and we have got used to it; and, after all, with the hardship come great benefits. Every able-bodied young Prussian must serve as a soldier, be he noble or low born, rich or poor. If he cannot read or write, he must learn. He must be punctual, neat, temperate, and so gets valuable habits. His body is trained to be strong and supple. Shoemaker and banker's son, count, tailor, and farmer, march together, and community of feeling comes about. The great tradi- tions of Prussian history are the atmosphere they breathe, and they become patriotic- The soldier must put ofE marry- ing, perhaps half forget his trade, and come into life poor; for who can save on nine cents a day, with board and clothes? But it is a wonder if he is not a healthy, well- trained, patriotic man." So talks your Prussian; and however much of a peace-man you may be, you cannot help owning there is some truth in it. WILLIAM T. HAKRIS. William Torrey Harris was born in North Kill- ingly, Connecticut, September the 10th, 1835. His early education was received in the common schools and in sundry academies, among others, Phillips and Andover, with a little more than two years at Yale. He did not graduate at any one of these institutions. Later in life, however, Yale conferred on him the degree of A. M. (1869) and LL.D. (1895); Brown University conferred on him the degrees of Ph. D. (1893), and the University of Missouri (1870), the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania (1894), and Princeton University (1896), the degree of LL.D. Doctor Harris resided in St. Louis from 1857 to 1880. During these twenty-three years he was respectively teacher, principal, assistant- superintendent, and finally, superintendent, of public schools, holding the last named position from 1867 to 1880. He was the center of those cultivated minds who assembled in the sixties and seventies at ex-Lieutenant-Governor Brock- meyer's house and at other places, and who promised for a time to make St. Louis a center of Hegelian philosophy. In 1880, Professor Harris was forced by fail- ing health to resign the position of Superintend- ent of the Public Schools ; on his retirement, he (191) 192 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKRITOEY. was presented by the citizens of St. Louis — in recognition of his faithful and distinguished ser- vices — with a gold medal that cost $300, and a purse of $1,000. He then visited Europe, rep- resenting the United States Bureau of . Educa- tion at the International Congress of Educators which was held at Brussels. Eeturning to the United States, he accepted a position as lecturer in the Concord School of Philosophy. In 1889, he again represented the United States Bureau of Education at the Paris Exposition, and on September 12th of that year, he was appointed Commissioner of Education of the United States, which oiEce he still holds. In 1866, he founded the Philosophical Society of St. Louis, and in 1867 began the publication of The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, the first publication of its iiind in the United States, if not in the world. The Journal made a pro- found sensation in this country, and was hailed with approbation in England. That such a work should come from St. Louis was probably the largest item in the list of surprises. The Journal is still very occasionally published, but it has faded from the public mind. From a business stand- point it was badly managed, and has, no doubt, been a financial loss to its publisher. Doctor Harris was assistant editor of " John- son's Cyclopaedia" and contributed some forty articles to the departments of philosophy and psychology. In conjunction with Messrs. Baily and Rickoff he prepared the Appleton " School WILLIAM T. HAERIS. 193 Readers ", and with Duane Doty, he drew up the first formulated " Statement of the Theory of American Education " . He had also priorly writ- ten an " Introduction to the Study of Philoso- ophy ", and published "Hegel's Logic " ; "The Genesis of the Categories of the Mind " ; " How to Teach Science in Public Schools" (1895); " The Spiritual Sense of Dante's Divina Corame- • dia " ; and, " Psychologic Foundations of Edu- cation " (1898) . With F. B. Sanborn, he pub- lished, in two volumes, " A. Bronston Alcott, his Life and Philosophy ". It is simply a matter of course that he should have devoted much thought and study to Dante's immortal work, and that he should have divined its inmost significance, — at least, should have discovered a spiritual sense which should seem the true and vital heart of the " Divina Comme- dia". His record of indefatigable devotion to the sub- ject of intellectual enlightenment so constant, so untiring, so steadily maintained, often hampered as he has been by physical discouragements, is in itself a monument of which any human being might well be proud. Doctor Harris is one of -the most learned and profound scholars, not only of the United States, but of the world. THE EDUCATIVE WORK AT MISSIONS. Education is a term of broad signiflcance and will apply to nearly all that the missionary undertakes to do. For 13 194 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. first he teaches God's message to man and impresses on the minds of the heathen people to whom he is sent the doctrine of the true God who loved man and sent His divine Son to die for him in order that lie might be saved. This doctrine of the divine-human nature of the true God, contains in it, as in a germ, all of Christian civilization. All of the good things which form the power and the glory of the most advanced nations of the world flow as a result from this doctrine : literature, history, and philosophy, — all these have a particular cast given them by the religious doctrine of Christianity, and you cannot successfully teach them to a people that is bound to a heathen creed. A mere nature religion does not admit of science, of free thought, and the investigation of matter and force, for these are the elements that he worships or dreads with a mortal fear, as evil demons, and he spends his whole life in trying to propitiate them with ceremonies and sacrifices. The Christian theory taught first that God transcends nature — that He created it by a divine word — and that He did all this for the sake of man. All time and space is therefore a vast cradle for the nurture of individuality up to personality. God an Absolute Personal Being desiring to share His independence and thought and will, with other beings whom He creates and raises up from nature, to be immortal persons and live in His kingdom forever. According to this doctrine God is love and grace and the nearest approach to Him that man can make is to be filled with the missionary spirit — the spirit that strives with all its might to aid others to see the light and be active in helping others to all that is good. This theological doctrine is the first lesson that the Christian missionary will teach, and without it all further teaching could not avail very much. For with nature religious superstition has and must have so large a sway in the human soul as to dominate its science and arts and make impossible their free development. But after this that nature is not a God nor a demon but only a process of creating and nurturing individuality — after this is adopted, science may explore it (nature) without fear, and invention may freely discover combinations through which the forces, wind, water, fire, electricity, and gravitation may be har- nessed for the service of men — even for his creature com- WILLIAM T. HARRIS. 195 fort and amusement; that is to say, for his bodily wants, food, clothing, recreation, and shelter, as well as for his spiritual wants of intercommunion of all men with all men, sharing in all experience of life, in all discoveries in science and in all insights into nature of the divine, and finally in all the great deeds that tend to benefit the race and thus belong to the missionary conduct and control of human life. First the true theology and next the application of its theory to life. The missionary will not leave his newly con- verted heathen in their manners and customs as he found them. He will change their forms of eating and drinking, their forms of producing food, clothing, and shelter, their habits of life, their institutions of marriage and the family, and their communal laws and usages. One after another, in due order, without haste and without rest, all these things will get changed by the missionary with God's bless- ing, "and the secular life of the converted heathen will grad ually come into harmony with a supernatural religion . While the people are under modes of life which have grown up under a nature-religion, they cannot fully realize the meaning of the Christian doctrine as taught by the mis- sionary. For all must be transformed by Its light before it is fully understood. The most advanced nations have found out what is involved in the Christian religion, far more than the less advanced. It took long centuries to arrive under Christianity at the place where nature was dispossessed of its demons, and the superstitions could so far be overcome as to permit free scientific investigation. And yet this view of nature with its matter and force as a mere instrument for human use was clearly stated from the beginning, and is implied even in the doctrine of the Trinity. But the heathen who retains his old manners and customs meets at every turn with some habit or observance based on a supersti- tious view of nature — something of luck or chance, or bad signs and evil omens, some trace of demonology that has moulded his life in heathendom and which pulls at his gar- ment's hem to drag him down again into the heathen view of the world from which Christian enlightenment is rescuing him. In the early centuries the Christian church found it nec- essary to change all of the heathen feasts and holidays into 196 LITEKATUEE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. saints' days or other reminders of the history of our Lord, By this change the entire calendar became a vivid suggestion of the doctrines of the new religion, whereas it had been, before, a source of constant return to the thoughts of the old religion. The lesson of this is the importance of caring for secular education at our foreign missions. This should be looked for along all of its lines, not because it is a substitute for doctrinal religion but because it aids and re-enforce It, and overcomes the tendency tore-action found in old habits and customs. The secular education of the mission station fits the con- vert from heathenism to enter the world of productive in- dustry and contribute to the wants of distant peoples who go to the world- market for their supplies. They receive in return their quota of the world's good?, brought to them from around the world. This is in Itself a Christian real- ization and not possible under the prevalence of nature religions; because nature religion involves local divinities, gods of this nation or that, gods hostile to other gods and hence it prevents a mutual good understanding among the peoples. Each one is suspicious of the other's motives and every trifle of difEerenee in customs is magnified into an evidence of malignant enmity. Only a state of war is in keeping with a worship of local gods and with a belief in the diverse origin of one's own tribes — my tribe from Baal, your tribe from Osiris. Hence the existence of a world- commerce implies the ascendency of a transcendental religion whose god Is above all nature and who creates nature as a reflection of his grace or loving kindness. With this belief all men are of one blood and made by the same Creator as brethren. Then only arises a spirit of tol- eration for all national peculiarities, accompanied by the missionary zeal to appeal to the intellects of the harrow faith. This proposes a conquest through enlightenment in- stead of a conquest through brute force. SAMUEL L. CLEMENS. Samuel Langhorn Clemens, known the world over under the nom-de-plume of " Mark Twain ", did some of his earliest literary work in St. Louis. He was at that time connected with the traffic business of the Mississippi ; having taken out a pilot's license and worked as a pilot until 1861. This period of his life is graphically de- scribed in " Old Times on the Mississippi ". " Mark Twain " was born in Hannibal, Mis- souri, November 30th, 1835. In May, 1902, he revisited the scenes of his youth and his early struggles. He has paid several visits to St. Louis since his permanent removal to the East, and is taking a generous interest in the Louis- iana Purchase Exposition of this year (1904), and in which he will be a prominent figure. In June, 1902, the City, of St. Louis named its harbor boat the "Mark Twain " in his honor. It was a sight long to be remembered to have seen the genial old white-haired gentleman ascend to the pilot house, take the wheel in hand, and steer the boat up the Mississippi once more after a lapse of probably forty years ! In his youthful days, we are told that Clemens "could not be persuaded to go to school". After his father's death, which occurred when he was twelve years of age, he became an apprentice (197) 198 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. in a printing establishment. At fifteen lie ran away from home and wandered about in the East living the life of a tramp printer until he wAs twenty. He then came back West and became a pilot on the Mississippi river. Shortly after the breaking out of the Civil War, he joined the Confederate forces in Missouri. He was shortly taken prisoner, but he soon escaped and made his way to California. From there, in 1867, he published his "Jumping Frog of Calaveras". Next, he traveled in Europe and the Holy Land as a newspaper correspondent, and in 1869, as the result of his journey, gave the world his " Innocents Abroad ". Next followed " Rough- ing It " (1871); "The Gilded Age", written jointly with Charles Dudley Warner (1873); " Old Times on the Mississippi " (1875); "The Adventures of Tom Say wer " (1876); "A Tramp Abroad" (1880); "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn " (1884) ; " A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur" (1889); "Following theEquator" (1897); " Merry Tales " (1892), and other works. In 1902 he wrote a series of articles on Christian Science for The JSforth American Review. I have observed the literary career of " Mark Twain" unfolding itself with much interest. It has been a puzzle to me. It had always seemed to me impossible that a writer who violated nearly all the canons of literary art, and whose themes were so thoroughly commonplace, should become so extensively known and so widely SAMUEL L. CLEMENS. 199 popular as Mr. Clemens has become. Of course, his fame is only of to-day, but it is wonderful that it is so widespread and hearty, even if it is merely ephemeral. On what is it based? — that is the puzzle. He deals of the everyday and commonplace — he is often coarse (as in " The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"), irreverent, if not blasphemous (as in "The Innocents Abroad"), and unnatural and straining after effect (asin " The Ad,ventures of Tom Saywer"). He has not one tithe of the refinement of Lowell, the delicacy of Irving, or the spontaneous genial- ity of Holmes; and yet, in public estimation, he is greater, or at least, he is more popular, than all three combined ! As a humorist, he paints no typical charac- ters, — he describes individuals whose peculiari- ties, and the unexpected conditions in which they are placed, awake our risibilities for the time being only, and leave no lasting impression. As a novelist, what could possibly be more wretch- edly untrue to history and to human nature than his " Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc " •■ — a twentieth century Joan, labelled fifteenth cen- tury? Mark Twain lacks the education abso- lutely necessary to a great writer ; he lacks the refinement which would render it impossible for him to create such coarse characters as Huckle- berry Finn; furthermore, he is absolutely uncon- scious of all canons of literary art. " He amuses us — he makes us laugh. There is enough sor- row in the world", said a lady to. me lately. 200 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Possibly, that is the secret of Mark Twain's im- mense popularity. Typothetse, an association of New Yorkers, commemorated the birthday of Franklin by a dinner on January 18, 1886. After the cloth was removed, President Martin, one of New York's oldest printers, led off with reminiscences of the historic marvels of typography, and Mr. Clemens, in response to the toast, " The Compositor " gave the following description of the life of a " cub " printer of forty years ago : THE COMPOSITOR. " The chairman's historical reminiscences of Guttenburg have caused me to fall into reminiscences, for I myself am something of an antiquity. (Laughter.) All things change in the procession of years, and it may be that I am among strangers. It may be that the printer of to-day is not the printer of thirty -five years ago. I was no stranger to him. I knew him well. I built his Are for him in the vpinter mornings; I brought his water from the village pump; I swept out his office; I picked up his type from under his stand ; and, if he were there to see, I put the good type in his case and the broken ones among the ' hell matter ' ; and if he wasn't there to see, I dumped it all with the ' pi ' on the imposing- stone — for that was the furtive fashion of the cub, and I was a cub. I wetted down the paper Saturdays, I turned it Sundays — for this was a country weekly; I rolled, I washed the rollers, I washed the forms, I folded the papers, I carried them around at dawn Thursday mornings. The carrier was then an object of interest to all the dogs in town. If I had saved up all the bites I ever received, I could keep M. Pasteur busy for a year. I enveloped the papers that were for the mail — we had a hundred town subscribers and three hundred and fifty country ones; the town subscribers paid in groceries and SAMUEL L. CLEMENS. 201 the country ones in cabbages and cordwood — when they paid at all, which was merely sometimes, and then we always stated the fact in the paper, and gave them a puff; and if we forgot it they stopped the paper. Every man on the town list helped edit the thing — that is, he gave orders as to how it was to be edited ; dictated its opinions, marked out its course for it, and every time the boss failed to connect he stopped his paper. We were just Infested with critics, and we tried to satisfy them all over. We had one subscriber who paid cash, and he was more trouble to us than all the rest. He bought us once a year, body and soul, for two dollars. He used to modify our politics every which way, and he made us change our religion four times in five years. If we ever tried to reason with him he would threaten to stop his paper, and, of course, that meant bank- ruptcy and destruction. That man used to write articles a column and a half long, leaded long primer, and sign them ' Junius ', or ' Veritas ', or ' Vox Populi ', or some other high- sounding rot; and then, after it was set up, he would come in and say he had changed his mind — which was a gilded figure of speech, because he hadn't any — and order it to be left out. We couldn't stand such waste as that ; we couldn't afford ' bogus ' in that office ; so we always took the leads out, altered the signature, credited the article to the rival paper in the next village, and put it in. " Well, we did have one or two kinds of ' bogus '. When- ever there was a barbecue, or a circus, or a baptizing, we knocked ofE for half a day; and then to make up for short matter we would ' turn over ads ' — turn over the whole page and duplicate it. The other ' bogus ' was deep phi- losophical stuff, which we judged nobody ever read; so we kept a galley of it standing, and kept on slapping the same old batches of it in, every now and then, till it got dangerous. Also, in the early days of the telegraph we used to econo- mize on the news. We picked out the items that were point- less and barren of information and stood them on a galley, and changed the dates and localities, and used them over until the public interest in them was worn to the bone. We marked the ada, but we seldom paid any attention to the marks afterwards ; so the life of a ' td ' ad and a ' tf ' ad was equally eternal . I have seen a ' td ' notice of a sheriff's sale still booming serenely along two years after the sale was 202 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERKITORY. over, the sheriff dead and the whole circumstance become ancient history. Most of the yearly ads were patent medi- cine stereotypes, and we used to fence with them. "I can see that printing oflflce of prehistoric times yet, with its horse bills on the wall, its ' d ' boxes clogged with tallow, because we always stood the candle In the ' k ' box nights, its towel, which was not considered soiled until it could stand alone, and other signs and symbols that marked the establishment of that kind In the Mississippi valley; and I can see, also, the tramping 'jour ', who flitted by in the summer and tarried a day, with his wallet stuffed with one shirt and a hatful of handbills; for it he couldn't get any type to set he would do a temperance lecture. His way of life was simple, his needs not complex; all he wanted was. plate and bed and money enough to get drunk on, and he was satisfied. But it may be, as I have said, that I am among strangers, and sing the glories of a forgotten age to un- familiar ears, so I will ' make even ' and stop." MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. Mary Ashley Van Voorhis was born in 1836 in Lyons, Wayne County, New York. In the fifties she married Gideon Townsend of Fishkill, New York. In the sixties they took up their permanent residence in New Orleans. Three daughters were the issue of this union. From the date of her removal to New Orleans her pen contributed to every notable occasion in the history of that city, and the title of Laureate of Louisiana was conferred upon her by the Louisiana Historical Society. In 1884 she was appointed poet of the New Orleans Exposition, and was selected to write the poem for the open- ing of the Woman's Department. Later on she was elected a member of the Liceo Hidalgo, the foremost literar}"^ club of Mexico, in recognition of her published literary appreciations of the land of the Montezumas. Mrs. Townsend was a prolific writer. Her first story was published in a Boston paper. The Lit- erary Museum . She afterwards contributed to The Critic, The Journal of Commerce, many Eastern magazines and several of the New Orleans papers. Besides her poetical writings, she has written enough essays, short stories and general corres- pondence to make a book of each kind of such compositions, besides a work of travel in Mexico. (203) 204 LITEEATUKE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. In 1885, Mrs. Emma Thacker Kaye, an ac- complished literary lady of Chicago, wrote to me upon her return from a visit to New Orleans : ' ' My visit to ' Zariffa ' was simply a sweet ova- tion. She is a highly cultured woman. Her house is furnished in lavish oriental style -^ rich tapestry hangings, large vari-colored rugs, great white silk storks embossed on the walls, majolica vases and rare old paintings, mandolins, bear- skins, etc., complete a home that bespeaks the abode of culture and refinement". To another friend I am indebted for the following written in 1886 : " Mary Ashley Townsend possesses a tall statuesque figure well adapted to the wearing of heavy velvets and rich brocades. She moves among the crowd with a stately grace. Her complexion is fair. Her soft brown hair is rolled back from a womanly brow — and gathered low in a classic coil displaying her shapely head. Her blue eyes have a fine earnest expression, and you comprehend that even in dreamy moods, she does not lose sight of the fact that she is an individual of whom something is constantly expected and demanded. She has a keen appre- ciation of the good, or reverse, in persons ". I remember that Mrs. Townsend read a poem at the meeting of the Associated Press, in St. Louis, about 1886. The above description of her cor- responds with my recollections of her. Mrs. Townsend' s published works include a novel, "The Brother Clerks" (New York, 1859); "Zariffa's Poems" (Philadelphia, MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 205 1870); "The Captain's Story", a dramatic poem (Philadelphia, 1874); " Down the Bayou, and other Poems " (Philadelphia, 1882), and "Distaff and Spindle" (Philadelphia, 1895. Her sonnets in the last mentioned work, The Neio York Press classed with the best ever written in English. Highly educated, accom- plished and naturally gifted, Mrs. Townsend holds a very high rank among Southern authors. In strength, imagination and mastery of language, she stands on a plane only slightly lower than that occupied by Poe and Lanier, the best examples of poetic genius produced by the South so far. She died at New Orleans, June 7, 1901. CREED, {From Zariffa's Poems.') I believe if I should die, And you should kiss my eyelids when I lie Cold, dead, and dumb to all the world contains, The folded orbs would open &t thy breath, And, from its exile in the isles of death. Life would come gladly back along my veins. I believe if I were dead, And you upon my lifeless heart would tread, Not knowing what the poor clod chanced to be, It would find sudden pulse beneath the touch Of him it ever loved in life so much. And throb again, warm, tender, true to thee. I believe if on my grave, Hidden in woody deeps or by the wave, Your eyes should drop some warm tears of regret, 206 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. From every salty seed of your dear grief, Some fair, sweet blossom would leap into leaf, To prove death could not make my love forget. I believe if I should fade Into those mystic realms where light is made, And you should long once more my face to see, I would come forth upon the hills of night And gather stars, like fagots, till thy sight, Led by their beacon blaze, fell full on me ! I believe my faith in thee. Strong as my life, so nobly placed to be, I would as soon expect to see the sun Fall like a dead king from his height sublime, His glory stricken from the throne pf time, As thee unworlh the worship thou hast won. I believe who hath not loved Hath half the sweetness of his life unproved; Like one who, with the grape within his grasp, Drops it with all its crimson juice unpressed, And all its luscious sweetness left unguessed, Out from his careless and unheeding clasp. I believe, love pure and true, Is to the soul a sweet, immortal dew, That gems life's petals in its hours of dusk; That waiting angels see and recognize The rich crown jew%l, love, of Paradise, When life falls from us like a withered husk. THE BATHER. {From " Zariffa's Poems.") Warm from her waist her girdle she unbouad. And cast it down on the insensate turf; Then copse, and cove, and deep-secluded vale, She scrutinized with keen though timid eyes, And stood with ear intent to catch each stir Of leaf, or twig, or bird-wing, rustling there. Her startled heart beat quicker even to hear MAEY ASHLEY TOWNSEND. 207 The wild bee woo the blossom with a hymn, Or hidden insect break its lance of sound Against the obdurate silence. Then she smiled, At her own fears amused, and Ijnew herself In God's own image by that hidden pool. Then from its bounds her wond'rous hair she loosed, Hair glittering like spun glass, and bright as though Shot full of golden arrows. Down below Her supple waist the soft and shimmering coils Boiled in their bright abundance, goldener Than was the golden wonder Jason sought. Her fair hands then, like white doves in a net, A moment fluttered 'mid the shining threads. As with a dexterous touch she higher laid The gleaming tresses on her shapely head, Beyond the reach of rudely amorous waves. Then from her throat her light robe she unclasped, And dropped it downward with a blush that rose The higher as the garment lower fell. Then she cast off the sandals from her feet. And paused upon the brink of that blue lake; A sight too fair for either gods or men; An Eve untempted in her Paradise. The waters into which her young eyes looked Gave back her image with so true a truth She blushed to look, but blushing looked again — As maidens to their mirrors oft return With bashful boldness, once again to gaze Upon the crystal page that renders back Themselves unto themselves, until their eyes Confess their love for their own loveliness. Her rounded cheeks, in each of which had grown. With sudden blossoming, a fresh red rose, She hid an instant in her dimpled hands, Then met her pink palms up above her head, And whelmed her white shape in the welcoming wave. Around each lithesome limb the water twined. And with their lucent raiment robed her form; And, as her hesitating bosom sunk 208 LITEEATURE OF LOUISIANA TERKITORT. To the caresses of bewildered waves, They foamy pearls from their own foreheads gave For her fair brow, and showered in her hair The evanescent diamonds of the deep. Thus dallying with the circumfluent tide, Her loveliness half hidden, halt revealed. An Undine with a soul, she plunged and rose, Whilst the white graces of her rounded arms She braided with the blue of wandering waves. And saw the shoulders of the billows yield Before ttie even strokes of her small hands, And laughed to see, and held her crimson mouth Above the crest of each advancing surge. Like a red blossom pendent o'er a pool — Till, done with the invigorating play, Once more she gained the bank, and once agai i Saw her twin image in the waters born. From the translucent wave each beauty grew To strange perfection. Never statue wrought By cunning art to fullness of all grace. And kissed to life by love, could fairer seem Than she who stood upon that grassy slope. So fresh, so human, so immaculate! Out from the dusky cloisters of the wood The nun -like winds stole with a saintly step. And dried the bright drops from her panting form As. she with hurried hands once more let down The golden drapery of her glorious hair. That fell about her like some royal cloak Dropped from the sunset's rare and radiant loom. DENTON J. SNIDER. Denton J. Snider, the classic scholar and Shakespearian critic, was born at Mount Gilead, Ohio, on the 9th day of January, 1841. He graduated at Oberlin College in 1862. In 1864, and during the succeeding two or three years, he taught English and American literature at the Christian Brothers' College, St. Louis, and later on was,a teacher in the St. Louis High School, under Professor W. T. Harris. In the latter part of the sixties and in the seventies, he was a prominent member of several leading philosoph- ical and literary societies, and during several years of its existence was a lecturer at the School of Philosophy of Concord, Massachusetts. He contributed frequently to The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, The Western, and other magazines of the higher class. During leisure hours he conducted classes for both sexes in Roman and Greek history. Homer, Herodotus, Shakespeare and Goethe. Professor Snider has probably done more for the cause of higher edu- cation in St. Louis than any one who has ever resided in that city, except Professor Harris. About the middle of the seventies, he spent two or three years in European travel, visiting principally the classic grounds of the past. Professor Snider Is the author of several works u (209) 210 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. of higher literature noted for their analytical insight, classic diction, and philosophical power. While the art is not of the highest, it is never- theless of a very high grade. Absorbed as he is in the contemplation of the central idea, he sometimes loses sight of the minor — though not always entirely unimportant details. He does not write for the popular masses, but for the educated few. Popular applause, to him, has no seductive side. •'His best poetry ", the late J. Gabriel Woer- ner, a ripe literary scholar, once said to me, " has not been in book form, but only in printed slips for distribution among his intimate friends. The finest specimens of his poetic powers are con- tained in his " Soul's Journey" (in three parts), 'The Triumph of Death,', ^The Triumph of the Image ' , and ' The Triumph of Eeason ' . The poem, or cycle of poems, is the outcry of his soul steeped in grief over the loss of his wife ' ' . Professor Snider married a St. Louis lady late in the sixties. His " Walk in Hellas " (1882), to me, is the most delightful of his books, because he is upon the classic ground so dear to him ; it infects the reader with that enthusiastic adoration of the beautiful, which is Mr. Snider's divine gift from the Muses. Professor Snider resided in St. Louis about twenty-five years. Since some fifteen years he lives in Chicago, but he pays frequent visits to his old friends in the city of the coming Expo- DENTON J. SNIDER. 211 sition. His wife died in St. Louis in 1874. He has an only daughter who is married and lives in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. He will locate in St. Louis again in March, 1904. His published works are: "A System of Shakespeare's Dramas" (1877); "Delphic Days" (1880); "Agamemnon's Daughter" (1885); " An Epigrammatic Voyage " (1886); "A Commentary on Goethe's Faust" (1886); " A Commentary on Shakespeare's Tragedies" (1887); "TheFreeburgers; a Novel" (1890) ; "Homerin Chios: anEpop^e" (1891) ; " Johnny Appleseed " and " World's Fair Studies " ( 1894 ) ; " The American State", " Psychosis " ; " Froe- bel's Mother Play-Songs"; "The Psychology of Froebel's Play-Gifts " ; "The Life of Fred- erick Froebel " ; " Psychology and the Psycho- sis"; "Ancient European Philosophy" (St. Louis, 1903) ; " Modern European Philosophy " (St. Louis, 1904) ; and three or four others of less importance. " An Epigrammatic Voyage " is a book of poet- ical musings written during Professor Snider' s travels among the classic authors — a log-book, in fact. His pages are the moonlight of poesy, their luster is the borrowed light of classic themes. While betraying an unusual fondness for things Olympian and Pompeiian, he criticises himself by saying that on the cairn of stones reared by former poets — " On the pile I throw down my pebbles, each one is scrib- bled With some legend faint, visible scarce to the crowd." 212 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. He loves to haunt the Homeric landscapes ; . he delights to drink the literary vintages grown in Greek sunshine. Not caring for popular ap- plause, he must seek his reward in the odors of Hymettus and the pellucid shores of Calypso. In 1899, Professor Snider published, "The Will and its World" (St; Louis), which is a valuable addition to education. It is not an ar- gument, but an unfolding of the fact that the will is free. It is a most admirable book on pedagogy in making clear both the processes by which the supreme good — a good will — must be attained if it iS ever realized and also those by which evil becomes dominant in the soul of man and the method of its own self-annulment. THE TALL APPLE TREE. {From " The Freeburgers.") The Tall Apple Tree was the sole antiquity of the village, where Time had as yet dropped none of its spiritual me- mentos; it rose out of the past a single flash shooting rear- ward into thick night. It became thus the mystery of the place, upon which the villagers stretched their souls quite back to the original apple-tree in the flrst Garden. What providing spirit had wandered hither before them and planted it just for their behoof? But its origin did not trouble many people ; they enjoyed its shade, they plucked its fruits and went their way, like most of the children of Adam. They never saw the hand reaching to them out of the dark with these gifts, never beheld the body to which this hand belonged, never looked upon the face which crowned this body. To these objects in the landscape, we must add another which towered up not far away and persisted in being seen DENTON J. SNIDEE. 213 for miles around. This was tlie School-house, a plain but commodious building, in which Miss Hope Winslowwas the controlling spirit. It may with justice be called the third center of the village; or, more properly, the third corner in the triangle made by the Tall Apple Tree and the Public Square. The three objicts seemed to stand in a certain close connection with one another, faintly suggested by their mathematical relation ; they belonged together and formed not only one spatial figure, but one spiritual fact of, the town. If either had been taken away, the rest would have been different, and Freeburg would have had another kind of life. The School-house was a plant of civilization, and it was well authenticated who set out the plant. Here the Un- known entered not, but was driven away with the pedagog- ical birch, if necessary. The School-house was the realm of the Known ; the very sight of it suggested its character. It was built on a little hillock, was three stories high, and overlooked the entire village, standing squarely on its base and tuined to the four points ot the compass. A striking fact about it was that, it was full of windows, which made it light within, and gave it the appearance of light without. As it rose up over its hillock, it seemed to be all eyes, es- pecially when the sun shone brilliantly upon it, and trans- formed each window-pane into a blaze of illumination. On every side it was open ; not a brick of it remained hidden by any intervening object; only a small veranda modestly sug- gested that there was an entrance to the building for any diligent seeker. These three centers will occur often in the course of our narrative, since around them most of the people as well as most of the events of Freeburg naturally group themselves. CONSCIENCE OR THE CONSTITUTION? (JFrom " The Freeburgers.") The anti-slavery agitation had arisen, and was gradually taking possession of the political conviction of the North. It was, however, no mere theoretical dispute about right and wrong ; the man was summoned to act. A national law 214 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. had been recently passed, which made it incumbent upon every citizen of a free country to aid in returning a fugitive slave to his master. The legislation of certain Northern States had sought, with varying success, to assist or to ob- struct the national law. From the legislature the question passed necessarily to the Judiciary. The issue was plain, in spite of all legal cobwebs spun around it; each candidate had to be tested by it; as Judge, his influence was important. The people rigidly applied the test to every man soliciting their sufirages ; they asked not what is law, but what does this man think Is the law. The great event loves to hide Itself and play with appear- ances before it throws off its mask and stands visible, in full panoply marching before the front rank of battle. In those days many were the tortuosities and subterfuges and legal quibbles going to prove by law that the law was no law. Some said the State was not constitutional; others declared that the national law was not constitutional, while the people were rapidly beginning to believe that the constitution Itself was not constitutional. Through dark subterranean chan- nels of argumentation the stream of discussion kept flowing, with new twists and turns, ntw solutions and new difficul- ties daily. Bat after all distinctions, subtle and obvious, important and unimportant, had been laid down, wiped out and laid down again, possibly to be wiped out again, there rose out of this turbulent sea of words one colossal ques- tion, unshaken by the tempest and high as heaven, with dazzling nakedness and of terrible practical import: Am I to obey Conscience or the Constilutlon? THE HOME OF DIANA. (^From "Agamemnon's Daughter.") There stands high up above the town a fane Whose marble front peeps out the thicket green. And every stone a softened tint hath ta'en, Purer than any pearl was ever seen, Washed in the waters of an ocean clean ; The leaflets flutter noiseless round the side, The tree -tops to the roof do fondly lean, The jewel of the wood within to hide. DENTON J. SNIDER. 215 The timid deer sports tliere without alarm, The wary bird can there no trapper fear, It was a spot where man dared do no barm, Peace reigneth in that wood the entire year, The fountain's modest joy one scarce will hear, As it wells out beneath a root of might, And trails in crystal pure a leaflet sere, Or paints a tender stain on pebble white. This was the home of Dian, these her woods, Where oft the Goddess rested from the chase, When she amid the sylvan solitudes Had led her choir in the tumultuous race And of that sport the air felt long the trace, Though the gay rout had faded all away ; It was the soft worn heart's own resting place. Far from the town, and the bold stare of day, GEOKGE W. CABLE. George W. Cable was born in New Orleans, October 12, 1844. His ancestors on his father's side were from Virginia, and on his mother's from New England. His parents removed to New Orleans in 1837. At fourteen, he was obliged to leave school and go to work to help the family financially. He was employed in the Custom House, and then in a dry goods store until he was eighteen, when he entered the Confederate army (1862). After the Civil War, he studied civil engineering ; on a surveying expedition along the banks of the Atchafalaya river he caught swamp fever from which he suffered for six years. At twenty-five (in 1869) he married Miss Louise Bartlett of New Orleans. He next became a bookkeeper in a cotton firm, began writing for the Picayune and some Eastern magazines, and was finally treasurer of the New Orleans Cotton Exchange until 1879, the year that his " Old Creole Days " was published. Mr. Cable's Creole stories gained for him im- mediate recognition and popularity. Like Bret Harte, he had the good luck to discover an un- gleaned field, ripe for the harvester. We had all heard of New Orleans, the City of the Carnivals, but we never knew her until he led us through her narrow, antique streets in the old French (216) GEORGE W. CABLE. 217 quarter, and pointed out the old mouldering houses with their overhanging balconies and mediaeval air. He swung open on their creaking hinges the doors of time-battered mansions, musty with the pungent odors of departed generations, and intro- duced us to the stately, bewigged and diamond- powered matrons, the courtly and chivalrous cav- aliers, and the bevies of volatile brunettes in summer dress and buckled slippers who loiter on the shaded piazzas and in the cool corridors. Here, at our very doors, was an enchanted land, a terra incognita to us. A province of la belle France, a corner of Moorish Spain, transplanted upon our soil, deep-rooted and flourishing; and we, grown sordid and cold-blooded in our fever- ish daily grasping after power and at dollars and cents, were all unconscious and unappreciative of this calm, unimpassioned life of these light- hearted, effervescent, care-free Latins! Mr. Cable has interpreted and recorded forever the traditions and the social life of the Creoles of Louisiana in fiction, just as surely as Mr. Gayarre has their legends and achievements in history. This is the impression Mr. Cable's books makes upon one who is not familiar with the Creoles of New Orleans and Louisiana. In December, 1903, I spent a week in New Orleans gathering materials for this book ; I was not in the city but a few hours that I felt the frigidity with which Mr. Cable's name was received whenever I mentioned it. The Creoles of New Orleans denounce Mr. 218 LITEEATURE OF LOUISIANA TERKITOET. Cable with an emphasis that is not to be mis- taken. They assert that he has maligned their race, that he has maliciously caricatured them and satirized their traditions. Furthermore, they say that he has done them an irreparable wrong — that while not so stating in plain lan- guage, still he has conveyed to Eastern readers the idea that the Creoles have a strain of negro blood; and, again, that he has drawn his heroes and heroines from among the quadroons and octa- roons and ignored the heroic element in the pure whites (a sin of omission, rather than of commission, as I understand this latter accusa- tion). Mr. Gayarre, I'Abb^ Rouquette and Professor Fortier have published pamphlets on this subject ; I regret to say that I was unable to procure copies of them. I leave this question to Mr. Cable and his critics ; I confess that I am not sufficiently conversant with the points at issue, to hazard an opinion. Mr. Cable's books are: " Old Creole Days " (1879); " The Grandissimes " (1880) ; "Madame Delphine (1881); "Dr. Sevier" (1883); "The Creoles of Louisiana" (1884); "The Silent South" (1885); " John March, Southerner" (1886); " Bonadventure " (1888); "Strong Hearts" (1888); "Strange True Stories of Louisiana" (1888); " The Cavalier " (1901); " Bylow Hill" (1902), — these were all pub- lished in New York. " The New Orleans Guide Book" was published in New Orleans, in 1884, GEORGE W. CABLE. 219 and " The Busy Man's Bible " etc., in Meadville, Pennsylvania, in 1891. In '"^ The Cavalier " and " Bylow Hill " Mr. Cable has invaded a new field and — has failed. Since about eighteen or twenty years, Mr. Cable has resided at Northampton, Massachusetts. STANLEY WATERLOO. Stanley Waterloo of Chicago (formerly of St. Louis, and later on of St. Paul), was born in St. Clair County, Michigan, in 1847. The first ten years of his life were spent in the backwoods of the northwestern frontier, which accounts for the intimate knowledge of nature he displays in many of his books. He is, says the Toronto Globe, " one of the best of nature's delineators." Out on this frontier, he learned more of the ways and doings of the pioneers, hunters and early settlers than of aught else, and grew up skillful with rifle, trap and fishing line. But, thanks to his mother, who at one time had been a school teacher, his education was not entirely neglected. Subsequently, he attended the Uni- versity of Michigan, but did not graduate. In 1870, he went to Chicago to study law, but soon drifted into journalism. After the great Chicago fire of 1871, he removed to St. Louis and there became one of the proprietors of the Evening Journal. He shortly left the Journal, and during the following twelve or thirteen years, he successively edited, or served on the editorial staff of. The Missouri Repub- lican (now the RepubUc), the Evening Chron- icle and the Olobe- Democrat. He next appears in St. Paul, where he began the publication of (220) STANLEY WATERLOO. 221 TJie Day. The paper not proving to be a tinan- cial success, it was sold to the proprietors of the Dispatch, and Mr. Waterloo removed to Chicago to fill a position on the editorial staff of the Tribune. From the Tribune, he became con- nected editorially with the Mail, the Times and the Evening Journal, respectively, during the succeeding seven or eight years, and until he turned his attention almost exclusively to litera- tui"e. He lately served two terms as president of the Chicago Press Club. His first book was a novel, " A Man and a Woman" (Chicago, 1892), which is now in its nineteenth American edition, and has gone through several English editions. This work is an analytical story of unordinary power and highly interesting as a study ; ' ' added to the interest of the tale, is the clear-cut, lucid and finished style in which it is written" (Chicago Herald). After "A Man and a Woman" followed: "The Seekers", "Armageddon", " The Story of a Strange Career ", " The Wolf's Long Howl ", " The Story of Ab " and " These are My Jewels." Of these, "The Story of Ab " displays a depth of scientific knowledge and re- search which are rarely to be found in the nov- elists of to-day. It is a story of the pre-historic cave dweller, the early man. The climate, the fauna, the human beings and their ways and daily life, are as accurately rendered as science and history can approximate them. The majority of Mr. Waterloo's books have 222 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. been issued from New York and London. They have obtained a positive foothold in England, and are a financial success to his English pub- lisher. But few of the American novelists of to-day can lay claim to an established English market. Mr. Waterloo is a patient, indefatigable stu- dent, and he justly merits all the success he has met with at home and abroad. The selection given below is from one of his " lighter" articles. MOTHER COON. {liVom The National Progress. 1903.} Frogs dream jast like other people, and their dreams are justified by lurking dangers which mean death to the frog. The greatest dangers to the frog are the things with long legs and the long, piercing bill, and another thing with four legs and a tail which is ringed about most beautifully. I suppose I know more than other frogs, because I listen so much to the human beings talking on the banks, and one day I heard a great scientist tell what was bad for frogs. He said that the two greatest enemies of the frogs were the small green heron and the coon — I suppose I should say " raccoon " because that is the full name of the murderous thing. Well, Mother Coon used to come swimming down from the np-waters of the creek, with four young coons swinging behind her, and they were very beautiful. Once in a while Father Coon would come swinging loaflngly behind them, but I did not fear him as much as I did Mother Coon. He was heavy and strong, but he was not so quick as Mother Coon. There was something devilish about Mother Coon. As she entered the pond, and swam quickly through it with her brood behind her, she seemed to see everything that was lying under the lily-pads. There was a swift twitch STANLEY WATERLOO. 223 of her neck, so swift that I cannot tell about it, and she had seen and torn from the mud another hiding frog and tossed it backj to be eaten by her children. They tore it to pieces, and it gave one strange little squeak before it died. That squeak has always bothered me in my dreams. Mother Coon came down at least once a week, and there were five hundred of us frogs in the pond in August, and there were only two hundred in the beginning of October, And yet I could not help admiring Mother Coon. She was so beautiful, with her keen eyes and her sharp nose and her regard for the welfare of her children. And the funny thing about it all was that I had a sort of sympathy with her, despite the fact that she or her children would have eaten me if I had not wallowed so deeply in the mud. She had her own troubles, and they were mighty serious ones. Johnny Smith had seen her once. Johnny Smith had told his father's hired man. Bill Jones, that there was a coon rang- ing along the creek, and so they came down one night with the hound, f That hound was the funniest looking animal that ever breathed. Of course a frog can't be expected to know much about dogs or breeds ; but that dog was certainly the most abnormal production in a canine way that ever was. He seemed to be a cross between a hound and an apple tree. He had short legs and thought he could run — bat he couldn't! Nevertheless, he had the scent in his nostrils of generations of hounds and terriers, and he could follow what he pleased. If Mother Coon had passed that night he knew it, and the only safety for Mother Coon was sweeping down the river and getting somewhere into the recesses below, and hiding herself in some great hollow tree. Things seem to equalize themselves, don't they? Mother Coon was my nightmare, and that imitation of a hound was Mother Coon's nightmare, and I guess her dreams were worse than mine 1 JOHN U. MUSICK. John R. Musick, author, journalist and politi- cian, was born in St. Louis County, Missouri, February 28, 1849, and died in Omaha, Ne- braska, April 14th, 1901. Injuries which he received while assisting in the rescue of the in- jured after a cyclone at Kirksville, Missouri, a few years previously, were the causes which led to his death. Mr. Musick graduated at the Northern Mis- souri State Normal School in 1874 ; he then studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1877, and opened an office at Kirksville, Missouri. There he practiced until 1882. The remainder of his life was devoted to journalism and litera- ture. He published: "Calamity Row", "The Mysterious Mr. Howard", "Brother against Brother", "Nature's Nobleman" and "His Brother's Crime ", inthe last half of the eighties, and " Stories of Missouri" (New York, 1897). ' ' Brother against Brother " is a story of the Civil War. Those who believe it good policy to revive the bitter memories of the Civil War, will find the story interesting and pleasant. In " Na- ture's Nobleman ", he depicts life and portrays characters as he finds them. He lacks a suffi- cient depth of insight, and does not carry his (224) JOHN R. MUSICK. 225 analysis as far as he should. In " Calamity Eow " he introduces a multitude of characters: stock operators, medical students, shop girls, dock ' rats ', street urchins, etc., etc. They go through a multitude of rapid changes and ex- periences. This is probably the worst of Mr. Musick's novels. Mr. Musick devoted the last years of his life to writing popular historical works. To this class belong: " Hawaii; our New Possessions ", " The War with Spain ", " Lights and Shadows of the War with Spain " and "Cuba Libre". But his most ambitious work was the series entitled "The Columbian Historical Novels" (New York, completed in 1897), in which he attempts the portrayal of the customs, manners, and every-day life of the peoples of the various periods from the discovery of America to the end of the Civil War. The work is in twelve volumes. Mr. Musick told me that he had spent ten years in research for the matter used in these volumes and that it took him a little over two years to write them. He was for many years a member of the Mis- souri Eepublican State Committee. He was twice president of the Authors' Guild of New York City, and was several times Grand Chan- cellor Commander of the Knights of Pythias of the State of Missouri. He served ten years as United States Commissioner at Kirksville, Mis- souri . 15 226 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. AN ADVENTORE OF AUDUBON. (From the St. Louis Magazine. 1886.) Audubon reached the cabin in the wilderness and present- ing himself at the door, asked a tall, ungainly looking wonian it he might find shelter beneath her roof during the night. She was by no means prepossessing in appearance ; her voice was grufE, and her attire negligently thrown about her, gave her a slatternly appearance. As he entered the hut and seated himself on a rude stool before the fire, he discovered a finely formed young Indian squatting in one corner, rest- ing his head between his hands and with his elbows on his knees. A long bow rested against the log wall near him, while a quiver of arrows and two or three raccoon skins lay at his feet. He paid no attention to Audubon ; he did not move, and scarcely seemed to breathe. The scientist was accustomed to the habits of the Indians, and knowing they pay little attention to civilized strangers, did not think the conduct of this young man unnatural . Many of the Indians of the Mississippi Valley spoke French, and Audubon addressed him in that language. The savage evidently understood him, for raising his head he pointed to one of his eyes, and at the same time giving him a significant look with the other. Audubon was horri- fied to find his noble young face covered with blood. He afterwards ascertained that an hour before his arrival, as the Indian was in the act of discharging an arrow at a raccoon in the top of a tree, the arrow split upon the cord and sprang back with such violence into his right eye as to destroy it forever. His long tramp had made Audubon hungry, and he asked his uncouth hostess if she could not furnish him with some supper. She answered that there was plenty of venison and jerked buffalo meat, and on removing the ashes from the hearth she procured a cake. Such a thing as a bed was not to be seen, but there was a pile of untanned bear and buffalo hides in the corner which might answer for a bed on the present occasion. " Am I to sleep there? " he asked. The woman glanced at the skins and nodded assent. She JOHN E. MUSIOK. 227 was a strong mixture of Freuch aud Spanish. Though not an Indian, she was more than a savage. She was one of those early settlers who had sought the frontier as a port of safety from the violated laws of civilization. Having satisfied the demands of his appetite, he helped his dog to a good supper before retiring. The Indian rose from his seat as if in extreme suffering. He passed and re- passed Audubon several times, and once pinched him on the side so severely as to almost evoke an exclamation of anger. But when he had started up, his eye met the Indian's, and the look was so forbidding as to chill the nervous scientist. It was not a threatening, but a warning look, so full of strange meaning as to myslify and alarm Audubon. Having accomplished his purpose, the Indian agent seated himself, drew an ugly looking knife from its greasy scabbard and examined its edge as one would a razor suspected of being dull, replaced it, and taking his tomahawk from his back, filled the pipe with tobacco and proceeded to smoke. When their hostess chanced to have her back turned toward them, he sent Audubon expressive glances. Never until that moment had the great ornithologist's senses been fully awakened to the danger which threatened him. He re- turned glance for glance with his companion, and felt assured that whatever enemies there might be about him, the Indian was not one of their number. At last realizing that his position was somewhat perilous, he asked the woman for his watch, wound it up, and under pretence of wishing to see what kind of weather they would have on the morrow, took up his gun and walked out of the cabin. He could have easily escaped, but beyond a few significant gestures from the young Indian, he felt that he had no assurance that the woman was not honest. Besides the dangers of the forest might be equal to any that threat- ened him in the cabin.' He slipped a ball Into each barrel of his gun, scraped the fiint, renewed the priming and re- entered the hut with a favorable report of his observations. Calling his faithful dog to him, he laid down with his gun at his side, and in a few moments was fast asleep. But he had no Intention of losing his consciousness. The young Indian still sat in a corner of the hut, and occasionally cast a glance at the corner where the scientist lay. But a short time had elapsed when voices were heard, 228 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. and from the corner ol his eyes, Audubon saw two athletic young men, bearing a dead stag on a pole between them, entering the door. They threw down their burden and called for whiskey. The young hunters had soon eaten and drunken them- selves into an almost helpless condition. The feelings of Audubon can be better imagined than described, when he saw his female flend incarnate take a large carving knife ard go deliberately to a grind-stone which stood near the fireplace, and proceed to grind it. One of her drunken sons turned the machine, while she poured on water and held down the glittering blade, grinding away and pausing every few minutes to test the keenness of the edge. They could not have been more deliberate had they set about killing a hog. All was ready. The hideous old hag was advancing, prob - ably contemplating the best way of dispatching the white man while her sons should be engaged with the Indian. Audubon was several times on the eve of rising and shooting her dead on the spot, — but she was not destined to be pun- ished in that manner. The door suddenly opened and there entered two stout travelers, each with a long rifle on his slioulder, Audubon sprang to his feet with a shout of joy, and heartily welcomed them, told them how well it was for him that they had arrived at that moment. The whole was told in a minute. The drunken sons were arrested, and though the hag fought like a tigress she was knocked down and shared a similar fate, The Indian danced for joy, and by signs giving them to understand that he could not sleep for pain, informed them that he would remain on guard. Day came and with it the punishment of the captives. They were now quite sobered. Their feet were unbound, but their arms left securely tied. Marching them in the woods oft the road, and having served them as regulators were wont to use such miscreants, they gave all the skins and furs to the young Indian, set fire to the cabin and pro- ceeded to the settlement. Audubon says that during the twenty-five years of his wanderings all over the country, this was the only time his life was in danger from his fellow creatures. Fifteen years later he traveled over the same ground; a marked change had taken place. The country was dotted with farm houses, villages and fertile fields, and there were good substantial roadside inns where the weary traveler could rest without danger. MRS. E. J. NICHOLSON. Let the people of New Orleans hear that you are writing a book in which their local authors will be noticed, and you will be told right and left, in the bookstores, on the streets, in the hotel corridoTs — " Don't forget Pearl Eivers!" As ' ' Pearl Eivers ' ' published only one vol- ume and a very small pamphlet, the attachment of the people of New Orleans to their dead poetess is simply beautiful. In St. Louis, ex- cept by a handful of literary scholars, " Pearl Rivers ' ' would have been forgotten within thirty days. " Pearl Eivers" was Eliza J. Poitevant. She was born on the banks of Pearl river, in Hancock County, Mississippi. Her ancestors were Huguenots who settled in Mississippi after the edict of Nantes. On account of her mother's poor health, she was taken in charge and reared by a childless aunt. Her home was a rambling old country house surrounded by deep woods. Here, on the banks of the river, with the com- panionship of birds and flowers and the smaller wild animals, she grew up loving nature and dreaming poems. While still almost a mere girl, she contributed poems to Bonner's Neto York Ledger and Willis and Morris' Home Journal which attracted the attention of Mr. A. M. Hol- brook, the proprietor of the New Orleans Pica- (229) 230 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. yune, who tendered her the literary editorship of his paper, which she accepted. Some two years subsequently she married Mr. Holbrook. A few years later he died, leaving her the paper which was heavily mortgaged and financially worthless. Through the influence of Mr. George Nicholson, the business manager, Mrs. Holbrook concluded to continue the publi- cation of the paper. She- assumed the editorial charge, and so ably did she conduct the Pica- yune, that before her death the debt was paid and it was on a sound financial basis, and with a largely increased circulation. Furthermore, its reputation was re-established — for it must be confessed that the Picayune had sadly fallen in public estimation since the days when George W. Kendall made it a household word to our fathers. Mrs. Holbrook married Mr. Nicholson in 1878. She died m 1896, leaving two sons. She was the first woman in the South who engaged prac- tically in newspaper publishing. After she assumed charge of the Picayune, she wrote very little poetry. The poetess had given place to the business woman, and business cares absorbed all her time and brain. She left us only one volume, "Lyrics, by Pearl Rivers". A pamphlet of twelve pages was published after her death, with the title of, "Two Poems. By 'Pearl Rivers' (Mrs. E.J. Nicholson.) Born, 1849; Died, 1896". MRS. E. J. NICHOLSON. 231 SINGING HEART. The world has bruised the singing heart, It has wept tears like dew; And Slander, with a poisoned dart, Has pierced it through and through. But singing hearts are hard to kill. And God made mine with wings To fly above all earthly ill ; And so it lives and sings. HAGAR. {From " Two Poems. ") * * * Go back ! Why do you follow me? I am a poor Bondswoman, but a woman still, and these Sad memories, so bitter and so sweet, Weigh heavily upon my breaking heart And make it hard, my lord — for me to go. " Your God commands it? " Then my gods, the gods Of Egypt, are more merciful than yours. Isis and good Osiris never gave Command like this, that breaks a woman's heart, To any prince in Egypt. Come with me And let us go and worship them, dear lord. Leave all your wealth to Sara. Sara loves The touch of costly linen and the scent Of precious Chaldean spices, and to bind Her brow with golden fillets, and perfume Her hair with ointment. Sara loves the sound Of many cattle lowing on the hills; And Sara loves the slow and stealthy tread Of many camels moving on the plains. Hagar loves you. Oh! come with me, dear lord. Take but your staff and come with me. Your mouth Shall drink my share of water from this jug And eat my share of bread with Ishmael ; 232 LITEKATUKE OF LOUISIANA TEKKITORY. And from your lips I will refresh myself Witli love's sweet wine from tender kisses presaed. Ah! come, dear lord. OhI come, my Abraham. Nay, do not bend your cold, stern brows on me So frowningly; it was not Hagar's voice That spoke from pleading words. Go back! Go back! And tell your God I hate him, and I hate The cruel, craven heart that worships him And dare not disobey. Ha! I believe 'Tis not your far-ofE, bloodless God you fear, But Sara. Coward! Cease to follow me! Go back to Sara. See ! she beckons now, Hagar loves not a coward ; you do well To send me forth into the wilderness, Where hatred hath no weapon keen enough, That held within a woman's slender hand Could stab a coward to the heart. I go! I go, my lord; proud that I take with me Of your countless herds by Hedron's brook Of all your Canaan riches, naught but this — A jug of water and a loaf of bread, And now, by all of Egypt's gods, I swear It it were not for Ishmael's dear sake My feet would tread upon this bitter bread. My hands would pour this water on the sands ; And leave this jag as empty as my heart Is empty now of all the reverence And overflowing love it held for you. I go! But I will teach my little Ishmael To hate his father for his mother's sake ; His bow shall be the truest bow that flies Its arrows through the desert air. His feet. The fleetest on the desert's sands ; Aye ! Hagar's son a desert prince shall be. Whose hands shall be against all other men ; And he shall rule a fierce and mighty tribe. Whose fiery hearts and supple limbs will scorn The chafing curb of bondage, like the fleet wild horses of Arabia. I go! MKS. E. J. NICHOLSON. 233 But like this loaf tliat you have given me, So shall your bread taste bitter with my hate ; And like the water in this jug, my lord, So shall the sweetest water that you draw From Caaaan's wells, taste salty with my tears. Farewell! I go, but Egypt's mighty gods Will go with me, and my revenge be. And in what ever distant land your God, Your cruel God of Israel, is known. There, too, the wrongs that yon have done this day To Hagar and your flrst-born, Ishmael, Shall waken and uncoil themselves, and hiss Like adders at the name of Abraham. JAMES W. BUEL. The amount of literary work that Mr. James W. Buel of St. Louis, can do in a given time is simply marvelous. Possibly, no living author has more books to his credit than he has. His works are sold by subscription only, and have an aston- ishing circulation. They have also netted him a large fortune. James W. Buel was born in Golconda, Illinois, October 22, 1849. He is the son of Alexander Hall and Sarah Jones Buel. He was brought up in a country town and followed the trade of a tanner until he was thirteen years of age, in the meantime attending a country school. He taught school in 1867, and in 1868 won a scholarship (by competitive examination) in the University of Illinois, which he attended for two years, at the same time being its librarian. He left col- lege before graduating, and started a country newspaper in Spring Hill, Kansas. Subse- quently, he was engaged in journalism in Kansas City and St. Louis. He married Eliza Brewster of Warsaw, Illinois, in 1871; she died in 1896. In 1901, he married Annie E. Hill of Minne- apolis. Mr. Buel began writing books in 1878, and has followed the literary profession ever since. In 1882, fortified with letters from Mr. Freling-^ (234) JAMES W. BUEL. 235 huysen, the then Secretary of State, he made an extensive tour of Eussia and Siberia, visiting the prisons and convict mines of the latter, as far east as Irkeetolc, and north to Leneseisk. He afterwards made many trips to Europe in quest of information for his historical works. His principal publications are: "Heroes of the Plains " (1881) ; " Metropolitan Life Unveiled " (1881); "Exile Life in Siberia" (1882); "The World's Wonders" (1884); "Sea and Land " (1885) ; " The Beautiful Story " (1887) ; "Heroes of the Dark' Continent " (1889); ' ' Around the World with the Great Voyagers ' ' (1890) ; "The Living World " and " The Story of Man " (1891) ; " Columbus and Columbia " and "The Magic City" (1893); " Manual of Self Help" and "America's Wonderlands" (1894); "Beautiful Paris" (1895); "Roses and Thorns of Paris and London" (1897); "The Great Operas" (10 sections) (1899); " Great Achievements of the Century ", " Hero Tales" and " McKinley and his Times " (1900); "Library of American History" (6 volumes) (1901) ; and " The Louisiana Territory and Ex- position " (10 volumes) (1904). Besides the books just enumerated he has co- laborated with the Honorable James G. Blaine, the Reverened T. DeWitt Talmage, and John Clark Eidpath in the production of other works which do not bear his name. 23r> LITEKATUEE OF LOUISIANA TERKITOEY. MAN. (From " The Story of Man.") The story of man is, pre-eminently, the most interesting, I may say captivating, study with which the human mind can concern itself. To those who have given no thought to the subject, the present is regarded as the golden age, the highest advance yet made in a persistent and constant ascent towards the summit of ambitious attainment. From our position we may look down upon the centuries and observe all the fruits of their development. But to the student of history, and especially of arcbseology, the aspect is far less flattering to our vanity, for he reads in the resurrected relics of the infinite past records that prove how man, in his efforts to reach a more perfect civilization, retrograded after each advance, just as the tide of the sea recedes as often as it rises to the flood. From primeval savagery, with its discomforts, disadvan- tages and discouragements, impenetrable brakes, dangerous animals, the fury of forces not comprehended, and the awe-inspiring environments that emphasized his defense- less condition — a very babe in the woods — man has grown by slo^ and intermittent advances to a high estate, and established himself as the lord of creation, the master of his surroundings. But it has not been an invariable prog- ress, for, like Sisyphu.s, he has tumbled back down the slope under the burden of the varied influences, and been forced, time and again, to begin anew his journey from the valley of barbarism. Our national conceit, the estimate we place upon our achievements in the framing of equitable laws, in inventions, in science, learning and contributory comforts, may, as it should, be relieved by a consideration of facts that so thoroughly establish the truth that at our best we are Ijjit imitators of those who lived ages ago, while in many particulars we are not so near the apex of perfect civilization as others who trod the upward path centuries before our era. * * * Who were the inventors, the promoters, the masters of the early sciences? Archimedes, who conceived the appli- cation of the lever? Why, the lever was in common use JAMES W. BUEL. 237 thousands of years before his age; so was the screw, so was the science of mathematics! All thei principles and sciences, as also that of specific gravity, were thoroughly understood and applied la the building of the Egyptian pyramids, and there is the best of evidence to prove the statement that steam power was also employed in the same great worlj. Did Guttenberg invent the art of piinting? Why, there is a paper in China that has been issued regu- larly for more than two thousand years I Did Galileo in- vent the telescope? Why, the Central Americans, before Galileo lived, knew all about the telescope, were familiar with the zodiac, were thorough astronomers, and one of their most ancient sculptures represents a man on an observatory looking through a telescope and making an astronomical observation! Is steel a discovery of the nineteenth cen- tury? Why, steel instruments were used during the reign of the shepherd kings in Egypt, six thousand years ago! Is the opera glass or spy glass, an instrument evolved fi'om Galileo's discovery?. Why, Nero used a gem through which to view the gladiatorial combats in the arena some hundreds of yards distant from the royal box! Mauritius is said to have owned a glass through which he could distinctly view the coast of Africa from a promontory of Sicily. * * * And so I might introduce many more examples in proof of the claim that civilizations rise and fall like the tides of the sea, for human progress is so intermittent that its muta- tions are like the motions of a pendulum, swinging now across the valley of benighted barbarism and up the gentle slope towards the pinnacle of exaltation, then driven back by ad- verse influences, scourges, devastating wars, immoralities, until, gaining momentum, it crosses the shadowy abysses and rises to the peak of human discouragement. Here the pendulum pauses until the gravity of ambition pushes it again forward, thus imparting a reciprocal impulse which keeps it in perpetual motion. And over this line, like the wash of the restless sea waves, we see a track marked by proud monuments and moulding ruins, the evidences alike of human aspirations and disappointments. 238 LITERATURE OP LOUISIANA TERRITORY. COLUMBUS. {From "Columbus and Columbia.") The story of Columbus Is at once an epic and an elegy; a narration of bold conception, persistent courage, lieroic attainment, mingled witli the gall of national Ingratitude and the malevolence of personal jealousies. The adven- tures of the Homeric Ulysses were not more illustrious vyith valor; the afflictions of NIobe were not more tearful with despair. East and west of his life there were bitter- ness and shadows: radiant Hope tip-toeing on the pedestal of wonderous accomplishments, and Faith bowing with grief before envious and invidious rivalry. No character In the world's history was ever more highly honored for chivalrous achievement; none more maligned by perfidy or oppressed by the spitefuiness of malice. He was a product of the brave days of old, yet was he a victim to the spirit that gave birth to intolerance and persecution; for the heroism that sought a reclamation of the holy sepulcher; that pro- duced Buy Diaz Campeador (the Cid); that measured lances with Mohammed-al-Nasir on the decisive and bloody field of LasNavas de Tolosa, was twin brother to the theop- athy that established the Inquisition. If we consider the slavishly superstitious, the intolerantly bigoted, the audaciously savage age in which he lived, which was characterized by the most desperate impulses, we shall be prepared to understand and to appreciate the disposition and proclivities of Columbus; to applaud his courage, and to condone his follies. For he was not with- out human frailties, but these were national — medisevai — rather than personal; errors of the times rather than pas- sions peculiarly his own. His was an age when so-called civilization saw no wrong in banishing Jews and confiscating their property to convert it to holy purposes; which be- lieved that true piety and loyalty to God were bes-t mani- fested by burning heretics at the stake as awful examples, or by torturing the impious until they confessed the vice of their unbelief; for, as answered Torquemada, "were it not better to sanctify men through afflictions of the flesh than that they be suffered to continue in their evil ways to JAMES W. BUEL. 239 the loss of their souls and their damnation through all eternity? " Cruel as these horrific measures were, and barbarous as the beliefs appear to us now, they were not the results of human depravity or moral debasement; so far from this being so, the people were wonderously devout, and it was the intensity of their religious, pietistical fervor that led them to adopt extreme methods for the conversion of all men to the true faith, for they honestly believed that this would alone secure for them salvation, and a beatific con- dition after death. "What! " argued they, '' is the suffer- ing of the body on the earth, compared with the results that affect the endless life in the world to come?" They accordingly accepted literally that divine injunction which demanded, or required, the sacrifice of eye or hand should they ofEend, and gave It that broader significance which to them justified a sacrifice of the sinful by any means howso- ever cruel. Though we cannot excuse the slavery that tormented for opinion's sake, yet it is not entirely just to hastily condemn the spirit of the masses, whose pious convictions gave creation to the Inquisition ; for no single Church bears all the odium of persecution any rriore than any one people is chargeable with the crime of bigoted intolerance. There have been transition periods in the life of all beliefs, and of all denominations, during which the dominant sect has shown jealously and injustice. When the time shall come that such a spirit is dead, then may we conclude that there is no difference of opinion, and that the lion and the lamb have lain down in perpetual truce, and universal, enduring peace hath possessed the world. MKS. HENEY L. PRESTON. Mrs. Henry L. Preston of Dubuque, Iowa, has made the noms-de-plume of ' ' Maude Mere- dith " and ' ' Kit Clover ' ' familiar in Western homes. Some years ago she naively informed me that she was born on a farm (in Vermont), raised on another, married a farmer from another, and went to housekeeping in Dubuque ; later on she wrote to me: "The world had so much work undone when I found it, that I have been busy ever since trying to set it right. * * * If ever I get all the work done up, and catch ' the mid- dle of my seam-needle ' , I will try to put into readable sentences some of the odd visions that float through my brain ". She further confessed: " I adore music; I love art and poetry, and — perfume ' ' ! ' ' Maude Meredith ' ' began her literary career in the pages of the Chicago Tribune in 1880. In 1881, she published, " The Eivulet and Clover Blooms" (New York and Chicago); in 1883, appeared "St. Julien's Daughter" (Chicago), a story of Dubuque in pioneer days; " Our Money Makers" (MinneapoHs, 1886); "The Parson's Sin" (Chicago, 1892), and " Win- some but Wicked " (Chicago, 1892), completes the list of her published writings. In 1884 she (240) MRS. HENRY L. PRESTON. 241 edited The Mid- Continent of Dubuque, and in 1866, The Housekeeper ot Minneapolis. She has been a frequent contributor to The Independent, the Inter-Ocean, the Pioneer-Press, The St. Louis Magazine, The Northwestern Magazine, The Hesperian, Golden Days, The Writer, and other periodicals. Mrs. Preston (until lately, Mrs. Dwight T. Smith) is now about fifty-five years of age. She is five feet, three inches in height, has sparkling dark eyes, abundant black hair, a small sensitive mouth, and a fair complexion. Add to this a strong, magnetic presence, and an earnest, candid and sympathetic disposition. So far, Mrs. Preston has attempted none of the higher fields of literature ; she has addressed herself to the masses of readers only, and quite singularly, she has cleverly avoided the Scylla and the Charybdis of the popular authoress of the day: gush and sensationalism. Her special literary sphere has been poetry, fiction, and papers on subjects of general home and house- hold interest to women ; in the latter department she has no superior among western writers. Her poems display an intimate familiarity with nature, a tender longing for, and out-reaching after, the good and the beautiful, a passionate chafing under restraint, and a calm, subdued sadness. 16 242 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. SATISFIED. I have asked much. Much have I asked of all of life's best living; And I would take from out life's iiand, But only gifts that were by far the bsst of giving, — No dull and leaden sands, My hours must touch. I have asked much. Much have I asked of all of love's ta.eet loving; Of perfect faith in dark eyes deep and true, And soft words full of all the tenderest proving That none save warm hearts knew; I would have much. And this beside : That it should be the one first love unbroken, No faithless trust, no patched and shattered tie, And I should know the truth by some strong bond unspoken; This have I asked. And I Am satisfied. WILL HE GIVE HIS BELOVED SLEEP? (_From The St. Louis Magazine, 1886.) When the feet are worn and weary, When the eyes grow dim with tears, When the days are long aud dreary, With the monotone of years, When the fainting footsteps falter In the marshes dark aud deep, With the griefs no time can alter, Will He give His loved ones sleep? When our happiness has vanished, And the heart is worn and old — Feeding on the husks is famished With a hungering untold — MRS. HENRY L. PRESTON. 243 And the way is dark and lonely Up the rugged mountain steep, Faith aslis the assurance only — That He give His loved ones sleep. Will He lead them by still waters, In the pastures fair and bright, Earth's poor heart-siclt sons and daughters, Out from darljness into light? Oh! I long to Ijpow the secrets The eternal silence keeps , Will we los€ our burden some day? Will He give His children sleep? Will there come a day of resting, When the pain and toil are done? Done the penance and the fasting, And the final sands are run? Will the heart forget its sorrows. And the eyes forget to weep? Then will be no weary morrows. If He gives His loved ones sleep. IS LITERATURE REMUNERATIVE? {From The Hesperian, 1899.) Ever since the days that Jo, rushing away from the arms of Meg and Beth, went down to New York, and earned a livelihood in such a ready offhand manner by her pen, an easy and painless way for thoughtless authors to dispose of all impecunious females, has been by the broad and golden highway of literature. Has an author a poor but ambitious young lady to attend to? He wins her fame and fortune — always fortune — by her pen. Has be a struggling and overtaxed wife and mother? Directly she gets out her pen, puts her inkpot on some con- venient chair, and, with a crowd of little ones clinging to her skirts, she crouches down upon a faded ottoman and writes, and lo! the flour barrel is filled, the family clothed, and the mortgage paid off on the little homestead. Has the author a moneyless widow who has been reared in luxury. 244 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. and has now fallen upon evils days? In a cheerless garret she wraps her shawl about her shoulders, and drawing from her trunk quires of heavy cream-tinted paper — remnants of her better circumstances — she begins a literary career that ends in fame and fortune. It in no way hinders the success of those people — does the fact that they have never before written a word for the press, — never even considered the essentials of a good poem or novel; and we are forced to conclude that writing acceptably is such a very easy matter, that one has only to feel the need of money in order to be forced, as it were, into a pleasant occupation, and, above all, a money-making one. Now this is all a sadly mistalien notion, and it not only lowers all literary achievement in the minds of people in other walks of life, but it leads to a world of dssappoint- ment among aspiring beginners, and as a natural conse- quence — though this is of small account — to a world of blame heaped upon creditors, who, poor souls, are in no way accountable for this state of affairs. * * * When our story writers leave the field of fancy and base the success of their heroes und heroines on probabilities, then we will read that to become a successful writer one must have education, a wide knowledge of the world, a pleasant style, and a geniune talent for writing. It is quite time that a reaction sets in, and that the young lady stuck to her school, the poor widow took a responsible position as housekeeper, and the struggling wife kept a couple of cows and sold pure milk to her neighbors, all of which would bring more money than a score of ink-pots in the hands of an army of amateur writers. ALCEE FORTIEE. Alce'e Foi'tier was born June 5, 1850, in St. James Parish, Louisiana. His father, Florent Fortier, was a sugar phinter, and his mother, Edwige Aime, was the daughter of Valcour Aime, well known as the pioneer in sugar refin- ing in Louisiana, and for his philanthropy. The Fortier family settled in New Orleans, from France, shortly after the foundation of that city. Alcee Fortier was educated in New Orleans and at the University of Virginia, and took a course in phonetics under Paul Passy, in Paris. In 1878, he was elected Professor of French in the Boys' High School in New Orleans, and in 1879 he became a member of the Faculty of the University of Louisiana which, in 1884, took the name of the Tulane University of Louisiana. He has been since many years professor of the Eomance languages in that institution. The principal works of Professor Fortier are: " Le Chateau de Chambord " ( 1884) ; " Bits of Louisiana Folk-Lore" (1888); "Sept Grands Auteurs du 19= Siecle " (1889) " Histoire de la Litte'rature Frangaise " (1893); "Louisiana Studies'-' (1894); "Louisiana Folk-Tales" (1894); "Voyage en Europe " (1895) ; "Precis de THistoire de France (1899); and " A His- (245) 246 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. tory of Louisiana" (1904); besides these, he has. written a number of French texts for col- leges. • Professor Fortier has written numerous articles for newspapers and magazines, and has delivered many lectures on French history and literature and Louisiana history, in the United States and in Paris. He has occupied — or still occupies — the following positions of trust and honor : mem- ber State Board of Education, 1888-1896; Vice- President, and later, President Board of Civil Service Commissioners of New Orleans, 1897- 1900; President Athenee Louisianais, since 1892; President Louisiana Historical Society, since 1894; President Modern Language Asso- ciation of America, 1898; President American Folk-Lore Society, 1894; President Catholic Winter School of America, 1897-1903, and several others. In 1894, Washington and Lee University conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Letters. He has received from the French government several decorations, among others, Officier d'Academie, 1896 ; Officier de I'lnstruction Pub- lique, 1901; and. Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur, 1902. He married Miss Marie Lanauze, in 1881, and has one daughter and four sons living. I have had the pleasure of reading some five or six of Professor Fortier' s books, and have a decided preference for his " Louisiana Studies ". This work is divided into three parts — Litera- ALOEE rOKTIBK. 247 ture, Customs and Dialects, and History and Education. His account of the literature of Louisiana is the best and most complete in exist- ence ; his study of the Creole dialect is simply wonderful ; he has reduced to an art what was before individual peculiarity ; he actually finds a grammar for this patois. I need not say, that he is perfectly at home in the historical and edu- cational chapter. In this petty age, his expressed appreciation of his contemporaries in the field of Louisiana literature, is simply beautiful. An unassuming, plain, honest-hearted old gentle- man, what less could be expected of him? He is, by all means, the foremost of the Louisiana litterateurs of to-day. THE VOUDOUX. (From "Louisiana Studies.") The negroes, as all ignorant people, are very supersti- tious. The celebrated sect of the Voudoux, of which so much has been said, was the best proof of the credulity and superstition of the blacks as well as of the barbarity of their nature. The idea of incantation and of charms for good or evil is as old as the world. In Virgil's eighth eclogue we all remember the words of Alphesiboeus : " Terna tibi haeo primum tripllci diversa colore Licia circumdo, terque haec altaria circum Eflagiem duco ; numero deus impare daudet." In the Middle Ages astrology was considered a science^ and sorcery was admitted. It is well known that when John the Fearless (of Burgundy) killed Louis of Orleans, the cele- brated theologian Jean Petit proved to the poor Charles VI. 248 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. that John had rendered him a great service iu killing his brother, as the latter had conjured the two devils, Hermas and AstraraoD, to harm the king, and they would have caused his death had not the Duke of Burgundy, like a devoted subject, saved his liege lord. The religion of the Voudoux was based on sorcery, and, being practiced by very ignorant people, was, of course, most, immoral and hideous. It is, fortunately, fast disap- pearing, the negroes becoming more civilized. The dances ol the Voudoux have often been described, and were, accoid- ing to the accounts, perfect bacchanalia. They usually took place at some retired spot on the banks of Lake Pontcbar- train or of Bayou St. John. Although this sect is nearly extinct, the negroes are still very much afraid of their witchcraft. The Voudoux, how- ever, do not always succeed in their enchantments, as is evident by the following amusing incident. One of my friends, returning home from his work quite late one even- ing, saw on a doorstep two little candles lit, and between them four nickels, placed as a cross» Feeling quite anxious as to the dreadful fate which was to befall the inhabitants of the house, the gentleman blew out the candles, threw them in the gutter, put the nickels in his pocket, and walked oft with the proud satisfaction of having saved a whole family from great calamities. This is how the Creoles fear the Voudoux. NAPOLEON. (^From " Precis de VHistoire de France.") Sainte-H^l^ne. — L'Angleterre ne traita pas son illustre captif avoc g6n6rosit6, et le gedlier, Hudson Lowe, manqua de tact et de. grandeur d'&me. NapoMon subit un long mar- tyre S. Sainte-H616ne et dicta des M^moires 6loquents sur sa prodigieuse carri^re. II monrut le 6 Mai 1821, et a laisf6 un nom qu'on ne pent comparer qa'^ ceux d'Alexandre, d'Annibal et de C6sar. II fut un grand destructeur d'homraes, 11 fut ambitieux, il fut 6goiste, 11 laissa la France plus petite qu'il ne lavait trouv^e, mais aussi il propagea dans toute I'Europe les prin- ALCEE ICORTIEK. 249 cipes de la Revolution, il cr^a des institutions qui durent encore et il d6nna a la France une gloire qui I'a consol^e dans ses defaites, on lui rappelant que, s'ii y a eu Sedan, il y a eu aussi Y6na, apids Rosbach. LAMARTINE. (_From "Sept Grands Auteurs du XIXe Steele ") II est mort en 1869. Quelques remarkes maintenaot. On me dit qu'on ne lit plus Lamartinp, qu'ii est le pofete des femmes et des jeunes gens. C'est deja un grand honnenr que d'etre le po^te des femmes, cela prouve que ses oeuvres soDt uoblfs et pures. II est le pn^te des jeuiies gens, cela est vral, mais il I'fest aussi de bien des hommes qui ne sont plus gennes. On I'accuse de monotonie; oui, sll'on n'aime pas a voir couler une riviere aux eaux calmes et trans- parentes, dans lesquelles se reflfetent les arbres et les fleurs, si I'on pent se fatiguer des belles images. Si I'on veut un torrent imp^tueux qui roule avec francas sur les rocs et rejaillit en cascades, que I'on prenne Victor Hugo. N'oub- lions pas, cependant, Alphonse de Lamartine, etrappelons- noas que sa vie et ses oeuvres se r^sument en ces trois mots qu'll voulait que I'on gravit sur la pierre de son tombeau: '' Amour, Pofisie et Religion ". THE FRENCH LANGUAGE IN LOUISIANA. (^From " Louisiana Studies.") The French spoten in Louisiana is generally better than that of the Canadians. It is easy to account for this. The Canadians were separated from the mother country in the middle of the eighteenth century, and, even long before that time, immigration from France was limited, and the population was increasing rather by the extraordinary fecun- dity of'the inhabitants than by the influx of immigrants. The language of Canada has remained nearly stationary, and is almost the idiom of the seventeenth century ; that is to say. It is sometimes quaint and obsolete. In Louisiana, 250 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. immigratioa coutiuued for a long time, and In the beginning of the nineteenth century a great number of exiles came from the French Antilles, and added many persons of high birth and refined manners to the original settlers. We received, however, in 1765, the immigration of the un- fortunate Acadian exiles, who did not contribute toward keeping the French language in a state of purity. Although many rose to high positions in the state, the language of a number of them still constitutes a real dialect. Another cause of the purity of our language is the fact that during the old regime almost all young men of rich families were educated in France. They received an excellent clas- sical education, but learned no English. My father told me that on his return home after a seven years' course in a French college, he knew so little English that he had to go to Lexington, Kentucky, for some time to study the language of the country. My grandfather, who was born during the Spanish domination, spoke French only, and did not allow English to be spoken in his family. We are not so exclusive at present, and we are very anxious that our children should know English perfectly well, but we still consider French as the mother tongue, as the language of the family. Though French is still the mother tongue of many thou- sands of Louisianlans, the fact cannot be denied that it is not as generally spoken as before the war. Considering that our Creole authors know that in writing in French they have but little chance of being read outside of their state, their patriotic and disinterested devotion to the language of their ancestors is certainly remarkable and most praise- worthy. EUGENE FIELD. About ten years ago I wrote to Eugene Field, at Chicago, for some data about himself from which I could write a short biographical sketch for a certain magazine I was then editing. In response, he sent me by mail a small pamphlet which he evidently had had printed to meet just such inquiries as mine. I can do no better than to let parts of that pamphlet, his " Auto-Analy- sis ", speak for him: "I was born in St. Louis, Mo., September 3, 1850, the (■econd and oldest surviving son of Roswell Martin and Frances (Reed) Field, both natives of Windham County, Vermont, Upon the death of my mother (1856) I was put in the care of my (paternal) cousin, Miss Mary Field French, at Amherst, Mass. " In 1865 I entered the private school of the Reverend James Tnfts, Monson, Mass., and there fitted for Williams Cjllege, which institution I entered as a freshman in 1868. Upon my father's death in 1869, I entered the sophomore class of Knox College, Galesburg, III., my guardian, John W. Burgess, now of Columbia College, being then a pro- fessor of that institution. But in 1870 I went to Colilmbia, Mo., and entered the State University there, and completed my junior year with my brother. In 1872 I visited Europe, spending six months and my patrimony in France, Italy, Ire- land and England. In May, 1873, I became a reporter on the St. Louis Evening Journal. In October of that year I married Miss Julia Sutherland- Comstock (born In Chenango County, New York), of St. Joseph, Mo., at that time a girl of sixteen. We had eight children — three daughters and live sons. " Ill-health compelled me to visit Europe In 1889; there I (251) 252 LITEEATDKE OF LOUISIANA TEEKITOEY. remained fourteen months, that time being divided between England, Germany, Holland and Belgium, My residence at present is in Buena Park, a North- Shore suburb of Chicago. " My newspaper connections have been as follows : 1875- 76, city editor of the St. Joseph(Mo.) Gazette; 1876-80, edi- torial writer on the St. Louis Journal and St. Louis Times- Journal; 1880-81, managing editor of the Denver Tribune, Since 1883 I have been a contributor to the Chicago Record (formerly Morning News). " I wrote and published my first bit of verse in 1879; it was entitled ' Christmas Treasures ' (see ' Little Book of Western Verse '). Just ten years later I began suddenly to write verse very frequently; meanwhile (1883-1889), I had labored diligently at writing short stories and tales. Most of these I revised half a dozen times. One, ' The Were- wolf ', as yet unpublished, I have rewritten eight times dur- ing the last eight years. "My publications have been chronologically, as follows: " 1. ' The Tribune Primer ', Denver, 1882. (Out of print, very scarce.) ('The Model Primer', illustrated by Hopkin, Brooklyn, 1882. A pirate edition.) " 2. ' Culture's Garland ', Boston, 1887. (Out of print ) "3. 'A Little Book of Western Verse', Chicago, 1892. (Large paper, privately printed and limited.) "4. 'A Little Book of Profitable Tales ', Chicago, 1889. (Large paper, privately printed and limited.) " ' A Little Book of Western Verse ', New York, 1892. " ' A Little Book of Profitable Tales ", New York, 1890. "6. ' With Trumpet and Drum ', New York, 1892. " 6. ' Second Book of Verse ', New York, 1893. " 7. ' Echoes from the Sabine Farm ', translation of Hor- ace, Chicago, 1893. In Collaboration With My Brother, Roswell Martin Field. " 8. Introduction to Stone's First Editions of American Authors, Cambridge, 1893. " 9, ' The Holy Cross and Other Tales ', Cambridge, 1893. " My favorite hymn is ' Bounding Billows '. "My favorites in fiction are Hawthorne's ' Scarlet Let- ter ', ' Don Quixote ' and ' Pilgrim's Progress '. "My favorite poems are Koerner's 'Battle Prayer', Wordsworth's ' We are Seven', Newman's 'Lead Kindly Light ', Luther's hymns, Schiller's ' The Driver,' Horace's EUGENE FIELD. 253 ' Fobs Bandusise ' and Burns' ' Cotter's Saturday Night '. I dislike Dante and Byron. I should like to have known Jer- emiah tlie prophet, old man Poggio, Horace, Walter Scott, Bonaparte, Hawthorne, Mme. Sontag, Sir John Herschel, Hans Andersen. " I favor a system of pension for noble services in litera- ture, art, science, etc. I approve of compulsory education. " I love to read in bed. "I am a poor diner; and I drink no wine or spirits of any kind; I do not smoke tobacco. "lam six feet in height; am of spare built; weigh 160 pounds and have a shocking taste in dress, " My eyes are blue, my complexion pale, my face is shaven, and I am inclined to baldness. ■^'I have tried to analjze my feeling toward children, and I think I discover that I love them in so far as I can make pets of them. "I do not love all children. " My heroes in history are Martin Luther, Mme. Lara- balle, Abraham Lincoln. " I dislike politics, so called. " f dislike all exercise and play all games very indifCer ently. " I believe in Churches and schools, I hate wars, armies soldiers, guns and fireworks. " I like music (limited). " My favorite color is red. "I do not care particularly for sculpture or for paint- ings; I try not to become interested for the reason that if I were to cultivate a taste- for them I should presently become hopelessly bankrupt. " I am extravaganlty fond of perfume. "I dislike crowds and I abominate functions. " I believe that if I live, I shall do my best literary work when I am a grandfather." He never lived to be a grandfather. He died in Ctiicago, November 4, 1895. Eugene Field is best remembered for some of his juvenile poems. At times he wielded a trenchant pen, but he was not always as just and 254 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. unprejudiced as he might have been; nor was his sense of honor always of the highest. But Eugene Field was — Gene Field ! Bright, clever, shrewd, a "good fellow" — his friends have forgiven him much, and tlie world will forgive him still, more. In the summer of 1902 we placed a tablet on the front of house number 634 South Broadway, St. Louis. The tablet informs the passer-by that Eugene Field was ' ' born in this house ' ' . He must have been born twice, then, for a few months later, his brother, Roswell Field, pointed out a house some four or five miles further north, in which, he said Eugene was born. As that was our first attempt, in St. Louis, to honor our literary celebrities, we will no doubt be more accurate in future. IN THE FIRELIGHT. {From The Chicago News, 1885.) The fire upon the hearth is low, And there is stillness everywhere ; Like troubled spirits here and there The flrelight shadows flattering go. And as the shadows round me creep, A childish treble breaks the gloom, And softly from a further room Comes: " Now I lay me down to sleep." And, somehow, with that little prayer And that sweet treble in my ears, My thought goes back to distant years And lingers with a dear one there : And as I hear the child's amen, EUGENE FIELD. 255 My mother's faith comes back to me : Crouched at her side I seem to be, And mother holds my hands again. Oh, for an hour in that dear place — Oh, for the peace of that dear time, Oh, for that childish trust sublime, Oh, for a glimpse of mother's face 1 Yet, as the shadows round me creep, I do not seem to be alone — Sweet magic of that treble tone — And "Now I lay me down to sleep! " SHARPS AND FLATS. (From The Chicago News, 1885.) " Moving again, eh? What's the matter with your board- ing place this time? " " Well, you know I told you about the torture I endured in the last place? " ''Yes. A family with twin boy-babies, both teething." " Yes. Well, I just got settled down in a new place in a nice room right next to the parlor, when the landlady mo- seyed in a gratid piano, backed it right up against my wall, and gave all the boarders the privilege of using it." " Where are you going now? " "Back to the babies? " — " Charlie, I'm afraid that if Guzzleby don't stop drink- ing soon he'll have snakes In his boots." "I'm not." " Why not? " " Why, there isn't a snake in the world that hasn't more self-respect than to be seen in his company." "Ah, but you know delitium tremens is only an affection of the mind." "Then I'm sure Guzzleby won't have 'em." — They met in a dark alley. " Your money or your life! " demanded the highwayman. The man in the silk hat gave up his money and drew him into conversation. 256 LITERATUEE OF LOUISIANA TEREITORT. When the highwayman emerged from the alley he stopped to count his money. It was gone — his own with It, every cent. Who was the man in the silk hat? A bank cashier. WOMAN'S WAYS. (From the Kansas City Times. 1881). Ten years ago — yes, may be more — I went to tell my love my love — I saw her at the cottage door The houeysackle twined above, And as I came, she came and stood Half leaning o'er the garden gate ; "Come in ", she cried, in merry mood. I see her now, a winsome girl — A child with frank and honest heart — Yet in her voice and eye and curl A modesty that passeth art. Last night I came, as years a<;o I came, and saw my darling wait For one who toddled to and fro — Half leaning o'er the garden gate. " Come in ", said she, but not to me — A tender smile upon her face — Ahl cruel, cruel lovel I see My little son hath stole my place. I see her now — my worshipped one — And yet she is not wholly mine. For love breeds love from sire to son, A woman's heart is love's own shrine. KATE CHOPIN. Mrs. Kate Chopin was born in St. Louis. She descends, on her mother's side, from several of the old French families of primitive St. Louis, and her father. Captain Thomas O'Flaherty, was a wealthy merchant of St. Louis. She graduated at the Sacred Heart Convent, and a few years later married Oscar Chopin of Natchitoches Par- ish, Louisiana. They lived on his plantation until his death which occurred several years ago. Her first literary venture , " At Fault " , is a good , homely story, not particularly exciting as to the plot, and somewhat crude at times, but still affording pleasant reading; in no way did it foreshadow her future work.. It was published in 1890, in St. Louis. Her next book, "Bayou Folk" (Boston, 1894), consists of a number of short stories and studies of Creole life. The facility and exact- ness with which Mrs. Chopin handles the Creole dialect, and the fidelity of her descriptions of that strange, remote Hfe in the Louisiana bayous, is remarkable. But she writes of (what she calls) her ' ' own people ' ' , for by inheritance of birth and by marriage, and I may add — by inclination, she is herself, a Creole. Her stories are extremely interesting as studies of life. She has been compared to Mr. Cable, 17 (257) 258 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. but no two writers could possibly traverse the same ground more at variance with each other. Her touch is far more deft than Mr. Cable's; her insight is more femininely subtle (if I may use the word); pain, sorrow, affliction, humbled pride, rude heroism — enter more completely into her sympathies. She feels and suffers with her characters. Nor is this strange : she is herself (as I have said before) to the manor born. Not so Mr. Cable. I do not wish to detract one tittle from the just praise I have given him else- where, but the soul of sympathy with which Mrs. Chopin overflows is wanting in his pages; we may smile with him, we may laugh with him — even grieve with him — but we are forced to realize, nevertheless, that he lacks that touch of humanity that Brunetifere so justly and so eloquently praises in Thackeray and George Eliot. The critics have not as yet fully under- stood the excellence of Mrs. Chopin's work. I remember Mrs. Chopin, when almost a child, reading one of Sir Walter Scott's novels ! Of later years, she is as she was then, an omniv- orous reader. She has a strong admiration for the late Guy de Maupassant, whose artistic methods she considers superior to those of any other French author of late days. She is not a ' ' blue-stocking ' ' — she has none of the man- ners, airs, affectations and eccentricities of the poseurs bleu. She has no fads, no serious pur- poses, no lesson to teach in life. She takes no notes, she has never, she declares, observed or KATE CHOPIN. • 259 studied people, places, or things, or conditions, or circumstances with a view of using them as literary material. She is simply a bright, unaf- fected, unpresuming and ivomanly woman. Mrs. Chopin has also published "A Night in Acadie " (Chicago, 1897) and "The Awaken- ing" (Chicago, 1902) — the latter a novel. Another work from her pen will appear some time during 1904. She was born February 8, 1851 ; she has five sons and one daughter. THE INCENDIARY. {^From "At Fault.") Out in the hills there was no such unearthly stillness reigning. Those restless wood-dwellers, that never sleep, were sending starlling gruesome calls to each other. -Bats were flapping and whirling and darting hither and thither; the gliding serpent making quick rustle amid the dry, crisp leaves, and ovei all sounded the murmur of the great pine trees, telling their mystic secrets to the night. A human creature was there too, feeling a close fellow- ship with these spirits of night and darkness; with no more fear in his heart than the unheeding serpent crossing his path. Every inch of the ground he knew. He wanted no daylight to guide him. Had his eyes been blinded he would no doubt have bent his body close to earth and scented his way along like the human hound that he was. Over his shoulder hung the polished rifle that sent dull and sudden gleamings into the dark. A large tin pail swung from his hand. He was very careful of this pail — or its contents, for he feared to lose a drop. And when he accidentally struck an intervening tree and spilled some upon the ground, he muttered a curse against his own awkwardness. Twice since leaving his cabin up in the clearing, he had turned to drive back his yellow skulking dog that followed him. Each time the brute had fled in abject terror, only to 260 I/ITBKATURB OF LOUISIANA TERRITOEY. come creeping again into his master's footsteps, when he thought himself forgotten. Here was a companion whom neither Jocint nor his mission required. Exasperated, he seated himself on a fallen tree and whistled softly. The dog, who had been holding back, dashed to his side, trembling with eagerness, and striving to twist his head around to lick the hand that patted him. Jocint's other hand glided quickly into his coat pocket, from which he drew forth a coil of thin rope that he flung deftly over the animal's head, drawing it c'ose and lightabout the homely, shaggy throat. So quickly was the action done, that no sound was uttered, and Jocint continued his way untroubled by his old and faithful friend, whom he left hanging to the limb of a tree. He was following the same path that he traversed daily to and from the mill, and which soon brought him out into the level with its soft tufted grass and clumps of squat thorn trees. There was no longer the protecting wood to screen him ; but of such there was no need, for the darkness hung about him like the magic mantle of mystery. Nearing the mill he grew cautious, creeping along with the tread of a stealthy beast, and halting at Intervals to listen for sounds that he wished not to hear. He knew there was no one on guard to-night. A movement in the bushes near by, made him fall quick and sprawling to the earth. It was only Gregoire's horse munching the soft grass. Jocint drew near and laid his hand on the horse's back. It was hot and reeking with sweat. Here was a fact to make him more wary. Horses were not' found in such condition from quietly grazing of a cool autumn.night. He seated himself upon the ground, with his hands clasped about his knees, all doubled up in a little heap, and waited there with the patience of the savage, letting an hour go by, whilst he made no movement. The hour past, he stole towards the mill, and began his work of sprinkling the contents of his pail here and there along with dry timbers at well calculated distances, with care that no drop should be lost. Then, he drew together a great heap of shavings and slathers, plentifully besprinkled it with what remained in the can. When he had struck a match against his rough trousers and placed it carefully in the midst of this small pyramid, he found that he had done his work too surely. The quick flame sprang into life, seiz- ing at once all it could reach. Leaping over intervals; KATE CHOPIN. 261 cfEacing the darkness that had shrouded him; seeming to mock him as a fool and point him out as a target for heaven and earth to hurl destruction at if they w.ould. Where should he hide himself? He only thought now of how he might have done the deed differently, and with safety to himself. He stood with great beams and loose planks sur- rounding him; quaking with a premonition of evil. He wanted to fly in one direction; then thought it best to fol- low the opposite ; but a force outside of himself seemed to hold him fast to one spot. When turning suddenly about, he knew it was too late, he felt that all was lost, for there was Gregoire, not twenty paces away — covering him with the muzzle of a pistol and — cursed luck — his own rifle for- gotten along with the empty pall in the raging flre. A HARBINGER. Bruno did very nice work in black and white ; sometimes in green and yellow and red. But he never did anything quite so clever as during that summer he spent in the hills. The spring-time freshness had staid, somehow. And then there was the gentle Diantha, with hair the color of ripe wheat, who posed for hlra when he wanted. She was as beautiful as a flower, crisp with morning dew. Her violet eyes were baby -eyes — when he first came. When he went away he kissed her, and she turned red and white and trembled so! As quick as thought the baby look went out of her eyes and another flashed into them. Bruno sighed a good deal over his work that winter. The women he painted were all like mountain flowers. The big city seemed too desolate for endurance, often. He tried not to think of sweet-eyed Diantha. But there was nothing to keep him from remembering the hills; the whirr of the summer breeze through delicate-leafed maples; the bird- notes that used to break clear and sharp into the stillness when he and Diantha were together on the wooded hillside. So when summer came again, Bruno gathered his bags, his brushes and colors and things. He whistled soft low tunes as he did so. He sang even, when he was not lost in wondering if thejsunlight would fall just as it did last June, 262 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. aslaot the green slopes; aod if — aud if Diautha would quiver red and white again when he called her his own sweet Diantba, as he meant to. Bruno had made his way through a tangle of underbrush; but before he came quite to the wood's edge, he halted; for there about the little church that gleamed white in the sun, people were gathered — old and young. He thought Diantha might be among them, and strained his eyes to see if she were. But she was not. He did see her, though — when the doors of the rustic temple swung open — like a white- robed lily now. There was a man beside her — it mattered not who ; enough that it was one who had gathered this wild flower for his own, while Bruno was dreaming. Foolish Bruno! to have been only love's harbinger after all! He turned away. With hurried strides he descended the hill again, to go and wait by the big water- tank for a train to come along. EDGAR W. HOWE. Edgar W. Howe, the well-known Kansas jour- nalist, obtained immediate success with his "Story of a Country Town" (Boston, 1884), of which William Dean Howells writes in The Century Mugazine : ' ' The book is full of simple homeliness, but it is never vulgar. It does not flatter the West, nor paint its rough and rude traits as heroic; it precises, and states, and the results are perfectly imaginable American condi- tions, in which the trait of beauty and pathos is lost. There are charming things in it." I thoroughly agree with Mr. Howells, and only wish to add that when we consider the poverty of the material he had to draw upon, it is simply marvelous that he could construct out of it so really interesting a book. Mr. Howe is the editor and proprietor of The Evening Olohe of Atchinson, Kansas, and is forty-nine years of age. Some slight traces- of his life may be found in his " Story of a. Coun- try Town" as he says himself that he often delineates in his novels such actual and familiar scenes as have made a strong impression on his mind. His home is on a green and sloping hillside in the northern suburbs of Atchinson, and the description of " The Locks " in his novel, " The Mystery of the Locks" (Boston, 1885) is (263) 264 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. a picture of his own house. To the right is the turbid Missouri, which he describes as it is seen from the windows of -"The Loclss ". Mr. Howe's methods of work are described in a letter he wrote to The Booh Buyer in the summer of 1886, and to which he lately referred me. I have given the substance of parts of that letter in this paper. In " A Moonlight Boy " (Boston, 1886), Mr. Howe was not as successful as in his prior works. The scene is partly laid in New York, and the author is not at home in the large cities. There is a vast difference between the daily life of a metropolitan city and a country town. He partly retrieved his lost ground the following year in " A Man Story " (Boston). Mr. Howe has a pleasant, full-shaven face, and very strong and positive features. He has a wife and two children. His literary work is a strong drain on his system as he performs it only in the evenings after his editorial work of the day is done and he is already tired out. It makes him thoroughly nervous and often causes sleepless nights. He is not satisfied with the execution of hi^ novels, as he realizes that he labors under disadvantages and feels that he could do far better work if he had more leisure time for reflection and composition. His novels are written at interrupted intervals, sometimes weeks going by without his putting pen and ink to paper. He thinks it is the fact of his writing under such disadvantages that makes his stories EDGAR W. HOWE. 265 somewhat sad in tone, since he has never in his life felt ambitious and encouraged after dark. EARLY RECOLLECTIONS. (From " The Story of a Country Town.") The house where we lived, and into which we moved on the day when my recolltctions begin, was the largest in the settlement; a square house of two stories, painted so white that after night it looked like a ghost. It was built on lower ground than Fairview church, though the location was sightly, and not far away ran a stream fringed with thickets of brush, where I found the panting cattle and gheep on hot days, and thought they gave me more of a wel- come than my father and Jo did in the field; for they were not busy, but idle like me, and I hoped it was rather a relief to them to look at me in mild-eyed wonder. Beyond the little stream and the pasture was the great dusty road, and in my loneliness I often sat on the high fence beside it to watch for the coming of the movers' wagons, and to look curiously at those stowed away under the cover bows, tumbled together with luggage and effects of every kind. If one of the drivers asked me how far it was to the country town I supposed he had heard of my wonderful learning, and I took great pains to describe the road, as I heard my father do a hundred times in response to similar inquiries from movers. Sometimes I climbed up to the driver's seat, and drove with him out to the prairie, and I always noticed that the women and children riding behind were poorly dressed, and tired looking, and I wondered if only the unfortunate travelled our way, for only that kind of people lived in Fairview, and I had never seen any other kind in the road. When I think of the ytais I lived in Fail view, I imagine that the sun was never bright there (although I am certain that it was), and I cannot relieve my mind of the impression that the cold, changing shadow of the gray church has spread during my long absence and enveloped all the houses where the people lived. When I see Fairview in my fancy 266 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. now, it is always from a high place, and looking down upon it the shadow is denser around the house where I lived than anywhere else, so that I feel to this day that should I visit it, and receive permission from the new owners to walk through the rooms, I should And the walls damp and mouldy because the bright sun and the free air of. iHeaven had de- serted them as a curse. THE PROFESSOR. In Cairo, Egypt, there is a university with twelve thousand students. This university is devoted mainly to teaching the theology of the Mohammetan faith. Many tf the three hundred instructors are ignorant of everything except the theology of the Koran. They were compelled to study this twelve years, in order to become instructors. No doubt many of these instructors think they are superior to ordinary morals because they have an Education; because they have attended College twelve years. Of what value is a knowledge of the Koran? It is the in- vention of the old man suffering with fits ; it has no basis in truth; no sensible man of real education pretends that it has. The absurdity of the Koran is so palpable that men of common sense will not discuss whether it is true or untrue. Admitting, then, that a man has spent twelve years in studying tbe Koran, is the fact important? Has he an edu- cation? Is he not inferior to the ordinary plain citizen who has an education including the simple details of life? The average college professor has a great deal of "learn- ing "that may be compared with the "learning" of the Moslem professors at Cairo, who have studied the Koran twelve years. GLOBE PHILOSOPHY. (^From The Atchinson Globe.) When a man can't afford to build a house with two stories, there is still opportunity for pride left to the wife by calling the new home a " bungalow." EDGAR W. HOWE. j 267 If jou want consideration, always give it. Every idle person bothers two or three busy ones. Laugh when a friend tells a joke; it is one of the taxes yon must pay. No man can go hunting or fishing without making an explanation afterwards. There is nothing the matter with Kansas; the trouble is with the politiciaus. A Hindoo who visited this country to study its institu- tions, visited the court house. "What's the jury for?" he asked. "To decide which side has the better lawyer," his guide replied. It used to be that people had to get together to gossip. Now they use the telephone. People who visit the cemetery a good deal gossip about the monuments. What has become of the old-fashioned woman who said in describing a thin person, " He has to stand up twice to make a shadow"? A man may not be able to manage bis own affairs, but he will give you advice about yours. A pretty woman has a hard time in this world in receiv- ing too much sympathy from the men, and not enough . sympathy from the women. Are your enemies more powerful than your friends? If a matter of great importance should come up in your com- munity would your acquaintance in the community be a help, or a hindrance? About the only thing a man will allow his wife to have a monopoly of is patience. Anything seems to be legal if it has enough force be- hind it. A secret is somtthing which yo.u tell every one, but whisper in telling it. Cover up your meanness and the fall will be all the harder when it comes. In these days, when women go around and teach parlia- mantary law, physical culture, domestic science, etc., 268 LITEEATDRE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. woman who teaches nothing but music, appears downright innocent and commonplace. We have noticed that an expression of gratitude for past favors is usually followed by a request for new ones. After a man reaches a certain age, he really ought to be excused from being annoyed by book agents. No one really loves you unless he believes you are hypno- tized when you do wrong. The average person's idea of being blunt is to tell dis- agreeable truths to a friend's face. The women's magazines do not say as much as they should about the desirability of the mush and milk habit. As a man grows older, his -hours for liking children are from 8 p. m. to 7 a. m., when they are asleep; but a woman, as age approaches, likes them all the time. Don't say a man is shiftless : Be polite, and say that he is too contented to ever get rich. The theory of law is that it is better that nine guilty men escape than that one innocent man be punished. But the rule has been enlarged until it permits ninety-nine guilty men to escape out of a hundred. WILLIS GEORGE EMERSON. Willis George Emerson, lawyer and mine owner (and author during leisure hours), was boi-n near Blakesburg, in Monroe County, Iowa, March 28, 1856. He is the son of the Reverend Stephen L. and Mary L. Emerson. His education was begun at the district schools of Union County, Iowa ; he next attended Knox College, Gales- burg, Illinois, but did not graduate. His college days over, he studied law and was admitted to practice in the United States District Court and the State Courts of Iowa, but shortly abandoned the law and taught in a country school for four years. We next find him at the Lombard Banking House, where he remained during the succeeding three years, and then removed from Iowa to Kansas, in 1886. In Kansas, he engaged once more in banking and paid some attention to poli- tics. In 1888, he was elected Presidential Elec- tor from the ?eventh Kansas Congressional dis- trict, on the Republican ticket. In June, 1900, he was appointed as Commissioner to the Paris Exposition by the governor of Wyoming; the same year he served as Vice-Chairman of the Speakers' Bureau of the Republican National Committee. He has an extensive reputation as a platform orator and political writer ; his speech in (269) 270 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. reply to " Coin " Harvey's " Financial School " was issued as a Kepublican campaign document in 1896, and in 1900 more than one million copies of his speech on sound money were circu- lated throughout the country by the Republican National Committee. He was elected one of the trustees of the American University at Washing- ton, on December 12, 1900. Mr. Emerson is a widower, and has two sons. He is one of the most promising of the - new writers of the day. Besides his books, he has written for various magazines and literary papers more than one hundred stories of travel and sketches of mining camps and mountain scenery. The popular song, " A Woodland Stream", is from his pen. He is the Commissioner from his state to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of this year. His published works are : ' ' Winning Winds ' ' ; "The Fall of Jason"; "My Partner and I", and " Buell Hampton ", all published in Boston and Chicago within the past six or seven years. He is at work on a fifth novel. DEDICATED TO MY OLD SWEETHEART. (From " Buell Hampton.") My sweetheart of the long ago — With rosy cheeks and raven hair — Sang lullabies so soft and low, All joyous was the rhythmic air. Though other links with luckless fate Have brought me bruises bathed in tears, WILLIS GEORGE EMERSON. 271 From childhood up to man's estate Her love has held me all the years. Our ties grow fonder, day by day, While graces all in her combine. Oh, love! make good and glad the way Where walks this sweetheart — Mother mine. THE CONFLAGRATION. (From " Buell Hampton.") The people had taken refuge in the upper stories, and on the roofs of buildings, to protect themselves from the savage arena below. As the fire drew nearer, and the light and heat became more intensified, a spectral hue fell over the blanched faces of all. A suffocating fear, far exceeding even that of the hot winds, enveloped the beleaguered town of Meade. The situation was desperate. The flames, in their maddened fury of triumph, were rushing on the wings of the wind toward their defenseless victims. The brave battalion of flre-flghters was forced to retire in haste before the stifling heat. The western fronts of the buildings shone as at noon- day, while to the eastward the long shadows danced, grew less distinct, and then darkened as the scarlet smoke rose and fell, producing strange and weird phantoms. The rapidly gliding columns of smoke, resting "one upon another — one upon another", seemed to have ignited and become a surging sea — a pyrotechnical display of Are waves. A few buildings on the outskirts caught fire from the great heat. Millions of flying sparks, as countless as the stars, fllled the air, threatening complete annihilation. The men- acing flames were advancing upon their helpless prey with a fierceness that seemed to partake of hellish glee. The cries of rabbits, the yelps of coyotes, the moaning howl of wolves, the frantic roarings of cattle, and the wail of hysterical and fainting women, — all produced the wildest pandemonium. Above the terrible tumult could be heard the hissing, crackling, seething laugh of the undulating, death-dealing labyrinth of flames — on they rushed, in awful fury. 272 LITERATURE OE LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Extinction seemed imminent. The burning buildings were already crumbling into charred ruins; while others were being enveloped with roaring, swirling sheets of Are. Like prophets, they seemed to be foretelling, by example, a cer- tain destruction. The cattle, the wolves, the jack- rabbits and the people, were alike demoralized and stampeded by an overpowering fear. The fire now advanced like a line of molten lava. On, on it c.ame, to the very limits of Meade. Man and beast seemed about to be offered up on a flery altar. The cattle moaned a sacrificial dirge. The smothering smoke crept stealthily down through the streets, and suffocation hushed the wail of the people. Like hordes of painted savages, the flames seemed to be brandishing bloody tomahawks, as they rushed at their victims with demoniacal shrieks of exulta- tion. Then, God smote the Rock of Deliverance, — a divine hand reached out in infinite compassion. The heavens opened, the rain descended in blinding torrents, the earth trembled with deafening peals of thunder, the lightning pierced the clouds in fearful grandeur, as if the Almighty, in His immeasurable goodness were hurling an admonition at the flames. Providence grappled the devouring demon by the throat, as he was in the very act of exulting over an almost certain victory. The flre-king of terror surrendered to an omnipo- tent decree. Its mighty strength was broken, and what a few moments before had seemed an irresistible artillery of power and defiance became a charnel-house, wrapped in the sable robes of its own defeat. Then there went up a cry from the people, "God lives! Our lives are spared! All praise to the Ruler of the Universe! " When the wreck and ruin had been surveyed in the gray dawn and morning of a new day, these loyal people, with a fortitude unequaled in the history of communities, returned to the burning embers of their dugout homes, and forgetting the devastation of the hot winds and the calamity of the greatest prairie-fire that had ever swept over the Southwest, they went on loving Kansas — the land of sunshine and of sun flowers. ALICE FEENCH. Miss Alice French ("Octave Thanet") was born in Andover, Massachusetts, in 1856. Since childhood she has resided in Davenport, Iowa, and stands in the front rank of the band of Western and Southern writers, which within the past ten or twelve years has done so much towards the reproduction and popularizing of the more chax'acteristic pictures of Western and Southern life. On both her father's and her mother's side, Miss French comes from old New England stock, her ancestors having been Massachusetts Bay colo- nists. Her father, a manufacturer of agricultural implements, was a man of literary tastes, and was forced to leave his Massachusetts home on ac- count of ill health and seek a milder western climate, while Miss French was a child. He descended in direct line from Sir William French, an Irish gentleman who settled in Massachusetts in the 17th century. Her mother was the daugh- ter of Marcus Morton, at one time governor of Massachusetts, and her ancestors came to New England in the Mayflower. " Octave Thanet' s " first work for the press was in the line of articles on subjects which had awakened her interest. In-door papers, jails and charities were among them. She began to write 18 (273) 274 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKRITOKT. very early in life, and for some time her articles were rejected with a painful regularity by maga- zine editors. She persevered, however, and fin- ally had a sketch accepted by the editor of Lip- pincotfs Magazine, and published with the title of "Communists and Capitalists". "This story," says Mr. Ho wells, "maybe read with equal pathos and instruction in these days." Her first story to attract public attention was "The Bishop's Vagabond", which appeared in The Atlantic Monthly when Mr. Howells was the editor of that magazine. Louise Chandler Moul- ton considers it her best short story, but Miss French has a decided preference for her " Ogre of Ha-HaBay". The majority of her stories (as this one) are based upon real incidents. Something she has heard, or read, or seen, fur- nishes the foundation' of a story, or goes into her note-book for future reference. She is a good worker ; she can write eight or ten hours a day, on the average, and feel no ill effects. She likes' to write in the morning, and spend the larger portion of the remaining hours of the day out of doors. She is fond of riding, rowing, and other athletic sports, and tramping about the woods. She is a fervent admirer of the paintings of Millet and Corot, and has a special fondness for the periods of English history in which Ed- ward VI. and Queen Mary reigned. She has a strong liking for German philosophy, though she says that she does not believe in it. Her nom-de- jplume was accidental ; she had an intimate school- ALICE FKENCH. 275 mate at Abbot Academy (Andover) named " Oc- tave ", and " Thanet " was a name she once saw on a passing freight car. Miss French has published: "The Heart of Toil" (New York) ; " Otto the Knight, and Other Trans-Mississippi Stories" (Boston, 1891); '■'Stories of a Western Town" (New Yorlc, 1893); " Knitters in the Sun " (Boston); "An Adventure in Photography?' (1893); "The Missionary Sheriff " ; and, " Expiation ". In a very recent letter. Miss French writes to me : " I was educated in the old girls' school at Abbot Academy (Andover, Massachusetts) * * * I began to write in 1879-1880. * * * i have lived much of my life in the South, lately. * * * The only long novel I ever wrote is ' Expiation ' " . Miss French owns a plantation in Arkansas on which she spends much of her time. Madame Blanc (" Th. Bentzon ") in her book of travels in the United States " Les Amer^icaines Chez Ulles", published in Paris, in 1896, has a very interesting account of Miss French and her life on this plantation. I believe that Madame Blanc's book has been translated and published East. Many of " Octave Thanet's " short stories have been translated into French, German, Spanish, Russian and Swedish. 276 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. THE SHORT STORY. {From Literature, 1888.) Not so many years ago, the short story was the poor re- lation in Action. To-day, every able writer of short stories finds himself flooded with demands for his work. * * * If we inquire into the reason for this changed regard, we shall find a simple explanation: Short stories are better treated, because they deserve better treatment — at least, with us. Perhaps, there is something in the concentrated and vivid quality of the short story that accords with our national temperament; certainly, Americans are admitted to do the best work. For one thing, whether or no, the great American novel so long awaited, so strenuously invited, has come, at last, unrecognized; our short stories are American to the core. They reflect our multitudinous national life. Its unruly complexity of race instincts, its daring, its un- derlying patience and clinging to order, its frantic aspira- tions held in leash by a sluggish but tremendous common sense, its provincial narrowness and cosmopolitan toleration, its reckless humor, its hidden tenderness and sentiment, its freedom, its vigor, its divine hopefulness — all are mirrored in our short stories. Yet the day of the short story has only begun. The story teller, by necessity, has made a study of words, of direct picturesque expression. He has so little space that a poor style will show all its faults. Probably there is not a single successful story teller who has not thought and puzzled and toiled through books and muddled his pages into a quagmire of ink and flogged his brain to win the Sphynx's secret, style. They tell of Theopile Gautier that he used to " de- vour dictionaries in search of words ". One can imagine that Am61Ie Rives has followed his example. Short story writers are tempted to place an inorc^iuate value on words, on single phrases that light a situation with a flare. Espe- cially do young writers have a hankering for color in style. They sacrifice form, harmony, the delicate graces of expres- sion, the charm and rest of half tints to a passionate and wearisome splendor. Each sentence is so brilliant, there is no climax. A style of this kind makes the eyes ache. ALICE FKENCH. 277 Strange and far-fetched similes are part of sucli a style and poor nature has more personifications than she was given by Greek mythology. The -wind cannot even blow in straight- forward, unadorned English: it will " tremble " or " rave " or, at best, be "atllt through the lush grasses ", nor does it mend matters by ceasing to blow, in that case it is liable to be "aswoon". MISS CONWAY'S HORSE. {From the Pocket Magazine, 1898 ) The surrey remained in the same spot. That was the cause of the universal enjoyment on the street. Doolan, the coachman, struck the horse again. The horse slightly heaved his flanks. It was a motion in a horse that might be compared to a shrug of the shoulders in a man. But he did not stir. He was a wonderful bay, having a glossy skin and a restless eye. Doolan tried new tactics. He made an encouraging chirrup with his lips, and said, "Sam!" encouragingly. But Sam merely braced his fore legs and rolled his eyes back on his blinders with their shining silver C, and took a fresh hold on his bit. "Horse balky?" inquired the barkeeper, cheerful and interested. '' He's a bit narvous and high-spirittd," answered Doolan, stiff and dignified. Doolan struck again and harder. With an indescribable expression of patient martyrdom Sam took the blow and did not move. " I had a balky horse, once," the barkeeper observed; the crowd by this time being swelled by four more men, and two women in plain, scant, short skirts, basques of an an- tique cut and checked aprons. "Vat did you done to your balky hoss? " one of the women said to the barkeeper. The crowd hung on his answer; Miss Conway leaned a little forward. " I sold Mm," said the barkeeper, with the effect of mak- ing a joke. " Yoa git out! " reproved the wrinkled man, "you don't know nothing 'bout bosses. Young feller, you jump down and lead the critter a bit; and he'll go all right." 278 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Doolan cast an oblique glance of scorn at the adviser and did not move. Neither did Sam. "Lady," continued the wrinkled man, "you tell that smart Alick to git out and lead the boss — " " With his head blinded! " " No, jest his head kept so he can't move ! " " Build a fire under the wagon, he'll be glad enough to go then!" "Say, Missis! lemme try my nigger chaser on him, I'll git him running! " These different suggestions were fired from the crowd in almost simultaneous fusillade. Miss Conway looked anx- iously at the horse ; she said something to Doolan,who handed her the reins and got down scowling, ironically cheered by the boys. But although he went to the horse's head and told Sam, "Good Sam, good old boy — you dom divil" to move on, there was no persuading Sam. Then he set his teeth, sprang back into his seat and caught up the whip. " I'd a boggy smashed by a hoss looked like that one's twin brother. I built a fire under that hoss one day and he moved jest far 'nuff to set the wagon afire, /say unhitch him and maybe that'll fool him," said the barkeeper. " I saw a dandy thing in a newspaper, dead sure for balky bosses " a man in the crowd offered; " it had reformed more balky bosses than any remedy they'd tried in that town for ayear. (The crowd showed signs of interest; Miss Conway looked at the speaker.) I wished to goodness I could remember it! Queer I can't. It was a real simple thing." "Maybe so you vas to gif him some nice grass," one of the women suggested. " I go git you some; You valk ahead und he coom after till he git by dis blace und den be go all right. You see! " But the gentle homeopathic remeny of grass tendered by bis mistress in person, was as useless as Doolan's heroic medicines of whip and voice. Sam hung his bead. He looked as If he wanted — if such a thing may be said of a horse — to burst into tears; but he did not take a step toward the tempter. Miss Conway was standing in the dust, the pretty yellow chrysanthemums of her filmy gown shifting about her in the wind, uncomfortably warm with her exertions, her dainty white hat blown to one side, and ALICE FRENCH. 279 the white Chuddah shawl that she carried, fluttering from her arm. Sam apparently thought well of her looks, for he rubbed his head against her shoulder with a little contented — or was it complacent? — whlnney. Miss Conway's eyes flashed. With a sudden movement she wound her shawl about the beast's head and bent over the place where his ear was wriggling, holding the ear steadily with both hands. " If you don't go I'll sell you to-morrow! " She called in his ear, and tugged at the bit. Now, whether the unusual attack disconcerted the firm soul of Sam so that, in an amaze and vacillation of mind such as is known to undermine the strongest spirits when assailed unaware, he weakened in his Intent, or whether he simply had stood as long as he wished and was now ready to go on again, it is certain that Sam allowed himself to be led a block; and that at the end of his walk, Miss Conway having removed the shawl and stepped into the surrey, he instantly trotted off briskly and vigorously, his head in the air and his eyes forward. Miss Conway drew a long sigh. "What a horse, Doolan! " she exclaimed. " He's a fright! " said Doolan. EMEESON HOUGH. Emerson Hough was. born in Newton, Jasper County, Iowa, on June 28, 1857. Three years before his birth, his parents, Joseph Bond and Elizabeth Hough, moved to Iowa from Loudoun County, Virginia. The Hough family is an old one in America. Richard Hough, a friend of William Penn, emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1683. The Houghs subsequently removed to Loudoun County, Virginia, from Pennsylvania, and other branches of the family removed to other parts of the country at still later dates. Most of them are Quakers. Joseph Bond Hough was what may be called a typical American. He was about six feet in height, with light hair and blue eyes, and was physically very strong and hardy. He was an out-door man and a good shot with either a rifle or a gun; he was also an accomplished writer. Emerson Hough's love for out-door sports and pastimes, and his fondness for writing of such topics, came to him naturally. He is a good shot himself, with all manner of weapons. Most of his writings are on out-door topics . In 1880, he graduated at the State University of Iowa, after having obtained a High Scho'ol education at Newton. His youth was spent like that of most village boys. He has several (280) EMBKSON HOUGH. 281 brothers and sisters. The circumstances of the family were good until late in his father's life, when he failed in business. In 1882, our author went to White Oaks, in Lincoln County, New Mexico — having priorly, in 1881, been admitted to the bar in Newton, Iowa. In New Mexico he was on the frontier, in a wild and rough com- munity. He prizes this year of his life very much. But there was very little legal practice to be obtained in such a place, and so he left New Mexico, and ever since has lived in many parts of the West, from Montana to Texas. Since a little more than a dozen years he has made his home in Chicago, though he traveled in the West several months of every year. Mr. Hough has beenengagedin newspaper and magazine work since a number of years. He has published "The Singing Mouse Stories " (New York, 1895), the chapters of which are so many reveries; the book is full of poetic feeling; "The Story of the Cowboy " (New York, 1897), a vivid picture of ranch life in the far Northwest and Southwest; "The Girl at the Halfway House"; "The Mississippi Bubble"; and, " The Way to the West " (Indianapolis, 1903). Of these, " The Mississippi Bubble " is the most widely read and circulated. " The Way to the West ' ' presents us with an historical panorama of pioneer life in the early West, and contains biographies of Daniel Boone, David Crockett and Kit Carson. His next novel, which he informs me will be published in a few months, will deal 282 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. in part with the negro problem in the South. He has contributed to the best magazines in the country, and he is no doubt entering upon his greatest period of literary activity. Mr. Hough married Charlotte A. Cheesebro of Chicago, October 26, 1897. There is no issue of this marriage. In 1889, he traveled through Yellowstone Park, and has since induced Con- gress to pass an act protecting the Park buffaloes. Much may yet be expected from his pen. THE AMERICAN RIFLE. (_From " The Way to the West.") Witness this sweet ancient weapon of our fatliers, the American rifle, maker of states, empire builder. Useful as its cousin, the ax, it is in design simple as the ax; in outline severe, practicable, purposeful in every regard. It is devoid of ornamentation. The brass that binds the foot of the stock is there to protect the wood. The metal guard below the lock is to preserve from injury the light set- triggers. The serrated edges of the lock plate may show rude file marks of a certain pattern, but they are done more in care- less strength than in cunning or in delicacy. This is no belonging of a weak or savage man. It is the weapon of the Anglo-Saxon; that is to say, the Anglo-Saxon in America; who invented it because he had need of it. This arm was born of the conditions that surrounded our forefathers in the densely covered slopes of the Appalachian Divide, in whose virgin forests there was for the most part small opportunity for extended vision, hence little necessity for a weapon of long range. The game or the enemy with which the early frontiersman was concerned was apt to be met at distances of not more than a hundred or two hundred yards, and the early rifle was perfect for such ranges. Moreover, it was only with great difficulty that the fron- tiersman transported any weighty articles on the Western EMERSON HOUGH. 283 pilgrimage. Lead was lieavy, powder was precious, the paths back to the land of such commodities long and ardu- ous. A marvel of adaptation, the American rifle swiftly grew to a practical perfection. Never in the history of the arms of nations has there been produced a weapon whose results have been more tremendous in comparison to the visible expenditure of energy; never has there been a more economical engine, or an environment where economy was more imperative. The ball of the American rifle was small, forty, sixty or perhaps one hundred of them weighing scarcely more than a pound. The little, curving horn, filled with the precious powder grains, carried enough to famish many shots. The stock of the rifle itself gave housing to the little squares of linen or fine leather with which the bullet was patched in loading. With this liny store of powder and lead, easily portable food for this providentially contrived weapon, the American frontiersman passed on silent'y.throngh the forest, a master, an arbiter, ruler of savage beast or savage foeman, and in time master of the civilized antagonist that said him nay. We shall observe that .the state of Pennsylvania was the starting point of the westward movement of our frontiers- men. We shall find also that the first American small-bore is thought to have originated in the German states of the Palatinate, but it was left for America to prove it and to perfect its use. At Lancaster, Pennsylvania, there was ^ifle maker, prob- ably a German by birth, by name Decherd or Dechert, who begun to outline the type of the American squirrel-rifle or hunting arm. This man had an apprentice, one Mills, with ideas of his own. We see this apprentice and his improved rifle presently in North Carolina; and soon thereafter rifle makers spring up all over the east slope of the Alleghanies, so that as though by magic all our hunters and frontiersmen are equipped with this long rifle, shooting the tiny ball, and shooting it with an accuracy hitherto deemed impossible in the achievements of firearms. Withal we may call this a Southern arm, since New En- gland was later in taking up its use, clinging to the Queen Ann musket when the men of North Carolina and Virginia scorned to shoot a s'quirrel anywhere except in the head. 284 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. The first riflemen of the Revolutionary War were Pennsyl- vanians, Virginians and Marylanders, all Southerners; and deadly enough was their skill with what the English officers called their " cursed widow and orphan makers". The barrel of the typical rifle of those days was about four feet in length, the stock slender, short and strongly curved, so that the sights came easily and directly up to the level of the eye in aiming. The sights were low and close to the barrel, some pieces being provided with two hind sights, a foot or so apart, so that the marksman might not draw either too fine or too coarse a bead with the low sliver or bone crescent of the fore sight. Usually the rear sight was a simple, flat bar, finely notched, and placed a foot or fifteen inches in front of the breach of the barrel, so that the eye should focus easily and sharply at the notch of the rear sight. Such was the care with which the sights were adjusted that the rifieman sometimes put the finishing touches on the notch with so soft a culling tcol as a com- mon pin, working away patiently, a little at a time, lest he should by too great haste go too deeply into the rear sight, and so cause the piece to shoot olhetwise than "true". The delicately arranged set-triggers made possible an instantaneous discharge without any appreciable disturbance of the aim when once obtained; and the long distance between the hind sight and fore sight, the steadiness of the piece, owing to its length and weight, the closeness of the line of sight to the line of the trajectory of a ball driven with a relatively heavy powder charge, all conspired to render extreme accuracy possible with this arm, and this accuracy became so general throughout the American frontier that to be a poor rifle shot was to be an object of contempt. * * * Powder and ball were precious in those early days, and though strong men ever love the sports of weapons, waste could not be tolerated, even in the sport. Sometimes at night the frontiersmen would gather for the pastime of "snuffing the candle", and he was considered a clumsy rifleman who but fanned the flame with his bullet, or cut too deeply into the base of the candle-wick, and so extinguished the light. Again the riflemen would engage in "driving the nail " with the rifle ball, or would shoot at a tiny spot of black on a board or a blazed tree -trunk, firing a num- EMERSON HOUGH. 285 ber of balls into the game mark. In nearly all such cases the balls were dug out of the tree or plank into which they had been flred, and were run over again into fresh bullets for use at another time. Thus grew the skill of the American rifleman, with whose weapon most of the feats of latter day short-range marksmanship could be duplicated. The early American depended upon his rifle in supporting and defending the family. Without it he had not dared to move across the Alleghanies. With it he dared to go anywhere, knowing that it would furnish him food and fending. When the deer and turkey became less numerous near him, he moved his home further westward, where game was more abundant. His progress was bitterly contested by the Indian savages, all the way across the American continent, but they perished before this engine of civilization, which served its purpose across the timbered Appalachians, down the watershed to the Mississippi, up the long and winding streams of the western lands, over the Eockies, and down the slopes of the Sierras to the farther sea. Had it never known change it had not been American. An ax is an ax, because a tree is a tree, whether in the Alleghanies or the Kockies; but the rifle met in the time different conditions. The great plains furnished larger game animals, and demanded longer range in arms, so that in time the rifle shot a heavier ball. So were equipped the early Americans, gaunt, keen, tire- less, that marched to meet the invading forces at the Battle of New Orleans; and when the officers of the British army, on the day after that stricken field, found half their dead shot between the eyes, they knew they could lead their troops no more against such weaponry and such weapon bearers. The rifle had won the West, and it would hold it fast. KUTH McENEEY STUART. Mrs. Ruth McEnery Stuart is the authoress of some of .the most popular stories written of late years —" Sonney " (New York, 1896); "Sol- omon Crow's Christmas Pockets" (New York, 1897); " In Simpkinsville " (New York, 1899); and, " Napoleon Jackson " (New York, 1902). She was born in Avoyles Parish, Louisiana. Her earlier years were spent in New Orleans during the Civil War, " fire and smoke and armed soldiers standing out as high lights in the memory-pictures of her youth ". There she married, and from 1879 to 1883, she lived on her husband's plantation in Arkansas, where she con- tinued her studies of the dialect, habits, customs, superstition, etc., of the Southern negro. She candidly admits that she has imbibed a few super- stitions herself, but she laughingly declares that they are " really sentiments that cling to early memories, rather than beliefs in signs and por- tents". Mrs. Stuart is not addicted to books and to study ; she is a close observer and has acquired a generous knowledge of human nature, being par- ticularly alive to the original and distinctive features of the people she is in contact with in daily life. She is tall, slightly built, and has a peculiarly tender expression about the mouth ; (286) RUTH McENEEY 8TDAET. 287 her eyes are soft brown, her hair is of the same color, and her complexion is fair. Other books by Mrs. Stuart are: "Carlotte's Intended" (New York, 1894); " Gobelinks " (New York, 1896), written with Albert Biglow Paine; "The Story of Babette " (New York, 1898); "Moriah's Mourning, and Other Sto- ries" (New York, 1898); " Holly and Pizen " (New York, 1899); "A Golden "Wedding, and Other Tales " (New York, 1900), etc. Mr. Harrison S. Morris, in Book News, thus writes of Mrs. Stuart : " The love of such humor as lies next to tears is Euth McEnery Stuart's birthright. She has seized the heart of Simp- kinsville's mystery, and laughs good-naturedly at its follies ; but she is kindling with sympathy for its homely tragedies and tragi-coraedies. She can poke fun at ' Mr. Tompkins', but she pities him all the same. This is the quality which gives Mrs. Stuart's book of tales, ' In Simpkinsville ' , an enduring element absent from many kindred collections. It appeals to two of our liveliest emotions. It is hard to keep back the tears over the poor demented and wronged Mary Ellen and her doll; but to let one's self go over the predicament of ' Tomp- kins ' is a wholesome delight. There are seven longish short stories in the volume and some apt illustrations. The book has a homespun texture woven of the soil. It is an American product, as native as green corn and as juicy." Mrs. Stuart has frequently given readings 288 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. from her writings in several of the principal eastern cities, and occasionally fills temporary vacancies in the editorial chairs of Harper's Bazar and Harper's Young People. As a writer of negro dialect, she has no superior. Since some years she is a resident of New York. LADY: A MONOLOGUE OF THE COW-PEN. (From " Moriah^s Mourning." Copyright, 1898, by Harper and Brothers .) Umb! Fur Gord sake, des look atdemcowsl All squez up together 'g'ins' dem bars in dat sof mud — des like I knowed dey gwine be — an' me late at my milklD'! You, Lady! Ttck yo' proud neck down f'om off dat heifer's head! Back, I tell yer! Don't tell me, Spot! Yas, I know she impose on you — yas she do. Keachin' her monst'ous mouf clair over yo' po' little rauley head. Move back, I say, Lady! Ef you so biggoty, why don't you fool wid some o' dem horn cows? You is a lady, eve'y inch of yer ! You knows who to fool wid. You isde uppishes' cow I ever see in all ray life — puttin' on so much style — an' yo' milk so po' an' blue, I could party nigh blue my starch clo'es wid it. Look out dar, Peggy, how you squeeze 'g'ins' Lady ! She ain' gwine teck none o' yo' foolishness. Peggy ain't got a speck o' manners! Lady b'longs ter de cream o' s'ciety, I have yer know, — an' bless Gord, I b'lieve dat's all de cream dey is about her. Hyah! fur Gord's sake lis'n at me, passita' a joke on Lady! I does love to pleg dem cows — dey teck it so good- natured. Heap o' us 'omans mought teck lessons in Chris- tianity f'om a cow — de way she stan' so still an' des look mild -eyed an' chaw 'er cud when anybody sass 'er. Dey'd be a heap less fam'ly quar'lin' on dis plantation ef de 'omans had cuds ter chaw — dat is ef dey'd be satisfied ter chaw dey own. But ef dey was ter have 'em 'twouldn't be no time befo' dey'd be cud fights eve'y day in week, eve'y one thinkin' de nex' one had a sweeter moufful 'n what she KUTH McENERY STUART. 289 had. Reckon we got 'nough ter go to law 'bout, widout cuds — ain't we Lady? Don't start pawin' de groun' now, des caze yer heah me speculatin' at yo' feed-trough. I kin talk an' work too. I ain't like you — nuver do n 'air one. I ain't gwine pay no 'tention ter none o' y'all no mo' now tell I git yo' supper ready. Po' little Brindle! Stan' so still, an' ain't say a word. I'm a-flxin' yo' feed now, honey — yas, I is! I alius mixes yo's fust, caze I know you nuver gits in till de las' one au' some o' de rest o' de greedies mos' gin'ally eats it up fo' you gits it. She's a Scriptu'al cow, Brindle is — she so meek. Yas, I sho' does love Brindle. Any cow dat kin walk in so 'umble, after all de res' git done, an' pick up a little scrap o' leavin's out 'n de trough de way she do — an' turn it eve'y bit into good yaller butter — dat what I calls a cow! Co'se I know Lady'll git in here ahead o' yer, honey, an' eat all dis mash I'm mixin' so good fur you. It do do me good to see 'er do it, too. I sho' does love Lady — de way 'er manners sets on 'er. She don't count much at de churn — an' she ain't got no conscience — an' no cha'acter — hut she's a lady! Dat's huccome I puts up wid 'er. Yas, I'm talkin' 'bout you, Lady, an' I'm a-lookin' at yer, too, rahin' yo' head up so circumstantial. But you meets my eye like a lady! You ain't shame-faced, is yer! You too well riz — you is. You know dat /know dat yo'po' measly sky-colored milk sours up into mighty fine clabber ter feed yo'ng turkeys wid — you an' me, we knows dat, don't we? Hyah! Dar, now, we done turned de joke on all you yal- ler-creamers — ain't we, Lady? Lordy ! I wonder fo' gracious ef Lady nod her head to me accidental ! Is you 'spondin' ter me. Lady? Tell de trufe, I spec's Lady ter twis' up 'er tongue an' talk some day — she work 'er monf so knowin ' ! Dis heah cotton-seed ought ter be tooken out'n her trough, by rights. Ef I could feed her on bran an' good warm slops a while, de churn would purty soon 'spute her rights wid de tukkeysl A high-toned cow, proud as Lady is, ought ter reach white-folk's table somehow-ma-ruther. But you gits dar all the same, don't yer Lady? You gits dar in tukkey-meat efdey donH rec^nize yer! 19 290 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Well! I'm done mlxin' now an' turns my back on de trough — an' advance ter de bars. Lordy, how purty dem cows does look — wid dat low sun 'g'ins' dey backs ! So patient an' yit so onpatient. Back, now, till I teck out dese rails ! Soh, now I Easy, Spot I Easy, Lady I I does love ter let down dese bars wid de sun in my eyes. I loves it mos' as good as I loves ter milk. Down she goes! Step up quick, now, Brindle, an' git yo' place. Lard have mussy! Des look how Brindle meek way lur Lady! I know'd Lady'd git dar fust! I know'd it I An' dat's huccome I mixed dat feed so purtic'lar. I does love Lady ! AN EASTER SYMBOL.- {From " MoriaWs Mourning." Copyright, 1898, by Har- per and Brothers.) Speaker: A Black Girl. Time: Easter Morning. " 'Souse me knockin' at yo' do' so early, Miss Bettie, but I'se in trouble. Don't set up in bed. Jes' lay still an' lemme talk to yer. " I come to ax yer to please ma'am loaned me a pair o'wings, mistus. No'm, I ain't crazy. I mean what I say. "You see, to-day's Easter Sunday, Miss Bettie, an' we havin' a high time in our chu'ch. An' I'se gwine sing de special Easter carol, wid Freckled Frances an' Lame Jake jinin' in de chorus in our choir. Hit's one o' deze heah visible choirs sot up nex' to de pulpit in front o' de congre- gation. " Of co'se, me singin' de high solo makes me de princi- plest flggur, so we 'ranged fur me to stan' in de middle, wid Frances an' Jake on my right an' lef sides, an' I got a bran new tarlton frock wid spangles on it, an' a Easter lily wreath all ready. Of co'se, me being de fust singer, dat entitles me to wear de highest plumage, an' Frances, she knows dat, an.' she 'lowed to me she was going to wear that white nainsook lawn you gi'n 'er, an' des a plain sec- EUTH MoENERY STUART. 291 onclary hat, an' at de p'iatecl time we all three got to rise au' courtesy to de coagregitioa, an' dea bu'st into song. Lame Jake gwine wear dat white duclj suit o' Marse John's an' a Easter lily in his button-hole. "Well, hit was all fixed dat- a- way, peacable an'proper, but you know de trouble is Freckled Frances is jealous-hearted, an' she ain't got no principle. I tell you, Miss Bettle, when niggers gits white enough to freckle, you look out for 'em! Dey jes ad\ranced f lir enough along to show white ambition an' nigger principle! An' dat's a dange'ous mixture! "An' Frances — ? She aiu't got no mo' principle 'n a suck-aig dorg! Ever sence we 'ranged dat Easter pro- gramme, she been studyin' up some awdacious way to outdo me to-day in de face of eve'ybody. "But I'm jes one too many fur any yaller freckled-faced nigger. I'm black — but dey's a heap o' trouble come out o' ink bottles befo' to'day! "I done had my eye on Frances! An' fur de las' week I taken notice ev'ry time we had a choir practlsin ', Fran- ces, she'd fetch in some talk about butterflies bein' a Bagter sign o' de resurrection o' de dead, an' all sech as dat. Well, I know Frances don't keer no mo' 'bout de resurrec- tion o' de dead 'n nothin'. Frances is too tuck up wid dis life fur dat! So I watched her. An' las' night I ketched up wid 'er. "You no dat grea' big silk paper butterfly you had on yo' jjianner lamp, Miss Bettie? She's got it pyrched up on a wire on top o' 'dat secondary hat, an' she's a-fixin' it to wear to church to-day. But she don't know I know it. You see, she knows I kin sing all oyer her, an' dat's hnccome she's a-projectin' to ketch de eyes o' de congregation! " But ef you'll he'p me out. Miss Bettie, we'll fix 'er. You know dem yaller gauzy wings you wo'e in de tableaux? Ef you'll loand 'em to me an' help me on wid 'em terreckly when I'm dressed, I'll be a whole live butterfly, an' I bet yer when I flutters into dat choir. Freckled Frances '11 feel like snatchin' dat lamp shade off her hat, sho's you born! An' fur once-t I'm proud I'm so black complected, caze black an' yaller, dey goes togather fur butterflies! " Frances 'lowed to kill me out to-day, but I lay when she sets eyes on de yaller-winged butterfly she'll 'predate de resurrection o' de dead ef she never done it befo' in her life." MAEY N. MURFREE. The short stories of Tennessee mountain life contributed to an Eastern magazine by " Charles Egbert Craddock" in the seventies, showed such marked individuality of character, that Miss Murfree at once began to be regarded as one of the leaders in the new school of South- western fiction writers then rapidly coming to the front. She is the daughter of the late William L. Murfree, sr., who removed to St. Louis from the Tennessee mountains very early in the seven- ties. Mr. Murfree was a lawyer by profession, and in St. Louis he published a legal treatise on " Sheriffs " which is still regarded by lawyers as an authority on the subject. He was also, during many years, a frequent contributor to law journals and reviews. In St. Louis, Miss Murfree devoted herself to writing short stories and observations of life, scenery and character in her beloved Tennessee mountains. Her first book, a collection of short stories, published under the title of, " In the Tennessee Mountains" (Boston, 1884), met with a hearty recognition and stamped its author at once as a close analysis of character and a master of the descriptive art. Since the publi- cation of this book, she has been a frequent con- (292) MARY N. MURFREE. 293 tributor to Eastern magazines and has published a number of other boolis — indeed, too many for her literar}' reputation. The list includes : " Where the Battle was Fought" (1884); " Down the Eavine" (1885); "In the Clouds" (1886); " The Story of Keedon Bluffs " (1887) ; " The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains" (1888); "The Despot of Broomsedge Cove" (1888) ; " A Specter of Power " (1889) ; " The Juggler" (1896); " In the Stranger People's Country " ; "The Bushwackers " (1889) ; "His Vanished Star " (1894); "The Story of Old FortLoudon" (1899); " The Mystery of Witch Face Mountain, and Other Stories," and several later ones. Her books all bear the imprint of a Boston publishing house. Miss Murfree was born in 1858, in Nashville, Tennessee. She has the blood of revolutionary heroes in her veins. The town of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, took its name from her family. The family fortunes were broken by the Civil War of 1861-65, and the Murfrees removed to this town when Mary was a little gii'l. They spent the summers in the Tennessee mountains. A partial paralysis of the feet prevented Mary from run- ning about and taking part in active play. She turned to mental occupation. Her loss was the world's gain. With her deep, bright, gray eyes, she watched the mountaineers, the negroes, and all the life about her, unconsciously making character studies for her future stories. So she 294 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. gathered the material for the striking sketches the reading public is now familiar with. Miss Murfree is short in stature; she has a large head and strong features. She has brown hair, and is sunny-natured and full of humor. While residing in St. Louis, her study was in the third story of house number 702 North Jefferson avenue, and was absolutely forbidden to intrud- ers. Servants never entered it, and only mem- bers of the family went to it under special circumstances. When working. Miss Murfree retired to this study, and was lost to the outside world. She generally worked from nine in the morning until dark. She is not a rapid or finished composer ; her writings are the result of the most exacting and conscientious labor. The first sketch, which is written off rapidly and fluently, is worked over and over again until it satisfies the exacting requirements of the authoress' conception. Every word is gauged and care- fully weighed. It is simply a matter for wonder that she produces as many books as she does in the time she devotes to work. Mr. Will Murfree, jr., the brother of Miss Murfree, and with whom I had a law office early in the eighties, once told me that his sister was not only an indefatigable worker, but also untiring in her researches after the minutest facts, and would spend hours upon hours in verifying the smallest details. A legal question was involved in a point in her " Where the Battle was Fought ' ' ; she consulted both her father and her MAEY N. MURFRBE. 295 brother, but even after so doing, she was not entirely satisfied until she had, as Will said with a smile, " wasted several weeks over law books and court decisions in law journals ". IKE HOODEN'S HEROISM. (From the Youth's Companion, 1886.) The mists had lifted from it, but the snow had fallen deep. Poor Valley lay white and drear, — between the grim mountain with its great black crags, its chasms, its gaunt, naked trees, and the long line of knobs, whose stunted pines bent with the weight of the snow. There was no smoke from the chimney of the black- smith's shop. There were no tracks about the door. An atmosphere charged with calamity seemed to hang over the dwelling. Somehow he knew that a dreadful thing had happened even- before he opened the door and saw his mother's mournful, white face. She sprang up at the tight of him, with a wild, sobbing cry that was half-grief, half -joy. He had only a glimpse of the interior, — of Jube, looking anxious and unnaturally grave; of the listless children, grouped about the flre; of the big, burly blacksmith, with a strange, deep pallor on his face, and as he shifted his position, — why, how was that? The boy's mother had thrust him out of the door, and closed it behind her. The jar brought down from the low eaves a few feathery flakes of snow, which fell upon her hair as she stood there with him. " Don't say nuthin' 'bout'n it," she implored. " He can't abide ter hear it spoke of." " What ails dad's hand? " he asked, bewildered. "It's gone!" she sobbed. "He war ter Peter's saw- mill day ye lef ' — somehow 'nuther the saw cotched it — the doctor tuk it off." " His right hand!" cried Ike, appalled. The blacksmith would never lift a hammer again. And there the forge stood, silent and smokeless. 296 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKRITOEY. What this portended, Ike realized, as he sat with them around the Are. Their sterile fields In Poor Valley had only served to eke out their subsistence. This year the corn-crop had failed, and the wheat was hardly better. The winter had found them without special provision, but without special anxiety, for the anvil had always amply supplied their simple needs. Now that this misfortune had befallen them, who could . say what was before them unless Ike would remain and take his step -father's place at the forge? Ike knew that this contingency must have occurred to them as well as to him. He knew it by the anxious, furtive glances which they one and all cast upon him from time to' time, — even Pearce Tatam, whose turn it was now to feel that greatest anguish of calamity, helplessness. But must he relinquish his hopes, his chance of an edu- cation, that plucky race for which he was entered to over- take the world that had a hundred years the start of him, and he forever a nameless, futureless clod in Poor Valley? His mother had the son she had chosen . And surely he owed no duty to Pearce Tatam. The hand that was gone had been a hard hand to him. He rose at length. He put on his leather apron. " Waal, — I mought ez well g'long ter the shop, I reck- ons," he remarked, calmly. " 'Pears like thar's time yit fur a tolor'ble spat o' work afore dark." It was a hard-won victory. Even yet he experienced a sort of satisfaction in knowing that Pearce Tatam must feel humiliated and of small account to be thus utterly depend- ent for his bread upon the boy whom he had so persistently maltreated. In his pale face Ike saw something of the bit- ternes she had endured, of his broken spirit, of his humbled pride. The look smote upon the boy's heart. There was another inward struggle. Then he said, as if it were a result of deep cogitation, — "Ye'll hev ter kem over ter the shop, dad, wunst in a while, ter advise 'bout what's doin'. 'Pears to me like mos' folks wouldn't 'low ez a boy no older'n me couldn't do reg- 'lar blacksmithin' 'thout some 'sperienced body along fur sense an' showin'." MAEY N. MUEFEEE. 297 The man visibly plucked up a little. Was he indeed so useless? "That's a fac', Ike," he said, gently. " I reckon ye kin make out toler'ble — considern'. But I'll be long ter holp." After this Ike realized that he had been working with something harder than iron, than steel — his own unsubdued nature. He traced an analogy from the forge; and he saw that those strong forces, the flres of conscience and th« coercion of duty, had wrought the stubborn metal of his character to a kindly use. Gradually the relinquishment of his wild, vague ambition began to seem less bitter to him ; for it might be that these were the few things over which he should be faithful — his own forge-flre and his own flery heart. And so he labors to fulfil his humble trust. The spring never comes to Poor Valley. The summer is a cloud of dust. The autumn shrouds Itself iu mist. And the winter is snow. But poverty of soil need not imply poverty of soul. And a noble manhood exists to-day in that humble smithy " Way down in Poor Valley." MRS. M. E. M. DAVIS. . Down on Rue Royal, the next block to where they tell you, " That was Paul Morphy's house — the great chess player, you know ", just next door to the sacred ground marked " The Spanish Commendaria " on Mr. Thompson's plat, — a little more than two blocks from the Cabildo and the old Cathedral, — right in the center of the historic old French and Spanish quarter, surrounded by "the Sieur George's first four- story building ' ' , General Jackson's headquarters, the " Cafe des Exiles ", Audubon's Studio, and, in fact, whole blocks redolent with the air of romance and legend and historic achievement, — right on this same narrow, antique Rue Royal, stands an old, time-beaten brick house that must have had its history and its gala days. You ring the bell ; you are conducted through a long, bare corridor that ends in a courtyard ; you turn again, take four or five steps, and then you find yourself passing through large, spacious rooms that breathe .an atmosphere of the days when people built houses with rooms in them, and not boxes. A tail, simply-dressed woman extends her hand and greets you with a smile. You look into her kindly, honest face, you listen tb her voice, and — you find yourself feeling wonder- fully at home. (298) MRS. M. E. M. DAVIS. "299 This is Molly Moore Davis — Mrs. M. E. M. Davis, the wife of the editor-in-chief of the Daily Picayune — that courteous old gentleman whom all New Orleans knows as Major Davis. Mary Evelyn Moore, the daughter of Doctor John Moore, an oldtime Southern gentleman, was born on her father's plantation in Texas. She began writing very early in life and pub- lished her first book "Minding the Gap, and Other Poems" (Houston, Texas, 1873) when she was only fifteen years old. The book was a very promising one, for a first book. During the Civil War, her father and her brothers served in the Confederate Army, and lost their home. In her "In War Time at La Rose Blanche" (Boston, 1888), she writes of the plantation and its memories. Madame Blanc, the well-known " Th. Bentzon " of the Paris reviews, published a translation of this book in France. In 1874, Miss Moore married Major Thomas E. Davis at Houston, and in 1875, they removed to New Orleans, where they have resided ever since. Mrs. Davis has unfortunately not con- tinued her efforts in poetry since several years, in spite of the promise contained in her first and only volume. She has made " name and fame " as a writer of short stories, sketches and novels. Her negro dialect stories are among the best in Southern literature, and her novels, " Under the Man Fig" (Boston, 1895), "The Wire Cut- ters" (Boston, 1899), " The Queen's Garden" (Boston, 1900), and " Jaconetta " (Boston, 300 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 1901), have a wide circulation throughout the country. The last is the story of a little girl living on a plantation just before the Civil War. It gives very attractive glimpses of the generous hospitality of old Southern families, and vivid impressions of the State (one of the Gulf States) just before the war. Other books by Mrs. Davis are : " A Christmas Masque of St. Roche" (Chicago, 1896); "An Elephant's Track, and Other Stories " (New York, 1897); " Under Six Flags: the Story of Texas" (Boston, 1897); and, "A Bunch of Eoses: Parlor Plays " (Boston, 1903). The following poem, "Counsel", was origi- nally published in the February, 1871, number of The Oalaxy, the former New York magazine, over the signature " M. E. M." (Molly E. Moore ) . It has lately been ' ' going the rounds ' ' of the press (thanks to the stupidity of some yellow journalist) credited to Coventry Patmore. Mr. Patmore never claimed the poem, — he probably never knew of its .being credited to him. He died in 1896; it is not included in his published works. I herewith append it: COUNSEL. If thou should'st bid thy friend farewell, But for one night though that farewell should be, Press thou his hand in thine ; how canst thou tell How far from thee MRS. M. E. M. DAVIS. 301 Fate, or caprice, may lead his feet Ere that to-raorrow come? Men have been linown Lightly to turn the corner of a street, And days have grown To moaths, and months to lagging years, Before they loolied In loving eyes again. Parting, at best, is underlaid with tears — With tears and pain. Therefore, lest sudden death should come between, Or time, or distance, clasp with pleasure true The palms of him who goeth forth. Unseen, Fate goeth, too I Yea, find thee always time to say Some earnest word betwixt the idle talk. Lest with thee henceforth, night and day. Regret should wallj. THE PASSING OF THE ROSE. What goes With the passing of the rose? What, with the fading of the grass? Alas, The greenness and the glory of the blade That burst its sheath, and leaped forth unafraid, Exulting in the sunshine and the shade! And ah, the flush Of summer roses, vivid in the hush Of moon, or pale with passion in the night! Perfume and color! Radiance and delight! The greenness and the glory go, alas, With the fading of the grass. A rapture unmeasurable goes With the passing of the rose. What goes When the white eyelids close? What, when the white feet pass? Alas, The golden splendor of her hair, love-blest! The warm white sweetness of her pulsing breast! 302 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. The warm red sweetness of her curving lip, Whereon the smile that all her soul confessed Dwelt holily! Her voice, sweet as the slip Of southern waters under southern skies! And, ah, the heavenly blueness of her eyes ! The splendor and_the music go, alas. When the white feet pass. A gladness unimagined goes When the white eyelids close. What stays When the fair rose decays? What, when the grass lies faded on the sod? Dear God, What stays? A singing sunshine in the brain! A memory of hill-slopes under rain, Bird-wing and butterfly about the plain! A dream of swaying stems, where roses red Stand tall and stately in the garden bed. Of petals drooping softly by the wall, Full softly, as the snow-white eye -lids fall! These blessings stay, dear God. Though all the grass lies withered on the sod. A glow imperishable stays, Though the fair rose decays. What stays When life has gone Death's ways? What, when her marble breast upholds the sod? Dear God, All things abide which Thou hast wrought for good! What stays? The glory of her womanhood, The joy that in her azure eyes did brood When at the morning Gate of Song she stood Listening! The beauty and the grace which filled Her world as with a sense of music, stilled But lingering, like unseen wings astir! Yea, more than these, the stainless soul of her! The brightness and the wonder stay, dear God, Though on her breast has dropped the clod. Love stays ! Love stays ! Though Lite has gone Death's ways! IRVING B. EICHMAN. Irving B. Riohman was born in Muscatine, Iowa, October 27, 1861, and has always lived in Iowa. In 1887, he married Elizabeth L. Green, also of Muscatine. In 1889, he was elected to the lower house of the Iowa General Assembly, and was re-elected in 1890. Politically, he is a Democrat. In 1893, he was appointed United States Consul-General to Switzerland, by Presi- dent Grover Cleveland. He held this post, giving general satisfaction, until 1898, when a political change in the presidency took place. Mr. Richman graduated from the Iowa State University,, and has since largely devoted his time to the continuation of his studies in law and literature. Since a number of years, he has been a practicing attorney. For one of his age, he has alread}' accomplished nauch in the field of serious literature. His first published work was "Appenzell" (London and New York, 1895) ; this is a valu- able study on the history,, constitution, and pres- ent condition of one of the oldest democratic countries in Europe and in the world. Says the author, " The history of this land forms a pecu- liarity in the great chain of popular uprisings in the Middle Ages. It shows more essentially than does even the history of the Forest Can- (303) 304 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. tons the contrast between the aristocracy and the people, between the rulers and the ruled " ; and its treatment from this point of view is both interesting and instructive. " Appenzell " has received very high praise from several leading London and Edinburgh newspapers. Prior to this work he had published, " John Brown among the Quakers, and Other Sketches " (Des Moines, Iowa, 1894). His latest book is, " Ehode Island: its Making and its Meaning. A Survey of the Annals of the Commonwealth from its Settlement to the Death of Eoger WiUiams, 1636-1683. By Irving Berdine Rich- man." It was also pubhshed from New York and London, in 1902, and is in two' volumes. How freedom of conscience and political liberty flourished upon the Island of Aquidneck and that part of the mainland which joined together* made up the old historic Rhode Island Plantations, is ably and interest- ingly described. This is probably the most com- plete and accurate account that we have of Rhode Island in its earlier days. The amount of researches made by the author becomes fully ap- parent when we take into consideration the abso- lute knowledge of time, place and circumstance which he displays as his narrative progresses. He has given us a fair and unprejudiced estimate of the character and achievements of the great apostle of religious liberty, Eoger Williams. The work ranks among the able and serious histories of our literature. The Nation con- IRVING B. RICHMAN. 305 siders this book as a "valuable contribution to American colonial history", and says that it is an " unusually careful and itnportant piece of investigation." Last January, Mr. Richman was busily at work on another book which will be published in 1905; its title will be, "Individualism and the Rise of the United States." He tells me that he will place emphasis on the role that Western and frontier influences have played in the devel- opment of American individualism. 20 MRS. SHEPPARD STEVENS. Mrs. Sheppard Stevens of Little Rock, Arkan- sas, the authoress of several historical novels, is comparatively a new writer, her first book having appeared a little more than five years ago. While she has produced many minor works, such as stories and sketches, that have appeared in the magazines and Sunday newspapers, all writ- ten during her leisure hours — her first ambitious efeort was, " I Am the King " (Boston, 1898), which was very favorably and encouragingly re- viewed by the press. ' ' I Am the King ' ' deals with the time of the crusades in the Holy Land, and the doughty deeds of King Richard, Coeur de Lion. The title of the story is derived from an incident in which the hero. Sir Godfrey de Bersac, sav^s the life of Richard, King of England, on the battle-field by crying out, " I Am the King! " and thereby directing the attacks of the Sara- cens toward himself, and so affording the true king an opportunity to escape. The story is full of action and interest and the style is bright and pleasing. Mrs. Stevens' second work, " The, Sword of Justice" (Boston, 1899) is also based on his- tory, but is not as interesting as its predecessor. In her next work, " In the Eagle's Talon" (Boston, 1902), she fully demonstrates that she (306) MKS. SHEPPARD STEVENS. 307 has devoted much time to the study of the cus- toms and manners of the people of St. Louis, and to the village itself, at the epoch just prior to the period of the Louisiana purchase. Many of her characters are well drawn and breathe the life of the days they lived and acted in, and of whose history they were a part. There is an air of reality and plausibility about Louis Lafreniere, Felicite Langlois and Pfere Mallet, which is de- lightful, but when the scene changes to France and to new characters, the authoress is far from happy in her delineations. The introduction of Napoleon, and his presentation in the role of a common seducer is a blunder. One regrets that the action is not confined to early St. Louis. Mrs. Stevens was born at Mobile, Alabama, and is a daughter of Bishop Pearce of Little Rock, Arkansas. She resided in St. Louis until the death of her husband, William C. Stevens, in September, 1903, after which event she again took up her residence in Arkansas. She informs me that a new novel — her fourth one — will be issued in spring (1904) by a Boston book pub- lishing house; its title will be, "The Sign of Triumph." THE HERMIT OF FOUCHE. No one seemed to know whence lie came, or how long he had been there, when a countryman, more curious than his kindj seeing the corner ot a shanty through the bushes, stopped his ox cart and went down the slightly worn path to reconnoiter. The abode, which rewarded this trouble, would scarcely justify even the name of " shanty," and after a wandering survey of the then deserted dwelling he returned to his cart. 308 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. "Glang! " he ordered, emphasizing his command with a crack from his long whip, and he slouched along beside his oxen, with a gait and bearing so like their own weary slow- ness, meditating over the loolishness which had led any human being to select such a spot in which to dwell. Some weeks after, when he encountered Elijah, tall, dark and gaunt, with sombre dark eyes, which seemed to burn with a consuming flre, he ceased to wonder, and decided that " the critter was plum crazy." The spot selected by the stranger for the erection of his shanty might well have given rise to wonder, even in the minds of the stolid country folks who frequented the road. It was upon the bank of a stream, a fork of the Arkansas, known to the people thereabouts as Fouche, and In reality a cypress swamp, from whose muddy, currentless depths the corrugated cypress trunks raise themselves high in air to end in dark green feathery foliage, arching over and closing in like a green Gothic aisle in one of nature's cathedrals. From root to topmost branch, the water below faithfully re- produces the leafy arch, and so still and unruffled is the surface of the swamp that the reflected image is as unwaver- ing and as clear cut as the original. Bash and water plant thrive beneath the trees, though little sun strikes through to help their growth, while dotted about here and there is a curious root formation, the cypress" knee," which presents the appearance of an abortive tree, attempted, perhaps, by one of nature's journeymen, who found his task impossible of completion. About twenty feet from the bank of this stream had been placed the hovel which had given rise to so much wondering comment. It was built of half rotten, discarded boards, and consisted of but a single room,who8e one window closed with a wooden shutter. The deficiencies in the roof were made good by a covering of tin, evidently constructed by the laborious melting and beating out of stray tin cans. On the outside of the house was a rude chimney, built of lath and plastered with mud. Within, on a floor of rough boards, stood a chair, table and bed, all unmistakably of home manu- facture, and evidently the work of awkward and unskilled hands. In one corner of the room, fastened to the wall, were two wide shelves. Upon the upper one rested an oblong box, of a size which might have served as a coffin for a new-born Infant. This box was secured by a tiny MRS. SHEPPARD STEVENS. 309 padlock, and had evidently remained untouched for months, as evidenced by the dust and cobwebs which had claimed it for their own. Beside the open hearth hung an iron pot and skillet. There was nothing in all the room to relieve its look of bare poverty save scrupulous cleanliness. Had one taken the pains to observe Elijah's way of living, he might almost have been led to believe that, like the prophet of old whose name he bore, he, too, depended upon the birds of the air for subsistence. For the most part, such poor living as he got came from the muddy waters at his door. He had a bateau and an old dug-out, which he had plugged up and made sufiSciently sound for use, and in one of these he daily paddled himself out on the swamp, to sit for hours patiently fishing for the tasteless finny inhabitants of the water. When his catch was larger than he needed he some- times sold a string of fish, and in this way supplied the few necessities of his meagre existence. Once or twice he had worked for a few days at odd jobs for some of the neighbor- ing farmers, but they were curious and asked many ques- tions, and so he had ceased any attempt to make his living among his kind, and now spent his days and nights beside the swamp, which seemed but a sombre personality. " That pore crazy critter '11 be chillin it 'fore long, ef he aint already at it," remarked a woman, glancing toward the cabin in the bushes from ier chair at the back of a wagon, as the oxen slowly slouched over the long bridge leading to town. " He'll git so full er pizen, he won't stop shakin' this side er judgment." If the chills racked his bones and the fever burnt his body, no one was any the wiser, for he endured in silence, growing perhaps a trifle more gaunt and yellow as the summer wore away. The hours spent in his miserable hovel which were not given to sleep were, for the most part, passed in prayer . Kneeling upright on the floor, his body sometimes swaying in ecstasy, oftener rigid with his strong effort at self-control, his voice would rise in supplicatory cadence until it reached a commanding frenzy, in which he besought, implored, demanded of the Almighty to help and save him from the temptation of the devil, and the weakness of his own heart; ending at last, when spent and weary with the force of his passionate outburst, with a sobbing iteration of " Lord have mercy; Lord, have mercy; Lord, have mercy! " LOUISIANA AUTHORS. Fraiigois Xavier Martin wrote the first history of Louisiana — "The History of Louisiana, from the earliest period ", in two volumes (New Orleans, 1827). This work is still in high esteem. He is also the author of a " History of North Carolina" (New Orleans, 1829). He was at one time one of the judges of the Su- preme Court of Louisiana. Several new edi- tions of his " Louisiana " have been issued; the latest is dated in 1882. While residing in North Carolina he translated and published " Pothier on Obligations " (1802). He occupied the Su- preme Bench of Louisiana thirty-two years. He was born in Marseilles, France, March 17, 1764, and died in New Orleans, December 11, 1846. B. M. Norman published in New Orleans, " Rambles by Land and Water, Cuba and Mex- ico " (1845) and " New Orleans and Environs " (1845). Also, "Rambles in Yucatan " (New York, 1843). B. M. Palmer of New Orlerns, is the author of, "The Family in its Civil and Churchly Aspects" (Richmond, 1876); "Sermons" (New Orleans, 1876); "The Life and Letters of James Flenley Thornwell" (Richmond, 1875) ; (310) LOUISIANA AUTHORS. 311 and, ?' Formation of Character" (New Orleans, 1889). Edward C. Wharton of New Orleans, is the author of, "The War of Bachelors", a novel (New Orleans, 1882). He also translated from the French, "The New World" (New Orleans, 1855), and wrote for the precocious Bateman children, Ellen and Kate, a comedietta, " The Young Couple" (1851), and a play, "Dick, the Newsboy". Other plays of his are, "The Toodles " (immortalized by Ben DeBar), "The J. Js," "Ten Thousand Fillibusters", "The Baggs-es", etc. He is also the author of a biography of Charles Gayarre. Alexander Walker was born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, October 13, 1819. He graduated from the law department of the University of Vir- ginia in 1840 and removed to New Orleans where he shortly abandoned law for journalism. He edited, at various times, the Jeffersonian, the Delta, thePzcaywne, the Times, and the Herald. He took an active part in politics, and at one time was a city judge. As a member of the State convention, he advocated and voted for the ordinance of secession. Nearly all of his books are of an historical character: "The Story of the Plague ; a History of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1852 " ; " Jackson and New Orleans" (New York, 1856); "The Life of Andrew Jackson " ; " Butler and New Orleans " ; "The Battle of Shiloh " ; and "Dueling in Louisiana." Mr. Walker died in Fort Scott, 312 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Arkansas, January 24, 1893. His " History of the Plague "' has been frequently reprinted. A new edition was issued in the nineties. George W. Kendall, born in Vermont, re- moved to New Orleans in 1835. During a number of years he was the editor of the Pica- yune. He published, " Narrative of the Texan Santa Fe Expedition," 2 volumes (New York, 1844), and " The "War between the United States and Mexico" (New York, 1851). During the Mexican War he served on General Zachary Taylor's staff. In the latter part of the fifties he removed to Texas. Edward Livingston is credited with, " Systeme de Loi Penale. £tat de la Louisiana" (Nou- velle Orleans, 1825); "An Answer to Mr. Jefferson's Justification of his Conduct. N. O. Batture" (Philadelphia, 1813); and, "Intro- ductory Report to the Code of Prison Discip- line, etc., for the State of Louisiana" (Phila- delphia, 1827). Doctor William H. Holcombe, a well-known physician of New Orleans, was a miscellaneous writer of both prose and poetry. He published: " Our Children in Heaven " (Philadelphia, 1868) ; "The Sexes" (Philadelphia, 1869); " In Both Worlds"; "Condensed Thoughts" (Chicago, 1889); and, "A Mystery of New Orleans" (Philadelphia, 1890). The last mentioned is a novel and its purpose is to illustrate the new dis- coveries in physio-psychology and to advocate a more friendly feeling between the North and the LOUISIANA AUTHORS. 313 South. It also throws light on the race problem of the South. Florence Converse of New Orleans, has pub- lished, "Diana Victrix " (New York, 1897); "The Burden of Christopher" (New York, 1900) ; and, " Long Will ", a story of England in the time of Chaucer (Boston, 1903). I am informed that she is writing a novel in which the scenes are laid principally in New Orleans. William Darby, the New Orleans geographer, published, "A Geographical Description of the State of Louisiana", etc. (Philadelphia, 1816); " A Geographical Description of Louisiana and Mississippi" (New York, 1817); and, "The Emigrant's Guide to the Western and South- western States", etc. (New York, 1818). He also published a large map of Louisiana, folded in boards (Philadelphia, 1816). William Preston Johnson (New Orleans) has written, " The Life of Albert Sidney Johnson " (New York, 1878), and "The Prototype of Hamlet" (New York, 1890), Miss Grace King was born in New Orleans and has ever since resided in that city. She is iden- tified with nearly all measures looking to the welfare of New Orleans, and has acquired an en- viable reputation throughout the country as a wi-iter of short stories and novelettes. She has written in other departments of literature, how- ever, and her " Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville" (New York, 1892), and " De Soto and his Men in the Land of Florida" (New 314 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. York, 1898), testify as to her ability as a biog- rapher. Other works by her are: "Tales of Time and Place" (New York, 1892); "Balcony Stories" (New York, 1893); " On the Planta- tion " ; " Earthlings " ; " Bo'nne Maman " ; "A History of Louisiana for Schools" (New York and New Orleans, 1893), written jointly with Professor J. E. Ficklin; " New Orleans, the Place and the People " (New York, 1896), etc. Beverly E. Warner, of New Orleans, has quite a number of books to his credit: " Trou- bled Waters: a Problem of To-day" (Philadel- phia, 1885); "English History in Shakes- peare's Plays" (New York, 1899); "The Young Man in Modern Life" (New York, 1901); and "The Young Woman in Modern Life " (New York, 1903). I am informed that another book from Mr. Warner's pen will be published this year. Judge T. Wharton Collens is the author of a tragedy, "The Martyr Patsiots " (1836), founded on the revolution of 1768, and two works on psychology and political economy, "Humanics" and "The Eden of Labor." They all bear the imprint of New Orleans. General Beauregard (Pierre Gustave Toutant) was born in St. Martin's Parish, Louisiana, May 28, 1818. He published: " The Principles and Maxims of the Artof War " (Charleston, 1863) ; " Keport of the Defense of Charleston " (Eich- mond, 1864) ; " Summary of the Art of War " (New York, 1891); and, " Commentary on the LOUISIANA AUTHORS. 315 Ctimpaign and Battle of Manassas, 1861 " (New York, 1891). He also wrote a pamphlet, " Ke- port on the Proposed System of Drainage" (New Orleans, 1859). General Beauregard wrote admirably, but it is as one of the ablest of the Southern commanders of the Civil War that he must be considered. He died in New Orleans, February 20, 1893. Alfred Eoman published a work in two vol- umes on "The Military Operations of General Beauregard" (New York, 1884). Mrs. E. B. Wetmore of New York, formerly Miss Elizabeth Bislandof New Orleans, the orig- inal " globe trotter ", has published " A Flying Trip around the World " (New York, 1891), and "A Candle of Misunderstanding" (New York, 1903). She wrote a few pages of Khoda Brough- ton's " Bachelor Indeed " (New York, 1892). May Mount has published two local books, "Sketch Book and Guide of New Orleans" (1890), and " Some Notables of New Orleans." Her local reputation is established. M. Sophie' Holmes (" Millie Mayfield ") has sung of ' ' Carrie Harrington " , " Progression ' ' , and "A Wreath of Rhymes" — all published in New Orleans. The first book bears date of 1857. Mother Teresa Austin Carroll, of the Convent of Mercy, New Orleans, has published a number of religious books: "Life of Catherine Mc- Auley" (1871); "Life of the Venerable Clement M. Hoibauer " (1877); three volumes 316 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. of ' ' Leaves from the Annals of the Sisters of Mercy "(1881-1890) ; and, "Essays, Educational and Historic" (1899). These books are all published in New York. " In Many Lands " will be added to the list this year. Mother Austin (as she is generally known) is very highly es- teemed in New Orleans. She was born in Clon- mel, Ireland, in 1836 ; her life, since her eight- eenth year, has been devoted to religion and religious education. She has resided in the United States (principally in Louisiana) since 1857. B. F. French, who published " The Historical Collections of Louisiana", etc. (1678-1691), in six volumes (New York, 1846-1853), and ' ' The Historical Collections of Louisiana and Florida, 1527-1702" (New York, 1875), was a merchant in New Orleans for many years ; he bought rare and old books, and ran a library for a while. His books were the nucleus of the present New Orleans Public Library. He died in New York very poor. Horace Fletcher is the author of ' ' Menti- culture, or the A, B, C of True Living " (Chi- cago, 1897); "That Last Waif" (Chicago, 1898); and "Happiness as Found in Fore- thought Minus Forethought" (Chicago, 1897). Mrs. C. V. Jamison is the authoress of "Seraph; The Little Violinist " (Boston, 1896) ; " Lady Jane " (New York, 1897) ; and " Toin- ette's Philip " (New York, 1898). Also, " The Story of an Enthusiast" (New Orleans, 1888). LOUISIANA AUTHORS. 317 W. W. Clendennin, the geologist, wrote ac- counts of the " Bluff and Mississippi Alluvial Lands of Louisiana", and " The Florida Par- ishes of Louisiana". Both were published at Baton Eouge. Napier Bartlett published three books : ' ' Sto- ries of the Crescent City" (New Orleans, 1869) ; " A Soldier's Story of the War " (New Orleans, 1874); and, "Military Eecord of Louisiana" (New Orleans, 1875). M. F. Bigney published " The Forest Pil- grims, and Other Poems " (New Orleans, 1869), and "Poetical History of Louisiana; also Co- lumbia, a Centennial Poem" (New Orleans, 1885). Henry C. Castellanos is the author of a local book, "New Orleans as it was; Episodes of Louisiana Life " (New Orleans, 1895). Thomas P. May has two books to his credit, " The Earl of Mayfield " (Philadelphia, 1880), and "A Prince of Breffny " (Philadelphia, 1881). Frank McGloin of New Orleans, is the author of, " Norodom, King of Cambodia " (New York, 1882), and three pamphlets, "The Mystery of Life", " The Being of God", and " Bdief and Unbelief", printed at New Orleans in 1894. James D. B. DeBow, editor and proprietor of the once famous DeBow' s Commercial Review of New Orleans, is the author of a work in three vol- umes which still has a recognized value, " The 318 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Industrial Resources etc. of the Southern and Western States " (New Orleans, 1853). He also compiled two other books, " Statistical View of the United States" and "Mortality Statistics, United States Census, 1850" (Washington, 1855). He was born in Charleston, South Car- olina, July 10, 1820. He graduated from the Charleston College in 1843. In 1845, he began the publication of his Review, which he contin- ued (with an intermission during the Civil War) until his death at Elizabeth, New Jersey, on Feb- ruary 7, 1867. Mrs. Suzanne Antrobus of New Orleans, wrote a good story of colonial Louisiana under the title of "The King's Messenger" (New York, 1901). Espy W. H. Williams has published, " The Dream of Art, and Other Poems " (New York, 1892), and a pamphlet, " Parrhasius; or Thrift- less Ambition" (New Orleans, 1879). His plays, "Witchcraft", "Eugene Aram", "The Duke's Jester", " A Cavalier of France", " The Man in Black " , " The Emperor' s Double " , "A Living Lie ", " Green and Grimes," and several others, may be frequently met with on the stage. They have never been issued in bookform. Mr. Williams was born in Carrollton (now a part of New Orleans), on January 30, 1852. He has lived all his life in New Orleans. He wrote a play for Lawrence Barrett and several for Robert Mantell and other well known actors. MISSOUEI AUTHORS. Frederick L. Billoa was born in Philadelphia, April 28, 1801, and took up his residence in St. Louis in 1818. He was in the St. Louis City Council in 1828, and shortly after served two terms as city comptroller. From 1863 until his death which occurred October 20th, 1895, he engaged in historical researches. He is regarded as an authority on the history of the early settle- ment of St. Louis and the Mississippi Valley. Mr. Billon published two large volumes on the early history of St. Louis: "Annals of St. Louis in its Early Days under the French and Spanish Dominations" (St. Louis, 1886), and " Annals of St. Louis in its Territorial Days, from 1804 to 1821 " (St. Louis, 1888). This latter work is a continuation of the previous one. Peter Richard Kenrick, the popular and highly esteemed Roman Catholic Archbishop of St. Louis, published: "The Holy House of Loretto" (Philadelphia, 1875); " The New Month of May" (Philadelphia); "Anglican Ordinations ", in which he deals learnedly upon a matter which had for some time been agitating the religious world, notably in England; and, ' ' Concio in Concilio Vaticano Habendo ' ' . He was born in Dublin, Ireland, in the year 1806; (319) 320 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. be came to the United States in 1833, and died in St. Louis, March 4, 1896. James D. Nourse was born in Bardstown, Kentucky, in 1816. He was editor of three dif- ferent papers at different times, while a resident of Bardstown. He removed to St. Louis, and in 1854, at the time of his death (by cholera) he was the editor of the St. Louis Daily Intelli- gencer. In his youth, he studied both medicine and law, but abandoned them both for journalism and literature. He is best remembered for his two novels j "Leavenworth" and " The Forest Knight" (Philadelphia, 1846). The latter is a story of the prairies ; Griswold in his ' ' Prose Writers of America", pronounces it " a noble work ' ' . His other books are : ' ' The Philos- ophy of History " ( " a clever little treatise ' ' , Tuckerman's "Sketch of American Litera- ture"); and, " Kemarks on the Past and its Legacies to American Society ' ' ( Louisville and London, 1852). Twenty, thirty years ago, I frequently heard old St. Louis journalists Speak very eulogistically of Mr. Nourse 's ability as a newspaper editor and writer. Judge J. Gabriel Woerner is the author of several works, among the best known of which are his legal treatises on ' ' The American Law of Administration ' ' and ' ' The Law of Guardian- ship" (1897 and 1898). In the line of fiction he has written, "The Eebel's Daughter", a story of love, politics and war. He is also the author of a successful drama, "Die Sklavin", MISSOURI AUTHORS. 321 which has been produced at some of the most prominent German theaters in the country. Judge Woerner was born in Wurtemburg, Ger- many, in 1826, and died in St. Louis in 1901. From 1870 to 1894, he was Judge of the St. Louis Probate Court. Adolph Ernest Kroeger produced quite a variety and number of works, which taken alto- gether, cover a wide field. Mr. Kroeger was a scholar and a man of many interests, as the bare enumeration of some of his books amply proves. He is the author of "The Minnesingers of Germany" (St. Louis); "Our Forms of Gov- ernment"; "Problems of the Future"; and, translations of Fichte's " Science of Knowl- edge " (Philadelphia, 1868) and "Science of Eights" (Philadelphia). One of ' his strongest books is his ' ' Future of the American Re- publics". He died in 1882. Bishop Enoch M. Marvin of the Methodist Church of St. Louis, published: " Series of Lec- tures on Transubstantiation " (1860); "The Work of Christ" (1867); " The Life of the Reverend William Goff Caples " ( 1871); " To the East by way of the West " (1878) ; " Doc- trinal Integrity of Methodism" (1878); " Ser- mons" (1881) — all published in St, Louis; and, " Sermons" (Nashville, Tennessee, 1876). The Reverend Thomas N. Finney published a " Life of Enoch M. Marvin ", and the Reverend David Rice McAnally, "The Life and Labors of Bishop E. M. Marvin ". 21 322 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Professor John H. Tice, for idany years a teacher, and, in the fifties. Superintendent of the public schools of St. Louis, was the author of " Relations between Matter and Force " ; " Over the Plains and on the Mountains; or, Kansas, Colorado, and the Rocky Mountains Agricultur- ally, Mineralogically, ^sthetically Described" (St. Louis, 1872); "Contributions to Meteor- ology" (St. Louis, 1874); and, " Elements of Meteorology" (St. Louis, 1878). He was the first " weather prophet", and during a number of years issued his annual " Meteorological Almanac". In 1854 and 1855 he edited The Teacher and Western Educational Magazine. Maj. J. N. Edwards, the Confederate soldier and well-known Kansas City journalist, wrote of " Shelby and his Men " (Cincinnati, 1867), and "Noted Guerillas" (St. Louis, 1880). After his death, Jennie Edwards compiled a work en- titled "John N. Edwards", which contains, among other things, " his most notable and in- teresting newspaper articles, together with some unpublished poems and many private letters ; also a reprint of ' Shelby's Expedition to Mex- ico ' " (Kansas. City). The Reverend Mosheim Rhodes, D. D., is a minister of the LutheTran Church, and the writer of a number of religious works of a practical character. He is author of: " Life Thoughts for Young Women " ; " Recognition in Heaven ' ' ; " Vital Questions " ; " The Throne of Grace " ; ' ' Luther and the Reformation " ; " Expository MISSOURI AUTHORS. 323 Lectures on Philippians " ; " Tlie Duty to the Church " ; " The True Glory of Young Men " ; and other works. Nathan C. Kouns of Kansas City, published two very promising novels : " Arius the Libyan " (New York, 1884), and " Dorcas, the Daughter of Faustina " (New York, 1884). In 1886, he published, "Repudiation; a Rhyme for the Times". He sometimes used the pseudonym, " Missourinsis ". He died suddenly in the latter part of the eighties. The late James Cox published a dozen works, mostly of a descriptive character: " An Arkan- sas Eden" (St. Louis, 1885); "Omaha Re- visited " (St. Louis, 1889) ; "St. Louis Through a Camera " (St. Louis, 1892) ; " Old and New St. Louis " (St. Louis, 1894) ; " The Carnival City of the World " ; " Missouri at the World's Fair " (Chicago, 1893) ; " Our Own Country " (St. Louis, 1894); "Won in the Losing" (New York, 1894); "History of the Cattle Industry of Texas and the Southwest" (St. Louis, 1895), and others. He was the secretary of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Company from 1898 to 1901. He died in 1902. Mrs. Sallie Rochester Ford descends from the Rochesters of England, her ancestry dating back to the time of " the Venerable Bede " the histo- rian, when the name was Hoef caster. She was born at Rochester Springs, Boyle County, Ken- tucky, and married March 7, 1855, the Reverend S. H. Ford, D. D., LL.D. She is the authoress 324 LITERATOKE OF LOUISIANA TEERITOKY. of "Grace Truman", "Evangel Wiseman" " Ernest Quest ", " The Inebriates ", "Morgan and His Men " , etc . , etc . She has been a resident of St. Louis since 1871. Mrs. Ford has a wide reputation as a denominational writer ; her ' ' Grace Truman "has attained a phenomenal sale. Dr. Ford has edited and published The Christian Repository, a Baptist monthly, since almost half a century. He has published: " A Brief Baptist History", "The Great Pyramid of Egypt", " A Complete Ecclesiastical History ", etc. Father Brennan (Martin L.), the well-known CathoHc priest and scientist of St. Louis, has contributed four volumes to the scientific and religious literature of later days, and will issue a fifth during the present year (1904). His pub- lished works are: " Electricity and its Discover- ies " (New York, 1885) ; " What Catholics have done for Science" (New York, 1887); "As- tronomy, New and Old" (St. Louis, 1888) ; and " The Science of the Bible " (St. Louis, 1898). Father Brennan was born in St. Louis about fifty- five years ago. He graduated from the Christian Brothers' College in 1865. He is very popular among all classes — irrespective of religious ten- dencies and views. His " Astronomy New and Old " , is used as a text-book in many of the public schools of the United States. *5vMrs. Mary F.Nixon Rouletof Webster Groves, Missouri, is the authoress of : " With a Pessimist in Spain", travels (Chicago, 1897); "Lascaand Other Stories" (St. Louis, 1898); "A Harp of MISSOURI AUTHORS. 325 Many Chords", fiction (St. Louis, 1899); " The Blue Lady's Knight ", a child's story (St. Louis, 1899) ; and "God, the King, my Brother", an historical romance of Spain, in the 14th cen- tury (Boston, 1900). Mrs. Roulet is the wife of Doctor Alfred Roulet, to whom she was married in 1899. She was the literary editor of The Church Progress (St. Louis) during several years ; she formerly resided in Chicago and was connected as a writer with the Times-Herald and Post. She was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, and has resided in Missouri since twenty-two years. Claude H.Wetmore, for many years connected with the St. Louis daily press, has published : " Sweepers of the Sea" (Indianapolis, 1900), a story of unusual interest on account of the picture pi-esented of the war between Chile and Peru in 1879, and as a portrayal of the two countries themselves; " Incaland " (Boston, 1902), a story of adventure in the interior of Peru and the closing scenes in the Chile-Peru- vian war; " In a Brazilian Jungle" (Boston, 1903), also a story of adventure; and, " Out of the Fleur-de-Lis " (Boston, 1903), containing a history of the Louisiana Territory until its pur- chase by the United States, a romance of the World's Fair City (St. Louis), and biographical sketches of the men who have made the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Mr. Wetmore is the editor of The Valley Weekly, an illustrated weekly of popular literature. In fall he will publish another book, " The Battle Against Bribery ". 326 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Marshall S. Snow, professor of history in St. Louis since 1870, is the author of a large number of pamphlets: " La Fayette " (St. Louis, 1884) ; "The City Government of St. Louis" (Balti- more, 1887) ; " Thoughts on Municipal Govern- ment " (St. Louis, 1887); "Higher Education in Missouri" (Washington, 1898), aad many others. He wrote the articles on " St. Louis " and "Missouri" for the new edition of the " Encyclopaedia Britannica " (1901). Professor Snow was born in Hyanuis, Massachusetts, in 1842. John Henton Carter (" Commodore Rolling- pin " ) is a writer of dialect verse and local stories, which have found some favor. " The Man at the Wheel" is a series of short sketches or stories, giving the experience of an old Mississippi river pilot; "The Ozark Post-Office" (St. Louis, 1899), is a more ambitious effort. The story is placed in Southwest Missouri during the time of the Civil War, and the years of reconstruction that followed. The characters are well drawn, and the language is homely and to the point. The locale is a small country town, and a farm among the Ozark Valleys. "Thomas Eutherton " is another work by the same author, as also, " Duck Creek Ballads " and " Buffets and Re- wards ". Professor William M. Bryant of the St. Louis High School, is the author of a variety of short works, dealing mostly with the philosophy of art and literature. He has published: " Philosophy MISSOURI AUTHORS. 327 of Landscape Painting" (St. Louis, 1882); " Goetlie as a Representative of the Modern Art Spirit " (St. Louis, 1889) ; " World Energy and its Self Conservation " (Chicago, 1890); "Eter- nity " (Chicago, 1892) ; " Ethics and the ' New Education'" (Chicago, 1894); " Syllabus of Ethics" (Chicago, 1894); "Hegel's Educa- tional Ideas " (Chicago, 1896); "Life, Death and Immortality" (New York, 1896); "His- torical Presuppositions and Foreshadowings of Dante's 'Divine Comedy'" (no place, no date). R. E. Lee Gibson is the author of "Early Poems" (1883); "Sonnets" (1895); "An Indian Legend, and Other Poems " (1896); and. " Mineral Blossoms " (1897). All of these are booklets in stiff paper covers and were issued in St. Louis. In 1902 Mr. Gibson issued " Sonnets and Lyrics " (Louisville) an elegant cloth bound volume. He is collecting material for another volume from poems of his that have appeared at various times in The Qentury and St. Louis magazines. The Hesperian, a.n.A other periodicals. Mr. Gibson was born at Steel ville, Missouri, in 1864, and has resided in St. Louis since 1887. He is a clerk of the St. Louis Insane Asylum, since some fifteen years. Will Ward Mitchell, of Higginsville, Missouri, has published: " Half a Dozen " ; " Harry B. Leary, a Life Picture" (1895); " Harry Lyle, and Other Rhymes"; " Jael, and Other Rhymes "(1898); " Since Forest Died " , poems; 328 JjITErature of Louisiana territory. " The Voice that is Still ", etc. Most of these are booklets printed at Higginsville. F. Louis Soldan, Superintendent of the St. Louis public schools, is the author of " Ameri- kanisches Lesebuch " ; "An Essay on the Dar- winian Theory"; and " Grube's Method of Teaching Arithmetic." He has also edited several works for use in schools. Dr. James Newton Baskett, of Moberly, Mis- souri, has published: "At You-AU's House" (New York, 1898), a nature tale of Northeast Missouri; " The Story of the Birds " ; " As the Light Led " (New York, 1900), a love story of Northeastern Missouri in the sixties; "The Story of the Fish ' ' ; and ' ' Sweetbrier and Thistledown" (New York, 1902). Doctor Bas- kett is an occasional contributor to leading Western literary periodicals. William Vincent Byars was born in Covington, Tennessee, June 21, 1857. He has resided in St. Louis since 1879, excepting four years in New York. His books are: " The Tempting of the King" (St. Louis); " Tannhauser " (St. Louis); " Studies in Verse " (New York) ; " Babble of Green Fields " (New York); "The Glory of the Garden " (St. Louis) ; " New Songs to Old Tunes" (New York) — verse, 1880-1897; in prose: "An American Commoner" (Columbia, Missouri); " The Hand-book of Oratory" (St. Louis) ; the introductory essays and biographies in the twenty volumes of "The World's Best Essays" and "The World's Best Orations" MISSOURI AUTHORS. 329 (St. Louis) ; and a number of pamphlets, among which are: "Homeric Memory Rhymes"; "The Salt of the Earth"; "Imperialism or Self-government"; and, "The Practical Value of the Classics ". C. L. Phifer of California, is credited with: " Love and Law; a series of Sonnets " (1889) ; ' ' Two Volumes of Verse " ( 1889 ) ; and ' ' Weather Wisdom" (1889), all published in California, Missouri ; and " Annals of the Earth " (Chicago, 1890), a wretched attempt at blank verse. Conde Benoist Pallen, Ph.D., LL.D., has published several works of a serious character displaying critical ability of a high order ; among them are, " Young Men in Catholic Life ", and "The Catholic Church and Socialism" (St. Louis, 1890) ; " The Philosophy of Literature " (St. Louis, 1897) ; and, " Epochs of Literature " (St. Louis, 1898"). Doctor Pallen is also the author of two books of verse, " Carmina " (London, 1885), and "The New Rubaiyat " (St. Louis, 1889). Theodore S. Case, editor of The Western (later on. The. Kansas City) Mevieiv of Science and Industry (1877-86), published: "Advan- tages of Kansas City " (Kansas City, 1887) ; " A Historj' of Kansas City " (Syracuse, New York, 1888); "Information for Investors in Kansas City Property and Securities " (Kansas City, 1889) ; and other local books. George W. Warder of New York, and until 330 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. lately of Kansas City, is the author of " Poetic Fragments" (St. Loiiis, 1873); "Eden Dell, and Other Poems " (Kansas City, 1878) ; " Fan- tasma, and Other Poems " (Kansas City, 1879) ;' " Utopian Dreams and Lotus Leaves " (London, 1885) ; " After Which all Things" (New York, 1893); " The Conflict between Man and Mam- mon" (Kansas City, 1898); " Invisible Light " (New York, 1899); "The New Cosmogony" (New York, 1899), etc. Miss Lelia Hardin Bugg has published a num- ber of works of a miscellaneous character. The list includes : " The Prodigal's Daughter " (New York, 1898) ; " People of our Parish " (Boston, 1900); "Orchids; a novel" (St. Louis, 1894); " The Correct thing for Catholics " (New York, 1891) ; " A Lady, Manners and Social Usages" (New York, 1893); "Correct English" (St. Louis, 1895); " A Little Book of Wisdom " (St. Louis, 1897), etc. I regret that want of space prevents my notic- ing the following authors : Reverend William G. Elliot, Henry T. Finck, Professor A. L. Graeb- ner, Eeverend D. R. McAnally, Doctor Hamline E. Robinson, Walter L. Sheldon, C. F. W. Walters, Anna E. Dugan ("May Myrtle"), J. Breckenridge Ellis, Conrad Witter, Aldine S. Kieffer, Father Charles Coppens, Edward S. Holden, Reverend Michael Mueller, Professor Sylvester Waterhouse, J. M. Greenwood, Pro- fessor S. A. Weltmer, Father Francis J. Finn, Lee Merri wether, and others. IOWA AUTHORS. Bishop William Stevens Perry was born in Providence,. Rhode Island, January 22, 1832. He took priest's orders in the Episcopal Church in 1858. After several years' connection with churches in Boston, Nashua (New Hampshire), Portland (Maine), Litchfield (Connecticut), and other places, on September 10, 1876, he was consecrated Bishop of Iowa. He is said to have received more honorary degrees than any other bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States. He wrote several books jointly with F. L. Hawks. He is also the author of: " His- torical Collections of the American Colonial Church"; "Life Lessons from the Book of Proverbs" (New York, 1872); "Some Summer Days Abroad " (Davenport, Iowa, 1880) ; " The Church's Year" (Davenport, 1881); "The History of the American Church" (1890); " The American Church and the American Con- stitution " (1895);. "The Episcopate in America" (New York, 1895); and several other works. He was historiographer of the Episcopal Church from 1868 until his death, which took place in Dubuque, Iowa, May 13, 1898. Professor H. H. Seerley, A. M., and L. W. Parrish, A. M., of the Iowa State Normal School, (831) 332 LITEEATURE OF LOUISIANA TEREITORY. published a " History of Civil Government in Iowa" (Chicago, 1897). Since then, Professor Seerley (now President of the Normal School) has published a " History of the Founding, Organization etc. of the Iowa State Normal School for the Years 1876-1901 " (Cedar Falls, Iowa, 1901); and several "Manuals". Of his twenty-two pamphlets I will mention only : " Christopher Columbus " (1892) ; " The Am- erican School and the American People" (1898) ; "The Normal School Problem" (1892); and, " The Public School Curriculum " (1903). Ex-Major L. H. M. Byars of Des Moines, author of the popular song of the Civil War, "Sherman's March to the Sea", published. " The Happy Isles and Other Poems " (Hartford, Connecticut, 1894). Of this book, Doctor Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote: " I have found my eyes moistened on reading ' Baby Helene ' ; I felt my patriotism stirred by 'Sherman's March to the Sea', and my sentiment warmed by ' Jamie's Coming o'er the Moor ' ". Mr. Byars has published a prose work, "Iowa, in War Times " (Des Moines, 1888). The late D. H. Ainsworth of Newton, is the author of, ' ' Eecollections of a Civil En- gineer ' ' , and Francis Tomlinson Johnson wrote a practical book, entitled, " A Talk to Mothers and Teachers" (Council Bluffs, Iowa, 1894). Mrs. P. Goldie of Sioux City, published, " Light Out of Darkness " (Sioux City, Iowa, 1895). IOWA AUTHORS. 333 F. B. Welkie wrote of " Davenport, Past and Present, Early History aiid Personal and An- ecdotical Keminiscences " (Davenport, Iowa, 1858). Mrs. Isadore Baker of Iowa City, is the authoress of, " Sonnets and Other Verse ", and " In Memoriam ", both published at Iowa City in 1897. B. O. Aylesworth is the author of, " Thirteen and Twelve Others ; from the Adirondacks and Elsewhere " (St. Louis, 1894), and " Song and Fable" (Des Moines, 1896). Mr. Aylesworth was the president of Drake University, Des Moines, when his books appeared. H. W. Lathrop, in 1894 the Librarian of the State Historical Society of Iowa, published, " Life and Times of Samuel J. Kirkwood, Iowa's War Governor " (Iowa City). Howard Carleton Tripp, since a number of years editor of the Kingsley weekly Times, is the author of, " Around the Fireside and Other Poems " (Kingsley, Iowa, 1894). George Chandler, Mayor of Osage, Iowa, wrote " A History and Civil Government of Iowa" (Chicago, 1885); "Iowa and the Na- tion" (Chicago, 1895); "A Geography of Iowa" (New York, 1898); and, "Practical Civics" (Chicago, 1901). Mr. Chandler was formerly Superintendent of the Public Schools of Osage. Charles G. Blahden was born in Marengo, Illi- 334 LITEEATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKRITORY. nois, January 19, 1857, and was educated in Con- necticut. In 1875 he removed to Fort Dodge, Iowa, of which city he was mayor in 1888-89. He is residing in Chicago at present writing. He has published : " Tancred's Daughter, and Other Poems " (New York, 1889) ; " A Valley Muse " (Chicago, 1900); "Omar Eesung " (Chicago, 1901 ) ; and the following booklets — all published in Chicago: "A Harvest of Eeeds " (1902); " A Drift of Song " (1902); and, " The Unre- membered God " (1903). George Shelby Hughs wrote " Ancient Civ- ilizations.", set the type himself, and supervised the printing of the book. His theme is — gen- erations pass away but the earth is eternal (Des Moines, 1896). Mrs. Ada Langworthy Collier of Dubuque, has written " Lilith " (Boston, 1885), "The Shadow of the Vou", both novels, and a volume of poems. Some of her poems in The Current, of Chicago, in the eighties, were unusually good. She was born in Dubuque. JohnPrayshaw Kayeis the author of " Nashti " (New York, 1895), a book of poems, and the late Mrs. Maria Werd of West Union, wrote, " A Voice in the Wilderness " (Chicago, 1896). Nathan H. Parker istheauthor of several books containing practical information about five States carved out of the Louisiana Territory : ' • Iowa as it is in 1855" (Chicago, 1855); "The Iowa Hand-Book for 1856" (Chicago, 1856); "The IOWA AUTHORS. 335 Iowa Hand-Book for 1857" (Boston, 1857); " The Minnesota Hand-Book for 1856-57 " (Bos- ton, 1857); "The Kansas and Nebraska Hand- Book for 1857 " (1857) ; " The Missouri Hand- Book " (St. Louis, 1865); and, "Missouri as it is In 1867 " (Philadelphia, 1867). Mr. Parker's books are useful and interesting, but should not be judged by their literary merit. Mrs. Alice Ilgenfritz Jones of Cedar Eapids, was born in Ohio ; she has resided some years in Louisiana, but the larger portion of her life has been spent in Iowa. Her first book was " High Water Mark " (Philadelphia, 1879) ; it has been succeeded by, "Beatrice of Bayou Teche " (Chi- cago, 1895), and "The Chevalier de St. Denis " (Chicago, 1900). With Mrs. Ella Merchant, she wrote, "Unveiling a Parallel ", which was published in Boston, in 1893. Professor Abel Beach of Iowa City, and teacher of Greek and Latin in the Iowa State University for many years, published a volume of poems, " Western Airs " (Bufealo, New York, 1896). Doctor Williaiu M. Salter has written a "Life of James W. Grimes," and Doctor J. R. Gorrell is the author of a novel, " Sins Absolved" (Des Moines, 1896). Liston McMillan wrote " Alathiasis ; or. Prin- ciples of Christian Hygiene " (Oskaloosa, Iowa, 1897). Mrs. Jennie Hickenlooper's " Illustrated His- tory of Monroe County, Iowa; Complete Civil, 336 LITEKATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Political, aad Military History, etc. Sketches of Pioneer Life, Biography, the Late War, etc." (Albia, 1896), contains a long account of the exploits of the Federal troops on the Missouri border during the Civil War. Captain E. A. Hadley wrote, " Cedar Creek. Popular History Refuted" (Des Moines, Iowa, 1898). The author of a "History of Dubuque County, its Cities, Towns, etc., War Eecord in the Ee- bellion. Early Settlers, etc.", is unknown to nae. The work is very interesting, locally (Chicago, 18,80). G. Walter Barr was born in Medway, Ohio, October 25, 1860. His parents removed to Laurence County, Illinois, when he was eleven years old. He was educated in Indiana, and then became connected with the Columbus, In- diana, Evening Republican. He studied medi- cine and began practicing in Iowa some twenty years ago. He has published : "Idiosyncrasy of Drugs" (Detroit, 1895) ; " Psysiological Action of Kola" (Detroit, 1896) ; and, " Shacklett, a Novel" (New York and London, 1901). He wrote the monograph on the Mississippi river in "The Valley of the Mississippi" (Qshkosh, Wisconsin, 1899), and has edited and published The Keoliuk Standard since 1902. MINNESOTA AUTHORS. Richard W. Johnson was born in Livingston County, Kentucky, February 7, 1827. He graduated at West Point and entered the army in 1849. He served with distinction during the Civil War, being wounded, captured, exchanged, and into active service again. He commanded brigades in several battles, and was retired witli the rank of Major-General, October 12, 1867. In 1868-'69 he was professor of Military Science in the Missouri State University and held the same chair from 1869 to 1871 in the University of Minnesota. He is the author of "A Manual for Colt's Breech-loading Carbine and Navy Revolver"; a "Memoir of Major- General George H. Thomas " (1881); and, "A Soldier's Reminiscences in Peace and War " (Philadelphia, 1886). In the latter part of the seventies and in the eighties, he was in the real estate business in St. Paul, in which city he died on April 21, 1897. Former Governor and United States Senator Cushman K. Davis, while practicing law in St. Paul, made a valuable addition to Shakespearian literature in "The Law in Shakespeare" (St. -Paul, 1884). Senator Cushman was born in Henderson, New York, June 16, 1838, and died in St. Paul, November 27, 1900, He was an 22 (337) 338 LITBKATURE OF LOUISIANA TEKEITORY. enthusiastic collector of Napoleonana and Shake- speariana. Monseigneur Eavoux is the author of a treatise on the Sioux language and ' ' Memoirs ' ' , and the Eeverend Samuel McChord Crothers told liber- ally of all Christians as " Members of One Body". Henry Wellington Wack has a novel, " Ali- dor " , to his credit. He is a contributor to sev- eral well-known Eastern magazines. Mrs. Mary Harman Severance collected and issued in bookform, " The Indian Legends of Minnesota ' ' . She formerly edited The Literary Northwest of St. Paul. Edward Lippett Fales of Sfe. Paul, is the author of "Songs and Song Legends" (St. Paul, 1887), a very promising first book. I cannot find that Mr. Fales has published any other book. Eugene V. Smalley was born in Randolph, Ohio, July 18, 1841. He was educated at Central College, New York. His college days over, he returned home. The Civil War breaking out, he enlisted in an Ohio regiment. After the war, he obtained the position of clerk to one of the committees of the House of Representatives, which appointment he held from 1865 to 1873. During the latter part of this period, he was the correspondent, and an editorial writer on the staff, of Greeley's New York Tribune. From Wash- ington, he removed to St. Paul, where he pub- MINNESOTA AUTIIOES. 339 lished The Northwest Magazine (devoted prin- cipally to industrial interests) from 1884 to the time of his death, December 29th, 1899. His published works are, a " History of the Northern Pacific Railroad" (New York, 1883); "His- tory of the Republican Party " (New York, 1885); and, "The Political History of Minne- sota ' ' . Franklyn W. Lee was the author of a number of books of poetry and fiction: "A Shred of Lace" (1891); "Senator Lars Erickson " (1891); " Dreamy Hours : Poems" (1891); "Mrs. Harding's Eyes"; "Two Men and a Girl"; "Mam' sellePaganine" (1894); " Whis- pers of Wee Ones " (Rush City, Minnesota, 1896), a poem; " The Sphynx of Gold" (Rush City, Minnesota, 1897), a poem. He died in May, 1897. He was about thirty years old at the time of his death. He was a reporter on the St. Paul Dispatch for several years, and resigned his position in 1895 to take charge of the Post, a weekly paper at Rush City, Minne- sota, which he had bought. With the over- enthusiasm of youth, Mr. Lee's work was done too hastily. Still, he was progressing; death came all too soon. Doctor J. H. Robinson, the author of " Nick Whiffles " , " The Rebel Spy " , " The Unknown ' ' , "The Disinherited", "Marion's Brigade/', and probably fifty other popular novels and novelettes, died in Minnesota some - time in the early nineties. He resided in Minneapolis 340 LITERATUKB OF LOUISIANA TEKRITOEY. twice in his life, I am told; but the best infor- mation I can obtain, leads to the belief that he was never a resident of Minnesota, but went there, for a few months at a time, for his health. J. F. Williams is the author of a " History of the City of St. Paul and Ramsey County, Minne- sota " (St. Paul, 1876), and T. H. Kirk of the " History of Minnesota" (St. Paul, 1887). J. W. Bond told of "Minnesota and its Re- sources, to which is added Campfire Sketches " (New York, 1853), and Doctor Brewer Mattock advocated " Minnesota as a Home for Invalids " (Philadelphia, 1871). Honorable M. K. Armstrong, a pioneer Da- kota Congressman, recently narrated the lives and achievements of " The Early Empire Build- ers of the Great West " (St. Paul, 1901). Isaac V. D. Heard, a well-known member of the St. Paul Bar in the seventies and eighties, wrote the " History of the Sioux War and Massacres of 1862 and 1863" (New York, 1863). Mr. Heard served as a volunteer in General Sibley's command. His book is very interesting. I believe he is dead. H. E. B. McConkey covered the same ground in his " Dakota War- Whoop; or, Indian Massa- cres and War in Minnesota of 1862-63" (St. Paul, 1864). Lily A. Long has published two novels, " A Squire of Low Degree" and "Apprentices to Destiny ", both issued from St. Paul. Miss MINNESOTA AUTHORS. 341 Long was born in St. Paul in 1860 ; she gradua- ted from the University of Wisconsin, and since some years has been connected with a St. Paul law book publishing house. She has contributed extensively to Eastern magazines and literary journals. Dillon O'Brien, a newspaper reporter and general writer who died in St. Paul sometime in the nineties, left three novels — " The Dalys of Dalystown", "Dead Broke", and "Frank Blake ". The scenes are laid in Ireland. The Reverend John Gmeiner is the author of, "Modern Scientific Views and Christian Doc- trines Compared"; "Emanuel"; "Spirits of Darkness", and several pamphlets. Father Gmeiner's writings are all on religious questions. L. Pierce, a St. Paul lawyer, is the author of " Di " (1890), a novel. The scenes are laid in St. Paul. For a first effort, it is not a bad beginning. Harriet E. Bishop, of St. Paul, has described the first years of Minnesota in " The Floral Home" (New York, 1857). Miss Bishop was a teacher and missionary. She had the reputation of being a most excellent woman, — but her cork-screw curls, that fell down on her shoul- ders, were simply wonderful. KANSAS AUTHORS. Mrs. Sara T. D. Robinson's " Kansas, its Inte- rior and Exterior Life, including a Full View of its Settlement, Political History, Social Life, Cli- mate" etc. (Boston, 1856), is a prejudiced ac- count of the "Kansas troubles" in the latter part of the fifties. Mrs. Robinson was the wife of the then governor of Kansas, Charles Robin- son, the leader of the free-state settlers, and who afterwards published ' ' The Kansas Conflict ' ' (New York, 1892). J. N. Holloway's "History of Kansas, from the First Exploration of the Mississippi Valley to its Admission to the Union", etc. (Lafayette, Indi- ana, 1868), is interesting principally on account of the pages that tell of the ' ' Border Ruffian War ' ' in which John Brown was a prominent figure. John H. Gihon's " Geary and Kansas " (Phila- delphia, 1857) is a history of the administration of Governor Geary and of the Territory up to July, 1857. Mrs. Ellen P. Allerton (Hiawatha), sung." An- nabel and Other Poems " (New York, 1885), and " Walls of Corn, and Other Poems " (Hiawatha, Kansas, 1894). A railroad company reprinted the poem, "Walls of Corn", and circulated a million copies of it in the East. (342) KANSAS AUTHORS. 343 Percy G. Ebbutt's "Emigrant Life in Kan- sas " (Pliiladelphia, 1886), is a narrative of per- sonal experiences and practical information, and as such is interesting and instructive. It is gen- erously illustrated. The late Henry Inman, brevet Lieutenant- Colonel United States Army, is the author of the delightful books of life on the plains, " The Old Santa Fe' Trail" and "The Great Salt Lake Trail ". He also published, " A Pioneer from Kentucky", " Tales of the Trail", and "The Delahoydes ", a story for boys. London Liter- ature says that he gives us " a real whiff of that wild life of the prairies from which Fenimore Cooper and Mayne Eeid drew their inspiration " . " In the Van of Empire " (Kansas City, 1889) ; "The Kanch on the Oxhide" (New York, 1898); and, "Buffalo Jones' Forty Years of Adventure" (Topeka, 1899), are also from his pen. W. C. Campbell narrated the adventures of ' ' A Colorado Colonel ' ' and other people of Oklahoma, Arizona, etc., and T. A. McNeal,- editor of the Mail and Breeze of Topeka, is responsible for " Tom McNeal's Fables ". Mr. Campbell also wrote a drama, " The Ame- thyst " . Professor Eli G. Foster, Miss Lizzie E. Woos- ter, E. J. Hoenshel, A. M., Henry C. Fellow, Ph.D., and several others, have published a large j^upibe.i; of .bopks adapted .to school purposes. . 344 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. John N. Reynolds of Atchinson, Kansas, managed. to fall into the clutches of the law and was condemned to serve a term in the peniten- tiary. He describes his experiences in "A Kansas Hell; or, Life in the Kansas Peniten- tiary" (Atchinson, Kansas, 1889). It would seem that there are some things worse than the cyclones, out in Kansas. Thomas Brower Peacock is the author of " The Vendetta" (Topeka, 1872); "The Rhyme of the Border War. An Historical Poem of the Kansas-Missouri Guerilla War", etc. (New York, 1880); and, "Poems of the Plains and Songs of Solitude" (New York, 1889). Eugene F. Ware of Topeka, Kansas, is the author of "Some Rhymes by ' Ironquill' " (Chicago, 1892), which reflect certain local traits and peculiarities of the West; " Irrigation Laws of Kansas" (Topeka, 1896), "From Court to Court " (Topeka, 1902), etc. William Allen White and Albert Bigelow Paine published, "Rhymes by Two Friends" (Fort Scott, Kansas, 1893), and Mr. White, three years later, issued "The Real Issue: a Book of Kansas Stories" (Chicago). "The Real Issue" contains fifteen stories, some of them are excellent, while others are ordinary. Since then, he has published, " Stratagems and Spoils" (New York), and "The Court of Boyville" (New York, 1903). He was, at the date of this last book, editor of the Gazette, of KANSAS AUTHORS. 345 Emporia, Kansas. Mr. White was born at Em- poria, Kansas, February 10, 1868. The Eeverend Charles M. Sheldon is the author of "Richard Bruce" (Chicago, 1892); "In His Steps: What would Jesus Do?" (Chicago, 1897); "The Crucifixion of Philip Strong " (Chicago, 1894) ; " For Christ and the Church" (Chicago, 1899); "Malcolm Kirk" (Chicago, 1898); "Lend a Hand"; "The First Christian Dally Paper, and Other Sketches ", etc. Mr. Sheldon is best known as the gentle- man who protested against the daily journalism of to-day as being unchristian. A Kansas news- paper publisher permitted him to publish one issue of his paper just as he saw tit to edit it. Mr. Sheldon's fizzle will long be a source of merriment to newspaper men. Hattie Horner (Mrs. Louthan), one of the best known of the Kansas female poets, is the authoress of " Poems " (Topeka, 1885) ; " Some Reasons for our Choice" (New York); and, "Not at Home" (New York, 1889). She edited a " Collection of Kansas Poetry." Noble L. Prentiss is credited with four vol- umes : "A Kansan Abroad " (Topeka, 1878) ; "Kansas Miscellanies" (Topeka, 1889); "Southern Letters" (Topeka, 1881; and, " Southwestern Letters " (Topeka, 1882). J. W. Steele, one of the editors of the former Kansas Magazine (1872-73), published "The Sons of the Border" (Leavenworth, 1873); 346 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. " Cuban Sketches " (New York, 1881) ; " Fron- tier Army Sketches" (Chicago, 1883); "To Mexico by Palace Car " (Chicago, 1884) ; "Old California Days " ; and, " Beyond the Missouri ". Joel Moody is the author of "Junius" and "The Science of Evil" (Topeka, 1871). He also sung "The Song of Kansas " (Topeka, 1890), while F. T. Atwood (Concordia) gave us " Kansas Poems ". William Herbert Carruth , one of the professors of the University of Kansas, has rendered a lasting service to his state by th^ publication of his two books on "Kansas in Literature" (Topeka, 1900). W. E. Ringle, A. B. (Coffeyville) and L. A. Kennoyer (Independence), tell us about the "Spring Flora of Eastern Kansas"; Colonel N. S. Goss writes " The History of the Bii'ds of Kansas ", and Benjamin F. Eyer tells us of ' ' The Birds of Kansas " ; an account of ' ' The Plants and Flowers of Kansas" is given by Bernard B. Smyth; "The Geologic Story of Kansas" is told by L. C. Wooster, and Pro- fessor S. J. Hunter makes " Elementary Studies of Insect Life ' ' . William Elsey Connelly has to his credit: " The Provisional Government of Nebraska Teri:!- tory", "The Life of John Brown", "The Overland Stage to California "," John Henry Lane", "The Kansas Territorial Governors" , " Wyandot Folk-Lore ", etc. He wrote " The KANSAS AUTHORS. Ml Overland Stage" in conjunction with Frank A. Eoot. Miss Mary E. Jackson is the authoress of, " The Spy of Osawatomie " (St. Louis, 1881) ; "The Life of Nellie C. Bailey " (Topeka, 1885) ; and, "Topeka Pen and Camera Sketches" (Topeka, 1890). Daniel W. "Wilder published " The Annals of Kansas, 1541-1885 " (Topeka, 1875), and " The Life of Shakespeare " (Boston, 1893). F. H. Barrington's " Kansas Day " (Topeka, 1892), contains a brief history of Kansas, selec- tions from Kansas authors, etc. Albert Bigelow Paine of New York, formerly lived in Kansas. While a resident of that State, he published "Gabriel" (Fort Scott, 1889), and two or three other works. John Preston Campbell is the author of "Queen Sylvia, and Other Poems " (Cincinnati, 1886); " The Land of Sun and Song " (Topeka, 1888); " Mere of Medevon " (Chicago, 1888); " My Mate Immortal" (New York, 1890), and other books. W.B. Felts published " Erblanke, a Tragedy " (Topeka, 1890) ; " Hernarne, a Comedy " (To- peka, 1891) ; " Wooing Time, Wedding Day and Married Life " ; and, " Eomancie ", a tale. P. L. Gray wrote, " Minola, the Fairy Queen" (Bendena, Kansas, 1890); "Butterflies and Koses" (Bendena, 1889); "The Book of 348 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Ruth" (Bendena, 1892); and, " Lost" (New York, 1889). Senator John James Ingalls' writings have been collected and issued in bookform since his death, under the title of , " A Collection of the Writings of the late Senator Ingalls, his Essays, Addresses and Orations. Dedicated to the People of Kansas" (Kansas City, Missouri, 1903). C. C. Hutchinson's "Resources of Kansas " (Topeka, 1871), is the record of fifteen years' observation in that state. It contains a map and forty illustrations. Anna A. Wright's " More Truth than Poetry " is a book of poems, rhymes, etc., about Kansas. George Campbell wrote " A Revolution in the Science of Cosmology"; George Washington Hoss, LL.D., "First Steps in Public Speaking " and "A Primer of Memory Gems"; Jesse Hardest}', "Railroads" ; ex-Lieutenant-Governor A. P. Riddle, " Legislative Practice ", and Pro- fessor .Walter H. Olin, " Commercial Geog- raphy." Frank W. Blackmar, Ph. D., of the State University, is the author of a " Life" of Charles Robinson, Kansas' first governor, " The Spanish Institutions of the Southwest"; a "Study of History " ; " Sociology and Economics " ; and, " The History of Human Progress ". COLORADO, NEBRASKA, AND OTHER STATE AUTHORS. Mrs. Warren Wilbur resided a number of j'sars in Denver, Colorado. She died at Erlanger, Kentucky, in 1895. While she was Miss Rosa Evangeline Angel, she published, " This Side and That" (Cincinnati, 1889), a volume of tender and delicate poems — the reflex of a gentle heart, devotional and hopeful. Through them all there breathes a trustful, home spirit that appeals more to the heart than to the mind. Miss Angel sang principally of love, hope, children, flowers and death, and some of her best poems remind us of the gentleness of Alice Cary and the sweet- ness of Jean Ingelow. " This Side and That " is a thoroughly womanly book. Her other book, "The Subtile Flame" (Denver, 1892), is the biography of a woman missionary. A large number of Mrs. Wilbur's poems lie strewn through the pages of numerous Western maga- zines and litei-ary papers, and should be collected in bookform. She was born in Cincinnati, and was about thirty-five years of age at the time of her death. J. F. Graff, a newspaper writer known as " Graybeard", is the author of " Graybeard's Colorado; or Notes on the Centennial State " (Philadelphia, 1882), and W. E, Pabor has told (349) 350 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. US of " Colorado, its 5'ields, Farms and Garden Lands " (New York, 1883). A. P. Hill has narrated pleasant "Tales of the Colorado Pioneers" (Denver, 1884). ' ' Hours at Home " is a volume of very ordi- nary poems published anonymously at Cripple Creek, Colorado, in 1895. Verner Z. Keed was born on a farm in Rich- land County, Ohio, October 13, 1863. He was raised in the farming regions of Iowa, and re- moved to Colorado in 1886. He has published: " Lo-To-Kah " (New York, 1895) ; " Tales of the Sun-Land" (New York, 1897) ; and, " Adobe- land-Stories " (New York, 1899). The first is a series of tales of Indian love and war, and un- like most books of Indian stories, is not coarse and trashy. The Sun-land of which the ' ' tales ' ' are written is Central America and parts adja- cent. Though weird and curious, the stories seem appropriate to the locality, and are well told. Mr. Reed resides at Colorado Springs and deals in mines and investments. Dr. J. H. Tilden of Denver, in 1896, pub- lished a work on prenatal influences under the title of, " Cursed before Birth ". Paul Tyner who published The Temple, a Denver, Colorado, monthly devoted to literature and occultism, has published a number of book- lets and pamphlets : ' ' The Living Christ ' ' and "Through the Invisible" (Denver, 1897); " Cash or Credit " (Denver, 1898), and others. COLORADO, NEBRASKA, AND OTHER AUTHORS. 351 W. H. Williams of Denver, is the author of "Vibration the Law of Life" (Denver, 1898), and Andy Adams wrote " A Texas Matchmaker" (1903). Miss Esmeralda Boyle of Kearny, Nebraska, is the authoress of "Thistledown" (Wash- ington); "The Story of Felice" (London, 1873) ; " Songs of Land and Sea " (JSfew York, 1875) ; " St. Cecilia's Gates " (Dublin, 1890) ; and, " Distinguished Marylanders " . She has also published a (pamphlet) story for children, " Something about the Letterkins " (Dublin, 1900), and gave the .first full life history of Francis Scott Key, the author of " The Star Spangled Banner ". She published a novelette, "The Daughter of his Friend", in The St. Louis Magazine in 1886. She is one of the daughters of Admiral Boyle and was born in Mary rand. She has spent several years in Eu- ropean travel, and has contributed largely to The Galaxy, The Overland Monthly, The St. Louis Magazine, The Hesperian, The Army and Navy Journal, and other periodicals. Orsamus Charles Drake is the author of "Nebraska Legends and Poems " (New York, 1871). Mrs. Makeever and Mary F. Morton of Ne- braska City, Nebraska; Maud De Vere Krake of East Point; Carl Smith (deceased) and Charles Hahn of Omaha, have each published a volume of poems. 352 LITEEATUBE OF LOUISIANA TEREITORY. Lincoln, Nebraska, should be noted for its one-book poets. The list includes: Professor Schuyler Miller, Will Maupin, A. L. Bixby, N.K. Griggs, H. L. Shedd, William E. Dunray and others. Mrs. Isabel G. Eichey of Plattsmouth, Ne- braska, sung of " A Harp in the West" (Buf- falo, 1895), and in 1899 gave the reading world " When Love is King " (Philadelphia). She is collecting together her later poems from the pages of The Woman's Weekly, The Twentieth Century Farmer, The Hesperian, and other periodicals, and will issue her third volume of poetry during the present year. Mrs. Eichey sings of the gentler passions, the home moods and aspirations, and the family ties which fill the heart and the life of a woman whose years have not been lived in the glare of public life. But she has also her meditative and relig- ious moods, and her appreciation of nature frames, here and there, in befitting words, a calm, serene picture of wood and field. Mrs, Eichey 's poetic genius was highly extolled by the late J. Sterling Morton, formerly Secretary of the Interior. She was born in Missouri in 1863, moved to Iowa when three years old. She is married, and has lived in Nebraska since a number of years. William J. Bryan, of Lincoln, is the author of "First Battle for Silver", etc.; Daniel Stephens, of Fremont, of the interesting " Silas Cobb" ; William Leighton, of Omaha, of a novel • COLOEADO, NEBRASKA, AND OTHER AUTHORS. 353 and the late Elbert R. Tingley, of Lincoln, of "Poco Loco ". William E. Broadfield wrote " Stories of Omaha. Historical Sketches of the Midland City" (Omaha, Nebraska, 1898). Judge William F. Pope's reminiscences of Arkansas are published under the following title : " Early Days in Arkansas ; Being for the Most Part the Personal Eecollections of an Old Settler — dedicated to the Memory of those Early Settlers who, through Trials, Disasters and Dangers, carved out Statehood and placed Another Star on the Flag of the Union. By Judge Wm. F. Pope. Edited by his son, Dun- bar H. Pope, with an Introduction by Hon, Sam. W. Williams, of the Little Eock Bar. Illus- trated." (Little Eock, Arkansas.) This work is of historical value. Fay Hempstead's " A Pictorial History of Arkadsas: from the Earliest Times to 1890" (St. Louis, 1890), is a work worthy of serious consideration. Doctor T. J. Sheldon of Little Eock, has given his theory of "The Law of Vibrations" (Little Eock, Arkansas, 1898). May Phillipps Tatro is the authoress of "Thanksgiving Souvenir" (Westport, South Dakota, 1895). 23 354 LITERATURE OF LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Freeman A. Miller, A.M., professor of Eng- lish language and literature in the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Oklahoma Territory, published "Oklahoma and Other Poems" (Buffalo, New York, 1895). This is very prob- ably the first published book by an Oklahoma author. THE END. / / / / * 4r ^ y/"^^ / '/ y r