Long Island Historical Society 
 
 CARY FUND 
 
 Founded in 1867, by 
 
 Mrs. MARIA CARY 
 
 In Memory of her Husband 
 
 WILLIAM H. CARY 
 
 FOR A DEPARTMENT OP 
 
 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY 
 
WALTER HINCHMAN IN 1914 
 
t 
 
 SKETCHES &> POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 WALTER HINCHMAN 
 
 4k 
 
 1 
 
 1845-1920 
 
PREFATORY 
 
 NOTE 
 
 The sketches and verses of Walter Hinchman, together with a 
 few biographical notes, are printed in this book for two reasons. In 
 the first place, his life was typically American. Industrious, laborious, 
 thrifty, he exemplified, as did so many of his rapidly vanishing 
 generation, the soundness of principle and stability of character which 
 are among our dearest, if now frequently forgotten, inheritances. 
 In the second place, it is believed that his many friends may be glad 
 to have a little memorial of his cheerful spirit and active mind. 
 
 5 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/sketchespoemsOOhinc 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 Walter Hinchman, whose life covered seventy-five years of vivid 
 activity, lived through three greatly varying eras in American history. 
 He knew in boyhood the period when the greater part of the country 
 west of the Mississippi was practically a wilderness, and when the 
 rest of the country was in its first stages of railroad and steamboat 
 travel, photographs generally unknown, and slavery still a fact. 
 During his middle life, scientific discoveries and inventions set the 
 stage for an astonishing material development. Finally, after experi- 
 encing in his youth the terrible years of the Civil War, he saw in 
 old age an upheaval which in large part overthrew those things 
 which had been laboriously built up in his lifetime. With much 
 justification he shared the view of so many of his contemporaries, 
 that it was "really hard to see where it all might be leading to." 
 Yet he never allowed the pessimism which he felt over international 
 affairs to make of him a gloomy companion. A lover of outdoors, 
 especially in the spring, he was instinctively optimistic. His unfail- 
 ing good humor and kindliness were the strongest traits in his 
 character. 
 
 Born July 25, 1845, near Doylestown, not far from Philadelphia, 
 at a country place purchased shortly before by his parents, Walter 
 Hinchman was the son of Morgan Hinchman and Margaretta Shoe- 
 maker. His mother's family, which had settled Shoemakertown, now 
 Ogontz, came to this country in 1682, and the old Shoemaker house, 
 his mother's home, now called 'The Ivy." on Old York Road, is 
 considered by many antiquarians to be the oldest house where Friends' 
 Meetings were held still standing in the United States.* When still 
 
 * Richard Wall, whose granddaughter, Sarah, married George Shoemaker, 
 came from Cheltenham, England, some time in 1682, hetween the 4th and 10 mos., 
 certainly as early as Wm. Penn, if not before. He bought six hundred acres of 
 land in Cheltenham township, Philadelphia County. This tract later became known 
 as Shoemakertown, now Ogontz. 
 
 "Thomas H. Shoemaker says in writing of Richard Wall, 'I have little doubt 
 that he built his home of stone and that it still stands, forming the rear or back 
 buildings of Joseph Bosler's dwelling. At this early day, before Friends had 
 meeting-houses, it was customary' to use the dwellings of members of the Society 
 for the purpose of holding religious exercises.' . . . The meeting-house, now 
 
 7 
 
8 
 
a little boy, he moved with his mother to Cincinnati, where he saw 
 much of his uncle, Isaac Shoemaker, whom he in many ways 
 resembled. A bachelor, a wanderer of the woods and helds, and a 
 great traveller, Isaac Shoemaker sketched constantly, and, no doubt, 
 instructed his young nephew in the art of the pencil. In fact, about 
 the only instruction he received in sketching was from his Uncle Isaac. 
 Though Americans seventy years ago had some tradition of drawing- 
 brought with them from England, they were really unacquainted 
 with good painting, either through photographs with European art, 
 or through Japanese prints with Oriental art. This latter art 
 impressed Walter Hinchman very much in his later years, as some 
 of his more recent sketches show. 
 
 Walter Hinchman had his early schooling in Cincinnati, first 
 at the Friends' School, ^then for a while at Herron's Seminary, and 
 afterwards at public schools. At home he received from his mother 
 an intimate knowledge of the Bible, and, since he had an unusually 
 retentive memory, it is not remarkable to those who knew him in 
 later years that he was rewarded at school. On the fly leaf of a 
 little Testament is written : "2d Testimonial 'Presented bv Friends' 
 First-Day School' to Walter Hinchman, as a mark of esteem for a 
 nearly perfect recitation of 124 Scripture verses and good conduct 
 during the exercises of the class, 8 mo. 1859, (1. I). Smith." At the 
 age of eleven, shy, sensitive, but very determined and wide-awake. 
 
 known as Abington Meeting, appears from the minutes to have heen completed in 
 the sixth month, 1700. Many marriages recorded in Abington Records, between 
 1686 and 1700, were in meetings held at the house of Richard Wall.' " — Genealogy of 
 the Shoemaker Family, by Benj. Shoemaker, J. B. Lippincott & Co. 
 
 "The chief historical interest in this house is, therefore, the fact that it was one 
 of the very earliest meeting-houses in Philadelphia County whose location can with 
 certainty be ascertained. . . . The Boarded Meeting-house, erected in Phila- 
 delphia the latter part of 1682, antedates it, but its location is unknown, while the 
 Bank Meeting was not built until 1685. It would also seem that Richard Wall's 
 house was the oldest meeting place of the Society of Friends still standing on this 
 continent, although there is one on Cononicut Island, Rhode Island, which has some 
 claim to this distinction. It was soon made a Monthly Meeting, as the records 
 show." Sarah Shoemaker's "descendants operated the mill for the making of flour 
 until about 1846, when the estate was sold to Charles Bosler," whose daughter-in- 
 law, Mrs. Bosler, still runs the mill. — The Colonial Houses of Philadelphia and Its 
 Neighbourhood, by Harold Donald Eberlein and Horace Mather Lippincott. Mrs. 
 Bosler says that the ceilings, now covered with plaster, in the older part of the 
 house used for the dining-room and kitchen are made of logs, which would point to 
 the early origin of this house. 
 
 9 
 
10 
 
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 * * * * * * M 
 
 ON SEVENTH STREET, BETWEEN WALNUT AND VINE. 
 
 MONTHLY REPORT .7/^ 
 (9/ G^vut cum/ g$e>me*a Q<f{aU> QyflP . 
 fop det Q^tond of (Zff<^, . m/ de'J?^^' 
 
 Deportment 
 
 Spelling 
 
 Heading 
 
 Writing. 
 
 Elocution 
 
 Arithmetic 
 
 English Grammar... 
 Political Grammar. 
 
 Geography 
 
 Philosophy 
 
 Latin 
 
 Greek , 
 
 French 
 
 German 
 
 Algebra 
 
 Geometry 
 
 Physiology 
 
 Geology 
 
 Drawing 
 
 Music 
 
 Composition 
 
 Chemistry 
 
 History 
 
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 / o—o 
 
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 /&-v 
 
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 3 0* 
 
 Demerit Marks 
 
 PLAN OF MARKING. 
 
 The system of marking runs from to 5 For 
 perfect compliance with the Rules each pupil 
 •laity receives S credits for deportment For 
 evrry violation nl Rules one is taken from the 
 merits and added to the demerits For each 
 perfect le»»ou the pupil receives 5 credits For 
 an inferior lesson a number in proportion to the 
 merit of the lesson. If the pupil is detained 
 for an imperfect lesson, he receives 1 demerit 
 mark 
 
 Q4^/ J oj? tvmed fate/... 
 
 / 
 
 & & 8 8 * 
 
 Every pupil is expected to be in Lis place, at tbe reading of the Scriptures and Prayer, at S>i o'clock in the 
 rooming, and at 2 o'clock in tbe afternoon. If absent, a wiitten excuse or permit from the parents or guardian 
 is required. If be wish to leave before tbe close of the School, a written request is required. If a pupil be 
 imperfect in a lesson, without a reasonable excuse, be will be detained after school to study that lesson. Each 
 student must employ at least one hour at home in study. 
 
 fl^PTarents and guardians will please assist in having the above rules observed. 
 
 it 
 
 JOSEPH HERRON, Principal. 
 
 ONE OF WALTER HINCHMAN S CINCINNATI SCHOOL REPORTS 
 
 11 
 
12 
 
he was sent to the Friends' Boarding School in Richmond, Indiana, 
 now Earlham College. 
 
 A letter from his mother, dated Cincinnati, 11 mo. 20, 1858. 
 gives an interesting glimpse of the early years : 
 
 . . . "Couldn't thee write a little one day and a little another, so 
 as not to get so tired, or do you have a set time and all the boys write 
 together? I am very sorry to hear you have such poor accommodation 
 for washing yourselves; do all the rest do like thee, get no further than 
 the face and hands? This way wouldn't suit Uncle Abram's ideas! 
 Well, I hope the house will be done before long, and you can be more 
 comfortable, but, my dear child, I am very sorry to have thee speak 
 about the principal teacher as thee does — why, it was such an ugly word 
 that I didn't read it out to Uncle. I have always thought that he was 
 very much liked there and hope when thee knows him better thee may 
 feel differently about him. But however this may be, never forget that 
 it is thy duty to be obedient and try to accord with their wishes, though 
 it may not always be agreeable to thyself." 
 
 Another glimpse reveals in the following little incident his sensi- 
 tiveness to suffering, as well as his appreciation of a humorous situa- 
 tion. In a football game he had chanced to kick an opponent rather 
 roundly on the shin, and the boy had retired to the stairs to nurse his 
 injury. After the game young Walter, fearing he might have really 
 injured his opponent, asked him with some solicitude how lie was 
 feeling. "Better," was the rejoinder, "better, thank thee, damn thee!" 
 
 The vacations were dearly prized in a day when school term< 
 were long. In these periods he had an opportunity to see his older 
 brother Charles, on vacation from another school. To this older 
 brother, tall and fearless, as he was small and timid, he looked tip 
 with admiration and awe. while lie, in his turn, provided entertain- 
 ment for his two younger cousins, the children of his uncle Abram 
 Taylor. To them his remarkable agility amounted to prowess, while 
 his early facility w ith the pencil and his invention and dexterity w ith 
 tools produced the most enticing games and toys before their 
 bewildered eyes. 
 
 It was during one of his later vacations that he must have made 
 the sketch* illustrating the following episode. Dr. Joseph Taylor! 
 and two of his cousins start ahead for a drive in the buggy, while 
 
 * See pp. 16 and 17. 
 
 t Joseph Taylor, brother of Abram Taylor, and founder of Bryn Mawr College. 
 See p. 53. 
 
 13 
 
14 
 
Walter and his cousin Sarah follow on horseback. The strap of her 
 saddle gives way and she is tipped off the horse, but caught hanging 
 by her long skirt on the pommel. Walter runs to the rescue and 
 demands her hair ribbons to mend the strap. This done, he places 
 his hands for her to mount and raises her to a certain height, but, 
 being of small stature, he cannot get her quite up. "Sally," he 
 finally says, "I can hold thee here all day, but I cannot get thee an 
 inch higher." The difficulty is finally solved by putting the horse in 
 the ditch. 
 
 One great joy of his vacations was the opportunity to follow 
 up his interest in nature, with many excursions afoot in forest or 
 field. It was a delight which he never lost. Many years later, while 
 he was living in New York, it led him to Central Park before break- 
 fast, or, in less clement seasons, to sketch animals at the Zoological 
 Gardens, and he never tired of watching the doves nesting in the 
 towers of the cathedral, so well seen from his hotel window. 
 
 At Earlham he appears to have been a bright and industrious 
 boy, but his passion for book knowledge received noteworthy impetus 
 when he returned to Cincinnati in 1862 and went for a short time 
 to the Hughes High School. During evenings spent devouring the 
 books of the Mercantile Library, he added to the German he had 
 acquired at school. This, his first foreign language, he knew thor- 
 oughly. "I well remember," writes one of his cousins, "our Sunday 
 reading of the Scriptures in our Cincinnati home, when he always 
 translated from his German Bible." His hatred of Germany, how- 
 ever, as a result of the Great War, prompted him just before his 
 death to destroy all of the many lyrical translations he had made 
 from the German.* 
 
 At seventeen, then, Walter Hinchman had added to the back- 
 ground of a good home the advantages of a sound education with 
 developing interests in nature and drawing. The opportunities open 
 to him were not artistic, but it is quite conceivable that, in other 
 circumstances, he might have followed either a naturalist's or an 
 
 * A few from Scheffel's Trompctcr von Sakkingen (pp 248, 249, etc.) had 
 been kept in earlier years by one of his nieces. 
 
 15 
 
16 
 
17 
 
BARN DRAWN BY WALTER HINCHMAN AT THE AGE OF 10 
 
 DRAWING BY ISAAC SHOEMAKER OF HIS NEPHEW DRAWING THE BARN \ THE BOY'S DRAWING ABOVE 
 
 18 
 
artist's calling.* The business career which he did pursue, as a 
 result, perhaps, of both his environment and his own practical, inde- 
 pendent nature, takes on added interest on account of the ten years 
 of varied activity which came immediately after his school days and 
 which equipped him, for later life, with an experience superior to 
 most collegiate training. He continued to study, to read, and to 
 draw, in spite of a ten-hour working day; he learned to observe and 
 to record accurately; and he became familiar with the ways of men. 
 
 His first business venture was a position, at the age of fifteen, 
 with Morris and Frank White, Quakers from Carolina, who had 
 freed their slaves and started a grocery business in Cincinnati. He 
 once laughingly said that the only drawing lesson he ever had was 
 painting labels on grocery boxes. This position with the Whites, in 
 1860, must have been during a vacation. On leaving school two 
 years later he was anxious to get into a machine shop, and shortly 
 after, through a friend, he obtained a position in Springfield, Ohio, 
 as the following letter attests : 
 
 Lagonda Agricultural Works 
 Office of Warder & Child 
 Springfield, Clarke Co., Ohio 
 
 Octohkr 10, 1862. 
 
 Walter Hinchman: 
 
 Dear Sir. — My nephew, John Warder, has applied for a situation 
 in our shops for you. We have hesitated for the following reasons, viz. : 
 Very few young men, raised as you have been, are willing to endure 
 the drudgery necessarily incident to a subordinate situation in a shop 
 and soon feel that they are kept at work which in no way advances their 
 knowledge of the trade — is tiresome and very uninteresting. This has 
 led us to discourage similar applicants. Another reason applies to your 
 case, viz. : You will be thrown with men who, although they are above 
 the average found in Western shops, as to habits and intelligence, are 
 not fit for your intimate associates. Not because they are mechanics, this 
 has nothing to do with it, but because they have never enjoyed the refined 
 home associations which have been your privilege, and which every young 
 man must cling to and cherish, as the bond which connects him with all 
 
 * The fact that he was color-blind may have had a deterrent influence. He 
 was color-blind only to red and green, however, being especially sensitive to all 
 shades of blue. One of his nieces, on being once presented with a sketch of a magenta 
 tiger, and later with a vermilion tree, always after that extracted the reds from 
 the color boxes which were given him. 
 
 19 
 
20 
 
that is noble and good in this world. Among such companions as you 
 would find in our shops, you must be self-sustained, and, while with them, 
 you must not be of them. This is a more difficult task than may at first 
 appear. Except John, your companionship out of work hours must be 
 in books. 
 
 If you are willing to look these facts in the face and still desire a 
 situation similar to John Warder's, you may come up at any time. The 
 compensation for first two years will be but little over cost of boarding, 
 washing, etc. I may add that I am desirous to have a suitable companion 
 for John, and that I shall feel great pride if you both make skillful 
 mechanics and successful business men. 
 
 John will write about the boarding house. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 (Signed) B. H. Warder. 
 
 During this period the storm of the Civil W ar was breaking. 
 Although the Hinchmans were Quakers, Walter's oldest brother was 
 serving in the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry, a young lieutenant of 
 twenty, under General Palmer. He himself tried to enlist early, but 
 was refused on account of his youth, small stature, and weak eyes. 
 He did serve in the Springfield Home Guards, however, and May 2, 
 1864, when the Hundred Days' Men * were called for, he was 
 accepted. He joined Hunter's command in Virginia as a corporal. 
 The work assigned to Hunter at this time is indicated in an extract 
 from Grant's order to Halleck, May 25, 1864: "If Hunter can pos- 
 sibly get to Charlottesville and Lynchburg, he should do so, living 
 on the country. The railroads and canal should be destroyed beyond 
 possibility of repairs for weeks. Completing this, he could find his 
 way back to his original base, or from about Gordonsville join this 
 
 * President Lincoln had accepted the offer of the Governors of Ohio, Indiana, 
 Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin to supply each a certain quota, "the term of service 
 to be one hundred days; the whole number to be furnished within twenty days; 
 the troops to be armed, equipped, and transported as other troops, but no bounty 
 to be paid, nor any credit on any draft, and the pending draft to go until the State 
 quota was filled." George C. Gorham, in his Life of Edwin M. Stanton, says: 
 "Although experience had shown that troops raised for a short term were more 
 expensive, and of less value than those raised for a longer period, these troops did 
 important service in the campaign. They supplied garrisons and held posts for 
 which experienced troops would have been required, and these were relieved so as 
 to join the armies in the field. In several instances the three months' troops, at 
 their own entreaty, were sent to the front, and displayed their gallantry in the hardest 
 battles of the campaign." — Life and Public Services of Edwin M. Stanton, by 
 George C. Gorham. 
 
 21 
 
army." Hunter was successful at first, and on June 16th he reached 
 and invested Lynchburg, but a counter-movement by Lee forced him 
 not only to retire, but to retire by way of Kanawha. "This lost to 
 us the use of his troops for several weeks from the defense of the 
 North."* 
 
 The grim character of the warfare seen by Corporal Hinchman 
 is indicated by Hunter's report: f "On the 12th I also burned the 
 Virginia Military Institute and all the buildings connected with it. 
 I found here a violent and inflammatory proclamation from John 
 Letcher, lately Governor of Virginia, inciting the population of the 
 country to rise and wage guerilla warfare on my troops, and, ascer- 
 taining that after having advised his fellow-citizens to this course the 
 ex-Governor had himself ignominiously taken to flight, I ordered his 
 property to be burned under my order, published May 24th, against 
 persons practicing or abetting such unlawful and uncivilized war- 
 fare." "The unsparing hand of Hunter" is the phrase used in Long's 
 Lee (p. 355) to characterize the expedition. After the failure before 
 Lynchburg, the force had a hard time in the mountains of Virginia , 
 their supplies were cut off and they nearly starved to death. 
 
 Mustered out September 5, 1864, Walter Hinchman returned 
 to Cincinnati and soon obtained employment in the machine shop of 
 I. and E. Green wald. % Here he worked till 1866, when he moved 
 to Philadelphia and took a position in Sellers' machine shop. Though 
 he worked at a lathe during a ten-hour day, he studied draughting 
 as well as German in the evening. Years later, when he could laugh 
 at the pride which temporarily put him in a difficult position, he gave 
 the following account of these days. With his never-failing desire 
 to draw, and doubtless with an ambition to better his condition, he 
 resigned his lathe job and applied for work in the draughting room. 
 Not accepted there, he found himself on the street without a job. 
 Shops were at that time cutting down on account of the contraction 
 of business after the war, and he wandered from shop to shop with- 
 out finding an available position. Too proud to return to Sellers', 
 the foreman of which he knew, and unwilling to appeal to his brother, 
 
 * Genl Jmbodcn's Account of Hunter's Raid, p. 485-6. 
 f:Q. R., vol. xxxvii, part I, p. 97. 
 
 t Many of his sketches are of his co-lahorers at Greenwald's. See pp. 74-79 
 
 22 
 
23 
 
now an officer of the Pennsylvania Steel Company, he soon found 
 himself nearly at the end of his resources. Sometime earlier he had 
 noticed in a Quaker periodical an advertisement which ended with 
 the singular sentence, "1 want a horn-book." As he had never heard 
 of a horn-book, he had looked up the meaning of the word, and the 
 advertisement had thus been impressed on his mind. He now recalled 
 that the advertiser, one Jonathan Dennis, wanted a draughtsman to 
 work on drawings for patents in Washington. The singular Dennis, 
 in reply to young Hinchman's application for the position, asked him 
 to draw an apple-parer. As unfamiliar with apple-parers as he was 
 with horn-books, Hinchman was lucky enough to find one at a hard- 
 ware shop ; he drew it and sent the drawing on to Washington. He 
 soon received a reply accepting him. By this time he had just enough 
 money left for the trip. 
 
 In Washington he found that his employer was a sort of patents 
 jobber, old, and practically quitting business, but a kindly Quaker 
 withal, who gave him shelter and took him Sundays to meeting. 
 After a few weeks, Dennis generously told him that he could do 
 better in a bigger, more vigorous concern and kindly offered to rec- 
 ommend him. In this way he got a position in the Government 
 Patents Office. The first drawings that he made were not considered 
 satisfactory, but he begged his employers to try him for a week with- 
 out pay. Largely self-taught in mechanical, as well as in freehand 
 drawing, he had not realized that in good mechanical drawing every 
 detail must be measured with compasses or calipers to the difference 
 of a hair's breadth. He had been accustomed to drawing relatively 
 unimportant lines freehand, but a few glances over the shoulders of 
 other men as they worked taught him the right way, and within the 
 week he was accepted as a skilled draughtsman. 
 
 He did not stay long in this position, however, for his brother 
 Charles early in 1867 obtained the opportunity for him through Gen- 
 eral William J. Palmer, a railroad promoter and builder, who was 
 planning a railroad through to the Pacific, to join a party of about 
 fifty people, called the Union Pacific Railway Excursion.* This 
 
 * "In the spring of 1867 a very extensive surveying expedition was organized 
 by the Kansas Pacific Railway Company (formerly called The Union Pacific 
 Railway, Eastern Division) in order to determine upon the best route for a southern 
 railway to the Pacific Coast through Kansas. Colorado. New Mexico. Arizona. 
 
 24 
 
GENERAL WILLIAM J. PALMER 
 
 25 
 
 Portrait by Herkomer 
 
the first survey for a railroad to the Pacific Coast, covered much of 
 the ground over which the Southern Pacific was later built, though a 
 more northern route (Union Pacific) was the one first followed. 
 The expedition left Philadelphia for St. Louis on May 31, 1867. 
 
 This surveying expedition would merit what might seem dispro- 
 portionate attention because of its own picturesque story. The larger 
 part of the journey lay through not only unbroken country, but 
 country which varied from the plains of Kansas to the deserts and 
 canons of Arizona and New Mexico; and at certain points hostile 
 Indians rendered advance exciting, sometimes peri A us. In an account 
 of the life of Walter Hinchman, moreover, the joirney has particu- 
 lar significance, for on it he had experiences and made friendships 
 which in large measure determined his whole bi siness life. The 
 story of the expedition is graphically told by Dr. William A. Bell, 
 photographer of the party. 
 
 "From 1820 to 1830," Dr. Bell says, p. 4, "the tide of emigration 
 gradually crept westward, until at last, between 1830 and '35, the dis- 
 covery of the enormous agricultural value of the prairie regions, which 
 occupy so large a portion of the eastern part of the Mississippi basin, 
 caused the wave of emigration to pass like a flood over all that country. 
 Chicago was unborn, and the great Northwest was almost unknown, when 
 St. Louis became the outlet for the produce of the western prairie 
 farmer." 
 
 "From St. Louis, the starting point" (Dr. Bell, p. 16), "we went 
 by rail to Salina (Kansas), the terminal depot at that time of the Kansas 
 Pacific Railway. At this point, 471 miles west of the Mississippi, we 
 exchanged the locomotive for the mule train, and marched due west over 
 a sea of grass for 216 miles to Fort Wallace, a military post on the borders 
 of the State of Colorado." 
 
 "About the railroad station (at Salina), and on each side of the line 
 for some distance," he says, p. 21, "lay pile after pile of the munitions, 
 not of war, but of peace — iron rails, oaken ties, cradles and pins, con- 
 tractors' cars, little houses on wheels, trucks innumerable, both empty 
 and full — while at the opposite side of the town our picturesque little 
 
 and the southern part of California. Until the Rio Grande del Norte (about equi- 
 distant from the Mississippi and the Pacific) had been reached, three separate 
 surveying" parties were required ; but between that river and the Pacific Coast, no 
 less than five parties, each capable of making an accurate instrumental survey, were 
 employed. . . . The United States Government, by furnishing escorts and trans- 
 portation, rendered assistance without which such an undertaking would at that 
 time have been impossible." — Nczc Tracks in North America, Dr. Win, A. Bell, 
 1869. 
 
 26 
 
camp of twenty wall tents, formed in a square and flanked by our wagons 
 and ambulances, lay peaceful and cool on the short green sward. 
 
 "Our chief. General W. W. Wright, who had already gained for 
 himself lasting laurels by the manner in which he had conducted the 
 railroad operations of Sherman's march through Georgia, made Salina 
 the rendezvous for all our parties. Here many of us met for the first 
 time, and the fortnight's sojourn, spent in completing our organization 
 and waiting for the weather, passed pleasantly by." 
 
 To leave Dr. Bell for a moment and quote from an early letter 
 of Walter Hinchman : 
 
 Salina, Kansas, June 7, 1867. 
 
 Dear Brother : 
 
 The excursion part}' arrived at this point yesterday and I was glad 
 to find Gen. Wright and party still here. 1 am now fairly installed as 
 one of the company, and have been very busy today finding what things 
 I had and where they were, some being loaded and others in camp, etc. 
 We have a good many jackasses here who do not pull the wagons, they 
 think because they are some Senator's son that they are a little above 
 the ordinary folks, and, as we have scarcely any discipline, thee can 
 imagine the worry of issuing ordnance to a crowd who want to choose 
 each one for himself, and have never learned the soldier's first duty— to 
 obey. We have Spencer rifles and Remington revolvers, so 1 will send 
 thy "Colt" home by Mr. Browne, of the excursion party, who has kindly 
 offered to take it. I would also send the ammunition, but Mr. B. pref erred 
 not to take it. 
 
 Instead of the ride over the plains, which 1 had been promising 
 myself, we are to walk all the way and will probably be out two years. 
 
 I think I shall like it; have been congratulated by ( apt. Blair, our 
 Q. M., who says he knew thee, on having a good "posish." tor which 1 
 have to thank my dear brother. We are loading up to start tomorrow 
 morning and I write in great haste to send by Mr. Browne, who leaves 
 tonight. 
 
 With love, I am, as ever, 
 
 Thy bro., 
 W If. 
 
 To return to Dr. Bell (p. 30) : 
 
 "We left Fort Harker on the morning of the 11th. and. three miles 
 beyond, passed through Ellesworth [Kansas], a wonderful place, having 
 seven or eight 'stores,' two hotels, fifty houses of other kinds, occupied 
 by nearly a thousand persons, and yet just one month old. Six weeks 
 ago the wild buffalo was roaming over its site, and the Indians scalped 
 a foolish soldier whom they caught sleeping where the new schoolhouse 
 now stands. The day of the buffalo and Indian have passed forever; 
 
 27 
 
never again will the one graze, or the other utter a war whoop on this 
 spot." 
 
 (Page 33) : "We had no sooner found ourselves in the land of the 
 antelope and the buffalo, beyond the little 'cities,' and out of hearing of 
 the locomotive, than Indian troubles began to cast their shadows around 
 us, deeper and deeper, as we moved forward. 
 
 "Never before had hostility to the pale-face raged so fiercely in the 
 hearts of the Indians of the plains, and never had so large a combination 
 of tribes, usually at war with each other, been formed to stop the advance 
 of the road-makers. From Dakota to the borders of Texas every tribe, 
 save the Utes, had put on war paint and had mounted their war steeds. 
 Reports came from the north that the Crows and Blackfoots had made 
 friends with the Sioux, and from the south that the Cheyennes and 
 Arapahoes, the Kiowas and Comanches, had been seen in large bodies 
 crossing the Arkansas and moving northward. The horrors of the last 
 summer were fresh in the minds of the frontier men, who remembered 
 many a comrade scalped by the red-skins. They laughed at the treaties 
 of the Fall, at General Sherman's councils, and Samborn's wagon-trains 
 laden with gifts. They said, 'Wait till the spring, till the frost is out 
 of the ground, and the grass is green and abundant, and then see then how 
 the savages will keep their treaties.' This season had arrived and the 
 Indian horizon looked blacker than ever. The Fort Kearney [Nebraska] 
 massacre, in which some of the wives of the officers were brutally mur- 
 dered, and the energetic demands of the railway company on the State had 
 resulted in a considerable military force being sent into Nebraska to 
 protect the road to Salt Lake. This had the effect of driving many 
 additional bands of Indian warriors southward to harass the poorly 
 guarded route along the Smoky Hill Fork [Kansas]." 
 
 On Sunday, June 24th, General Wright and party arrived at 
 Fort Wallace [Kansas], where General Hancock and Major Calhoun 
 had preceded them. The party from Philadelphia received a hospitable 
 welcome, but found that the fort had been the scene of an attack 
 from the Indians the clay before. Four men killed and four wounded. 
 Sunday was calm, but to continue from Dr. Bell : 
 
 (Page 58) : "Peace did not last long, however, for early dawn 
 brought the red-skins back again. They were evidently ignorant of the 
 fresh reinforcements, and came determined this time to take the fort and 
 repeat in all its horrors the Fort Kearney massacre. Pond Creek Station 
 was the first point of attack, but, as usual, this little fortress — for, in 
 fact, it was quite a stronghold in its way — proved too much for them. 
 They succeeded in stampeding four of the stage-horses, and almost the 
 first intimation received at the fortress of an attack was brought by these 
 horses galloping straight towards us, two-and-two, exactly in the same 
 
 28 
 
order as they were accustomed to be driven. One was bleeding from a 
 wound in the hind leg, another had been shot in the neck. The Indians 
 followed on their horses, whooping and yelling like a host of demons. 
 Without a moment's delay a dozen cavalry from the fort, united with 
 some thirty-five of our escort and led by our officer, Captain Barnitz, 
 were in the saddle. The bugle sounded, and out they went across the 
 open plain. . . . 
 
 "At the first cry of 'Indians!' we were all out of our tents, rifle in 
 hand. My friend, Walter Hinchman, Criley, our carpenter, and myself 
 started immediately for a ravine about two miles off on the right, which 
 formed a covered approach of six miles or more in length, leading in 
 the direction of our camp. General Wright very wisely detained the 
 rest of the party in camp to defend it in case of attack while the cavalry 
 were away. Finding no Indians advancing along the ravine we returned 
 to breakfast, feeling it undesirable to go farther unprotected and alone. 
 Two hours of great suspense followed, which was not much relieved by 
 the appearance of a horseman from the field of action, who came to get 
 an ambulance for the dead and wounded. 
 
 "No sooner had the cavalry followed the retiring band beyond the 
 ridge, exchanging shots and skirmishing all the way, than on either flank 
 two fresh bodies of warriors suddenly appeared. They halted for a few 
 minutes; a powerful-looking warrior, fancifully dressed, galloped along 
 their front shouting out directions; and then, like a whirlwind, with lances 
 poised and arrows on the string, they rushed on the little band of fifty 
 soldiers. The skirmishers fired and fell back on the line, and in an instant 
 the Indians were amongst them. Mow the tide was turned. Saddles 
 were emptied and the soldiers forced back over the ground towards the 
 fort. The bugler fell, pierced by five arrows, and was instantly seized 
 by a powerful warrior, who, stooping down from his horse, hauled him 
 up before him, cooly stripped the body, and then, smashing the head of 
 his naked victim with his tomahawk, threw him on the ground under his 
 horse's feet. On the left of our line the Indians pressed heavily, cutting 
 off five men, among them Sergeant Frederick Wylyams. With his little 
 force, this poor fellow held out nobly till his horse was killed, and one 
 by one the soldiers fell, selling their lives dearly. The warrior who 
 appeared to lead the band was, up to this time, very conspicuous in the 
 fight, dashing back and forth on his grey horse, and by his actions set- 
 ting an example to his warriors. In the melee, however, one of our 
 cavalry men was thrown to the ground by the fierceness of the Indian 
 onslaught, when this leader, who I have since learned was the famous 
 Cheyenne war-chief Roman-nose, attacked the prostrate man with his 
 spear. Corporal Harris, of 'G' company, was near him, and struck 
 Roman-nose with the sabre which he held in his left hand. Quick as 
 thought the chief turned on him, but as he did so the faithful 'Spencer' 
 
 29 
 
a 
 
 30 
 
of the corporal met his breast, and, with the blood pouring from his 
 mouth, Roman-nose fell forward on his horse, never again to lead his 
 'dog-soldiers' on the warpath. By this time, it was more than evident 
 that on horseback the soldiers were no match for the red-skins. Most 
 of them had never been opposed to Indians before; many were raw 
 recruits, and their horses became so dreadfully frightened at the yells 
 and the smell of the savages as to be quite unmanageable. So Captain 
 Barnitz gave the order to dismount. 
 
 "When the dismounted cavalry commenced to pour a well-directed 
 valley from their Spencers, the Indians for the first time wavered and 
 began to retire. For two hours Captain Barnitz waited with his thinned 
 ranks for another advance of the Indians, but they prudently held back, 
 and, after a prolonged consultation, retired slowly with their dead and 
 wounded beyond the hills to paint their faces black and lament the death 
 of one of the bravest leaders of their inhuman race. 
 
 "I have seen in days gone by sights horrible and gory — death in all 
 its forms of agony and distortion — but never did I feel the sickening 
 sensation, the giddy, fainting feeling that came over me when 1 saw 
 our dead, dying and wounded after this Indian fight. A handful of men, 
 to be sure, but with enough wounds upon them to have slain a company 
 if evenly distributed. . . . 
 
 "As I have said, almost all the different tribes on the plains had 
 united their forces against us, and each of these tribes has a different 
 sign by which it is known. 
 
 "The sign of the Cheyenne, or 'Cut arm,' is made in peace by draw- 
 ing the hand across the arm. to imitate cutting it with a knife; that of 
 the Arapahoe, or 'Smeller tribe,' by seizing the nose with the thumb and 
 forefinger; of the Sioux, or 'Cut-throat,' by drawing the hand across the 
 throat. The Comanche, or 'Snake Indian,' waves his hand and arm in 
 imitation of the crawling of a snake ; the Crow imitates with his hands 
 the flapping of wings; the Pawnee, or 'Wolf Indian.' places two fingers 
 erect on each side of his head, to represent pointed ears ; the Blackfoot 
 touches the heel and then the toe of the right foot, and the Kiowa's most 
 usual sign is to imitate the act of drinking. 
 
 "If we now turn to the body of poor Sergeant Wylyams we shall 
 have no difficulty in recognizing some meaning in the wounds. The 
 muscles of the right arm, hacked to the bone, speak of the Cheyennes, or 
 'Cut arms'; the nose slit denotes the 'Smeller tribe,' or Arapahoes ; and 
 the throat cut bears witness that the Sioux were also present. There 
 were, therefore, amongst the warriors Cheyennes, Arapahoes, and Sioux. 
 It was not till some time afterwards that I knew positively what these 
 signs meant, and I have not yet discovered what tribe was indicated by 
 the incisions down the thighs and the laceration of the calves of the legs 
 in oblique parallel gashes. The arrows also varied in make and color, 
 
 31 
 
according to the tribe, and it was evident, from the number of different 
 devices, that warriors from several tribes had each purposely left one in 
 the dead man's body." 
 
 (Page 66) : "At the close of the following week General Hancock 
 arrived. He had left so many of his escort here and there along the road 
 that no additional troops could be spared for us, and our expedition might 
 have ignominiously returned to its outset had not Colonel Greenwood 
 most liberally offered to escort us with his surveying party and his 
 colored troops — making, in all, nearly fifty additional men — across the 
 remainder of the country considered unsafe." * 
 
 From Fort Wallace [Kansas], Walter Hinchman wrote the 
 following letter, July 3, 1867: 
 Dear Brother : 
 
 Thy welcome favor of 20th ult. has just been received, the first letter 
 I have had since leaving Salina. 
 
 We arrived at this post over a week ago and have remained here 
 inactive, but I heard a whisper to the effect that we may move in a few 
 days. The Indians have been rather bold in their attacks, and, as our 
 party will be spread out over a considerable distance while surveying, 
 we ought to have a larger escort. So far we have only had 50 cavalry- 
 men, and we of the survey party have done more guard duty than they. 
 We are divided into three parties, the whole of each party "going on" 
 every third night. This is a little more than we bargained for, and I don't 
 think we can work very well and do guard duty also. Gen. Wright is 
 not at all popular with the command, and, to speak plainly, I do not think 
 him competent to have charge of such a company as this in an enemy's 
 country. He seems to me to be very timid, yet desirous of creating the 
 opposite impression. The Indians made a demonstration on this post the 
 day after our arrival, and in the fight which ensued our escort lost heavily, 
 having seven men killed and five wounded. The killed were stripped 
 naked and one of them horribly mutilated, but the savages were driven 
 back before they could treat the others in the same brutal manner. 
 
 The principal object of the Indians is plunder, and I don't think 
 
 * "We afterwards learned that on the same morning a hard fight took place 
 near Fort Wallace by a company of the Seventh Cavalry, under Captain Barnitz. 
 On this occasion the Indians abandoned their old style of circle fighting, formed in 
 line and charged after the manner of a squadron of cavalry. This made the 
 fighting desperate, it being mostly hand to hand. In this fight some of the bravest 
 and most efficient non-commissioned officers of the Seventh Cavalry were killed and 
 their bodies mutilated in the most horrible manner. When an Indian was shot off 
 his pony, two red-skins would ride their ponies up to him, pick up the body and 
 carry it to a place of safety. Those who were in the fight state that they never 
 saw such excellent riding as the Indians exhibited on this occasion." Other notice 
 of this skirmish can be found in From a Summer on the Plains, by Theo. R. Davis. 
 Harper's New Monthly Mag., Feb., 1868. 
 
 32 
 
they would fight unless the odds were largely in their favor, as they don't 
 like to be killed any more than the rest of us. 
 
 So far I have not seen anything like a fort at the places so designated 
 on the maps; taking this point Fort Wallace, for instance, as a sample, 
 it is merely a collection of tents and Government warehouses, with no 
 signs of defense, not even the simplest kind of a rifle pit until after we 
 came, when they imitated us and threw up several crescent-shaped 
 trenches. 
 
 There is a soft magnesian limestone found all through this state, 
 which makes an excellent building material ; it is very soft and easily 
 worked, as soft as chalk, and hardens by exposure. Timber is exceedingly 
 scarce, consisting of a few scattered trees and small bushes along the 
 creeks, chiefly cottonwood. Wood is worth $65 per cord. The land is 
 not so rich here as in the eastern part of the state; in fact, we are now 
 on what used to be styled the great American Desert; rain seldom falls 
 and the grass would be entirely withered by the scorching sun, were it 
 not for the depth to which its roots descend, the sod being many times 
 thicker than with you. Major Calhoun, who went ahead of us with 
 General Hancock, joins us here; look out for his letters in the "Press" 
 and "Harper." I would rather trust to his advice, if I needed it, than 
 anyone else in camp, but will try to keep my own counsel. . . . 
 
 My pay is $60 per month, (I said nothing about the $75 thee spoke 
 of.) A few days ago General Wright made me tapeman, which brings 
 no additional pay (as I did not ask for any), so I will not have nothing 
 to do on the way. The men, two-thirds or more, are perfect greenhorns 
 about surveying and never saw a rod or chain till they came out 
 
 here - • • • July 4, 1867. 
 
 I wish I had some more baggage, there are many things which I 
 need, and cannot now obtain, which might just as well have been brought 
 along. Many of the boys have large trunks in addition to their valises 
 and four or five blankets ; shall have to make the best of what I have and 
 know better next time. Although the days are very hot here, the nights 
 are frequently very cold, so that two or three blankets arc very comfortable 
 over all our clothes. The stage came up yesterday with the mail and no 
 passengers, but crammed with soldiers and with a cavalry escort in order 
 to keep off the noble Indian. 
 
 Please write me, care of W. W. W right, Chief Engr., U. P. R. 
 W. E. D., St. Louis. 
 
 Mr. Knapp, one of our party (son of the editor St. Louis Republican), 
 leaves us tomorrow for home, as do several others, going with General 
 Hancock. He will take our letters and mail them at St. Louis, which 
 will expedite their transmission. 
 
 With love to mother and our friends at B. 
 
 I am, thy very affectionate Bro., Walter. 
 
 33 
 
In his brother's handwriting, jotted down on the back of an old 
 invitation to the 3d Annual Meeting of the Anderson Cavalry, is the 
 following list, which, because of the diversity of the articles and the 
 quaintness of introducing "A flask of best brandy," together with a 
 "Tract on Swearing, Rum, and Tobacco," is quoted in full : 
 
 Sent for W. H. to care of W. J. P., 
 
 Fort Craig, N. M. 
 
 1 pr. heavy grey blankets. 
 
 1 pr. heavy top D. S. boots, heels shod. 
 
 1 heavy coat, 1 army officer's cape (French). 
 
 1 large gum blanket. 
 
 Some good medicine (buy of W. J. A.) 
 
 1 haversack — on hand. 
 Sewing materials (strong). 
 
 2 fishing lines and hooks (Kriders, 2d & Walnut). 
 Some No. 1 cartridges, 44-cal. 
 
 Some small buckles, brass. 
 
 Matches, 4 boxes best, w. proof. 
 
 Newspapers, magazines, and songs. 
 
 Tract on Szvearing and Rum and Tobacco. 
 
 P. knife, F. & S. combined. 
 
 Flask of best brandy, 4th proof. 
 
 Pencils and drawing paper, and ink and pens. 
 
 1 Cholera and Fever and Ague mixture. 
 
 2 pocket mem. books. 
 
 $10 in postal currency, 10 and 5's. 
 
 1 pocket looking glass. 
 
 1 diary and pocket almanac. 
 
 1 pocket magnifying glass. 
 
 1 box paper collars. 
 
 1 dozen selected photographs. 
 
 1 chest for packing same. 
 
 Hinges and hasp ; padlock, to be enclosed inside, ^-inch. 
 
 Screw lid down. 
 
 India rubber envelopes. 
 
 Bag for papers, etc. 
 
 1 piece of oiled silk. 
 
 Drinking cup. India rubbers. 
 
 Camphor in packing. 
 
 $1 in new pennies, $1 in new 3-cent currency. 
 
 Further news of the party and of Walter Hinchman is contained 
 in a letter from General Palmer to Charles S. Hinchman : 
 
 34 
 
Santa Fe, October 17, 1867. 
 
 My dear Mr. Hinchman: 
 
 I received your favors of August 26th and September 25th, and was 
 very glad to hear from you and to receive the copies of analyses. I 
 think the Vermejo coal we afterwards discovered will show no more 
 sulphur and much less ash than the "Raton" which was analyzed. It is 
 a magnificent deposit. 
 
 I detached your brother from the Gila party [Southern New .Mexico] 
 so he might accompany me. He is a thorough-going, sensible and faithful 
 fellow, and I want just such a young man close at hand. Since Dr. 
 Lamborn would not let you come, I will have to take your brother. He 
 is temporarily acting as Quartermaster to Miller's division, which started 
 nearly a week ago on the survey of the 35th parallel from Isleta on the 
 Rio Grande below Albuquerque, but as soon as I can find someone to 
 replace him in that capacity I shall take him as my secretary. He sketches 
 quite well the country we pass through, and with some practice would 
 excel in this valuable talent. I will catch them at Fort Wingate [New 
 Mexico]. 
 
 The box arrived at Santa Fe and will be sent down in one of Colonel 
 Greenwood's wagons to your brother. As it was directed to me, I had 
 opened it, tried on the hat (which fits well) and tasted some of the 
 French brandy (which is unexceptionable) before I saw the slip which 
 contained "inventory of articles for Walter Hinchman." I was in such 
 a brown study, wondering what kind friend has sent me a new hat. that 
 I had not noticed the inventory. 
 
 Tell Dr. L. I have his letter and will answer it before crossing 
 the Rio Grande. How did the Anderson dinner come off? I hope often 
 to hear from you. 
 
 Regards to ReifT and McAllister. 
 
 Yours. 
 
 Wm. J. Palmer. 
 
 Dr. Bell, after describing the long march to the Purgatoire River, 
 Colorado, writes (p. 95) : 
 
 "The fourth pass was discovered by General Wright, about four- 
 teen miles farther west, lower than any of the others, most suitable for 
 a railroad, but too rough either for a wagon road or even a mule path. 
 This has been named Cimarron Pass [New Mexico]. Its elevation is 
 6,166 feet. 
 
 "While camped at the mouth of the Purgatoire Canon I examined 
 that end of it. None of the grandeur of the Red Rock Canon was to 
 be found here ; the walls were perpendicular only towards the top. and 
 were composed of grey sandstone, somewhat metamorphosed, probably 
 from their proximity to the Raton Mountains [on border between 
 
 35 
 
36 
 
Colorado and New Mexico], which are partly volcanic. They did not 
 exceed 200 feet in height, yet it was difficult traveling along the banks, 
 for it took my friend Walter Hinchman and myself four hours to lead 
 a mule packed with my photographic 'outfit' two miles, in which short 
 distance we nearly lost our valuable quadruped in a quicksand, and had 
 to load and reload at least half a dozen times." 
 
 From Albuquerque, New Mexico, Walter Hinchman wrote as 
 follows to his brother : 
 
 October 12, 1867. 
 
 My dear Brother: 
 
 I little thought ten days ago that I would be writing thee from Albu- 
 querque, but since my last letter from Fort Craig [New Mexico], there 
 have been some important changes made in our outfit, part of which I 
 dare say thee was expecting. General Wright was relieved a week ago, 
 much to the surprise of the party. Many speculations were rife as to 
 our movements, some declaring that we would lay at the fort several 
 weeks to settle up affairs, but General Palmer, with an energy to which 
 we were not accustomed, ordered Miller's party to be ready to move next 
 day. The design is for Runk and Eicholtz to survey a line from Fort 
 Craig to the coast on the 32d parallel, terminating at San Diego ; while 
 Miller and Greenwood (who has heretofore been working on the Denver 
 line) run a line on the 35th parallel, following the same general route 
 taken by Whipple some years ago ; all the parties are to meet at San 
 Francisco and go home by sea; what a jolly time we will have if we all 
 get safely home. General Palmer told me I should go with him as clerk 
 and "sketchist," so now I have a horse to ride and feel as gay as a lark. 
 Have been Miller's Q. M. for the last week, which accounts for my being 
 at this place; hope the General will soon arrive, as I do not want to be 
 with J. Imbrie any longer than necessary. General Wright and Dr. Le 
 Conte left Albuquerque today by stage for the East. Dr. Le Conte has 
 been of very little service to the company so far as my knowledge goes ; 
 he was too much afraid of Indians and too fond of his own ease to 
 examine the country as he should. Dr. Parry is just the contrary in 
 every respect; he is a little man, very quiet and reserved in his manners, 
 a hard worker and small talker. Among the first to rise in the morning, 
 he is away on his mule by himself half an hour before the rest are ready 
 to start ; then we see nothing more of him till evening, when he is sure 
 to find camp and come in about supper time. Our next post after 
 leaving here will be Fort Wingate [New Mexico], which we will reach 
 in about three weeks. Please write me to Prescott, Arizona, for two 
 months, after which direct to San Francisco. I am sorry that our letters 
 miscarry. I should like to get newspapers and am much obliged to thee 
 for sending them, but very few come to hand. 
 
 37 
 
Thy favor of September 17th, enclosing grandmother's, was received 
 a few days since. Say to grandmother that I am very much obliged for 
 her kind remembrance. I am writing in Major Calhoun's room. It is 
 late and must say "adios." The Major sends his particular regards to 
 thee. 
 
 Thy affectionate brother, 
 
 Walter. 
 
 General Palmer's party, including Walter Hinchman, thoroughly 
 investigated the district of the Pueblo Indians, where the Santa Fe 
 road now runs, including the villages of Laguna, Acoma, and Zuni. 
 Later they left their traces in the names of their principal members, 
 inscribed under the title U. P. R. C. E. D. on El Moro, or Inscription 
 Rock. Soon after this they left the country of the more peaceful 
 Pueblo Indians and entered what is now the State of Arizona, where 
 they were again subject to attacks from the fiercer Indian tribes. 
 They followed along the valley of the Colorado Chiquito, or Little 
 Colorado, and across the peaks to Prescott. 
 
 Dr. Bell continues (p. 172) : 
 
 "It was not the wish of our surveyors to carry a line of railway 
 over the actual base of the San Francisco peaks at an elevation exceeding 
 7,000 feet for 100 miles if a lower grade could be obtained farther south. 
 With this object in view, General Palmer, after having pushed rapidly 
 forward in advance of the parties to Prescott, determined to retrace his 
 steps through this intricate canon country and ascertain if there was any 
 possibility of finding a practicable route through it. He was accompanied 
 during these excursions by Hinchman, whom my readers will remember 
 as one of my companions in the earlier chapters, and he had also a small 
 detachment of soldiers and a few more members of the survey to assist 
 in the work. At one time General Gregg, who happened to be at Prescott, 
 joined him with his escort." 
 
 By November they had reached the head waters of the Verde 
 River, Arizona, and in Sycamore Canon were attacked by the Apache 
 Indians. Soon after, Walter Hinchman made a sketch of this attack, 
 in which the Indians on top of the mountain are seen rolling stones 
 down upon the party below. In later years General Palmer had two 
 large paintings made from the drawing, about which he wrote : 
 
 April 3, 1903. 
 
 Dear Walter : 
 
 At last, the other day, that long-lost little sketch you made of the 
 attack in Verde Canon turned up at Glen Eyrie, and I gave it to W. Craig. 
 
 38 
 
,19 
 
a local artist, to paint a picture from it. He has done so, but has scarcely 
 done the coloring aright and my memory is not altogether firm in regard 
 to those rocks. Can you tell me whether the granite was at the bottom, 
 or stratified rock (I think the latter), and whether any white sandstone 
 came in on the way up, and whether the prevailing rock color from 
 bottom to top was red or grey, or red and strata, and grey interlarded ? 
 
 If you are able to refresh my memory with regard to this matter I 
 shall be very much obliged. 
 
 Yours, 
 
 Wm. J. Palmer. 
 
 General Palmer, in a letter to Dr. Bell, written in Signal Canon, 
 Arizona, at the foot of Mogollon Range, near San Francisco Moun- 
 tain, December 8, 1867, gives an interesting account of this attack: 
 
 (Page 174) : "But very few days have passed since leaving Pres- 
 cott in which we did not meet recent signs of Indians ; the rude wigwams 
 of bunch grass and branches, which the Arizonians call 'wicky-ups' ; the 
 moccasin tracks ; the mescal heaps, where the Indian has been roasting 
 his supply of winter subsistence, composed almost entirely of this root; 
 the sweating-house, or earth oven, which he gets into when sick, and 
 which is almost his. sole remedy for disease; the fresh trail, and the 
 'rancheria,' or village of a greater or less number of wigwams. 
 
 "We have been surrounded by these constantly, but all were aban- 
 doned; and, although the stealthy Apache was watching us from every 
 rocky look-out, we could nowhere catch sight of him. An inexperienced 
 traveller would have imagined that there had been a general exodus, and 
 that the whole race had disappeared — had gone to the Tonto basin, or 
 the Gila, or some remote hiding place. 
 
 "If he wanted to have this mistake corrected, he should have done 
 as we did : he should have gone down into a canon and traveled along 
 its bed for a few miles, until he had reached a place where you can look 
 up on either side and not discover the remotest chance of getting out — 
 where ahead, and in the rear, as far as you can see, it looks like a deep 
 grey coffin. Then suddenly he would hear a war-whoop that would make 
 him think that all the savages in the Rocky Mountains, from Fort 
 Bridger [Utah] to Apache Pass, were within bow-and-arrow range. 
 
 "A week or two ago, on an occasion very similar to the above, Gen- 
 eral Gregg was with me. We were hunting for a route from the Val de 
 Chino eastward to the Colorado Chiquito, by crossing the head-waters 
 of the streams flowing into the Rio Verde close up to where they emerged 
 from the high, rocky wall at the base of the San Francisco Mountains, 
 when we came to the canon of Sycamore Fork. We succeeded in descend- 
 ing the gorge, but the ascent was so exceedingly steep that we thought 
 the pack train could not climb up out of it, and concluded, in spite of 
 
 40 
 
its violating the fundamental rule of Indian warfare in these mountains, 
 to return to the bed of, the canon and follow it to its mouth. 
 
 "It was strewn with fragments of red sandstone, from the size of a 
 church to that of a pebble, over which we dragged our foot-sore animals 
 very slowly. We had made some eight miles, when, as it seemed, at the 
 roughest part of the whole way, where nature had made a sort of waste 
 closet at random for all the shapeless blocks and sharp-cornered masses 
 of rock and washed-out boulders that she had no time to work up and 
 wished to hide from sight, we suddenly heard a shot from the brink of 
 the canon at our rear, and the dreaded war-whoop burst upon us. Then 
 we looked up to the right and left, ahead and to the rear, but the walls 
 seemed everywhere as tall as a church steeple, with scarcely a foothold 
 from top to base. They had looked high before, and the chasm narrow, 
 but now it seemed as though we were looking up from the bottom of a 
 deep well or a tin mine, and no bucket to draw us up by. Soon the shots 
 were repeated, and the yells were followed by showers of arrows. We 
 staggered and stumbled about as fast as a very slow ox-team along the 
 rocky bed till we came to some bushes, and then stopped. 
 
 "Some of the Indians had got on the edge of the canon ahead of us. 
 whose yells answered those from the rear, and the whole concatenation 
 of sounds echoed among the cliffs till it seemed to us that every rancheria 
 in Arizona had poured out its dusky warriors to overwhelm us. 
 
 "It was a yell of triumph — of confidence. It appeared to say, ,( >h. 
 ye wise and boastful white men, with your drilled soldiers and repeating 
 guns, and wealth and power, who came out to hunt the poor Indian Erom 
 his wigwam, look where we have got you ! We have only been waiting 
 for you to make some blunder ; now we shall take advantage of it and 
 not let any of you escape. It shall be worse than at Fort Kearney, for 
 not even one shall be spared to tell the story. It will be a good place to 
 bury you; in fact, you are already buried in as deep a grave as you could 
 wish. We shall only leave you there, that is all, ha! ha! What are your 
 Spencer carbines worth, and your soldiers with their fine uniforms and 
 drill? It is only the old lesson we are teaching you: our forefathers 
 taught it to Braddock, and it has been repeated many times since ; but 
 we shall drive it into you deeper than ever it has been before, ha ! ha ! 
 You thought we had all gone, but our eyes were never off you. and now 
 we are gathering our warriors from every hiding place. This is the way 
 we call them out — whoop ! whoop ! whoop ! and they are lining the edge 
 of the canon before and behind you. You can take your time. It is 
 only ten miles to the mouth, and the farther you go the deeper the canon 
 gets. Perhaps you wish to retreat? It is only eight miles back and you 
 know what sort of a path it is. From the cedars on the brink we will 
 pick you off at our leisure, and you shall not see one of us. This country 
 belongs to us, the whole of it ; and we do not want your people here, nor 
 
 41 
 
your soldiers, nor your railroad. Get away to where you belong — if you 
 can ; ha ! ha !' 
 
 "It was not all this in detail, but the sum and concentration of it, 
 that flashed through my mind as I listened to those yells, now rising clear 
 and wild on the breeze, and now dying away in the distance. 
 
 "We moved close up to the foot of the wall from the top of which 
 the shots came, thinking it would be too steep for them to hit us, but 
 the great rocks that came rolling down upon us, resounding almost like 
 heavy ordnance through the canon, drove us away from that slight shelter. 
 Here was a new danger and a very serious one, since there was no hope 
 that this kind of ammunition would give out, and the Indians evidently 
 knew how to use it. 
 
 " 'Now, officers, be quick and sharp in giving your orders ! Throw 
 away precedent and drill, and come down to native common sense V 
 'Now, soldiers, be prompt, and jump at the word of command, and don't 
 get disheartened ! And you, muleteers, scatter out your animals ; keep 
 them sheltered as much as possible and avoid all disorder. Now, every- 
 body keep cool, for every man's life hangs upon a single movement here; 
 and, if a panic breaks out, all is lost, and the latest tragedy in the great 
 Apache war, which they say has been waging against the Spaniards and 
 Americans for over two hundred years, will have been enacted !' Soon 
 the sharp, clear voice of the adjutant rang out from behind a huge rock 
 in the channel, his carbine at a 'ready,' and without moving his eyes from 
 the cliff : 'Sergeant, send six men to scale that side of the canon !' 
 
 "As they moved out, General Gregg joined them and directed their 
 movement. 
 
 "I gave the next order to the little escort I had brought from New 
 Mexico: 'Sergeant Miller, station five men on this side of the canon to 
 cover that scaling party with their fire. Let them take shelter behind 
 the rocks.' This was done, and the devoted little band began slowly to 
 ascend what seemed an almost vertical wall of sandstone. 
 
 "Until now, although the yells had rung all around us, the firing 
 was confined to the west side of the canon, but at this moment a very 
 close shot was fired from the other side, and our plans could not be 
 carried out unless this was stopped. Another scaling party of six men 
 was accordingly detailed, of which I took command, and began ascending 
 the eastern cliff, covered by the fire of a second small party in the canon. 
 This disposed of all our fighting force, the remainder being required to 
 take care of the animals. How we got up, God knows ; I only remember 
 hearing a volley from below, shots from above, Indian yells on all sides, 
 the grating roar of tumbling boulders as they fell, and the confused 
 echoing of calls and shouts from the canon. Exhausted, out of breath 
 and wet with perspiration, boots nearly torn off and hands cut and bleed- 
 ing, I sat down on the summit and looked around. Across the narrow 
 
 42 
 
chasm I saw the other scaling party. Everything was as quiet as death, 
 the Indians had disappeared, melting away as suddenly and mysteriously 
 as they had at first appeared. They had gone to their hidden lairs, 
 cowed by our determined approach. 
 
 "It had been hurriedly arranged before we ascended that the scaling 
 parties should move on down stream at the brink of the canon, covering 
 the pack-train and animals which would march along the bed. Accord- 
 ingly, we moved on towards the Rio Verde ; but, in consequence of side 
 canons, were compelled to keep back at least half a mile nearer to the 
 foot of the mountain than the course of the canon. 
 
 "Six miles farther, while skirting a ridge which projected from the 
 mountain, the Indians from the top began yelling again like demons and 
 firing at us, but the range was too long to do any harm. They were too 
 cowardly to attack even our small party, and now that we were no longer 
 engulfed in a canon we laughed at their whoops. They followed us. 
 however, hoping to catch us in a ravine, but we always sent three men 
 across first to cover the rest and be covered by them in turn. 
 
 "Just as the sun was setting we recognized from a high point the 
 mouth of the Sycamore and the valley of the Rio Verde. We had not 
 been able, from the roughness of the country, to approach the side of 
 the canon in which we supposed the rest of the party were moving, and 
 could not, therefore, ascertain their whereabouts. But at last, towards 
 dark, we descended a second time, by a deep side gorge, into the canon, 
 dropping down fully 2,000 feet in the space of half an hour. It was 
 just light enough when we reached the bed of the canon to discover that 
 our party had not passed down it, and, although fearful lest the Apaches 
 should notice our descent and again pepper us in the narrow ravine, we 
 turned up it to meet them. 
 
 "That night's march up the canon, over the broken rocks and through 
 the tangled thickets was worse, if anything, than the attack. Every 
 pebble in the darkness was magnified to a boulder, and every boulder 
 seemed as large as a house; fording the rapid stream twenty times, we 
 shivered with cold and wet when we halted for a brief rest; expecting 
 every moment to meet our party encamped, we yet wondered how they 
 would dare to stop in such a place. Finally, near midnight, we halted under 
 some sheltering rocks and concluded to take some sleep, but the guides 
 protested against having a fire, saying that the Indians would detect and 
 shoot into it. To sleep without one. however, was impossible. At last 
 I concluded that it was better to die from an Indian arrow than to freeze 
 to death in the darkness and ordered a small one to be lighted, beside 
 which we sat and slept and shivered until a little before daylight, when 
 we took another smoke for breakfast and pushed out into the darkness 
 to continue our march up the stream. 
 
 "During the night a great rock had either become dislodged or 
 
 43 
 
had been rolled down by Indians, but it fell into the canon with a report 
 like thunder. I started up and found I had not dreamt it. I would give 
 something to have a faithful picture of that little party with the expres- 
 sion of each as they stood or leaned, staring out into the pitch-dark canon 
 and wondering what would come next. 
 
 "By daybreak we had got well on our way when we heard shots in 
 the rear, which we presumed to be Indians firing into our abandoned 
 camp. We commended ourselves for early rising and pushed on, wonder- 
 ing what could have become of General Gregg's party. Finally, the guides 
 insisted on getting out of the canon and striking towards Prescott, but 
 I ordered them to keep ahead, feeling confident that we should soon meet 
 the party or its trail. 
 
 "At last all hope seemed to be gone and I agreed to climb out up 
 the western cliff. It was as much as we could do to reach the top, and 
 imagine our feelings on arriving there to find that we were merely on a 
 vertical ledge of rock, and that immediately on the other side was the 
 same canon we had come along an hour before. We scrambled along the 
 narrow ledge, however, faint from hunger and fatigue, having come 
 nearly twenty miles on foot, up and down canons and steep ravines, 
 climbing through mountain passes and stumbling over the rocky bed of 
 the streams, equivalent to at least sixty miles, as we thought, on a level 
 road. We had had nothing to eat for over twenty-four hours, and very 
 little sleep ; the night was bitterly cold, our overcoats were left behind 
 when we scaled the cliff during the Indian attack. . . . 
 
 "Such was our condition when one of the party cried out, 'What is 
 that smoke?' I got out my field glasses and saw two fires and some 
 animals grazing contentedly on a distant hill. 'That is camp, boys ! 
 Orderly, fire two shots in quick succession !' The shots were fired. 
 Anxiously, we listened for the acknowledgment. It came soon, the two 
 welcome answering shots, and we strode on with renewed heart. 
 
 "Now, if we had not seen camp I could have walked as many miles 
 as we had already gone without giving up, but when I came within two 
 miles of camp and felt certain of succor, and could talk with General 
 Gregg across a deep canon, only half a mile distant, my legs, somehow or 
 other, refused to carry me farther, and I came to the conclusion that 
 infantry service was disagreeable on an empty stomach. So I made a 
 fire and laid down to sleep and sent for rations, which my faithful servant, 
 George, brought out to me in the rain, with a flask of whisky from 
 General Gregg, and strict injunctions to be sure to drink it all — a com- 
 mand I promptly obeyed. I hope the Temperance Society will forgive 
 me, as I could have drunk a demijohn under the circumstances without 
 being affected by it. 
 
 "It was by no means a short walk even from where we were to 
 General Gregg's camp, as we had to head the deep side canon and to 
 
 44 
 
cross several others near their sources. It was raining, and the ground 
 and rocks were slippery; but at last we arrived and received the con- 
 gratulations of the party, who had heard the Indian shots and shouts 
 and feared we had met too many of the 'noble reds.' 
 
 "General Gregg had found a way out of the Sycamore Canon along 
 a horrible trail, by unloading his pack mules and making several trips 
 of it. He had signalled to us, but had no means of communication, and 
 supposed we had struck for Camp Lincoln, a military post in the valley 
 of the Verde, fifty miles to the south." 
 
 In this same letter, written in camp, another mention is made of 
 Walter Hinchman by General Palmer as follows : 
 
 (Page 172) : "After climbing and scrambling along these moun- 
 tains for more than two weeks since leaving Prescott, endeavoring to find 
 a route eastward to the Colorado Chiquito without passing over San 
 Francisco Mountain, I have at last reached the valley of that river, and 
 am waiting here in camp this pleasant December Sunday for the return 
 of Hinchman, whom I have sent down the river to get news if possible 
 of Greenwood's whereabouts. Hinchman will probably find a mound 
 there with a letter buried, containing an account of Greenwood's move- 
 ments and stating where we can find him. We have two signal fires 
 burning on the highest points overlooking our camp to guide Hinchman 
 to us, and from this we have called the tributary of Canon Diablo in 
 which we are encamped 'Signal Canon.' I have called it a camp, but it 
 is only a 'high-toned' bivouac, as we parted with tents and wagons a fort- 
 night ago, and since that time have relied on pack mules, and even these 
 have been unable to cross the rugged country through which this recon- 
 naissance has been made without sacrificing some of their number to the 
 good of the cause." 
 
 Dr. Bell takes up the story (p. 185) : 
 
 "Notwithstanding the bonfires which were kept blazing all night above 
 Signal Canon, Hinchman did not return. Next morning they searched 
 for him in all directions, but in vain. Fearing that he had fallen into 
 the hands of the Apaches, they redoubled their exertions and continued 
 the search for three days, but still without success ; and at last Palmer 
 had to give it up and return to Prescott, persuaded that one of the 
 greatest favorites of our whole party had fallen a victim to the cause. 
 Hinchman, however, was intended by Providence for better things than 
 to furnish a scalp and a night's amusement to the red-skins. He had 
 lost his way, and, becoming confused in the intricacies of the canon 
 country, thought it best to make his way, as well as he could, to Prescott 
 where he arrived on the fourth day, thoroughly exhausted, not having 
 tasted food during all that time." 
 
 45 
 
On New Year's Day, 1868, General Palmer wrote from Fort 
 Mojave to Charles Hinchman : 
 
 "Your brother is well and with me. He got separated for four days 
 over beyond the San Francisco mountain, and, as he hadn't anything to 
 eat along, I believe he was somewhat hungry at the end of that period 
 when he reached supplies. He looked a little pale for a week thereafter. 
 I was quite uneasy for a while, fearing the Apaches would run into his 
 little squad, as I met numerous wigwams, just abandoned, immediately 
 after parting from him at Sunset Gap, but he turned up all right. So 
 that, instead of writing you a sad letter of condolence as I at one time 
 expected would be requisite, I am enabled to record his little adventure 
 merely with its harmless finale. It is rather different from campaigning 
 in Tennessee or Georgia, where Crittur Companies could reach 'sinkers' 
 and a 'few molasses,' with perhaps a reasonable pig or chicken, in almost 
 any short march." 
 
 Two months later, its labors completed, the expedition broke up 
 in California, and Walter Hinchman returned by sea via Panama, in 
 charge of General Palmer's pet horse Don, already mentioned in the 
 much-quoted letters from Signal Canon. Although born in the East, 
 within a few miles of the Atlantic seaboard, Walter Hinchman thus 
 saw the Pacific Ocean before he did the Atlantic. 
 
 The western expedition evidently had a great influence on his 
 life. Though he had several more years of travel, it connected him 
 definitely with General Palmer and railroading, while the more pic- 
 turesque phases of it must have struck his quick perception, thus 
 contributing to that store of knowledge and appreciation which made 
 him in later years so conspicuously an educated man. He spoke rarely 
 of the expedition, for he had in marked degree the uncommon virtue 
 of leaving himself out of the conversation; however, when he did 
 mention it in recent years, he dwelt little on the engineering features, 
 but talked chiefly of the heat of the Arizona desert, the appearance 
 of the mountains and canons, the wild life by the way, the beauty of 
 green California as they descended from the Tejon Pass, and the 
 hospitality of the monks in an old Spanish settlement at the Pass. 
 In telling of the four days when he was lost in the canon country, 
 he said that he could have returned to camp, had he not been detained 
 by missing his way, so long that he supposed the camp might have 
 been broken and that he might find Indians instead of friends there 
 Fearing discovery by the Indians, he abandoned his horses, for which 
 
 46 
 
Drawings by Walter Hinchman, Feb., J86g 
 
 47 
 
48 
 
he lacked provision, and he and his men travelled on foot by night, 
 guiding themselves by the stars, and hiding as much as possible by 
 day. He decided to make for Prescott, where they had headquarters, 
 and arrived there, on the fourth day, before General Palmer's party. 
 This explanation of just what he did do when astray will not surprise 
 those who in later years accompanied him on walks in the woods, 
 for they would say that he could not have been lost, in the sense of 
 losing, his direction. 
 
 After returning to the East, Walter Hinchman joined General 
 Palmer in Washington, where they were engaged in railroad matters, 
 especially in connection with the projected Denver and Rio Grande 
 Railroad. Congressional action was slow, however, and, at General 
 Palmer's advice, Hinchman left Washington and worked for a while 
 in the Pennsylvania Railroad shops at Altoona. By the first of the 
 year, 1869, he was doing draughting for the Pennsylvania Steel Co., 
 at Steelton, Pa., but keeping up his connection with General Palmer 
 and railroad friends, and, spurred on by the "Wanderlust," he went 
 again to the West, late in the same year, this time with the Central 
 Pacific Railroad. He met with Indians again, as his sketches show, 
 but they seem to have been of the more peaceable variety.* He appa- 
 rently returned from this trip sometime in the spring, for in the 
 summer of 1870 he made a visit to his mother and uncle, who had 
 built a home near Burlington, New Jersey. Early in 1871, however, 
 he was again on the march, this time to the far Xorthwest with a 
 party that included Dr. S. Weir Mitchell, Samuel M Felton, Governor 
 J. Gregory Smith, William B. Ogden, Miss Maria Audubon, and 
 others. They spent all of the spring and summer in Minnesota, 
 especially in the neighborhood of Duluth and at various points along 
 the Northern Pacific Railroad, but by October 5th Hinchman was 
 back in the East on his way to join ex-Governor Smith, of Vermont, 
 at St. Albans. 
 
 He had accepted the position of private secretary to the Gover- 
 nor, who was then President of the Northern Pacific Railroad and 
 the Vermont Central Railroad, and stayed with him from two to 
 three vears. He then joined his brother Charles in Philadelphia, 
 with whom he stayed, off and on, for three years. During these 
 
 *See pp. 112. 113. 
 
 4') 
 
50 
 
years he worked with his brother in the office of the Pennsylvania 
 Steel Co., or went up to Steelton to test rails, and for a while had 
 charge of the blast furnace there. This last job he gave up on 
 account of his eyes, which he had strained over draughting work 
 some years before and which troubled him more or less for the rest 
 of his life. At one time, in 1875, when he was forced to quit alto- 
 gether, he went with Dr. Joseph Taylor to Florida. In 1877, after 
 eight years separation from General Palmer, he moved to New York 
 and entered the service of the now-established Denver and Rio Grande 
 Railroad, of which he soon became treasurer. 
 
 As early as 1872, General Palmer was considering a Mexican 
 railway and went to Mexico, but the first record of Walter Hinch- 
 man in Mexico is the date 1882 on one of his sketches, ''a bordo vel 
 vapore, Whitney." * One of the chief memories of his nephews and 
 nieces is his frequent appearance, in the eighties, with bright Mexican 
 serapes and quaint earthenware jars and figurines. During these 
 years he learned Spanish, his second foreign language. 
 
 Through his connection with the West, and his trip to Minne- 
 sota, he became interested in the Western Land Association, in which 
 both he and his brother took an active part, while his association 
 with General Palmer and the Denver and Rio Grande led him to 
 become affiliated with the Mexican National Construction Company. 
 These three remained his chief business activities for upwards of 
 thirty years, and in one or another he always held some official 
 position. 
 
 He continued to travel in connection with his business, but his 
 wanderings, his university training, were now over. Years later, 
 when one of his nephews projected further study at the University 
 of Berlin, he remarked: "Study in Berlin's all right, T suppose: but 
 travel; that's the great education. See how other people live and 
 think." Anyone who knew Walter Hinchman in his later years must 
 realize, not only what business experience he gained from the ten 
 years of travel and various activity, but what a vast store of infor- 
 mation and human knowledge he laid up for himself. 
 
 He walked daily, rain or shine, from the Buckingham Hotel. 
 50th and Fifth Avenue, where he lived for over forty years, to his 
 
 * See p. 88. 
 
 51 
 
office in lower New York, which he occupied all these years in asso- 
 ciation with General Palmer. This latter half of his life, though 
 lacking in the picturesque activity of the earlier part, was full of 
 the steady industry of maturer years. When not attending to busi- 
 ness he found plenty to interest him in the world of books, and art, 
 and nature, and, when socially inclined, he found those who knew 
 him ever ready to receive him. Very often the week-ends, but always 
 the Sundays, even up to his last year of life, found him at his brother's 
 homes, in Philadelphia or at the seashore. In a letter, written June 
 7, 1901, he writes of the latter place: 
 
 "The southern coast of New Jersey, from Atlantic City to Cape May, 
 has the advantage in its firm, hard, sandy shore, but I doubt whether even 
 Avalon can show better country inland than Sea Girt, which has both 
 beauties : 
 
 " 'Where tides of grass break into foam of flowers, 
 And where the wind's feet shine along the sea.' 
 
 "We saw many birds, robins and sparrows, fish-hawks, crows, black- 
 birds and shore birds were to be expected, but what do you think of 
 Baltimore orioles, wrens, catbirds, warblers, and the great brown thrush, 
 besides woodthrushes and the golden-winged woodpecker, chewinks, 
 chickadees, pewees, swifts, and swallows? 
 
 "We saw fish-hawks pick up dead fish from the beach, an unusual 
 proceeding ; perhaps the fog prevented them from seeing fish in the water 
 or maybe the fish swam lower than in sunshiny weather." 
 
 Many weary hours he spent on jury duty, from which he felt 
 too many men claimed exemption. A little incident connected with 
 this duty shows that having once made up his mind he was a person 
 of great determination. At one time he could not come to the opinion 
 of the other eleven jurors, and they were held for days and days, for 
 he would not budge from his conviction. When they were finally 
 released, his brother asked him how it came out. "Oh, I convinced 
 the other eleven," he said. 
 
 The remarkable fact is, as someone said of him, that, living alone 
 all these years, he never became morose, but always maintained a 
 cheerful spirit, tempered by a philosophic calm. 
 
 French he did not study till he was nearly fifty, when he began 
 taking lessons from a little French woman whom he met at Lake 
 Minnewaska. where, after 1892, he spent most of his summers. He 
 nevertheless mastered it sufficiently to read it easily, though he never 
 
 52 
 
IT WAS DONE WITH THIS INSTRUMENT, INDEED 
 
learned to speak it fluently, and he has left some charming transla- 
 tions of lyrical poems in that language.* It was at Minnewaska, 
 too, that he developed much interest in photography. As might be 
 expected, he did not content himself with mere "views," but tried 
 many tricks with the camera, taking some amusing double pictures 
 of himself, which he labelled "astrals." Here, also, he found great 
 pleasure in the mountain walks and wild creatures, and many of his 
 nature sketches, especially the studies of trees, belong to this period. 
 
 In 1903-4 a very severe attack of pericarditis kept him housed 
 for the winter. Before this, he said, he had never spent a day in 
 bed in his life. He appeared to get over it, though in the sixteen 
 years to follow he no doubt had times of suffering which he never 
 showed to the outside world. As one said of him, "He always seemed 
 to be so much 'on deck.' " This attack, however, no doubt contributed 
 to his decision, about 1905, to retire from business. It is a question 
 whether he realized then that he was liberating himself for the full 
 enjoyment of his congenial pursuits in book and field and for the 
 radiation, in that enjoyment, of the best that was in him among his 
 friends. 
 
 For some years before his retirement from business, his nieces 
 and nephews had been old enough to be companionable to him. 
 Together they made trips variously to Mexico, Canada, Newfound- 
 land, England, and Italy, or studied together the great world of 
 nature. Many hours were spent, if not out-of-doors in the country 
 or in Central Park, in fascinating explorations of museums. A trip 
 to New York to see "Uncle" always meant a visit to the Museum of 
 Natural History, or the Aquarium, or the Metropolitan Museum of 
 Art, and he showed by his intimate knowledge of them all that he 
 also spent many hours there alone. He was to them a great teacher, 
 perhaps from the very fact that he never assumed the position of 
 teacher, but rather that of learner with them. 
 
 Not the least part of his success with children was his amazing 
 agility. At almost any age he would stand on his head or play leap- 
 frog or vault the fence if a child could be delighted thereby. He 
 enjoyed it himself, too. Only the summer before his death, when 
 he was out canoeing with two of his nieces, he insisted on performing 
 
 * Pp. 228-229, etc. 
 
 55 
 
AEOLIAN HARP 
 
 Made by Walter Hihchman 
 
 acrobatic feats along the edge of the canoe, much to their astonishment 
 and remonstrance. Hand-in-hand, as a source of entertainment to 
 children, went his dexterity with tools. In the fifties he had amused 
 his little cousins at Cincinnati by making marvelous toys. Sixty years 
 later he was still doing the same sort of thing for his grand-nephews 
 and grand-nieces, an Aeolian harp, beautifully fashioned, to beguile 
 a rainy day, wonderful birds out of milkweed seed-pods, or a perfect 
 little cantilever bridge out of pins and note-paper. 
 
 Young people always loved him. His knowledge seemed encyclo- 
 pedic; he was always ready for what interested them — he was never 
 "too busy," and he was ready, too, 
 
 "With step 
 So active, so enquiring eye, or tongue 
 So varied in discourse." 
 
 A delightful picture of him and of what he meant to young men 
 is revealed in a letter reminiscent of a summer at Minnewaska : 
 
 "I first met your uncle," says the writer, "in the summer of 1904, 
 which I spent at Lake Minnewaska. I had a very difficult job of tutoring 
 that summer, and had to spend many weary hours cudgeling knowledge 
 into a sluggish brain. What would have been a dull task was changed 
 into a pleasant vacation, largely through the friendship of your uncle. 
 We often arranged to spend my few free hours in the clay walking over 
 the mountains, and there he was at his best. I have always fancied that 
 I was some walker myself, but his light, springy stride taxed me to the 
 utmost. Everything on the hillside suggested comment, and the best of 
 those walks was that our brains were always as active as our feet. I 
 
 56 
 
THE SHAWANGUNK CLUB, MINNEWASKA 
 
 remember one priceless clay he told me he had a surprise for me and led 
 me by new paths to a ridge overhanging a deep ravine. We crept down 
 to the edge of the ravine in silence and then he told me to listen, and 
 by and by came stealing up from the ravine the song of the winter wren. 
 The melody was so precious that it seemed closely allied to silence. In 
 fact, we agreed afterwards that we could not tell as the song mounted 
 higher and higher just when it ceased. Your uncle's theory as we walked 
 home was that the human ear is capable of registering sound only within 
 certain limits, and that the little feathered throat we never saw went on 
 giving out the precious melody long after our human ears had failed to 
 follow the flight of the song. 
 
 "One of the kindest things your uncle did for me was to make me 
 a 'silent' member of the Tiberius Club. I say 'silent' advisedly, because 
 no youth of my age would have dared to open his lips in that august 
 throng. The Tiberius Club solved the problems of the evenings. After 
 dinner they would meet, a group of keen minds, possibly lawyers and 
 business men, but scholars all. The opening rite would be the kindling 
 of the fire, a task which your uncle always performed, using only the 
 
 57 
 
back of an envelope and one stick of wood for kindling. The group 
 always watched with great care this proceeding, and the invariable success 
 of the fire always made the lighter of it beam with conscious pride. The 
 Club received its name because of the eternal controversy which was 
 always in the background as to the character of the Emperor Tiberius. 
 The conversation was always brilliant, and might play over every topic 
 of past, present, and future interests, but the shade of the Emperor 
 Tiberius always lurked in the chimney corner to be dragged out by your 
 uncle when the conversation flagged. Old Mr. de Peyster and Mr. Spack- 
 man were the leaders of the debate. All your uncle needed to say was a 
 few words to arouse the speaker into eloquent presentation of his side 
 of the case, and then your uncle would settle back with a chuckle and 
 listen. When he once got Mr. de Peyster started, he would nudge me 
 and call my attention to his gestures, to notice especially his fingers, which 
 in their grace and curve your uncle was always wont to compare to the 
 tips of hemlock boughs that he loved so well. 
 
 "It was, I think, characteristic of him that he would stimulate con- 
 versation, rather than take part in it. His keen wit could play about on 
 any subject, but he had a rare faculty of enjoying the wit of others more 
 than he did his own, and that is one thing that made him such a friend 
 of mine as a young man. I was at the stage of life when I was eager 
 to express myself, and his skill in drawing me out always made me feel 
 when I was with him that I was at my very best. I am content to repeat 
 that last statement ... as an expression of his friendship to me and 
 to other young men : when we were with him we were at our best. I 
 wonder if any higher tribute could be made." 
 
 And another young man : 
 
 "Perhaps of all the grown-ups of my boyhood, Cousin Walter was 
 the most companionable and the nearest to being a companion and friend; 
 or, rather, there is no perhaps about it. He was unique in the power 
 to bridge the gulf that is the ordinary accompaniment of a difference in 
 age. He swam, ran, walked with us, took photos, and took part in our 
 reading, and took us boys out into nature with him, and seemingly came 
 down to our level and back to our age with us." 
 
 Walter Hinchman's memory, especially for poetry, was remark- 
 able. Not only could he quote Scripture or cap verses, in the days 
 of gentler pastimes, but he could recite long passages of almost 
 anything he had read, even after a lapse of many years. Shortly 
 before his death, in speaking of his youth, he told how an acquaint- 
 ance invited him, when a boy in Cincinnati, to attend the meeting of 
 a club where an actor was going to speak. He said that this was 
 
 58 
 
WALTER HINCHMAN AT MINNEWASKA 
 
the first time he had ever heard anything rendered in dramatic 
 fashion; and, being a tragic piece, it had seemed really terrible to 
 him. He then proceeded to recite the verses which the actor had 
 spoken, whereupon one of his auditors remarked, "How well you 
 remember it after all these years." "I haven't thought of it from 
 that day to this," he replied. Again, standing on a narrow rock high 
 above the sea at Tintagel, he suddenly began reciting a page or more 
 of The Last Tournament, growing dramatic with the recitation and 
 nearly throwing himself off the cliff when, impersonating Isolt, he 
 "belted" an imaginary Tristram "with her white embrace." When 
 one of his nephews supposed that he had just been re-reading the 
 poem, he said that he had not seen it for forty years. Possessed of 
 a pleasing, though not powerful voice, and of an excellent ear for 
 time, he read and recited well — dramatic verse especially, in which 
 he brought out the tone of voice implied in the lines. Lyrical verse 
 he frequently recited with a curious sing-song, but almost musical, 
 lilt. Certain favorite lines he would thus repeat over and over quietly 
 to himself, much as one might whistle. Among these perhaps the 
 chief was : 
 
 "Thus sang they in the English boat 
 A holy and a cheerful note ; 
 And all the way, to guide their chime, 
 With falling oars they kept the time" ; 
 And a visit to his brother's summer home at Sea Girt, New Jersey, 
 invariably found him humming: 
 
 "The tumbling ruins of the o-ce-an." 
 On the lighter side his dramatic instinct showed itself in great 
 powers of mimicry, both of animals and human beings, so that his 
 anecdotes had color as well as point. To hear him recite Shamus 
 O'Brien in perfect Irish brogue was a great treat. On this side, 
 too, he bubbled over, among intimate friends, with an Elizabethan 
 love of word-play and puns. 
 
 That many of his accomplishments were unknown to his larger 
 circle of friends is only another way of emphasizing his modesty and 
 self-effacement. As Dr. Johnson said of Burke, he "never talked 
 from a desire of distinction, but because his mind was full" ; yet even 
 his sheer love of discussion he curbed among any but the most inti- 
 
 60 
 
mate. But any who knew him can bear witness to the charm of his 
 manners and the winsomeness of his smile. No sketch of his char- 
 acteristics, moreover would be complete without mention of his 
 exquisite neatness and his care to keep in good physical condition. 
 Though he rarely gave advice, even to his nephews, one of his favorite 
 quotations was to remind them that the body was the temple of the 
 Holy Ghost. He practiced what he preached. 
 
 In 1903 he joined the Century Association, and there, as the years 
 passed, he found particularly happy surroundings and congenial 
 friends. After retiring from business he passed most of his time at 
 the Century, and, though he made occasional trips abroad and spent 
 summers at Minnewaska, he returned always to the Century as his 
 home. 
 
 In the early spring of 1920 a severe illness proved too much for 
 his heart, and, though he rallied for a time, he weakened with the 
 approach of warm weather and died on June 9th, at his sister-in- 
 law's summer home, at Sea Girt, New Jersey. He was buried beside 
 his brother in Friends Southwestern Burying Ground, in the suburbs 
 of Philadelphia. 
 
 What strikes one most, perhaps, in looking back over the entire 
 life of Walter Hinchman is the remarkable balance of an artistic 
 nature, with business intelligence and with a high sense of duty and 
 self-discipline. Possibly even more fundamental was his quick sym- 
 pathy. One of his friends, speaking of him, says : "He stood very 
 near to his friends by virtue of many avenues of approach, all of 
 which led to his warm heart and sympathetic mind. I state it thus, 
 for whatever leads us out of ourselves quickens, deepens, and 
 strengthens the personal relation in us. And this more than almost 
 any man in the Century he was able to effect through his genial 
 manner and extreme friendliness. This bent helped to educate the 
 individual in us and establish a relationship which made his presence 
 ever welcome. 'He was universally interesting because he was 
 universally interested.' " 
 
 A few years before his death, finding that one of his Century 
 friends had been commanded by the doctor to give up smoking, 
 Walter Hinchman told him that he would join him in his resolve to 
 help him keep it, and from that time to his death he never smoked 
 
 61 
 
again. It was characteristic of him to do that sort of thing; it was 
 still more like him never to speak of it. This friend said of him: 
 "He was a great teacher, who taught mainly by example, not by 
 precept, as all great teachers have done ever. He always went where 
 he was wanted, and whenever he went they always wanted him more 
 and more." 
 
 Still another, his most intimate friend, who had known him, not 
 only at the Century, but throughout his earlier years, says that he 
 "never heard him say a foul thing, nor a mean thing, though this by 
 no means implied any weakness. No one could impose upon him, 
 and none was so quick as he to denounce humbug or mawkish 
 sentimentality." 
 
 One cannot help missing the contact of so pleasing a personality, 
 but one cannot genuinely mourn a life so well rounded and so well 
 spent, a thought which Dr. Joseph Duryee, one of his beloved Cen- 
 turions, feelingly expressed in the following words spoken at the 
 funeral, June 12, 1920: 
 
 "We gather in this home today to pay tribute to one who in a long 
 life has brightened, helped, and inspired us. It is my privilege to speak 
 the thoughts of many he loved with a loyal devotion that for each one 
 had added new meaning to the great word 'friend.' 
 
 "When a life endowed with singular mental vigor, ennobled by 
 worthy and patient labor, enriched by varied study and learning, and 
 dignified by simple and gracious manners ends, there is no reason to 
 mourn or to deplore. No mists of pain or sorrow, no chilling sense of 
 loss, should obscure the perfect satisfaction that comes as we realize 
 how good it is for us to have known Walter Hinchman. 
 
 "'Not thee we mourn, O friend! as fall our tears. Thine is the 
 rest, the glory, and the gain. We grieve that we more lonely walk the 
 years and weaker turn to earthly toil and pain.' His example speaks to 
 us of the inestimable value of a character wholesome, winsome, gentle, 
 and unselfish. Compared with this, nothing else is much worth while. 
 These characteristics were distinctive in our friend. His delight in knowl- 
 edge. How persistently he gathered at their source and made his own 
 the facts and truths that are of interest. More than almost any mind I 
 have known, his was encyclopedic. How wonderful was his power of 
 impartation. Somehow he trained himself to command at will any part 
 of his knowledge and clearly and happily give to others. We, with whom 
 he mingled constantly in a most friendly place, were ever enriched by his 
 recollections and suggestions. It was always good for us to be with him, 
 
 62 
 
63 
 
his alertness stimulated our minds, he was so sound in judgment, his 
 sympathy was so broad and unaffected. It is no effort for the stars to 
 shine, and the sparkle in his eye, the harmony in his voice, the winsome- 
 ness of his smile always brightened the room in which he sat. How we 
 shall miss his wit, his humor, his keen perceptions, his fine discrimina- 
 tions ; but, most of all, his presence in our midst. We loved him because 
 we knew he loved us. His memory, his abiding influence, is a rich 
 inheritance. 
 
 "As 1 think of Walter Hinchman, his attitude toward life, and his 
 estimate of its values, I am reminded of an imperishable saying of St. 
 Paul, the noblest of all definitions of the ideal of human education : 
 'Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honorable, whatsoever 
 things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovable, 
 whatsoever things are of good report; take account of these.' One other 
 thought : What kept our friend through a long life of vicissitude, through 
 sorrows of which he never spoke, through loneliness, the greatest test 
 of all, and made him the loyal gentleman, the trusted comrade, the ever- 
 helpful friend? May it not have been because 'he gave his heart to the 
 Purifier and his will to the Sovereign Will of the Universe?' We leave 
 him 
 
 " 'To the silent memory that sings 
 
 A ceaseless requiem to our loved dead.' 
 
 " 'Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, 
 And let perpetual light shine on him.' " 
 
 (A 
 
BOYHOOD SKETCHES 
 
 id 
 
 65 
 
67 
 
68 
 
69 
 
70 
 
71 
 
CHARACTER SKETCHES 
 MECHANICS IN OHIO 
 
a 
 
 74 
 
75 
 
76 
 
77 
 
78 
 
79 
 
80 
 
EARLY AND MISCELLANEOUS 
 SKETCHES 
 
 ttty 
 
 81 
 
V, 
 
 * 
 
 82 
 
SKETCH OF SAMUEL W1LKESON ON TITLE PAGE 
 
 OF paschal's annotated constitution, given 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR TO SAMUEL WILKESON IN 1868, 
 WHO IN TURN GAVE IT TO WALTER H1NCHMAN 
 
 83 
 
85 
 
86 
 
87 
 
88 
 
\ 
 
 CENTRAL AND UNION PACIFIC TRIP 
 
 i 869-70 
 
90 
 
91 
 
92 
 
93 
 
94 
 
95 
 
96 
 
97 
 
98 
 
99 
 
100 
 
NORTHERN PACIFIC TRIP 
 1871 
 
102 
 
103 
 
104 
 
105 
 
> 
 
 106 
 
107 
 
108 
 
109 
 
110 
 
Ill 
 
112 
 
114 
 
ODD SKETCHES 
 
 MOSTLY DRAWN ON TRAINS 
 
116 
 
117 
 
118 
 
119 
 

 
 L Z 
 
 ^^^uuL iA u cl Fez Aunt 
 
 120 
 
• t 4 
 
 121 
 
< 
 
 Q 
 O 
 
 122 
 
STUDIES OF TREES AT MINNEWASKA 
 
124 
 
125 
 
126 
 
127 
 
12S 
 
129 
 
\M) 
 
131 
 
132 
 
133 
 
134 
 
135 
 
136 
 
137 
 
138 
 
139 
 
140 
 
141 
 
142 
 
143 
 
144 
 
145 
 
146 
 
147 
 
148 
 
149 
 
150 
 
STUDIES OF ANIMALS AND BIRDS 
 
152 
 
153 
 
154 
 
155 
 
156 
 
/ 
 
158 
 
lU Ji 
 
 159 
 
160 
 
161 
 
162 
 
163 
 
SEA GIRT, 1915 
 
 164 
 
166 
 
167 
 
168 
 
169 
 
170 
 
INSECTS AND FLOWERS 
 
173 
 
174 
 
175 
 
176 
 
177 
 
Ske eft-Laurel, or Lamb kill. 
 
 178 
 
179 
 
LANDSCAPES AND DECORATIONS 
 
182 
 
184 
 
LATER PORTRAIT SKETCHES 
 
188 
 
189 
 
190 
 
to 
 
 191 
 
192 
 
193 
 
194 
 
196 
 
197 
 
198 
 
ORIGINAL POEMS 
 
^-|xvu <L<A^u>fc aMiKv^g ^P^Lh^i oMA<tS^ i(s*Ajdo, 
 
 Dear Daisy: March 31, 1894. 
 
 The spring poet has broken loose — get your waste-basket ready. 
 
 Walking in the park this afternoon I found the enclosed effusion, though I did not hear 
 any "peepers," nor see anything resembling the sketch which heads the lines, and which, I 
 suppose, is intended for a hyla! I wish you would draw a good one for me. 
 
 Please tell your father that I expect to be in Philadelphia Monday and perhaps part of 
 Tuesday also. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 Walter II inch man. 
 
 200 
 
OXfi^v- ^oMJit 4y(iJU/v^> un^dl^ r^juJI^^ 
 
 urk^t, >4x4mc^ <^qaaJy^ j^Jbn^M umv&l (Ia*JL 
 
 is ^ 
 
 201 
 
ALENTINE'5 ^ ?>^al^Us^ jlojuU ' 
 
 QjLiixJt ^U^xXu£> &H^lv &>^Uu- -fad >WcuJu f 
 
 202 
 
*yb^cL Cbioyy^ {JuiJ 'cLou^m Only Jxm^uU , 
 jii^JL ally ^ Cm^Iyi^^r^^ c&zJiu^lXj . 
 
 ^^cc^X 3 doll; tAxs> TkOazUvv Y^sxaJD, 
 QgHjJL^L txyyi^JU CoJCil, fjJi>€^tZ^ -tjH/nJy^ CLclMla^ ! 
 
 203 
 
February 14, 1896. 
 
 While yet the fields are flecked with snow, 
 
 And fountains form an icy cup, 
 And winds through leafless branches blow, 
 
 St. Valentine wakes Cupid up! 
 
 At once, in general chorus, ring 
 
 Rhymes rudely wrought, or murmuring sweet ; 
 And with the rest who tribute bring, 
 
 I lay mine at my lady's feet. 
 
 And though Italian grace I need 
 And skill, to praise her as I should. 
 
 Her wit, in my crude lines will read, 
 Not what I write, but what I would. 
 
 204 
 
February 14, 1896 
 
 Dear Peggy, may your heart incline 
 To choose me for your Valentine ; 
 Or, if such pref'rence be not shown, 
 Still in your circle count me one. 
 I would, to win your fav'ring smile, 
 Sing, in E-liz-a-be-than style, 
 
 " Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes, 
 Which starlike sparkle in their skies; 
 Nor be you proud, that you can see 
 All hearts your captives; yours yet free. ,? 
 
 Then (if I'm further speech allowed), 
 I'll say, you're too good to be proud; 
 That merit needs must conscious be, 
 And know its worth as well as we : 
 And let her fancy have free scope. 
 For, till she chooses, all may hope. 
 So while such hope sustains my steps. 
 I sign myself : yours, Samuel Pepvs. 
 
 205 
 
206 
 
^fc^Cuh ^xxvurvx^ ^AjQ^AJUU / frr tJu^fco . 4jUL£ . 
 
 all 
 
 -fuisv^ I^JUucL o-y^y ^CU^aJ 1 <j^XL ! 
 
 207 
 
March 25, 1897. 
 
 Dear Daisy: 
 
 Opening my portfolio, to make Dr. Duryee's portrait lie straight, I 
 came upon the enclosed sketch, made last month, to send to a certain 
 young lady, then thrown aside and an old monk drawn instead. Now, 
 remembering your discourse last evening, I venture to submit this as 
 answering your prescription for a picture, viz., it illustrates nothing, and 
 its meaning can neither be descried nor described. (I remember thinking 
 that the rings might jingle under the hammer, but somehow the rhymes 
 would not.) 
 
 You like Scribner. Have you read this month's art notes on the 
 beauty of pure line? That seemed to me good sense, but the critic did 
 not stop with words only, but referred to a drawing on a previous page, 
 in which I could take no pleasure at all! Thus do tastes differ. So you 
 will tell me my sketch is all wrong and is no "picture." Very well; into 
 the waste-basket with him, and have a new theory for me to oppose next 
 Monday. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 W. H. 
 
 208 
 
y almund 
 
 February 14, 1898 
 
 On February's fourteenth day, 
 
 When loves and doves and Cupids twine, 
 And every youthful heart is gay, 
 
 Responsive to its Valentine, 
 E'en age may feel the magic glow, 
 
 (As sap in ancient trees will stir). 
 And I — a pretty girl, I know — 
 
 It warms the heart to think of her. 
 
 But ah, the dream of maiden blithe 
 
 Let grizzled age to youth resign, 
 For Time's inexorable scythe 
 
 To Vale clips my Valentine! 
 
 209 
 
February 13, 1899. 
 
 Dear Daisy : 
 
 I know that I wrote Vale to you last year, but, like Patti's farewells, 
 or Rip Van Winkle's cups, it does not seem to count this time, for here 
 is February again and here am I, and (do I hear you say), "here's the 
 wall and the sun's gone down!" 
 
 But it is all because of the blizzard and of my having become aware 
 that there are just the right number of letters in your name for a sonnet. 
 
 However, this is positively the last sending. The puns are getting 
 worse and worse ; anon I must stop, so this goes 
 
 Anonymously. 
 
 My lady casts a spell on me, 
 
 Wherefore I spell her name, 
 And let her letters lead my lines, 
 
 That she may see the same. 
 
 A cross is something hard to bear, 
 
 Yet all would get across quick; 
 A cross stick is a cross old bear, 
 
 But not so this acrostic. 
 
 This is really too bad. Let it be expunged. P. T. O., which 
 stands for please tear off, as well as "please turn over." 
 
 210 
 
211 
 
To a sin inner girl — 
 
 "The opinion of Pythagoras concerning wildfowl.'' 
 
 St. Valentine's Day, 
 
 February 14, 1904. 
 
 Although one's dear be called a "duck," 
 
 Beware the trope's abuse; 
 Take waterfowl for zvhat-are-fair, 
 And fancy (in Awosting * air), 
 
 May call a girl a goose ! 
 
 A statelier imagery is mine, 
 
 Swanlike, dear maiden, you're 
 My cygnet — be my Valentine 
 And let your future lot be mine, 
 
 And make my signature. 
 
 l'envoi 
 
 To Daisy, thus, on Cupid's clay, 
 
 I tell anew, 
 What all young men would like to say, 
 
 And old ones, too! 
 
 Awosting : Name of a place, an old Indian word, meaning wild goose. — Ed. 
 
 212 
 
Saint Valentine's Day, 
 
 February 14, 1914. 
 
 When Eden bloomed, a garden fair, 
 
 Without a soul to reap it, 
 The Lord appointed Adam there 
 
 'To dress it and to keep it." 
 
 "It is not good to be alone," 
 
 So, helping his endeavor, 
 Eve came, and soon made Adam own 
 
 His love for Eve forever. 
 
 Some cynics Eve in cv\\ find, 
 
 (A myth long taught in college), 
 Whereas, 'twas Eve's inquiring mind 
 
 First led the way to knowledge ! 
 
 By her example learn we may, 
 
 Whate'er our rank or station, 
 If we would walk in wisdom's way, 
 
 Attain by a/>/>/ication. 
 
 Eve's "heaven's last, best gift" to man ; 
 
 She ate before he dared to! 
 And thru Eve's aid he may evade 
 
 Some ills that flesh is heir to. 
 
 Envoy 
 
 Dear later Eve, in this our day, 
 
 O will you not incline 
 To light a later Adam's way 
 
 And be his Valentine? 
 
 213 
 
TOTAL DEPRAVITY 
 "Sir, the man who would make a pun would steal a sheep." 
 
 We wonder at the girl from college Dr - J ohnson 
 
 Whose small noil holds such heaps of knowledge, 
 
 But there's an art-league-girl completer 
 
 Can give the other points, and beat her ! 
 
 If you learn science through her media 
 
 You'll sigh for such a cyclopedia. 
 
 One thing she hates (or else pretends), 
 
 She doesn't like her punning friends. 
 
 Well, some folks find such humor fable, 
 
 To Carlyle, Lamb was lamentable, 
 
 And puns have caused no end of pain 
 
 Since "Eve Seth, Adam, Abel Cain." 
 
 Perhaps e'en now old Cato's wraith 
 
 With puns impugns the punic faith. 
 
 And you may (if hate lasts below), 
 
 Mark Antony kick Cicero. 
 
 To play on words men have inclined, 
 
 And practiced puns, time out of mind, 
 
 Made game of all things, feared no frown. 
 
 Mahan may hand his hist'ry down, 
 
 Tell what has been, and what must be, 
 
 When one neglects controlling sea ; 
 
 Then, I see fruit, which "can't elope," 
 
 Become a graceful "antelope." 
 
 Be, learned lady, not irate 
 
 That I with puns thus punctuate ; 
 
 Like pedlar's gew-gaws they're displayed 
 
 To catch the eye of man or maid, 
 
 And, since you chose this name to strike us, 
 
 "Autolvcus," you ought to like us. 
 
 And yet you don't. What's that you tell us. 
 
 There's someone else! but, I'm not jealous. 
 
 May 14. 1897. 
 Sentence. — -To be immediately committed to the flames. 
 
 214 
 
Formulae for impressionist landscapes, deduced from recent con- 
 versation at "820" : 
 
 January, 1898. 
 
 Style No. 1 
 
 A misty, moisty, muggy morning gray, 
 
 A sweetly, sadly, sombre, sylvan scene, 
 A dancing nymph, a ghost, a faun, or fay, 
 
 Quite dimly daubed upon a dismal green, 
 Wan, withered leaves a-wired to weird trees, 
 
 Whose scraggling branches scarify the sky. 
 All blend a symphony of harmonies 
 
 Whose vagueness wins the soul, we know not why. 
 
 Style No. 2 
 
 Take pots of paints of many vivid hues, 
 
 Large brushes, breadth of manner to allow. 
 With rainbow tints the Atmosphere suffuse, 
 
 In middle distance splotch a purple cow. 
 Untrammeled by exactitude of line, 
 
 Foreshortened, or hindshortened though she be, 
 A select few thv purpose will divine 
 
 And own a Something beyond what we see. 
 Don't try to imitate existing things. 
 
 Bad drawing leaves imagination free. 
 Lay on then, heedless of Philistine flings. 
 
 For this is Art, and that's enough for thee! 
 
 215 
 
2 
 
 216 
 
Dear girls, who feel the Fine Arts call, 
 And beaux-ideals are seizing, 
 
 Know that, what comprehends them all, 
 Is just the art of pleasing. 
 
 And if you seek to follow those 
 
 Who form and color know, 
 Give little heed to silly beaux, 
 
 Yet see — Ce-cilia Beaux. 
 
 The clanging bell of breakfast tolled, 
 
 In haste I join the folks, 
 And find that H.O.T. is cold, 
 
 And Joe cares not for jokes. 
 
 O friends, what means the solemn look 
 
 That round the table runs ? 
 Why, Daisy's fiat has gone forth, 
 
 She cries fie at all puns. 
 
 So quit your quips and quibbles queer. 
 
 And speak no longer thus, 
 For as your days are growing sere. 
 
 You should grow serious. 
 
 For Daisy's favor, to be sure, 
 
 My ways I'll gladly mend, 
 / have reformed; pray do not count 
 
 This one which makes an end. 
 
 All flesh is grass to be cut down 
 By time, himself the sower; 
 
 Yet if I fall by Daisy's frown. 
 Time is to me no mower. 
 
 218 
 
TWO THOUSAND REASONS WHY WE CELEBRATE JULY 
 
 The Seventh month (in ancient years 
 
 Fifth by enumeration), 
 Now, in mid-summer's heat, appears 
 
 A Hebrew fabrication.* 
 
 For he who changed the calendar, 
 
 And still extends his fame 
 In "Kaiser," "Czar," and "Emperor," 
 
 Gave to this month his name. 
 
 But our regard takes little heed 
 
 Of any Roman praetor, 
 Or mischievous, or mighty deed, 
 
 Of Imp, or Imperator. 
 
 Howe'er by name or number known, 
 
 We write in golden letters f 
 The month which these two birthdays own; 
 
 Mary's and Margaretta's.f 
 
 Whose coming cheers us on the way, 
 
 As everyone allows, and — 
 "But these are but two reasons," nay. 
 
 These two M's are 2,000! 
 
 * This atrocious pun must be attributed to the weather. 
 
 t These rhymes specially prepared for the New England ear. 
 
 219 
 
PLASTER OF PARIS POETRY 
 
 The obelisk in Central Park 
 
 Is slender, tall, and true ; 
 And obviously this remark, 
 
 Dear Anna, rhymes with you. 
 
 Since Egypt this gray column nursed 
 What centuries are reckoned ! 
 
 " 'Twas gazed on by Seti the first, 
 And here seat I * a second f 
 
 On park settee, J and muse § upon 
 That arid country where those 
 
 Fair rows of columns, lotus crowned. 
 Line palaces of Pharaohs. 
 
 But here no lotus bloom I see, 
 November bleak day e'er knows. 
 
 So Anne, I'll send a rose to thee, 
 A flower more fair than Pharaoh's. 
 
 * The influence of Mr. W. M. S. is here apparent 
 
 t Really a minute, but it "wouldn't come in the rhyme." Thus "prose tells the 
 truth just as it happened, while poetry makes it up as it goes along." 
 t After this, anything may be expected. 
 
 § Probably a covert allusion to the voice of the cat of Bubastis. 
 
 220 
 
Photograph taken by Walter Hinchman 
 
 221 
 
"Alone I walked the ocean strand," 
 I held my hat with either hand, 
 When right before me on the strand 
 Appeared a "pied-billed dabchick," 
 (Or "grebe," or some such loony bird 
 The like of which I ne'er had heard.) 
 It's keen eye ranged the waters wide, 
 It's sharp beak turned from side to side, 
 And, as the sea its body laved, 
 A jabblerwocky wing it waved; 
 The sea receding- left it then 
 Quite helpless on the ground again. 
 Alas, poor wounded bird (thought I), 
 That never more shall swim or fly ! 
 Just then, on wave of wider sweep, 
 The bird slid down into the deep. 
 Afloat, with quick recovery, 
 All life and grace, it swam off free, 
 And, as a crested billow reared, 
 Dove through the wave and disappeared. 
 
 Sea Girt, June, 1905. 
 
 222 
 
THE RETURN TO SEA GIRT * 
 
 (Mid-Summer, 1911) 
 
 Though Sea Girt's sounding surge and rounded dunes abide, 
 And green are lawn and hedge, and meadows golden-eyed, 
 Though bright the summer skies, and soft the south winds blow, 
 And birds in "sh rubbish" hide, just as they used to do, — 
 Alack! the garden's grace, which we were wont to laud, 
 Is gone — and, not by blight — all our best plants are gnawed! 
 For, in the neighb'ring shade b'rer rabbit has his lair. 
 And thence has made his raids upon our flowers fair. 
 
 The while, in our first rage on vengeance dire we think, 
 Our Groton brother comes, like Lowell's bobolink, 
 
 Gurgling in ecstasy his sweet refrain 
 
 Of "June! dear June! Now God be praised for June." 
 And with him and with her the garden smiles again. 
 Our angry thoughts are stayed. 
 
 (Memo.) The rabbits we will pen. 
 
 * Written after the marriage in June of one of his nephews in England to a 
 girl whose Christian name is "June." — Ed. 
 
 223 
 
A PULLMAN CAR PRODUCT 
 
 (Instigated by Anne) 
 
 November 28, 1907. 
 
 Problem. — Translation of Charles d'Orleans' spring rondel. 
 
 Specifications. — No thought or qualifying word to be added or 
 omitted : form, measure, rhythm, and rhyme preserved. 
 
 Result. — Cannot be called "inexpressibly poor," since its poverty 
 is expressed. 
 
 O time hath cast his cloak away, 
 
 His cloak of wind and cold and rain, 
 
 And decks himself in 'broideries fine,* 
 With sunshine sparkling, clear and gay, 
 
 or 
 
 (With smiling sunshine, clear and gay). 
 
 No bird nor beast but, in his way 
 
 In song, or jargon, sayeth plain f 
 
 That time hath cast his cloak away. 
 His cloak of wind and cold and rain. 
 
 Rivers and rills and fountains play. 
 And wear, on lovely liveries, vain 
 or 
 
 (Wearing a lovely livery, vain) 
 With silver drops, a jeweled chain, or (train), 
 And each is dressed in new array, 
 
 or 
 
 (Each thing is newly clad again), 
 Now time has cast his cloak away. 
 
 * London rhyme. 
 
 f Thus Cowper, of clumsily capering cows in spring : 
 
 Though wild their strange vagaries and uncouth their play. 
 Yet each resolved to give such act and utterance as they may 
 To ecstacy too big to he suppressed. 
 
 224 
 
Stilts, 6^ bttHA^t^td/jdJ^ J <f£*4c^ 
 
 ^fi, ivlttf^, <db fatten tiuU^ 
 
 1ARK 
 
 225 
 
This little rabbit stands upon 
 A book of letters by Fenelon. 
 Now, rabbits are not reckoned wise, 
 Yet may this one find in your eyes, 
 Although his wit be not commanding, 
 Acceptance for his understanding. 
 
 Ce petit lapin, si mignon, 
 Repose sur lettres du Fenelon. 
 On n'appelle pas le lapin sage, 
 Mais, je vous prie que cette image, 
 Malgre tout ga, accepterez-vous 
 Pour la sagesse qu'elle a dessous. 
 
 226 
 
LYRICAL TRANSLATIONS 
 
L'AMOUR 
 
 Jeune, j'aimai — le temps de mon bel age, 
 
 Ce temps si court, l'amour seul le remplit ; 
 Ouand j'atteignis la saison d'etre sage, 
 
 Tou jours j'aimai — la raison me le dit. 
 Puis l'age vient, et le plaisir s'envole, 
 
 Mais mon bonheur ne s'envole aujourd'hui, 
 Car j'aime encore, et l'amour se console; 
 
 Rien ne pourrait me consoler de lui. 
 
 Madame d'Houdetot. 18 — ? 
 
 FEMME SENSIBLE 
 Chant du barde dans Ariodant 
 
 Femme sensible, extends-tu le ramage 
 De ces oiseaux qui celebrent leurs feux? 
 
 lis font redire a l'echo du rivage : 
 
 Le printemps fuit, hatez-vous d'etre heureux. 
 
 Vois-tu ces fieurs, ces rleurs qu'un doux Zephire, 
 
 Va caressant de son souffle amoreux? 
 En se fanant elles semblent te dire: 
 
 Le printemps fuit, hatez-vous d'etre heureux. 
 
 Moments charmants d'amour et de tendresse, 
 Comme un eclair vous fuyez a nos yeux ; 
 
 Et tons les jours perdus dans la tristesse 
 
 Nous sont comptes comme des jours heureux. 
 
 Hoffman. 1800. 
 
 228 
 
L' AMOUR 
 
 In youth I loved — the time of my fair age, 
 
 That time so brief, and love alone rilled it ; 
 When in due season I became more sage, 
 
 I yet loved on — reason commended it. 
 Then old age came, and pleasure flew away, 
 
 But happiness has not yet flown from me, 
 For I love still, and love consoles today, 
 
 But, lacking it, nothing could comfort me. 
 
 FEMME SENSIBLE 
 Chant du barde daxs Ariodant 
 
 O lady sensitive, dost hear the birds. 
 
 Their passion celebrate with warbling' glee? 
 
 The echoing shore repeats their tuneful words: 
 "The springtime flies, make haste and happy be." 
 
 See'st thou the flowers, gentle zephyrs blow? 
 
 With loving breath they're moved caressingly; 
 Fading the while, they seem to tell thee low ; 
 
 'The springtime flies, make haste and happy be." 
 
 O moments sweet of love and tenderness. 
 How like a flash before our eyes you flee! 
 
 And 'gainst our years are counted with like stress 
 Days sadly lost and those spent happily. 
 
 229 
 
CHANSON 
 
 Viens Aurore, 
 
 Je t'implore, 
 Je suis gai quand je te voi. 
 
 La bergere 
 
 Qui m 'est chere, 
 Est vermeille comme toi. 
 
 De rosee, 
 
 Arrosee, 
 La rose a moins de fraicheur; 
 
 Une hermine 
 
 Est moins fine ; 
 Le lait a moins de blancheur 
 
 Pour entendre 
 
 Sa voix tehdre 
 On deserte le hameau ; 
 
 Et Tityre, 
 
 Qui soupire, 
 Fait taire son chalumeau. 
 
 Elle est blonde, 
 
 Sans seconde ; 
 Elle a la taille a la main ; 
 
 Sa prunelle 
 
 Etincelle 
 Comme l'astre du matin. 
 
 D'ambroisie, 
 
 Bien choisie, 
 Hebe la nourrit a part ; 
 
 Et sa bouclie, 
 
 Quand j'y touch e. 
 Me parfume de nectar. 
 
 Henri IV. 13—? 
 
 230 
 
CHANSON 
 
 Dawn of day, 
 
 Come I pray, 
 I am glad when thee I see. 
 
 The milkmaid near, 
 
 Who's my dear, 
 She is rosy red like thee. 
 
 Roses new 
 
 Wet with dew 
 Are less fresh to sight; 
 
 Ermine's fur 
 
 Less fine were ; 
 Milk is not so white. 
 
 Just to hear 
 Her voice clear 
 
 All the village come ; 
 And Tityrus, 
 Who sighs with us, 
 
 Leaves his reed-pipe dumb. 
 
 She is fair. 
 
 Past compare ; 
 Form and feature perfect are; 
 
 Her eyes bright 
 
 Sparkle light 
 As the morning star. 
 
 With heav'nly food, 
 
 Choice and good, 
 Nursed by Hebe's care ; 
 
 On her lip. 
 
 There I sip 
 Nectar's perfume rare. 
 
 231 
 
AUTRE CHANSON 
 
 L'aube nait et ta porte est close ! 
 
 Ma belle, pourquoi sommeiller? 
 A l'heure on s'eveille la rose 
 
 Ne vas-tu pas te reveiller? 
 
 O ma charmante, 
 
 Ecoute ici 
 L'amant qui chante 
 
 Et pleure aussi ! 
 
 Tout f rappe a ta porte benie ; 
 
 L'aurore dit : Je suis le jour! 
 L'oiseau dit: Je suis l'harmonie ! 
 
 Et mon coeur dit: Je suis l'amour! 
 
 O ma charmante, 
 
 Ecoute ici 
 L'amant qui chante 
 
 Et pleure aussi ! 
 
 Je t'adore ange et t'aime femme. 
 
 Dieu qui par toi m'a complete 
 A fait mon amour pour ton ame 
 
 Et mon regard pour ta beaute! 
 
 O ma charmante, 
 
 Ecoute ici 
 L'amant qui chante 
 
 Et pleure aussi ! 
 
 Victor Hugo. 
 
 232 
 
AUTRE CHANSON 
 
 Morning dawns, thy door unclose ! 
 
 Wherefore sleepest thou, my dear? 
 At the hour when wakes the rose, 
 
 Wilt thou not awake with her? 
 
 Charmer fair, 
 
 O listen ! Here's 
 A love to share 
 
 Thy joys and tears. 
 
 All things rap on thy blest door; 
 
 Morning says : T am the day ! 
 Birds their harmonies outpour. 
 
 And my hearts sings love alway! 
 
 Charmer fair, 
 
 O listen ! Here's 
 A love to share 
 
 Thy joys and tears. 
 
 Angel adored and woman loved! 
 
 Heaven which by thee completes me, 
 For thy soul has given me love. 
 
 And for thy beautv, eyes to see! 
 
 Charmer fair, 
 
 O listen ! Here's 
 A love to share 
 
 Thy jovs and tears. 
 
 233 
 
LE ROSIER 
 
 Je l'ai plante, je l'ai vu naitre 
 
 Ce beau Rosier ou les oiseaux 
 Viennent chanter sous ma fenetre, 
 
 Perches sur ses jeunes rameaux. 
 
 Joyeux oiseaux, troupe amoureuse, 
 
 Ah ! par pitie ne chantez pas ; 
 L'amant qui me rendait heureuse, 
 
 Est parti pour d'autres climats. 
 
 Pour les tresors du nouveau monde 
 
 II fuit l'amour, brave la mort. 
 Helas! pourquoi chercher sur l'onde 
 
 Le bonheur qu'il trouvait au port. 
 
 Vous, passageres hirondelles. 
 
 Qui revenez chaque printemps, 
 Oiseaux voyageurs, mais fideles, 
 
 Ramenez-le moi tons les ans. 
 
 De Leyre. 17 — . 
 
 234 
 
LE ROSIER 
 
 I planted it, I watched it grow. 
 
 This lovely rosebush where birds sing, 
 
 Under my window casement low, 
 In its young branches clustering. 
 
 O happy birds, O loving troop, 
 For pity's sake. Ah ! sing no more, 
 
 My love who made my life complete 
 Has left me for another shore. 
 
 From love he flies, and death he braves, 
 In the new world he'll treasures court. 
 
 Alas! why seeks he o'er the waves 
 The good he might find here in port. 
 
 Ye swallows swiftly lost to view, 
 Who with each spring again appear 
 
 Birds of travel, yet so true. 
 Bring him to me every year. 
 
 235 
 
CHANSON DE FORTUNIO 
 
 So vous croyez que je vais dire 
 
 Qui j'ose aimer, 
 Je ue saurais, pour un empire, 
 
 Vous la nommer. 
 
 Nous allons chanter a la ronde. 
 
 Si vous voulez, 
 Que je l'adore et (ju'elle est blonde 
 
 Comme les bles. 
 
 Je fais ce que sa fantaisie 
 
 Veut m'ordonner, 
 Et je puis, s'il lui faut ma vie, 
 
 La lui donner. 
 
 Du mal qu'une amour ignoree 
 
 Nous fait souffrir, 
 J'en porte Tame dechiree 
 
 Jusqu'a mourir. 
 
 Mais j'aime trop pour que je dis 
 
 Qui j'ose aimer, 
 Et je veux mourir pour ma mie 
 
 Sans la nommer. 
 
 Alfred de Musset. 1836. 
 
 236 
 
CHANSON DE FORTUNIO 
 
 If you suppose that I'll tell whom 
 
 I dare love true, 
 I could not, for an empire's wealth, 
 
 Name her to you. 
 
 An't please you, we will sing a ronde. 
 
 With this refrain, 
 That I adore her, and she's blonde 
 
 As golden grain. 
 
 Whate'er her fancy findeth fit, 
 
 To do I'm rife, 
 And I could, had she need of it, 
 
 Give her my life. 
 
 From love unknown the heart forlorn 
 
 111 suffereth. 
 And I hear mine, distracted, torn, 
 
 E'en unto death. 
 
 But my heart's treasure's far above 
 
 My humble lot. 
 And I would die for her I love 
 
 And name her not. 
 
 Alfred de Musset. 1836. 
 
 "Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, 
 but not for love." — As You Like It (Act IV, Scene 1). 
 
 237 
 
STANCES 
 (Last Stanza) 
 
 C'est toujours accord ou querelle : 
 
 (O miserable que je suis!) 
 Je ne saurais vivre avec elle, 
 
 Et sans elle aussi je ne puis. 
 
 Jean Desmarets. 
 
 LE BLASON DE LA MARGUERITE 
 (First Stanza) 
 
 En avril ou naquit amour, 
 J'entrai dans son jardin un jour, 
 Ou la beaute d'une fleurette 
 Me plut sur celles que j'y vis. 
 Ce ne fut pas la paquerette, 
 L'oeillet, la rose ni le lys : 
 Ce fut la belle Marguerite, 
 Ou'au coeur j'aurai toujours ecrite. 
 
 Jean de la Taille. 
 
 Te souvient-il du lac tranquille 
 Ou'effleurait l'hirondelle agile, 
 Du vent qui courbait le roseau 
 Mobile, 
 
 Et du soleil couchant sur l'eau, 
 Si beau? 
 
 Chateaubriand. 
 
 238 
 
STANCES 
 
 (Last Stanza) 
 
 It's always quarrel or forgive 
 (O miserable is my lot!) 
 
 I don't know how with her to live, 
 And yet without her I cannot. 
 
 LE BLASON DE LA MARGUERITE 
 (First Stanza) 
 
 In April's month when love was born, 
 I in his garden came one morn, 
 Wherein one flow'ret's beauty rare 
 Pleased me above all others there. 
 'Twas not the blue-eyed violet sweet. 
 Nor pink, nor rose, nor lily white : 
 But 'twas the lovelv Marguerite 
 Which in my heart I always write. 
 
 Do mem'ries wake of that still lake. 
 
 Which swift- winged swallows rippled make, 
 
 Where roses sway in balmy air 
 
 And shake, 
 And sunlights play on waters there 
 
 So fair? 
 
 239 
 
LE CHANT DU CORDIER 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va, chantant tout bas : 
 
 Blonde filasse que je tire, 
 Dis-nous a quoi tu serviras? 
 
 Feras-tu virer un navire, 
 
 Boulinette, drisse ou grand bras? 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va, chantant tout bas. 
 
 Pendue au clocher du village, 
 Feras-tu sonner le bourdon, 
 
 Enter rem ent et marriage, 
 
 Messe et tocsin, guerre et pardon? 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va, chantant tout bas. 
 
 Dans la plaine ou chaque fillette 
 Apporte son linge a secher, 
 
 Berceras-tu la chemisette 
 
 De Madelon, flenr du rocher? 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va, chantant tout bas. 
 
 Mais las ! peut-etre sur la dune, 
 
 Ou va rodant le gabelou, 
 Dois-tu hisser au clair de lune 
 
 Un fraudeur pendu par le cou? 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va, chantant tout bas. 
 
 240 
 
LE CHANT DU CORDIER 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow. 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 Flaxen thread, which I twirl, 
 Tell us what shall be thy place, 
 
 Wilt thou serve ships' sails to furl, 
 Halliard, gear, or yard-arm brace? 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow, 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 In belfrys hung, in villages, 
 
 Wilt thou sound, till time shall cease. 
 Interments and marriages, 
 
 Alarm and worship, war and peace? 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow, 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 On the plain, where maidens yet, 
 Garments spread to dry them well. 
 
 Wilt thou rock the chemisette 
 Of Madelaine, the village belle? 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow. 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 But ah ! perhaps upon the dune. 
 
 Where ride excisemen thieves to check. 
 
 Thou must hoist up, in light of moon, 
 A smuggler hanging by the neck? 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow. 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 241 
 
Cord a noeud, a l'heure tardive, 
 Ou se serrent ceux qui sont deux, 
 
 Seras-tu l'echelle furtive, 
 
 D'un voleur ou d'un amoureux? 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va chantant tout bas. 
 
 Fais mieux, petite, et pour ma peine 
 Rends-moi jaloux de ton destin, 
 
 Corde au puits ou vient Madelaine 
 Puiser, bras nus, soir et matin. 
 
 A reculons, a petits pas, 
 
 Le cordier va chantant tout bas. 
 
 A. de Belloy. 
 
 PANDORE 
 Ou les deux Gendarmes 
 
 Deux gendarmes, un beau dimanche, 
 
 Chevauchaient le long d'un sentier ; 
 L'un portait la sardine blanche, 
 
 L'autre le jaune baudrier. 
 Le premier dit d'un ton sonore : 
 
 ''Le temps est beau pour la saison. 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 Phoebus, au bout de sa carriere, 
 
 Put encor les apercevoir ; 
 Le brigadier, de sa voix here, 
 
 Troubla le silence du soir : 
 "Vols, dit-il le soleil qui dore 
 
 Les nuages a Thorizon. 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 242 
 
Knotted cord, at hours late, 
 
 When youthful ardor seeks its mate, 
 Wilt thou, as a ladder tall, 
 
 Help thief or lover o'er the wall? 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow, 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 Do better thread, and for my care 
 Make me wish thy lot to share ; 
 
 Well rope where comes Genevieve 
 
 To draw, arms bare, at morn and eve. 
 
 Backward, with short steps and slow, 
 Goes the spinner singing low. 
 
 PANDORE 
 Ou les deux Gendarmes 
 
 Two soldiers, on a Sunday fair. 
 
 Were riding in the public way, 
 The one a chevroned sleeve did wear, 
 
 The other's coat made less display. 
 The first said in sonorous tone : 
 
 "The weather for the season's rine." 
 "Corporal," says the other one, 
 
 "Corporal, your opinion's mine." 
 
 Phoebus might still, at close of day, 
 
 Be seen where sky and hilltop meet ; 
 The Corporal, in his haughty way, 
 
 Disturbed the evening silence sweet ; 
 "See," said he, "how the setting sun 
 
 Gilds clouds on the horizon's bar." 
 "Corporal," said the other one, 
 
 "Corporal," said he, "right you are." 
 
 243 
 
"Ah! c'est un metier difficile: 
 
 Garantir la propriete; 
 Defendre les champs et la ville 
 
 J)u vol et de finiquite! 
 Pourtant, l'epouse qui m'adore 
 
 Repose seule a la maison. 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 "II me souvient de ma jeunesse; 
 
 Le temps passe ne revient pas . 
 J'avais une folle maitresse 
 
 Pleine de merite et d'appas. 
 Mais le coeur . . . (pourquoi ? je Tignore 
 
 Aime a changer de garnison. 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 "La gloire, c'est une couronne 
 
 Faite de rose et de laurier ; 
 J'ai servi Venus et Bellone : 
 
 Je suis epoux et brigadier. 
 Mais je poursuis ce meteore 
 
 Qui vers Colchos guidait Jason 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 "Puis, ils reverent en silence ; 
 
 On n'entendit pins que le pas 
 Des chevaux marchant en cadence. 
 
 Le brigadier ne parlait pas. 
 Mais, quand revint la pale aurore. 
 
 On entendit un vague son ! 
 — Brigadier, repondit Pandore, 
 
 Brigadier, vous avez raison." 
 
 Gu STAVE X ADA U X . 
 
 244 
 
"Ah! 'tis no easy task I do, 
 
 Preserving peace and property. 
 Protecting town and country, too, 
 
 Against thieves and iniquity ! 
 Meanwhile my wife's at home alone. 
 
 Though she adores me, I'm afar." 
 "Corporal," says the other one, 
 
 "Corporal," said he, "right you are." 
 
 "I'm thinking of my youthful days; 
 
 The time once passed ne'er comes again, 
 I mind a foolish mistress ways. 
 
 So full of charm and merit then. 
 But the heart (why? to me's unknown), 
 
 Loves to change its ruling star." 
 "Corporal," said the other one, 
 
 "Corporal," said he, "right von are." 
 
 "Glory's crown ; what is it more 
 
 Than roses twined with laurel? 
 I serve the Gods of love and war, 
 
 I'm married, and a corporal, 
 But still that meteor leads me on. 
 
 Which Jason led to Colchos far." 
 "Corporal," said the other one, 
 
 "Corporal," said he, "right you are." 
 
 Then mused they on in silence deep ; 
 
 And naught resounded hut the tread 
 Of horses' hoofs in rhythmic beat, 
 
 And nothing more the Corporal said. 
 But when the day began to dawn, 
 
 One might have heard a muffled snore : 
 "Corporal," said the other one, 
 
 "Corporal," said he, "right you are." 
 
 245 
 
NOUVELLE CHANSON SUR UN VIEIL AIR 
 
 S'il est un charmant gazon 
 
 Que le soleil arrose, 
 Ou brille en toute saison 
 
 Quelque fleur eclose, 
 Ou Ton cueille a pleine main 
 Lis, chevrefeuille et jasmin, 
 J 'en veux faire le chemin 
 
 Ou ton pied se pose ! 
 
 S'il est un sein bien aimant 
 
 Dont l'lionneur dispose ! 
 Dont le ferme devouement 
 
 N'ait rien de morose, 
 So tou jours ce noble sein 
 Bat pour un digne dessein! 
 J'en veux faire le coussin 
 
 Ou ton front se pose ! 
 
 S'il est un reve d'amour, 
 
 Parfume de rose, 
 Ou Ton trouve chaque jour 
 
 Quelque douce chose. 
 Un reve que Dieu benit. 
 Ou l'ame a Tame s'unit. 
 Oh ! j'en veux faire le nid 
 
 Ou ton coeur se pose ! 
 
 Victor Hugo. 183- 
 
 246 
 
NOUVELLE CHANSON SUR UN VIEIL AIR 
 
 If there be a charming green 
 
 Where, by heaven's dew fed, 
 Sparkling" in all seasons seen 
 Flowers fresh are spread, 
 Where one gathers with free hand 
 Loveliest lilies in the land, 
 There a pathway I'd command 
 For thy foot to tread ! 
 
 If a loving breast there be. 
 
 Wherein honor glows! 
 Whose devoted constancy 
 
 Nothing morose knows. 
 If that noble breast and rare 
 Always beat with purpose fair, 
 I would make a pillow there 
 
 For thy head's repose! 
 
 If a dream of love there be. 
 
 Fragrant as the rose. 
 Where each day may fancy see 
 
 Something sweet unclose. 
 Dream of heaven blest and free. 
 Soul with soul in unity, 
 Such the nest I'd make for thee 
 
 For thy heart's repose! 
 
 247 
 
MAILIED 
 
 Es kommt ein wundersamer Knab' 
 1st durch die Welt gegangen, 
 Und wo er geht, bergauf, bergab, 
 Hebt sich ein Glast und Prangen. 
 In frischem Grim stent Feld und Thai, 
 Die Vogel singen allzumal, 
 Ein Bliithenschnee und Regen 
 Fallt nieder allerwegen. 
 
 Drum singen wir im Wald dies Lied 
 Mit Hei-und Tralaleyen 
 Wir singen's, weil es spriesst und bliiht, 
 Als Gruss dem jungen Maien. 
 
 Den Mai ergotzt Gebrumm und Summ, 
 
 1st immer guter Laune, 
 
 Drum schwirren durch den Tann herum 
 
 Die Maienkafer braune, 
 
 Und aus dem Moos wachst schnell herfur 
 
 Der Fruhlingsblumen schonste Zier, 
 
 Die weissen Glocken lauten 
 
 Den Maien ein mit Freuden. 
 
 Drum singen wir im Wald dies Lied 
 Mit Hei-und Tralaleyen 
 Wir singen's, weil es spriesst und bliiht, 
 Als Gruss dem jungen Maien. 
 
 Jetzunder denkt, wer immer kann, 
 Auf Kurzweil, Scherz und Minne ; 
 Manch einem grauen Biedermann 
 Wird's wieder jung zu Sinne. 
 Er ruft hiniiber iiber'n Rhein ; 
 "Herzliebster Schatz, O lass mich ein !" 
 Und hiiben tont's und driiben : 
 Im ]\fai da ist gut lieben ! 
 
 248 
 
SPRING SONG 
 
 A youth of wonderful renown 
 Now through the world is going, 
 
 And where he goes, up hill or down, 
 Are grace and splendor showing. 
 
 Fresh green, the fields and valleys bear, 
 
 The birds are singing everywhere. 
 A rain of flower blossoms bright 
 Falls over all like snow-flakes white. 
 
 So in the woods we sing this song ; 
 
 And, tra-la-la repeating, 
 We sing the buds and blooms among, 
 
 To youthful May a greeting. 
 
 O May delights in murmuring sound ; 
 
 Hums in good humor ever ; 
 Hears from the fir trees all around, 
 
 The locusts shrill endeavor ; 
 While mosses in quick growth present 
 The spring flowers loveliest ornament, 
 
 Whose fairy bells so white 
 
 Ring May in with delight. 
 
 So in the woods we sing this song; 
 
 And, tra-la-la repeating, 
 We sing the buds and blooms among, 
 
 To youthful May a greeting. 
 
 Now each one thinks, as each one can, 
 
 Of jest or lore revealing, 
 And many a gray old worthy man 
 
 Is young again in feeling; 
 Again he calls, far o'er the Rhine, 
 O let me in hearts treasure mine! 
 
 And sounds arise from over there * 
 
 In May 'tis good one's love to share ! 
 
 Echoes rare ring over there. 
 
 249 
 
Drum singen wir im Wald dies Lied 
 Mit Hei-und Tralaleyen 
 Wir singen's, weil es spriesst und bluht, 
 Als Gruss dem jungen Maien. 
 
 — Der Trumpeter von Sakkingen, 
 
 SCHEFFEL. 
 
 O wende nicht den scheuen Blick 
 Und fleuch nicht zag und bange, 
 
 Kehr zum Balkone keck zuriick 
 Und lausche meinem Sange. 
 
 Vergeblich Miih'n, mir zu entfliehn. 
 
 Ich blase ruhig weiter, 
 Da werden meine Melodieen 
 
 Zur wundersamen Leiter. 
 
 Auf der Accorde Sprossen schwingt 
 
 Die Lieb empor sich leise, 
 Durch Schloss und Riegel zu dir klingt 
 
 Dann wiederum die Weise. 
 
 Die Welt ist nicht von Leder, 
 Im Tannwald wachst kein Stroh, 
 
 Als lnstiger Trompeter 
 Blas ich halli. hallo! 
 
 Das jubelt, schallt und larmet, 
 
 Das ist ein heir Geton : 
 Wer sich des Klanges harmet, 
 
 Der mag in's Kloster gehn. 
 
 250 
 
So in the woods we sing this song ; 
 
 And, tra-la-la repeating, 
 We sing the buds and blooms among. 
 
 To youthful May a greeting. 
 
 O turn not with shy look away, 
 As fear thy flight were winging; 
 
 Come back unto the balcony 
 And listen to my singing. 
 
 Vain trouble thus from me to flee. 
 
 For I but keep on blowing. 
 And from my melody there'll be 
 
 A wondrous ladder growing. 
 
 From tuneful chords the rundles spring 
 On which love leaps up lightly, 
 
 Through bars and bolts the measures ring 
 Until they reach thee rightly. 
 
 The world's not made of leather. 
 
 No straws on fir trees grow, 
 A merry bugler, ever 
 
 I blow halli, hallo! 
 
 With joyous sounds, so tuneful, 
 Clear echoing, high or low : 
 
 Who finds the twanging harmful. 
 Let him to Cloisters go. 
 
 251 
 
Sonne taucht in Meeresrluthen, 
 Himmel blitzt in letzten Gluthen, 
 Langsam will der Tag verscheiden. 
 Feme Abendglocken lauten — 
 Dein gedenk ich, Margaretha. 
 
 Haupt gelehnt auf Felsens Kante, 
 Fremder Mann in fremden Lande, 
 Urn den Fuss die Wellen schaumen, 
 Durch die Seele zieht ein Traumen — 
 Dein gedenk ich, Margaretha. 
 
 252 
 
The setting sun dips in the sea, 
 The sky with his last glory gleams, 
 Now slowly fades the day from me, 
 The evening hell far distant seems — 
 Of thee I'm thinking, Margaretta. 
 
 With head reclined on rocky strand, 
 A stranger in a foreign land, 
 Ahout my feet the billows foam, 
 Through my spirit fancies roam — 
 Of thee I'm thinking, Margaretta. 
 
 253 
 
GETTY RESEARCH INSTITUTE 
 
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