Gass, T6 re. >^ i 
 Book . ,Cfe I 
 
The selections from the writings of 
 Longfellow are used by permission of 
 and by special arrangement with Hough- 
 ton, Mifflin, and Co., the authorized 
 publishers of Longfellow's works, — a 
 courtesy which the author acknowledges 
 with gratitude. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introduction 9 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Birthplace 13 
 
 Chapter II. 
 Boyhood 26 
 
 Chapter III. 
 Education and Travels 38 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 Prose Works, Marriage, Call to 
 Harvard 51 
 
 Chapter V. 
 Life in Cambridge and Poems 64 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 Evangeline 76 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 Poetic Activity 89 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 Hiawatha 102 
 
 (5) 
 
Chapter IX. page 
 
 Courtship of Miles Standish 117 
 
 Chapter X. 
 Tales of a Wayside Inn, and 
 Fl'eur-de-Luce 125 
 
 Chapter XL 
 Closing Activities 132 
 
 Chapter XII. 
 Some Selections from the Poems of 
 Lonsffellow 145 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Portrait of Henry Wadsworth 
 
 Longfellow Frontispiece. 
 
 Longfellow House, Portland Maine. 14 
 
 Longfellow's Birthplace 17 
 
 Longfellow House, Cambridge, 
 
 Mass 67 
 
 Wayside Inn, Sudbury, Mass 126 
 
 (7) 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The story of a beautiful life is pre- 
 eminently precious. It is a constant 
 incentive to aspiring faith and an unfail- 
 ing source of guidance. 
 
 No method of education is more po- 
 tent for ethical results than the method 
 which furnishes the mind of growing 
 youth with rich concrete data full of 
 human incident and poetic suggestion. 
 Through such data the mind is enabled 
 to rise to the highest conception of duty 
 and the best formulation of morals. 
 
 Longfellow's life is singularly suited 
 to this purpose. Its simplicity and its 
 purity alike render it wholesome and 
 helpful. Its incidents are more than the 
 steps in the unfolding of his own career. 
 They are unusually valuable as guides 
 to others. This narrative is, therefore, 
 of great moment to the growing child. 
 The author has had the insight of one 
 that knows and also loves this life. 
 With keen appreciation of childhood's 
 (9) 
 
10 
 
 needs she has selected the most fitting 
 incidents for presentation. The presen- 
 tation is clear, forceful, and sensible. 
 There is a conspicuous absence of friv- 
 olous and gossipy material and a sym- 
 pathetic narrative of what is, for the 
 child, most wholesome and most stimu- 
 lating. 
 
 Many selections from Longfellow's 
 poems are inserted at such places in the 
 text as to give them peculiar force and 
 emphasis. These should be studied care- 
 fully and then memorized accurately. 
 Perhaps no other result of literary 
 study is so valuable as the memorizing 
 of poems of intrinsic value. These are 
 carried through life, and frequently af- 
 ford comfort and comjpanionship in the 
 hours that are dark and the days that 
 are dreary. 
 
 Such an introductory sketch as this 
 will quicken in the pupil a desire to 
 know more fully the life and lines of 
 Longfellow. This is its best service. 
 To have early in life a lively concern for 
 
II 
 
 a great poet is of the greatest signifi- 
 cance. The author's highest hopes will 
 have be'en realized if her words arouse 
 the interest of young minds in this 
 American poet, who shares with Whit- 
 tier that preeminent quality of the 
 great Swiss teacher, Pestalozzi, "the 
 piety of the heart." 
 
 It is a pleasure to commend this 
 volume, to congratulate its author 
 upon her fine discrimination and beau- 
 tiful devotion to our gentle poet, and to 
 express the wish that it may enjoy the 
 wide reception its intrinsic excellencies 
 so richly merit.. 
 
 M. G. Brumbaugh. 
 
 University of Pennsylvania, April 14, 
 1903. 
 
GLIMPSES OF LONG- 
 FELLOW. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 BIRTHPLACE. 
 
 By the generosity of Mrs. Anne 
 Longfellow Pierce, the poet's sis- 
 ter, the Maine Historical Society 
 at her death came into posses- 
 sion, under certain conditions, of 
 the old mansion on Congress street, 
 Portland, Maine, known as the 
 Wadsworth-Longfellow house. 
 
 The members of the Longfellow 
 family sensitive to the rude gaze of 
 a curious crowd admitted only a 
 chosen few of the many lovers 
 of the poet. As a consequence, 
 since August i, 1901, when the 
 property passed under the control 
 (13) 
 
14 
 
 of the society before mentioned 
 and was thrown open to the pub- 
 lic, hundreds have made the pil- 
 gfimage to this shrine of American 
 poetr}^ 
 
 The house as it now stands is a 
 three-story structure of brick 
 shaded by magnificent old arching 
 elms. A tablet near the entrance 
 tells the following facts : 
 
 House erected bv General Peleg 
 Wads worth 1785-6. 
 
 Home of Lieut. Henry Wads- 
 worth. 
 
 Birthplace of Com. Alex. S. 
 Wadsworth. 
 
 Home of Stephen Longfellow 
 and Henry Wadsworth Longfel- 
 low. 
 
 When Peleg Wadsworth, the 
 maternal grandfather of Longfel- 
 
15 
 
 low, arrived in Portland in 1784, 
 there were very few houses, as no 
 attempt had been made to rebuild 
 the town since its destruction by a 
 British fleet in 1775. The family, 
 therefore, were obliged to move 
 into a building originally intended 
 for a barn, and it was here that 
 Henry Wadsworth, the famous 
 uncle after whom Longfellow was 
 named, began his short but illus- 
 trious life. 
 
 Peleg Wadsworth was a general 
 merchant, as well as surveyor, and 
 with New England thrift he built 
 his store and barn and then began 
 the erection of his house. At that 
 time, 1785, bricks could not be pur- 
 chased nearer than Philadelphia, 
 and what was supposed to be a suf- 
 ficient number was ordered. The 
 
i6 
 
 walls, sixteen inches thick, swal- 
 lowed them much faster than had 
 been expected and work had to be 
 suspended until the following 
 spring, when more brick was ob- 
 tained and the house finished. It 
 was two stories, had a high pitched 
 roof and four chimneys. It was 
 very unusual in appearance, as it 
 was at that time not only the larg- 
 est but the only brick house in 
 Portland. In 1815 when Longfel- 
 low was eight years of age, it was 
 raised to three stories and looks as 
 it does to-day. 
 
 The family moved into this com- 
 modious house and here in 1804 
 their daughter Zilpah was married 
 to Stephen Longfellow, a descend- 
 ent of William Longfellow, who 
 had emigrated from Yorkshire to 
 
17 
 
 Massachusetts in 1675. For a 
 time the young couple remained in 
 the home of Mrs. Longfellow's 
 father, but soon set up their own 
 altar in a house on the corner of 
 Congress and Temple streets, where 
 their first child, Stephen, was born. 
 During the winter of 1806-7 Cap- 
 tain Samuel Stephenson, husband 
 of Abigail Longfellow, was called 
 away on business and the Longfel- 
 lows took up their abode in the 
 "great square house by the sea" 
 with Mrs. Stephenson, where, on 
 February 27, 1807, Henry Wads- 
 worth Longfellow was bom. 
 
 The house, still standing, is on 
 what was then the corner of Front 
 and Hancock streets and com- 
 manded an unobstructed view of 
 Casco Bay. Long since, Commer- 
 
i8 
 
 cial street has shut out the view 
 and Front street has been renamed 
 Fore street. 
 
 Many people are under the im- 
 pression that the poet was born in 
 his grandfather's house instead of 
 the "great square house by the sea." 
 
 Portland people tell the follow- 
 ing amusing incident : 
 
 A teacher in the public schools 
 hoping to impress upon the minds 
 of the children the true birthplace, 
 described the "square house" which 
 was at that time occupied by a fam- 
 ily from the Emerald Isle. A few 
 days later wishing to test the virtue 
 of her teaching she asked where 
 Longfellow was born. Instantly a 
 little hand went up and a shrill 
 treble piped out, "In Patsey Flan- 
 nigan's parlor." 
 
19 
 
 Gen. Wadsworth left Portland in 
 the sprino; of 1808 to improve a 
 large tract of land granted him by 
 the government for his services in 
 the Revolutionary War, and the 
 Longfellows again took up their 
 abode in the house thus vacated,, 
 Henry being little more than a year 
 old. 
 
 The true lover of Longfellow. 
 has a feeling of reverence and awe 
 as he crosses the threshold and 
 enters the place where so many 
 beautiful thoughts and fancies 
 were born in the soul of the poet; 
 v/here every spot is hallov/ed by 
 his association with it, and where 
 all his life long he loved to return. 
 
 Here the gentle, sensitive lad 
 grew, and his genius with him, un- 
 til he was fourteen. Here from the 
 
20 
 
 front he had an unobstructed view 
 of White Head, Fort Preble, and 
 Portland lighthouse, while Back 
 Cove and the farms and woodlands 
 toward the White Mountains met 
 his gaze from the rear. 
 
 The house is colonial in style 
 with the wide hall running through 
 the center on the walls of which 
 can be seen the original wall paper 
 now over a hundred years old, 
 while a shelf under the stairway 
 still holds the old fire buckets used 
 at that time. The front room on 
 the left, the largest then in Port- 
 land, has a fireplace generous 
 enough for the odorous pine logs 
 so plentiful there, deep window 
 sills quite comfortable when used 
 as modern window seats, and some 
 of the old furniture. This room 
 
21 
 
 is the one where all the social gath- 
 erings, weddings, and funerals of 
 both families have taken place. 
 The room directly back of this has 
 been used for various purposes ; as 
 a bedroom by Peleg Wadsworth 
 and his wife, and later on as a 
 workroom by different members of 
 the Longfellow family. From the 
 windows of this room can be seen 
 the vine that ''clings to the moul- 
 dering wall" and on an old writing 
 desk which still has a place be- 
 tween these windows the poet 
 wrote The Rainy Day. 
 
 THE RAINY DAY. 
 
 The day is cold, and dark, and 
 
 dreary ; 
 It rains and the wind is never 
 
 weary ; 
 
22 
 
 The vine still clings to the mould- 
 ering wall, 
 
 But at every gust the dead leaves 
 fall, 
 
 And the day is dark and dreary. 
 
 My life is cold, and dark and 
 dreary ; 
 
 It rains and the wind is never 
 weary ; 
 
 My thoughts still cling to the moul- 
 dering past, 
 
 But the hopes of youth fall thick 
 and fast, 
 
 And the days are dark and dreary. 
 
 Be still, sad heart ! and cease re- 
 pining ; 
 
 Behind the clouds is the sun still 
 shining: 
 
 Thv fate is the common fate of all, 
 
23 
 
 Into each life some rain must fall, 
 Some days be dark and dreary. 
 
 The front room on the right has 
 always been the living room ex- 
 cept during the period when 
 Stephen Longfellow used it for a 
 law office. Here William Pitt Fes- 
 senden, George Pierce, and many 
 others came to him as students. 
 When it was converted into a law 
 office the entrance on the left was 
 added so that the family would not 
 be disturbed by clients. 
 
 On the second floor the left hand 
 front room was generally used by 
 Zilpah Longfellow, and was known 
 as "Mother's room." In it she 
 died. Directly above on the 
 third floor is the room occupied by 
 Longfellow as a boy, and which he 
 
24 
 
 always insisted upon having when- 
 ever he visited there in after years. 
 The room directly back is one of 
 the most interesting. Here, traced 
 in the most deHcate handwriting, 
 still visible on the white paint, are 
 some of the poet's earliest verses. 
 There are many different dates 
 and several poems, but a placard 
 warns the visitor neither to copy 
 nor photograph. There is no re- 
 quest not to memorize, and here are 
 two lines: "J^b' 14^ '^^37- -^ 
 beautiful sunset of golden clouds." 
 Again: ''How dear to my heart is 
 the home of my childhood." 
 
 It is the intention of the Maine 
 Historical Society to give these 
 verses, together with their history, 
 to the public at some future date. 
 
25 
 
 The kitchen is interesting with 
 its great deep wide fireplace; its 
 Dutch oven, and all the old cook- 
 ing utensils of curious design. 
 Here too, can be seen the little foot 
 stove which was filled with coals 
 and carried to church by Henry as 
 he walked by his mother's side. A 
 massive old English sideboard 
 adorns the dining room — ^the old 
 law office — and a favorite chair of 
 Longfellow's is at the window 
 where he used always to sit. 
 
 
CHAPTER 11. 
 
 BOYHOOD. 
 
 Longfellow as a boy possessed 
 traits of character that developed 
 and made his life beautiful in after 
 years. "He is remembered," says 
 his brother, *'as being active and 
 eager though sensitive and impres- 
 sionable; quick-tempered, but as 
 quickly appeased ; kind-hearted and 
 affectionate, — the sunlight of the 
 house." "Remarkably soHcitous al- 
 ways to do right," wrote his 
 mother, while his sister says that 
 he was "true, high-minded, and 
 noble — never a mean thought or 
 act." 
 
 He greatly enjoyed boyish 
 games but abhorred loud noises and 
 rude play. The story is told that 
 (26) 
 
27 
 
 on one Fourth of July he privately 
 begged the maid to put cotton in 
 his ears ; but upon being questioned 
 about it said that it was not true. 
 Later in life a visitor tells that he 
 closed the shutters during a thun- 
 der storm remarking that he dis- 
 liked everything violent. 
 
 His love of order was inherent 
 and was a distinctive quality of his 
 poetic mind. In The CGinbridge 
 Magazine of March 1896 his daugh- 
 ter writing of tliis characteristic 
 says: 
 
 "The rhythmical quality showed 
 itself in an exact order and method, 
 running through every detail. This 
 was not the precision of a martinet; 
 but anything out of place dis- 
 tressed him as did a faulty rhyme, 
 or defective metre. 
 
28 
 
 "His library was carefully ar- 
 ranged by subjects, and although 
 no catalogue was ever made, he was 
 never at a loss where to look for 
 any needed volume. His books 
 were deeply beloved, and tenderly 
 handled. Beautiful bindings were 
 a great delight, and the leaves were 
 cut with the utmost care and neat- 
 ness. Letters and bills were kept 
 in the same orderly manner. The 
 latter were paid as soon as ren- 
 dered, and he always personally at- 
 tended to those in the neighbor- 
 hood. An unpaid bill weighed on 
 him like a nightmare. Letters were 
 answered day by day, as they accu- 
 mulated, although it became often 
 a weary task. He never failed, I 
 think to keep his account books ac- 
 curately, and he also used to keep 
 the bank books of the servants in 
 his employment, and to help them 
 with their accounts." 
 
29 
 
 When one thinks of the careless, 
 slipshod habits of some of our great 
 writers this love of order and neat- 
 ness in Longfellow commands our 
 admiration. It means too that art, 
 in any form, and disorder are not 
 necessarily synonymous terms. 
 
 Longfellow was particularly 
 fortunate in his home which was 
 one of culture and refinement. Sur- 
 rounded by books and music the 
 environment was the best possible 
 for an impressionable mind. His 
 father's library, though not large, 
 was a well selected one with such 
 famous persons as Shakespeare, 
 Milton, Pope, Dry den. Goldsmith, 
 and others of like character occu- 
 pying the place and sharing it with 
 such noted historians as Hume- 
 Gibbon, Robertson, and others. 
 
30 
 
 The Sunday reading was entirely 
 separated and of a different char- 
 acter from that of "week-days." 
 Mrs. Longfellow with her simple, 
 unquestioning faith would gather 
 her children about her and read to 
 them from the Bible and talk to 
 them of its truths. The Psalms 
 were her special favorites and as 
 she read the lyrical expressions of 
 the "sweet Psalmist of Israel" who 
 shall say that they did not leave 
 distinct impressions on the childish 
 mind that unconsciously influenced 
 the man? 
 
 The old Portland library also 
 contained much that was good and 
 the boys used to go there, and 
 sometimes received permission to 
 go on to Johnson's book store and 
 
31 
 
 look over the new books that came 
 from Boston. 
 
 Every young mind is influenced 
 in some degree by what is read and 
 Longfellow, when presenting the 
 Resolutions on the death of Irving 
 before the Massachusetts Historical 
 Society, tells of his early impres- 
 sions. He said : 
 
 "Every reader has his first book ; 
 I mean to say, one book among all 
 others which in early youth first 
 fascinates his imagination, and at 
 once excites and satisfies the de- 
 sires of his mind. To me, this 
 book was the Sketch-Book of 
 Washington Irving. I was a 
 school-boy when it was published, 
 and read each succeeding number 
 vvith ever increasing wonder and 
 delight, spell-bound by its pleasant 
 humor, its melancholy tenderness, 
 its atmosphere of revery — nay. 
 
32 
 
 even by its gray-brown covers, the 
 shaded letters of its titles, and the 
 fair, clear type, which seemed an 
 outward symbol of its style. How 
 many delightful books the same au- 
 thor has given us. ... Yet still 
 the charm of the Sketch-Book re- 
 mains unbroken ; the old fascination 
 remains about it; and whenever I 
 open its pages, I open that myster- 
 ious door which leads back into the 
 haunted chambers of youth." 
 
 The influence of Longfellow's 
 sister Anne — afterward Mrs. 
 Pierce — was another factor in the 
 development of his character. To 
 her he confided all his joys and 
 sorrows, as well as his hopes and 
 aspirations, and received from her 
 the loving sympathy and encourage- 
 ment so necessary to successful 
 achievement. In 1820 when he was 
 thirteen years of age there appeared 
 
33 
 
 in The Portland Gazette his first 
 printed verses, The Battle of 
 Lovell's Pond. It has been as- 
 serted so frequently that the silly 
 lines about ''Mr. Finney and his 
 turnip" were Longfellow's first at- 
 tempt at poetry that it may be wise 
 to say just here that we have it on 
 his own authority that he never 
 wrote them. *'The Battle of 
 Lovell's Pond" was no doubt in- 
 spired by visits to Lovell's or Love- 
 well's Pond, which was near Hiram 
 where his grandfather Wadsworth 
 lived, and where the event in New 
 England history known as "Love- 
 well's Fight" with the Indians oc- 
 curred. The story made a deep 
 impression on his mind and found 
 utterance in the poem. It was in 
 the darkness of a chill November 
 
34 
 
 evening that the timid lad, with 
 much misgiving of heart, dropped 
 into the letter box at the foot of 
 Exchange street the first expres- 
 sion of his poetic soul. His sister 
 Anne shared his confidence and to- 
 gether they waited impatiently for 
 the next issue of the paper, a semi- 
 weekly. At last it came, but they 
 were obliged to wait until their fa- 
 ther had slowly read it, — but when 
 they did get it, — yes, the poem was 
 there : 
 
 THE BATTLE OF LOVELL^S POND. 
 
 Cold, cold is the north wind and 
 rude is the blast 
 
 That sweeps like a hurricane 
 loudly and fast. 
 
 As it waves through the tall wav- 
 ing pines lone and drear, 
 
35 
 
 Sighs a requiem sad o'er the war- 
 rior's bier. 
 
 The war-whoop is still, and the 
 
 savage's yell 
 Has sunk into silence along the 
 
 wild dell ; 
 The din of the battle, the tumult, 
 
 is o'er 
 And the war-clarion's voice is now 
 
 heard no more. 
 
 The warriors that fought for their 
 
 country — and bled, 
 Have sunk to their rest ; the damp 
 
 earth is their bed ; 
 No stone tells the place where their 
 
 ashes repose, 
 Nor points out the spot from the 
 
 graves of their foes. 
 
36 
 
 They died in their glory, sur- 
 rounded by fame, 
 
 And victory's loud trump their 
 death did proclaim; 
 
 They are dead; but they live in 
 each Patriot's breast, 
 
 And their names are engraven on 
 honor's bright crest. 
 
 There were satisfaction and un- 
 told delight in the faces of both as 
 they finished reading and we are 
 told that Henry re-read it many 
 times, each time with increasing 
 satisfaction. With a heart full of 
 the joy of success he that evening 
 visited the home of his father's 
 friend. Judge Mellen, whose son 
 Frederic was his own friend. The 
 conversation after a time chanced 
 
37 
 
 upon poetry and the Judge re- 
 marked: "Did you see that piece 
 in to-day's paper? Very stiff, more- 
 over it is all borrowed, every word 
 of it." Poor sensitive lad ! how his 
 heart shrank within him. He left 
 the house as quickly as possible, 
 and there were tears on his pillow 
 that night. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 EDUCATION AND TRAVELS. 
 
 The "district of Maine" was sep- 
 arated from Massachusetts and ad- 
 mitted into the Union on the same 
 terms as the original states, on 
 March 15, 1820, and there at once 
 sprang up great pride in the state 
 institutions. Bowdoin College, 
 then in its second decade, was one 
 of these and the father of Long- 
 fellow a valued trustee. Being a 
 graduate of Harvard himself it 
 might be supposed that when the 
 selection of a college for his sons 
 was to be made, the choice would 
 be in favor of the older one. The 
 local pride before mentioned may 
 have been a factor in determining 
 upon 3owdoin, but whatever the 
 (38) 
 
39 
 
 reason, we know that in 1821 
 Henry and his brother Stephen 
 successfully passed the entrance ex- 
 amination for that institution. Dur- 
 ing the first year they studied at 
 home — perhaps on account of 
 Henry's youth — and did not go to 
 Brunswick until the autumn of 
 1822. The brothers occupied a 
 room in the house of the Rev. Mr. 
 Titcomb on Federal street, the 
 same house in which Harriet 
 Beecher Stowe afterward wrote 
 Uncle Tom's Cabin. They were 
 evidently not surrounded with 
 much luxury for the mother wrote : 
 "I am sorry to find that your room 
 is cold. I fear learning will not 
 flourish, nor your ideas properly 
 expand, in a frosty atmosphere; 
 and I fear the Muses will not visit 
 
40 
 
 you, and that I shall have no poetic 
 effusion presented on New Year's 
 Day." 
 
 The same traits that made Henry 
 a lovable boy manifested themselves 
 and made him a favorite youth. 
 Letters from professors, classmates, 
 and friends all unite in loving trib- 
 ute to him. In his correspondence 
 with his family we have glimpses 
 of what he was doing and thinking. 
 'T have this evening been reading 
 a few pages in Gray's Odes. I am 
 very much pleased with them," he 
 writes; and again, "I am in favor 
 of letting each one think for him- 
 self, and I am very much pleased 
 with Gray's poems. Dr. Johnson to 
 the contrary notwithstanding." 
 Again : ''We commenced Locke on 
 the Human Understanding more 
 
41 
 
 than a week since. I find it thus 
 far neither remarkably hard nor un- 
 interesting. I began with the de- 
 termination to Hke it at any rate, 
 and so get on very easily." Ah ! 
 Henry, that last sentence is the key- 
 note to success in any undertaking, 
 *'a determination to like it at any 
 rate." During these years in col- 
 lege "the Muse" did not desert him 
 and he continued to contribute to 
 the Portland paper and also wrote 
 some prose articles for the Ameri- 
 can Monthly magazine of Phila- 
 delphia. In April, 1824, the first 
 number of the United States Liter- 
 ary Gazette, a semi-monthly, ap- 
 peared; in November a poem on 
 Thanksgiving was published signed 
 with the initials which afterward 
 became so familiar, H. W. L. Six- 
 
42 
 
 teen poems followed in succeeding 
 numbers of the magazine. From 
 these, five were selected by the au- 
 thor to be reprinted in his first vol- 
 ume of verse, Voices of the Night. 
 The vacations were generally spent 
 at home and there can be no doubt 
 of the welcome Longiellow re- 
 ceived. His brother says that 
 "'Portland then, as since, was noted 
 for the beauty of its ladies, and to 
 them the young and susceptible 
 poet did not fail to render a ro- 
 mantic homage." 
 
 Just as the standard of a nation is 
 judged by the place accorded to its 
 women so the true man can be 
 judged by his homage to true wo- 
 manhood, and a companion of 
 Longfellow writes: "You were 
 ever ^ an admirer of the sex; but 
 
43 
 
 they seemed to you something holy, 
 — to be gazed at and talked with, 
 and nothing further," and his 
 brother says, "this chivalrous feel- 
 ing towards women was all his life 
 characteristic of him; and it might 
 have been said of him, as it was of 
 Villemain, that 'whenever he spoke 
 to a woman it was as if offering her 
 a bouquet of flowers/ " 
 
 The last years of college were 
 full of the question of a future life 
 work. In writing to George W. 
 Wells he says : "Somehow, and yet 
 I hardly know why, I am unwilling 
 to study any profession. I can not 
 make a lawyer of any eminence, be- 
 cause I have not a talent for argu- 
 ment ; I am not good enough for a 
 minister — and as to physic, I ut- 
 
44 
 
 terly and absolutely abhor it." To 
 his father who had selected the law 
 as a profession for him he writes: 
 '*In thinking to make a lawyer of 
 me, I fear you thought more par- 
 tially than justly. I do not for my 
 own part, imagine that such a coat 
 would suit me. I hardly think na- 
 ture designed me for the bar, or the 
 pulpit, or the dissecting room." 
 
 The real desire of his heart is 
 disclosed in a later letter to his 
 father. "I want to spend one year 
 at Cambridge for the purpose of 
 reading history, and of becoming 
 familiar with the best authors in 
 polite literature. * =i< * After 
 leaving Cambridge, I would attach 
 myself to some literary periodical 
 publication, by which I could main- 
 tain inyself . * * * the fact is I most 
 
45 
 
 eagerly aspire after future emi- 
 nence in literature; my whole soul 
 burns most ardently for it, and 
 every earthly thought centers in it." 
 
 Longfellow graduated in 1825 in 
 the most distinguished class ever 
 sent out from Bowdoin college. 
 Hawthorne, Franklin Pierce, J. S. 
 C. Abbott, J. W. Bradbury, and 
 Jonathan Cilley were among the 
 members. 
 
 Longfellow's immediate future 
 was made possible by the founding 
 of a professorship of Modern Lan- 
 guages toward which Madame 
 Bowdoin had contributed a thou- 
 sand dollars. The peculiar elegance 
 of a translation by him of an ode of 
 Horace had attracted the attention 
 of a member of the board, Mr. 
 Benjamin Orr, who presented his 
 
46 
 
 name for the new chair. The joy 
 of the young graduate can better 
 be imagined than described when 
 his father returned from the meet- 
 ing of the board with the proposal 
 that he go abroad to better fit him- 
 self for the position with the un- 
 derstanding that he be appointed 
 to the professorship upon his re- 
 turn. 
 
 As the autumn and winter were 
 unfavorable for a sea-voyage in a 
 sailing packet — then the only 
 means of ocean travel — Longfel- 
 low studied in his father's law 
 office. If the reader will refer to 
 the picture of the Longfellow 
 house he will see on the right-hand 
 side a small addition to the house 
 proper which was built as an err- 
 
47 
 
 trance to the office and is also 
 known as "the Httle room" in which 
 Longfellow wrote much during that 
 winter of waiting. He, with some 
 of his classmates and fellow stu- 
 dents in the law office, tried to write 
 a series of papers for the Portland 
 Advertiser, something like the Sal- 
 magundi papers of Irving. The 
 authorship was kept a profound se- 
 cret and the readers mystified if not 
 profited. 
 
 Shortly before sailing, in a letter 
 to Miss Doane, he wrote: "My 
 reading leads me to think that it is 
 with thoughts as with money : those 
 who have most appear before the 
 world in a plain dress; those who 
 have little dash out in tawdry splen- 
 dor." The truth of this thought 
 
48 
 
 is still so self-evident in the begin- 
 ning of the twentieth century that 
 it might be held as an axiom. 
 
 Longfellow bade adieu to his 
 home and friends just as the fitful 
 showers of April, 1826, were giving 
 place to the more faithful sunshine 
 of May. It must be remembered 
 that he was only nineteen years of 
 age, that he was to be absent for 
 three years, that crossing the ocean 
 was not then the common event 
 that it is to-day, and that there 
 were then no magnificent floating 
 palaces propelled by steam. He 
 spent a little time in Boston where 
 he received the last letters from 
 home; his mother's full of solici- 
 tude and his father's of wise coun- 
 sel. While awaiting the sailing of 
 the packet-ship from New York he 
 
49 
 
 visited Philadelphia. In going 
 about that city of Brotherly Love 
 "he came upon the pleasant enclos- 
 ure of the Pennsylvania Hospital" 
 which, many years after, he made 
 the scene of the last meeting of 
 Evangeline and Gabriel. 
 
 On May 15 the vessel on which 
 he was a passenger sailed for Haver 
 de Grace and on June 15 just a 
 month later, he writes to his 
 mother: "I have at length reached 
 the shores of the Old World. 
 We arrived yesterday at four 
 o'clock P. M., and I employ the 
 first leisure moment to send you 
 tidings of my safety." 
 
 The travels and study in France, 
 Spain, Italy, and Germany were 
 now begun which were to prepare 
 him more thoroughly for his pro- 
 
50 
 
 fessorship in Bowdoin. While in 
 Gottingen during his last year 
 abroad he commenced he says, "a 
 kind of Sketch-B'ook of scenes of 
 France, Spain, and Italy." These 
 "Sketches" were afterward elabor- 
 ated into Outre-Mer, A Pilgrimage 
 beyond the Sea, and will be spoken 
 of more fully in another chapter. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PROSE WORKS^ MARRIAGE^ CALL TO 
 HARVARD. 
 
 If the nobleness, gentleness, and 
 purity of the character of Longfel- 
 low have been dwelt upon some- 
 what at length it has been with a 
 purpose. 
 
 When we look into the lives of 
 many of the poets we might be led 
 to suppose that the highest form 
 of poetic expression is the result of 
 tragic living and questionable en- 
 vironment. The fierce, passionate 
 outbursts of Byron, the ravings of 
 Poe, the lovesongs of Burns, the 
 lyrics of Shelley, and the produc- 
 tions of many others might foster 
 this belief. To know that there are 
 some who, like Tennyson, Brown- 
 (51) 
 
52 
 
 ing, Wordsworth, Longfellow, Bry- 
 ant, Lowell, and others, have reach- 
 ed and kept a place high on the lad- 
 der of fame without this element is 
 gratifying and encouraging. No 
 one is ever true to himself or his 
 God who does not constantly keep 
 in view the highest ideals and strive 
 to live as nearly up to them as 
 possible; but if, in the struggle, he 
 falls below the heights and occupies 
 some lower ground with a life of 
 truth and goodness, the result of 
 his best endeavor, who shall say 
 that it is not infinitely better than 
 reaching the topmost intellectual 
 pinnacle by devious paths and start- 
 ling the world from his dizzy place 
 by perfect poetry from an impure 
 soul? 
 
53 
 
 Critics say that Longfellow was 
 not "grand," or "profound," or "in- 
 tensely individual," or even "strik- 
 ingly original," that "he uttered 
 nothing that we did not already 
 know." If he was not "profound" 
 neither was he obscure, and sim- 
 plicity is ofttimes greater than 
 grandeur. On this subject a writer 
 in the Boston Transcript says: 
 
 "Against the strained, esoteric 
 subtleties of the latest vogue in 
 English poetry, we are backing the 
 very simplicity of Longfellow's 
 verses for a hale and hearty immor- 
 tality. Let some of the riddled ad- 
 mirers of unintelligible phrases to 
 set forth indescribable 'agony' set 
 themselves down to tell a straight- 
 forward story as effectively and 
 dramatically as he has done in 
 many examples, and they will find 
 
54 
 
 the art that conceals art in his work 
 to be of the rarest and finest." 
 
 If he was not "individual" or 
 '"original" he was sympathetic and 
 true and gentle and good, and 
 *'sang himself into the hearts of 
 the people" by the beauty and pur- 
 ity of his own life reflected in his 
 poetry. "He was a singer in all 
 keys" and his poetry is "the gospel 
 of good will set to music." 
 
 Before looking more closely into 
 the poetry of Longfellow it may be 
 interesting to know something 
 more of his prose works. In the 
 larger life which he lived "beyond 
 the sea" Longfellow's literary im- 
 pulses received an impetus which 
 resulted in the "Sketches" before 
 mentioned. There can be no doubt 
 
55 
 
 that the impression made upon him 
 by Irving's Sketchbook had its 
 influence upon his own production^ 
 and yet it is as distinctively Long- 
 fellow's as the Sketchbook is Ir- 
 ving's. 
 
 Upon his return from abroad, in 
 1829, where he had made himself 
 master of several languages, and 
 had stored his mind with the litera- 
 ture of each of the four countries 
 in which he had passed the last 
 three years, he assumed the duties 
 of professor of modern languages 
 in Bowdoin College for which he 
 had so thoroughly prepared himself. 
 While there he found time, in ad- 
 dition to his regular work, to write 
 critical essays on foreign literature, 
 to prepare a Spanish grammar for 
 
56 
 
 his pupils, and to revise and elab- 
 orate the ''Sketches" into Outre- 
 Mer: A Pilgrimage beyond the 
 Sea. The book was published in 
 Brunswick from the press of Mr. 
 Joseph Griffin whose foreman was 
 Mr. Theodore S. McLellan who 
 passed his ninety-first birthday on 
 December ii, 1901. Mr. McLel- 
 lan's home was next to that of the 
 Rev. Mr. Titcomb where Longfel- 
 low roomed as a student and the 
 man now in the twilight of life still 
 loves to tell of the boy "who was a 
 favorite with every one." 
 
 In a personal letter to the author 
 dated January 3, 1902, Mr. Mc- 
 Lellan relates an amusing incident 
 regarding the publication of 
 Outre-Mer. Believing that it will 
 be of interest to lovers of Long- 
 
57 
 
 fellow the following extract is 
 given : 
 
 "I was foreman in the printing 
 office and did most of the press work 
 and the largest part of the type work 
 on Oiitre-Mer. Two of the female 
 compositors did part of the type 
 work and it was necessary to cut 
 the manuscript in order to give 
 them 'a set' commencing and end- 
 ing with a paragraph. 
 
 "Longfellow did not like to have 
 his copy cut. It was written on old 
 style letter paper, and the copy of 
 each form stitched together. One 
 day he wrote at the end of the 
 copy : 
 
 'Mr. Griffin! Mr. Griffin! 
 
 If you let the devil "Theodore" 
 Tear my copy any more 
 
 I'll destroy him in a Jiffin.' 
 
 "I used to read the 'galley' 
 proof and correct the typographical 
 errors and make up the form. The 
 
58 
 
 second proof was corrected by Mr. 
 Griffin, and I read the copy. The 
 third proof was sent to Longfellow 
 who had told me if he did not re- 
 turn it in half an hour we could 
 strike off the form. I set up the 
 verse in type which he had written 
 about me and added it to the proof- 
 sheet. He was at the office in much 
 less than a half hour, much excited, 
 fearing we would print the form 
 with the verse attached, but I had 
 taken it out." 
 
 Outre-Mer is the record of his 
 pilgrimage beyond the sea and is 
 told in a simple, pleasing style. 
 
 One other event of great import- 
 ance occurred during Longfellow's 
 residence in Brunswick. In Sep- 
 tember, 1 83 1, he was united in mar- 
 riage to Mary Storrer Potter of 
 Portland, a refined, highly educated, 
 
59 
 
 and charming woman. The house 
 where they spent the first years of 
 their united Hves still stands on 
 Federal street shaded by old elms. 
 Longfellow himself gives a picture 
 of his study there. He says : 
 
 "June 23. 1 can almost fancy my- 
 self in Spain, the morning is so 
 soft and beautiful. The tesselated 
 shadow of the honeysuckle lies mo- 
 tionless upon my study floor, as if 
 it were a figure in the carpet; and 
 through the open window comes 
 the fragrance of the wild briar and 
 the mock orange. The birds are 
 caroling in the trees, and their 
 shadows flit across the window as 
 they dart to and fro in the sun- 
 shine; while the murmur of the 
 bee, the cooing of the doves from 
 the eaves, and the whirring of a little 
 hummins: bird that has its nest in 
 
6o 
 
 the honeysuckle, send up a sound 
 of joy to meet the rising sun." 
 
 In December 1834 at the sugges- 
 tion of Professor George Ticknor, 
 Harvard extended an invitation to 
 Longfellow to fill the chair of mod- 
 ern languages and literature from 
 which the former wished to retire. 
 At the same time he was given per- 
 mission to study abroad if neces- 
 sary. He gladly accepted and, ac- 
 companied by Mrs. Longfellow, 
 sailed for Europe early in 1835. 
 
 While in Amsterdam in October 
 of that same year Mrs. Longfellow 
 was taken seriously ill. After re- 
 covering somewhat she was able to 
 go on to Rotterdam when she again 
 became very ill and died November 
 29, 1835. This great sorrow fell 
 with crushing weight upon the de- 
 
6i 
 
 voted husband and one of his most 
 tender and beautiful poems, Foot- 
 steps of Angels, immortalizes the 
 memory of her whose life had 
 brightened and made fuller and 
 richer his own for four short years. 
 
 FOOTSTEPS OF ANGELS 
 
 When the hours of day are num- 
 bered, 
 And the voices of the night 
 Wake the better soul, that slum- 
 bered, 
 To a holy, calm delight ; 
 
 Ere the evening lamps are lighted, 
 And like phantoms grim and tall, 
 
 Shadows from the fitful firelight 
 Dance upon the parlor wall ; 
 
 Then the forms of the departed 
 Enter at the open door; 
 
62 
 
 The beloved, the true hearted, 
 Come to visit me once more; 
 
 He, the young and strong, who 
 cherished 
 
 Noble longings for the strife, 
 By the roadside fell and perished, 
 
 Weary with the march of life! 
 
 They the holy ones and weakly, 
 Who the cross of suffering bore, 
 
 Folded their pale hands so meekly, 
 Spake with us on earth no more ! 
 
 And with them the Being Beauti- 
 ous. 
 
 Who unto my youth was given, 
 More than all things else to love me, 
 
 And is now a saint in heaven. 
 
 With a slow and noiseless footstep 
 Comes that messenger divine. 
 
63 
 
 Takes the vacant chair beside me, 
 Lays her gentle hand in mine. 
 
 And she sits and gazes at me 
 
 With those deep and tender eyes. 
 Like the stars, so still and saint- 
 like, 
 Looking downward from the 
 skies. 
 
 Uttered not, yet comprehended, 
 Is the spirit's voiceless prayer. 
 
 Soft rebukes, in blessings ended 
 Breathing from her lips of air. 
 
 O, though oft depressed and lonely, 
 All my fears are laid aside. 
 
 If I but remember only 
 
 Such as these have lived and 
 di^d. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 LIFE IN CAMBRIDGE AND POEMS. 
 
 The thoroughfare in Cambridge, 
 Massachusetts, now known as Brat- 
 tle street, was, in the long ago, 
 called "Tory Row." The first 
 house in the "Ro>v," built by Briga- 
 dier-General WilHam Brattle in 
 1740, in the midst of spacious and 
 beautiful grounds, whose paths then 
 led down to the Charles river, is 
 now occupied by the Social Union. 
 The "Row" consisted of seven fine 
 estates, the second of which was the 
 Vassall Place, this house being one 
 of the oldest in Cambridge. Di- 
 rectly opposite in 1759 Colonel John 
 Vassall built the house in which we 
 are particularly interested. At the 
 outbreak of the Revolution Colonel 
 (64) 
 
Vassall fled to England and the 
 house was confiscated by the state 
 and occupied by a regiment from 
 Marblehead. This was the be- 
 ginning of its historic connection 
 with the army, which was kept up 
 all through the long struggle for 
 freedom. It served as headquar- 
 ters for Washington from July, 
 1775, until the evacuation of Bos- 
 ton. During that time of gloom our 
 first great president held many 
 councils of war and pondered much 
 on the outcome in the northeast 
 room which is still held sacred to 
 his memory. 
 
 On January i, 1793, after pass- 
 ing through many hands, it was 
 purchased by Dr. Andrew Craigie. 
 Dr. Craigie had amassed a fortune 
 as apothecary-general of the Conti- 
 
66 
 
 nental army, and he enlarged and 
 greatly beautified the estate. His 
 hospitality was unbounded, and two 
 of his distinguished guests were 
 Talleyrand and the Duke of Kent, 
 father of Queen Victoria. His for- 
 tune was so reduced by his extrav- 
 agances that he was obliged to part 
 with all of his large estate, except a 
 few acres, before his death. After 
 his death his widow found it abso- 
 lutely necessary to add to her small 
 income, and this she did by letting 
 rooms to Harvard students and pro- 
 fessors. 
 
 It was in this way that Longfel- 
 low, after returning from abroad 
 and taking up his duties as "Smith 
 professor" in Harvard, found his 
 way into the house that was to be 
 his home until he should enter the 
 
67 
 
 "building of God, an house not 
 made with hands, eternal in the 
 heavens." Comfortably settled in 
 the southeast corner room of the 
 second floor, the former sleeping 
 room of Washington, he was able 
 to look across the meadows to the 
 silent, winding river Charles, and 
 on beyond to the city in the dis- 
 tance. 
 
 When Longfellov/ entered upon 
 his duties at Harvard he carried 
 with him the same qualities of mind 
 and heart, the same gentle, noble, 
 refined nature, the same quick sym- 
 pathy that had so endeared him to 
 all with whom he had come in con- 
 tact in the years gone by. Cam- 
 bridge was then dominated by the 
 college, and its professors formed a 
 cultured, social circle where he very 
 
68 
 
 soon found congenial friends and 
 companions, among whom were 
 Ticknor, Prescott, Norton, Sumner, 
 and others. 
 
 During this year, 1837, with his 
 heart still tender with a great sor- 
 row, he wrote The Reaper and the 
 Flowers; in June, 1838, The Psalm 
 of Life, both of which are so fa- 
 miliar to every boy and girl. Of 
 the latter the poet says : "It was 
 written in my chamber, as I sat look- 
 ing out at the morning sun, admir- 
 ing the beauty of God's creations 
 and the excellence of his plan. The 
 poem was not printed until some 
 months later, and even then with 
 great reluctance." Many have told 
 of the comfort derived from this ex- 
 pression of faith in God. 
 
69 
 
 THE PSALM OF LIFE. 
 
 Tell me not in mournful numbers, 
 Life is but an empty dream ! 
 
 For the soul is dead that slumbers 
 And things are not what they 
 seem. 
 
 Life is real ! Life is earnest ! 
 
 And the grave is not its goal ; 
 Dust thou are to dust returnest, 
 
 Was not spoken of the soul. 
 
 Not enjoyment, and not sorrow. 
 Is our destined end or way; 
 
 But to act that each to-morrow 
 Find us further than to-day. 
 
 Art is long, and time is fleeting, 
 And our hearts, though stout and 
 brave. 
 Still, like muffled drums, are beat- 
 ing 
 Funeral marches to the grave. 
 
70 
 
 In the world's broad field of battle, 
 
 In the bivouac of life, 
 Be not like dumb, driven cattle! 
 
 Be a hero in the strife ! 
 
 Trust no future, howe'er pleasant! 
 
 Let the dead Past bury its dead ! 
 Act, — act in the living Present ! 
 
 Heart within and God overhead! 
 
 Lives of great men all remind us 
 We can make our lives sublime, 
 
 And, departing, leave behind us 
 Footprints on the sands of 
 time : — 
 
 Footprints that perhaps another, 
 Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 
 
 A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, 
 Seeing, shall take heart again. 
 
 Let us, then, be up and doing, 
 With a heart for any fate; 
 
71 
 
 Still achieving, still pursuing, 
 Learn to labor and to wait. 
 
 In the year 1838, Hyperion was 
 begun. It was finished and pub- 
 lished in 1839 and is really an ac- 
 count of his second trip abroad. 
 The inscription on the wall of the 
 chapel of St. Gilgen, "Look not 
 mournfully into the past. It comes 
 not back again. Wisely improve the 
 present. It is thine. Go forth to 
 meet the shadowy future without 
 fear, and with a manly heart," sug- 
 gested the romance and became the 
 motto of his life. Into this he wove 
 personal experiences and laid the 
 scene among the places recently vis- 
 ited. One writer says that "he put 
 into his story the pain, the passion, 
 and the ideals of his heart. It was a 
 book to touch the soul of fervent 
 
^2 
 
 youth. It had much beauty of 
 fancy, and it showed how deeply the 
 imagination of the young American 
 had been stirred by the poetic asso- 
 ciations of Europe and enriched by 
 the abundant sources of foreign 
 culture." Almost immediately there 
 followed the publication of his first 
 volume of verse, Voices of the 
 Night, which contained his recent 
 poems, seven of his early poems, 
 and many translations from the 
 Spanish, Italian, and German. 
 Hawthorne wrote that "Nothing 
 equal to some of them had ever been 
 written in this world — this western 
 world, I mean." 
 
 The next two years were years of 
 hard work as instructor in Harvard, 
 and yet he found time to pour out 
 such-^a flood of pure song that when 
 
7Z 
 
 his second volume, Ballads and 
 other Poems, was published the 
 impression made by Voices of the 
 Night was so strengthened that he 
 at once found himself the most 
 widely read and the best loved of 
 American poets. His nature was in 
 no way changed by this love and 
 praise, but seemed to expand and 
 grow more eager to merit what he 
 received. 
 
 The close application of the past 
 years made it necessary for Long- 
 fellow to go abroad in search of 
 health, and accordingly he was 
 granted six months' leave of ab- 
 sence, and made the journey which 
 was so full of interest through Bel- 
 gium, visiting Bruges, Ghent, Ant- 
 w^erp, and Brussels. He afterward 
 went to Marienberg-on-the-Rhine 
 
74 
 
 to a water-cure, and there met the 
 German poet, FreiHgrath. The 
 friendship then formed between 
 them remained unbroken until the 
 death of FreiHgrath, thirty years 
 later. Another delightful feature 
 of this tour was his visit with Dick- 
 ens in London in October. Dick- 
 ens had but lately returned to Eng- 
 land from, our own shores so that 
 the cordial relations begun here 
 were simply continued there. 
 
 In October he returned home and 
 while on the way wrote the eight 
 poems on slavery, which were after- 
 ward published in pamphlet form 
 under the title of Poems on Slav- 
 ery. No one can read these poems 
 without feeling that the moral na- 
 ture of the poet found expression 
 against an evil that was corrupting 
 
75 
 
 the public conscience and making 
 miserable a race in no way respon- 
 sible for its condition. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 EVANGELINE. 
 
 Delightfully located, pleasantly 
 occupied, surrounded by congenial 
 friends, Longfellow still felt the 
 need of something more in his life ; 
 the need of a sympathy beyond that 
 of friendship, and accordingly on 
 July 13, 1843, he was married to 
 Frances Elizabeth Appleton, whom 
 he had first met in Switzerland in 
 1836, and whose character he had 
 portrayed in the ''Mary Ashburton" 
 in Hyperion. One could rarely 
 find a happier marriage. Those who 
 knew Miss Appleton speak of her 
 stately presence, cultivated intellect, 
 and her deep, though reserved feel- 
 ing. After the wedding two weeks 
 were ^ spent in Longfellow's apart- 
 (76) 
 
11 
 
 ments in the Craigie House, after 
 which they went to Portland and 
 Nahant to see the parents of both, 
 the Appletons spending their sum- 
 mers in Nahant. 
 
 Following this the relatives of 
 Mrs. Longfellow at Pittsfield were 
 visited, in whose house stood the 
 "old clock on the stairs" swinging 
 out its Never — Forever. Accompa- 
 nied by Charles Sumner a tour of 
 the Catskills was another feature of 
 this happy time. It was on this 
 tour that, passing through Spring- 
 field, they visited the Arsenal, and 
 Mrs. Longfellow remarked "how 
 like an organ looked the ranged and 
 shining gun-barrels which covered 
 the walls from floor to ceiling, and 
 suggested what mournful music 
 death would bring from them." 
 
78 
 
 From this suggestion came the 
 poem, The Arsenal at Spring- 
 field. Vacation over^ they turned 
 their faces toward Cambridge and 
 once more went to the Craigie 
 House, which was now their own, 
 having been purchased by Mr. Ap- 
 pleton for them. A little later he 
 added the land across the street, 
 which reached down to the river, 
 and which is to-day the little park 
 given to the city of Cambridge 
 by the children of Longfellow on 
 condition that it should be forever 
 kept open to the winding Charles. 
 As long as he lived he loved to see 
 the children playing there, and 
 never tired of the beautiful view. 
 
 From now on for many years 
 Longfellow's life was one of peace 
 and joy and prosperity. His home 
 
79 
 
 was filled with the gentle presence 
 of its mistress, and their united hos- 
 pitality always opened wide the 
 door to friends. His daughter says : 
 ''All who came were made welcome 
 without any special preparation, 
 and without any thought of per- 
 sonal inconvenience." Not to 
 friends only was the door open, but 
 to all who came to appeal for help 
 or succor. His wife's dowry, to- 
 gether with the income from his 
 books, made it possible for him to 
 listen to all such appeals and to re- 
 lieve them, and ''his house was 
 known to all the vagrant train." 
 There can be no doubt that the ge- 
 nial influences of this happy life 
 found an outlet in his poetry. 
 
 The Spanish Student, written 
 some time before, was brought out 
 
8o 
 
 in book form in 1843. In 1845 
 The Belfry of Bruges and Other 
 Poems appeared. Longfellow in 
 his journal for November 24 says : 
 *'Got my last proof from the 
 printer ; so that my second boy and 
 my fourth voKime of poems {The 
 Belfry of Bruges and Other 
 Poems) come into the world about 
 the same time." 
 
 During this same year Haw- 
 thorne coming to dine with Long- 
 fellow, brought with him his friend, 
 H. L. Conolly, at one time rector 
 of a church in South Boston. 
 
 A parishioner of Mr. Conolly's, 
 Mrs. Haliburton, had related to him 
 the story of the separation of a 
 young Acadian maiden from her be- 
 trotiied at the time of the dispersion 
 of the Acadians by the English 
 
8i 
 
 troops. For many long years they 
 sought each other and at last met in 
 a hospital where the lover lay dy- 
 ing. Mr. Conolly had tried to in- 
 terest Hawthorne to such an ex- 
 tent that the result would be a novel 
 but in vain. Longfellow was great- 
 ly touched by the story, and more 
 especially by the constancy of the 
 lovers, and said to Hawthorne, "If 
 you really do not want this incident 
 for a tale, let me have it for a 
 poem," to which he consented. He 
 seems not to have been able at first 
 to settle upon a name for his story 
 of love in Acadie, for, culling from 
 his journal found, in Samuel Long- 
 fellow's "Life," he says on Novem- 
 ber 28, 1845 : "Set about 'Ga- 
 brielle,' my idyl in hexameters, in 
 earnest." Again, December 7 : "I 
 
82 
 
 know not what name to give to — 
 not my new baby, but my new 
 poem. Shall it be 'Gabrielle/ or 
 *Celestine,' or 'Evangeline' ? " 
 
 Before his marriage Longfellow 
 had overtaxed his eyes to such an 
 extent that their use was impaired 
 for years. Mrs. Longfellow was 
 his faithful amanuensis and reader. 
 On January ii, 1846, he says: 
 "Time speeds away, and with these 
 dim eyes I accomplish little." 
 On the next day : "The vacation is 
 at hand. I hope before its close to 
 get far on in Evangeline. Two 
 cantos are now done, which is a 
 good beginning." Already we find 
 him chafing somewhat under his 
 college work and wondering if he is 
 to be an author if it would not be 
 wiser to be that alone. On February 
 
83 
 
 27, i847> hs says: "Evangeline is 
 ended. I wrote the last lines this 
 morning." 
 
 "Still stands the forest primeval; 
 
 but far away from its shadow, 
 Side by side, in their nameless 
 
 graves, the lovers are sleeping. 
 
 * * * Ji« 
 
 "While from its rocky caverns the 
 deep-voiced neighboring ocean 
 
 Speaks, and in accents disconsolate 
 answers the wail of the forest.'^ 
 
 Most critics agree in saying that 
 the classic hexameter can not be re- 
 produced in English. "The lan- 
 guage is too harsh and unbending, 
 and the quantity of English sylla- 
 bles depends upon accent and is not 
 unchangeable, as is the case with 
 
84 
 
 the Greek." Notwithstanding this, 
 Longfellow chose to write Evan- 
 geline in hexameter, and the style 
 called forth much and varied criti- 
 cism. Poe attacked it without mer- 
 cy. Hawthorne, Whittier, and Low- 
 ell commended it highly. The lat- 
 ter in his delightfully amusing way 
 speaks of it in the Fable for Crit- 
 ics in the following manner : 
 
 *'I'm not over-fond of Greek metres 
 
 in English, 
 To me rhyme's a gain, so it be not 
 
 too jinglish. 
 And your modern hexameter verses 
 
 are no more 
 Like Greek ones than sleek Mr. 
 
 Pope is like Homer; 
 As the roar of the sea to the coo of 
 
 a pigeon is, 
 
8s 
 
 So, compared to your moderns, 
 
 sounds old Melesigenes; 
 I may be too partial, the reason, 
 
 perhaps, o't is 
 That I've heard the old blind man 
 
 recite his own rhapsodies. 
 And my ear with that music im- 
 pregnate may be. 
 Like the poor exiled shell with the 
 
 soul of the sea, 
 Or as one can't bear Strauss when 
 
 his nature is cloven 
 To its deeps within deeps by the 
 
 stroke of Beethoven; 
 But, set that aside, and 't is truth 
 
 that I speak. 
 Had Theocritus written in English, 
 
 not Greek, 
 I believe that his exquisite sense 
 
 would scarce change a line. 
 
86 
 
 In that rare, tender, virgin-like pas- 
 toral Evangeline. 
 
 That's not ancient nor modern, its 
 place is apart 
 
 Where time has no sway, in the 
 realm of pure Art, 
 
 'T is a shrine of retreat from 
 Earth's hubbub and strife 
 
 As quiet and chaste as the author's 
 own life." 
 
 Stedman calls it "the flower of 
 American idyls," while Howells 
 says it is ''the best poem of our 
 age." 
 
 Whatever the critics may say 
 there are those who are thankful 
 that the classic hexameter was used 
 instead of the common rhymed 
 English pentameter. Longfellow 
 knew the storm he would call forth 
 and, as if to justify his choice to 
 
87 
 
 himself, put the song of the mock- 
 ing bird into the latter. 
 
 "^'Upon a spray that overhung the 
 
 stream, 
 The mocking-bird, awakening from 
 
 his dream, 
 Poured forth such delirious music 
 
 from his throat 
 That all the air seemed listening to 
 
 his note. 
 Plaintive the song began, and slow ; 
 It breathed of sadness, and of pain 
 
 and woe ; 
 Then, gathering all his notes, 
 
 abroad he flung 
 The multitudinous music from his 
 
 tongue, — 
 As after showers, a sudden gust 
 
 again 
 
 * From Samuel Longfellow's "Life," 
 Vol. n. 
 
88 
 
 Upon the leaves shakes down the 
 rattling rain. 
 
 Compare this with the song as it 
 is in its classic form in Part II, be- 
 ginning with line 873. For "Ho- 
 meric grandeur" read the burning 
 of Grand Pre, Part I, beginning 
 with line 613. 
 
 Whatever the personal prefer- 
 ence regarding the style may be no 
 one can help being benefited by the 
 patience, constancy, love, and faith 
 so beautifully portrayed in this tale 
 of Acadie. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 POETIC ACTIVITY. 
 
 The pathway of the poet is not 
 always strewn with flowers for he, 
 nke other people, has troubles pe- 
 culiar to himself. The budding 
 genius, with the temerity of youth, 
 calmly and serenely sends his ver- 
 dant ideas for comment and crit- 
 icism to some one whom he greatly 
 admires, but upon whom he has 
 no claim whatever, whose long 
 suffering and patience in this di- 
 rection are not always recorded. 
 Longfellow was not exempt from 
 this form of torture, indeed his 
 gentle, kindly spirit rather in- 
 vited than repelled the earnest 
 young worker. On one occasion, 
 (89) 
 
90 
 
 however, when he was unus- 
 ually busy he received from an 
 aspirant after fame a long poem 
 demanding a reading and criticism. 
 This was too much even for him 
 and he says in his journal: 'T will 
 do no such thing, unless Congress 
 pass a special law requiring it of 
 me." 
 
 At another time a stranger wrote 
 requesting him to write a valentine 
 for him in answer to one he had 
 received the year before from a 
 young lady. Longfellow says, "he 
 does not want to show the white 
 feather in a poetic way, — and wants 
 the help of my white feather." 
 " Tlease tell me who was Evan- 
 geline, what country did she belong 
 to, also the place of her birth?'" 
 " 'Did the youth in 'Excelsior' at- 
 
91 
 
 tain his purpose, or die before he 
 had crossed the pass?' " are ex- 
 amples of the hundreds of questions 
 written him. His kindly spirit 
 prompted him to answer these but 
 it was always at the expense of 
 time and strength. 
 
 The evolution of the American 
 novel was slow. The conditions 
 here on this new continent were 
 not such as were conducive to lit- 
 erary developement. The fight for 
 existence was too strenuous to ad- 
 mit of dreaming. The real was too 
 tragic to allow the imagination full 
 sway. The making of a nation was 
 too serious a business for play- 
 writing. When, in 1821, Cooper 
 published The Spy we awoke to 
 the fact that America had a novel- 
 ist of her very own. In 1822 Miss 
 
92 
 
 Sedgwick, in a Nezv England Tale, 
 divided the honors with him, 
 while Irving and Hawthorne soon 
 made their initial attempts in fic- 
 tion. The scarcity of this particu- 
 lar kind of literature and the suc- 
 cess of Hyperion may have been 
 the incentives v^^hich prompted 
 Longfellow to again write a tale 
 in prose. Immediately after finish- 
 ing Evangeline, early in 1847, he 
 began Kavanagh which was not 
 published, however, until 1849, 
 Vihen it brought the following com- 
 ment from Emerson : 'T think it 
 the best sketch we have seen in the 
 direction of the American novel. 
 For ^ here is our native speech and 
 manners, treated with sympathy, 
 taste, and judgment." Hawthorne 
 generously wrote: "It is a most 
 
93 
 
 precious and rare book ; as fragrant 
 as a bunch of flowers, and as sim- 
 ple as one flower. A true picture 
 of life." Notwithstanding these 
 encouragements he never again 
 published any prose tales. 
 
 During the summer of 1849 
 Longfellow was summoned to Port- 
 land by the serious illness of his 
 father who died August 3 of that 
 year. "Farewell, O thou good man, 
 thou excellent father," says his son. 
 Leaving Portland by rail he saw 
 the church yard on the hillside and 
 he says he "saw the stones of the 
 graveyard gleaming white; my 
 father seemed to wave me a last 
 adieu." His mother survived until 
 185 1 when she too passed into the 
 great beyond. 
 
 In 1850 there appeared a new 
 
94 
 
 volume of verse under the 
 title of The Seaside and the Fire- 
 side, which contained The Building 
 of the Ship, Resignation, The Fire 
 of Driftwood, The Singers, The 
 Christmas Carol and eighteen other 
 poems. The Building of the Ship 
 is undoubtedly one of the most vig- 
 orous of Longfellow's poems and 
 has found a place in every truly pa- 
 triotic American breast. 
 **Build me straight, O worthy 
 
 Master ! 
 Staunch and strong, a goodly 
 
 vessel. 
 
 That shall laugh at all disaster, 
 
 And with wave and whirlwind 
 
 wrestle ! 
 
 ^ ^ ^ 
 
 'There's not a ship that sails the 
 ocean 
 
95 
 
 But every climate, every soil, 
 Must bring its tribute, great or 
 
 small, 
 And help to build the wooden wall ! 
 
 "Ah, how skillful grows the hand 
 That obeyeth Love's command! 
 It is the heart, and not the brain, 
 That to the highest doth attain, 
 And he who followeth Love's behest 
 Far excelleth all the rest ! 
 * * * 
 
 "Day by day the vessel grew. 
 With timbers fashioned strong and 
 
 true, 
 Stemson and keelson and sternson- 
 
 knee, 
 Till, framed with perfect symmetry, 
 A skeleton ship rose up to view ! 
 And around the bows and along 
 
 the side 
 
96 
 
 The heavy hammers and mallets 
 
 plied, 
 Till after many a week, at length, 
 Wonderful for form and strength, 
 Sublime in its enormous bulk, 
 Loomed aloft the shadowy hulk ! 
 
 * ^ :}; 
 
 "Thou, too, sail on O ship of State ! 
 Sail on O Union, strong and great ! 
 Humanity with all its fears. 
 With all the hopes of future years, 
 Is hanging breathless on thy fate! 
 We know what Master laid thy 
 
 keel. 
 What Workmen wrought thy ribs 
 
 of steel 
 Who made each mast, and sail, 
 
 and rope. 
 What anvils rang, what hammers 
 
 beat. 
 In what a forge and what a heat 
 
97 
 
 Were shaped the anchors of thy 
 
 hope! 
 Fear not each sudden sound and 
 
 shock, 
 'Tis of the wave and not the rock ; 
 'Tis but the flapping of the sail, 
 And not a rent made by the gale! 
 In spite of rocks and tempest's roar, 
 In spite of false lights on the shore, 
 bail on nor fear to breast the sea! 
 Our hearts, our hopes, are all with 
 
 thee, 
 Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, 
 
 our tears, 
 Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, 
 Are all with thee, — are all with 
 
 thee I" 
 
 — From The Building of the Ship. 
 
 In Resignation he voices his 
 
 grief at the death of his little 
 
 daughter Frances, and touches with 
 
98 
 
 tenderest sympathy the hearts of 
 thousands of others around whose 
 firesides there is "one vacant chair." 
 
 "There is no flock, however watched 
 and tended, 
 But one dead lamb is there! 
 There is no fireside, howsoe'er de- 
 fended, 
 But has one vacant chair ! 
 
 "Let us be patient! These severe 
 afflictions 
 Not from the ground arise. 
 But often times celestial benedic- 
 tions 
 Assume this dark disguise. 
 
 "We see but dimly through the 
 mists and vapors ; 
 Amid these earthly damps. 
 
99 
 
 What seem to us but sad, funereal 
 tapers 
 May be heaven's distant lamps. 
 
 "There is no death ! What seems so 
 is transition; 
 This life of mortal breath 
 Is but a suburb of the life elysian 
 Whose portals we call Death." 
 — From Resignation, 
 
 For many years Longfellow had 
 in mind a more lofty and sublime, 
 as well as a more elaborate poem 
 than any he had yet undertaken. 
 As early as 1841 he conceived the 
 idea of the Trilogy of Christus, 
 in which he would portray Chris- 
 tianity in the Apostolic, Middle, and 
 Modern Ages. In 1851 the second 
 part of the Trilogy, The Golden 
 Legend, was published giving a 
 
100 
 
 picture of Christianity in the Mid- 
 dle Ages. The third part, The 
 New England Tragedies, was 
 next written and pubHshed in 1868. 
 The Tragedies were two in num- 
 ber, "John Endicott" standing for 
 the conflict between Puritan and 
 Quaker," and "Giles Corey of the 
 Salem Farms" telling of the witch- 
 craft delusion. Both were intended 
 to set forth Modern Christianity 
 and "express the supremacy after 
 bitter struggle of the divine spirit 
 of charity as the central idea of a 
 true Christian freedom." It was 
 not until 1871 that he wrote The 
 Divine Tragedy, the first part of 
 the Christus Trilogy representing 
 Apostolic Christianity. He says : 
 *'The subject of 'The Divine Trag- 
 edy' has taken entire possession of 
 
lOI 
 
 me, so that I can think of nothings 
 else." These three in their regular 
 order were afterward published un- 
 der one cover with the title of 
 Chris tits: A Mystery. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 HIAWATHA. 
 
 After eighteen years of contin- 
 uous service as professor in Har- 
 vard, Longfellow resigned his posi- 
 tion on commencement day, 1854. 
 He wore his black robes for the 
 last time and "the whole crowded 
 church looked ghostly and unreal" 
 as a thing in which he had no part. 
 The work had grown irksome be- 
 cause of the tax upon time and 
 strength required in its perfor- 
 mance. Together with household 
 duties and social environment he 
 had- little leisure for the flights of 
 fancy in which his poetic spirit de- 
 lighted. 
 
 While the past two years had 
 been less productive than many pre- 
 (102) 
 
103 
 
 vious ones, we have some evidence 
 of activity during that time. The 
 Two Angels, written when the 
 Angel of Life gave to him a 
 baby daughter and the Angel of 
 Death took the young and beau- 
 tiful wife of Lowell — and The 
 Rope Walk, belong to the latter 
 part of this period. Just before 
 giving up his routine work in the 
 class room he began what was to 
 be, in the opinion of some, his mas- 
 terpiece, Hiawatha. Begun under 
 the name of "Manabozho" it ended 
 as "Hiawatha" and as Bayard Tay- 
 lor says, "floats in an atmosphere 
 of the American Indian summer." 
 
 "With the odors of the forest, 
 With the dew and damp of 
 meadows. 
 
104 
 
 With the curling smoke of wig- 
 wams, 
 With the rushing of great rivers." 
 
 To those famihar with the Indian 
 the peculiar and difficult measure 
 of the Finnish epic in which Hia- 
 watha is written seems especially 
 adapted. The monotonous, sin^ 
 song repetition is still heard when- 
 ever they indulge in their own 
 poetry and song. Longfellow had 
 long been greatly interested in the 
 Red man and had studied his 
 legends. The Burial of the Min- 
 nisink, found among his earlier 
 work, shows the same power to 
 bring out his traditions and cus- 
 toms without offending the poetic 
 sense as does Hiawatha while the 
 little Shawnee woman in Evange- 
 
I05 
 
 line charms us with her tale of love 
 and sorrow. 
 
 Is there anything more poetic 
 than the East-Wind's wooing of 
 the maiden until into a star he 
 changed her? 
 
 "Young and beautiful was Wa- 
 bun; 
 
 He it was who brought the morn- 
 ing, 
 
 He it was whose silver arrows 
 
 Chased the dark o'er hill and val- 
 ley ; 
 
 He it was whose cheeks were 
 painted 
 
 With the brightest streaks of crim- 
 son, 
 
 And whose voice awoke the village, 
 
 Called the deer, and called the hun- 
 ter. 
 
io6 
 
 Lonely in the sky was Wabun; 
 Though the birds sang gayly to 
 
 him, 
 Though the wild-flowers of the 
 
 meadow 
 Filled the air with odors for him, 
 Though the forests and the rivers 
 Sang and shouted at his coming. 
 Still his heart was sad within him, 
 For he was alone in heaven. 
 
 But one morning, gazing earth- 
 ward, 
 While the village still was sleeping, 
 And the fog lay on the river, 
 Like a ghost, that goes at sunrise, 
 He beheld a maiden walking 
 All alone upon a meadow. 
 Gathering water-flags and rushes 
 By a river in the meadow. 
 
 Every morning, gazing earth- 
 ward, 
 
107 
 
 Still the first thing he beheld there 
 Was her blue eyes looking at him, 
 Two blue lakes among the rushes. 
 And he loved the lonely maiden, 
 Who thus waited for his coming ; 
 For they both were solitary, 
 She on earth and he in heaven. 
 
 And he wooed her with caresses, 
 Wooed her with his smile of sun- 
 shine, 
 With his flattering words he wooed 
 
 her. 
 With his sighing and his singing. 
 Gentlest whispers in the branches, 
 Softest music, sweetest odors. 
 Till he drew her to his bosom, 
 Folded in his robes of crimson. 
 Till into a star he changed her, 
 Trembling still upon his bosom ; 
 And forever in the heavens 
 They are seen together walking. 
 
io8 
 
 Wabun and Wabun-Annung, 
 Wabun and the Star of Morning." 
 
 Do not many of us imagine we 
 can see the hand of Kabibonokka 
 as he paints the leaves in Autumn, 
 stains the leaves with red and yel- 
 low ? Who of us does not welcome 
 Shawondase when he sends the 
 blue bird and the robin and the 
 swallow northward and fills the air 
 with dreamy softness? 
 
 On the way home after the en- 
 counter with his father Mudjekee- 
 wis, Hiawatha stopped to buy heads 
 of arrows of the ancient arrow- 
 maker 
 
 "Where the Falls of Minnehaha 
 Flash and gleam among the oak- 
 trees 
 
109 
 
 Laugh and leap into the valley. 
 There it was he saw the wayward 
 Minnehaha 
 
 With her moods of shade and sun- 
 shine, 
 Eyes that smiled and frowned alter- 
 nate, 
 Feet as rapid as the river, 
 Tresses flowing like the water, 
 And as musical a laughter ; 
 And he named her from the river, 
 From the water-fall he named her, 
 Minnehaha, Laughing Water." 
 
 Upon reaching home he told to 
 old Nokomis all that had happened 
 in the meeting with his father but 
 said not a word of arrows, not a 
 word of Laughing Water ; was the 
 nature of the Red man unlike that 
 of his white brother ? 
 
no 
 
 The gift of the maize, the friend 
 of man, Mondamin, is beautifully 
 told. 
 
 When Hiawatha meets Megisso- 
 gwon, the Magician, who sends dis- 
 ease and death, and hears his words 
 of boasting he answers ; 
 
 "Big words do not smite like war 
 
 clubs, 
 Boastful breath is not a bow string. 
 Taunts are not so sharp as arrows, 
 Deeds are better things than words 
 
 are. 
 Actions mightier than boastings!'* 
 
 which would be a very good answer 
 to make to the braggart of to-day. 
 
 *'As unto the bow the cord is. 
 So unto the man is woman, 
 Though she bends him, she obeys 
 him. 
 
Ill 
 
 Though she draws him, yet she 
 
 follows, 
 Useless each without the other!" 
 
 The beauty and delicacy of Hia- 
 watha's wooing must be read in its 
 entirety to be fully appreciated. We 
 can fancy the ancient Arrow-maker 
 as he sits in the doorway of his 
 wigwam and muses of the past, 
 while youth looks forward to the 
 future. Carved on one of the rustic 
 bridges that spans the water from 
 the Falls as it winds its way along 
 wooded banks to the Father of Wa- 
 ters, is the head of an Indian chief. 
 It may be a portrait of the Arrow- 
 maker, while the Laughing Water, 
 as it smiles in the sunshine, is pic- 
 turesque and beautiful enough for 
 Minnehaha. The sylvan stillness is 
 broken only by her gurgling laugh- 
 
112 
 
 ter and an occasional cheerful note 
 from a woodthrush. And here he 
 wooed and won her. Then the 
 journey homeward and the feast- 
 ing and the singing and the story 
 telling. 
 
 Hiawatha, realizing how "Great 
 men die and are forgotten," taught 
 his people all the art of Picture- 
 Writing. 
 
 *'From his pouch he took his colors. 
 Took his paints of different colors, 
 On the smooth bark of a birch-tree 
 Painted many shapes and figures, 
 And each figure had a meaning, 
 Each^ some word or thought sug- 
 gested." 
 
 The sweet singer, Chibiabos dies ; 
 "He has moved a little nearer 
 
113 
 
 To the Master of all music, 
 To the Master of all singing \" 
 
 The ghosts come and for many- 
 days make their abode with Hia- 
 watha and at last are discovered 
 weeping because the living do not 
 wish for the return of the dead. 
 
 "We are but a burden to you, 
 And we see that the departed 
 Have no place among the living." 
 
 Great sorrow comes to every one 
 and 
 
 "Into Hiawatha's wigwam 
 Came two other guests, as silent. 
 As the ghosts were, and as gloomy." 
 
 Famine and Fever fastened them- 
 selves upon the lovely Laughing 
 Water and she heard again the 
 
114 
 
 Falls of Minnehaha, saw again 
 her father standing lonely in his 
 doorway, 
 
 "Then they buried Minnehaha; 
 In the snow a grave they made her, 
 In the forest deep and darksome. 
 Underneath the moaning hem- 
 locks. 
 
 Clothed her in her richest gar- 
 ments, 
 
 Wrapped her in her robes of 
 ermine ; 
 
 Covered her with snow like ermine, 
 
 Thus they buried Minnehaha. 
 
 ^ ^- 'K 
 
 "Farewell, O my Laughing Water ! 
 All my heart is buried with you, 
 All my thoughts go onward with 
 
 you ! 
 Come not back again to labor, 
 Come not back aeain to suffer 
 
115 
 
 Where the Famine and the Fever 
 Wear the heart and waste the body. 
 Soon my task will be completed, 
 Soon your footsteps I shall follow 
 To the Islands of the Blessed, 
 To the Kingdom of Ponemah, 
 To the Land of the Hereafter!" 
 
 Before the coming of the Pale- 
 faces Hiawatha sees a vision in 
 which he beholds his nation scat- 
 tered, forgetting all his counsel and 
 warring with each other ; yet upon 
 the arrival of his white brothers he 
 gives them hearty hospitable wel- 
 come, and in his farewell bids his 
 people listen to their words of wis- 
 dom. 
 
 **And the evening sun descending 
 Set the clouds on fire with redness, 
 
ii6 
 
 Burned the broad sky, like q. prairie, 
 Left upon the level water 
 One long track and trail of splen- 
 dor, 
 Down whose stream as down a 
 
 river, 
 Westward, westward Hiawatha 
 Sailed into the fiery sunset, 
 Sailed into the purple vapors, 
 Sailed into the dusk of evening. 
 * * * 
 
 "And they said, 'Farewell forever!' 
 Said 'Farewell, O Hiawatha !' " 
 
 One critic says that the hero is 
 *'much more like an Indian King 
 Arthur than is the Hiawatha of the 
 original legends," but does that 
 make the charm of the poem any the 
 less? . If the poet does not idealize 
 of whom can we expect it? 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 COURTSHIP OF MILES STANDISH. 
 
 As a descendant of John Alden, 
 on his mother's side, Longfellow 
 must have taken a peculiar pleasure 
 in writing, The Courtship of Miles 
 Standish. The poem is a true 
 picture of the old colony days 
 depicting with a pleasant humor 
 the daily life of those brave men 
 and women to whom Plymouth 
 Rock had been "as a door step in- 
 to a world unknovv^n' ' and was to be 
 ''the corner stone of a nation." The 
 ''doughty little Puritan Captain," 
 the mast^ of the departing "May- 
 flower," and the hero himself are 
 surrounded with the pleasantries 
 (117) 
 
ii8 
 
 allowable in a work of "lighter 
 vein," while Priscilla with the 
 laughter in her roguish eyes as she 
 says "Why don't you speak for 
 yourself, John?" is a type admired 
 by both sexes for her noble woman- 
 hood and her womanly tact. Skil- 
 fully and delicately Longfellow has 
 shown the heart side of the Puri- 
 tans. We are too apt to think 
 of them as living for conscience 
 sake alone, while in fact they lived 
 and loved much as the world has in 
 all times and climes. 
 
 Plymouth rock was returned to 
 the original landing place some 
 years ago and is now permanently 
 fixed there. Pilgrim Hall, Ply- 
 mouth, is a most interesting place 
 for here are collected and preserved 
 
119 
 
 all the Interesting relics of the Pil- 
 grims. 
 
 The Alden case stands on the 
 south side of the hall and contains 
 John Alden's Bible, printed in 1620, 
 and some ancient documents with 
 his signature. Next to this is the 
 Standish case in which is a pot and 
 platter and the famous Damascus 
 sword of Captain Miles Stand- 
 ish; 
 
 * * "his trusty sword of Damas- 
 cus, 
 
 Curved at the point and inscribed 
 with its mystical Arabic sen- 
 tence," 
 that hung upon the wall of 
 his house when he interrupted 
 the ''diligent scribe" and asked him 
 to do his wooing for him, at the 
 
120 
 
 same time, confessing his fear of 
 a woman's "No." 
 
 "I can march up to a fortress and 
 
 summon the place to surrender, 
 But march up to a woman with 
 
 such a proposal, I dare not. 
 I'm not afraid of bullets, nor shot 
 
 from the mouth of a cannon, 
 But a thundering 'No !' point-blank 
 
 from the mouth of a woman, 
 That I confess I'm afraid of, nor 
 
 am I ashamed to confess it !" 
 
 It is said that General Grant 
 was much interested in this 
 piece of steel when he visited 
 Plymouth and handled it with 
 much satisfaction. The Arabic in- 
 scriptions had always been a puzzle 
 until 1 88 1 when Professor James 
 Rosedale of Jerusalem with a 
 
121 
 
 troupe of Arabs from Palestine vis- 
 ited the town and deciphered them. 
 He pronounced them to be different 
 dates, all very old, and the last he 
 translated as follows: — 'With 
 peace God ruled His slaves {creat- 
 ures), and zuith the Judgment of 
 His arm He troubled the mighty 
 of the wicked/' This famous lin- 
 guist had no doubt that the sword 
 dated back two or three centuries 
 before the Christian era. 
 
 Just across the bay in Duxbur}^ 
 on Captain's Hill, so-called because 
 it was the home of Captain Miles 
 Standish, is a monument to the 
 memory of the "Pilgrim Warrior.'* 
 Thus in marble and song there will 
 be preserved the memory of the 
 hero in war but the coward in love. 
 And as long as there is young life, 
 
122 
 
 wooing and winning and response 
 ive hearts, John Alden and Pris- 
 cilla Mullens will never be forgot- 
 ten. 
 
 On July 9, 1861, Mrs. Long- 
 fellow was sitting in the library 
 with her little girls, putting into 
 small packages some curls she had 
 just finished cutting. While seal- 
 ing the packages a lighted match 
 falling to the floor set fire to her 
 summer gown and she was so se- 
 verely burned that she died the next 
 morning. 
 
 *'*Three days later her burial 
 took place at Mt. Auburn. It 
 was the anniversary of her mar- 
 riage-day ; and on her beautiful 
 head, lovely and unmarred in 
 death, some hand had placed a 
 
 * From Samuel Longfellow's Life of 
 Longfellow. 
 
123 
 
 wreath of orange blossoms. Her 
 husband was not there, — confined 
 to his chamber by the severe 
 burns which he had himself re- 
 ceived. These wounds healed 
 with time. Time could only as- 
 suage, never heal, the deeper 
 wounds that burned within." 
 
 For m.any months he was not 
 able to speak of this overwhelming, 
 crushing sorrow and he never en- 
 tirely recovered from it. All 
 through the "Joiii'nal" there is the 
 burdened heart cry of his grief. 
 "To the eyes of others, outwardly, 
 calm; but inwardly bleeding to 
 death," he wrote. After his death 
 there was found in his portfolio 
 The Cross of Snow, written 
 eighteen years after the death of 
 Mr5. Longfellow which still 
 breathed the changeless sorrow of 
 
124 
 
 his life. However he was not em- 
 bittered, not made cynical, but 
 rather grew more mellow and gen- 
 tle. He resumed the translation of 
 Dante, laid aside long ago, after a 
 time and later still began again to 
 delight the world with his own 
 poetry. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 TALES OF A WAYSIDE INN AND 
 FLEUER-DE-LUCE. 
 
 The Tales of a Wayside Inn 
 were published in 1863, 1872, and 
 1873, first, second, and third parts, 
 respectively. The Wayside Inn 
 still stands in Sudbury town, 
 dispensing hospitality. In fancy 
 we can see the group of friends 
 around the blazing fire of wood, 
 see the "ruddy glow" filling "the 
 parlor large and low;" 
 
 See it spread like a crimson stain, 
 Over the small square window 
 
 pane; 
 Then creep slowly along the wall. 
 And cast a halo over them all. 
 (125) 
 
126 
 
 First the landlord "grave in his 
 aspect and attire;" then the stu- 
 dent, the young Sicilian, and the 
 Spanish Jew from Alicant; the 
 theologian "from the school of 
 Cambridge on the Charles,'' the 
 Poet, and the Angel with the violin. 
 And if we listen we can hear the 
 magic music as it quivers forth 
 under the famed musician's"^ touch, 
 from the instrument in whose "hol- 
 low chamber" 
 
 "The maker from whose hand it 
 
 came 
 Had written his unrivalled name 
 Antonius Stradivarius." 
 
 And as the last wild melody dies 
 away there is the "hurry of hoofs 
 in a village street" and we hear the 
 
 * Tlie Musician was Ole Bull. 
 
127 
 
 Landlord telling of Paul Revere 
 
 and his wonderful ride. Each tells 
 his tale, the fire burns low, the 
 shadows deepen, the clock strikes 
 one, and the good nights are said. 
 
 While all the people portrayed 
 are real and the Sudbury Inn looks 
 as it is described to be the meetings 
 never really took place. Three of 
 the friends, however, spent their 
 summers there. The Birds of Kil- 
 lingsworth is the only one of the 
 tales that was of the poet's own in- 
 vention. While the others mav 
 show a lack of inventive power 
 they also show extensive reading 
 and literary craftsmanship for they 
 are told in his owm charming style. 
 
 The translation of Dante ^ re- 
 sumed under such sad conditions, 
 was continued and placed in the 
 
128 
 
 printer's hands in 1863. For two 
 years Norton and Lowell met with 
 the poet ever}^ Wednesday evening 
 in his study for the purpose of aid- 
 ing him in his revision of the work. 
 Mr. Norton says they paused over 
 every doubtful passage, objected, 
 criticised, praised with a freedom 
 that was made perfect by Mr. Long- 
 fellow's absolute sweetness, sim- 
 plicity, and modesty, and by the en- 
 tire confidence that existed between 
 them. Absorbed in this he pro- 
 duced fewer verses of his own at 
 this time. 
 
 Fleuer-de-Luce, containing 
 among other things, Christmas 
 Bells, The Wind Over the Chimney, 
 The Bells of Lynn, and Divina 
 Commedia was brought out in 1867. 
 
129 
 
 ''I heard the bells on Christmas Day 
 Their old, familiar carols play, 
 
 And wild and sweet 
 
 The words repeat 
 Of peace on earth, good will to 
 men! 
 
 "And thought how, as the day had 
 
 come, 
 The belfries of all Christendom 
 Had rolled aiong 
 The unbroken song 
 Of peace on earth, good will to 
 men ! 
 
 "Till, singing, singing on its way, 
 The world revolved from night to 
 day, 
 A voice, a chime, 
 A chant sublime 
 Of peace on earth, good will to 
 men!" 
 
 — From Christmas Bells. 
 
130 
 
 In 1868 Longfellow made his 
 third and last trip to Europe. 
 There was a large family party 
 consisting of his son, just married, 
 his three daughters, two sisters, a 
 brother, and Mr. T. G. Appleton. 
 The longing to again visit the old 
 familiar places was to be gratified. 
 
 He was the recipient of much at- 
 tention while abroad. It was told 
 him that the Queen would be sorry 
 not to meet him while in England, 
 whereupon, a day was fixed for 
 his visit to Windsor. After a year 
 and a half of rambling and sight- 
 seeing we find him once more at his 
 desk in Craigie House, "thankful 
 to have brought his little flock back 
 to the fold." ''How glad I am to 
 be at home ! The quiet and the 
 
131 
 
 rest are welcome after the surly sea. 
 But there is a tinge of sadness in 
 it, also." 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 CLOSING ACTIVITIES. 
 
 Although the years were adding 
 themselves to the poet's life, silver- 
 ing his hair and making more beau- 
 tiful his kindly face, the poetic spirit 
 had not grown old and he produced 
 some of his best verse during these 
 later years. 
 
 As we have hurried along catch- 
 ing a glimpse here and there into 
 the life of one of our best loved 
 poets it has been impossible even 
 to make mention of much that has 
 become familiar to every reader, 
 such as Midnight Mass for the Dy- 
 ing Year, The Skeleton in Armor, 
 so full of fine imagination. The 
 Wreck of the Hesperus, The Secret 
 of the Sea, The Lighthouse, Sea- 
 (132) 
 
133 
 
 weed and many others belonging 
 to his earher years. Bronson says 
 that he has no rival save Walt 
 Whitman on the subject of the sea. 
 While he told in a graphic 
 way of its terrors he loved best to 
 sing of its beauty. As he M^atched 
 the River Charles winding its sil- 
 ver S down to the great shining 
 sea, many thoughts, no doubt fol- 
 lowed and lie buried in its depths. 
 In 1874 The Hanging of the 
 Crane, that beautiful picture of how 
 '*a new household finds its place," 
 was written and we seem to see the 
 poet's own fireside as vv^e read, 
 
 "O fortunate, O happy day. 
 When a new household finds its 
 
 place 
 Among the myriad homes of earth, 
 
134 
 
 Like a new star just sprung to 
 
 birth, 
 And rolled on its harmonious way 
 Into the boundless realms of space !" 
 — From The Hanging of the Crane. 
 
 In July, 1875, the noble poem 
 Morituri Salutanius was read 
 at the fiftieth anniversary of his 
 class at Bowdoin College. If those 
 who are growing old would only 
 remember that 
 
 "Age is opportunity no less 
 
 Than Youth itself, though in an- 
 other dress, 
 
 And as the evening twilight fades 
 away 
 
 The sky is filled by stars invisible 
 by day," 
 
 there would be fewer people retired 
 because of it, fewer pessimists ; 
 
135 
 
 more sunshine in the world, more 
 happiness, and one would never see 
 that most pitiable object, one who 
 has outgrown his usefulness. 
 
 Keramos was published in 1878 
 and the Potter's song, as well as 
 the rest of the poem, shows that 
 the poet had not yet lost his power 
 to tell in verse something of the 
 philosophy of life. 
 
 Turn, turn, my wheel! Turn round 
 
 and round 
 Without a pause, without a sound : 
 So spins the flying world away! 
 This clay, well mixed with marl and 
 
 sand, 
 Follows the motion of my hand] 
 For some must follow, and some 
 
 command. 
 Though all are made of clay! 
 
136 
 
 Turn, turn, my zvheel! All things 
 
 must change 
 To something new, to something 
 
 strange. 
 Nothing that is can pause or 
 
 stay; 
 The moon will wax, the moon will 
 
 wane. 
 The mist and cloud will turn to 
 
 rain. 
 The rain to mist and cloud again. 
 To-morrow he to-day. 
 
 Turn, turn, my wheel! All life is 
 
 brief ; 
 What nozu is bud will soon be leaf, 
 IV hat now is leaf zvill soon decay; 
 The imnd blozvs east, the wind 
 
 blows zvest; 
 The^ blue eggs in the robbings nest 
 
137 
 
 Will soon have wings and beak and 
 breast^ 
 And flutter and fly away. 
 ^ ^ ^ ^ 
 
 Turn, turn, my wheel! . .This 
 
 earthen jar 
 A touch can make, a touch can mar; 
 
 And shall it to the Potter say. 
 What makest thou? Thou hast no 
 
 hand? 
 As men who think to understand 
 A world by their creator planned, 
 IVho wiser is than they. 
 
 >K * * 5k 
 
 Turn, turn, my zvheel! 'Tis na- 
 ture's plan 
 
 The child should grozv into the 
 man, 
 The man grow wrinkled, old and 
 gray; 
 
138 
 
 In youth the heart exults and sings, 
 The pulses leap, the feet have 
 
 wings; 
 In age the cricket chirps, and brings 
 The harvest home of day. 
 
 — From Keramos. 
 
 The Village Blacksmith is un- 
 doubtedly a favorite with all child- 
 ren because their childish imagina- 
 tions are not strained to see the 
 "spreading chestnut tree" under 
 which "the village smithy stands," 
 while the picture of him as "he goes 
 on Sunday to the church" and hears 
 his "daughter's voice singing in the 
 village choir" is a familiar scene. 
 How appropriate then that the 
 children of his beloved Cambridge 
 should present to Longfellow on 
 his seventy-second birthday an arm 
 chair made from this same chestnut 
 
139 
 
 tree, whose spreading branches had 
 afforded shelter from the sun's 
 fierce rays for many years on Brat- 
 tle Street, as a token of their love 
 for him. From My Arm-Chair 
 was written in response to the gift 
 and is one of his most beautiful 
 poems. 
 
 "The heart hath its own memory, 
 
 like the mind, 
 And in it are enshrined 
 The precious keepsakes, into which 
 
 is wrought 
 The giver's loving thought." 
 
 There is no more appreciative, 
 tender, charitable, and beautiful 
 delineation of the character of the 
 poet Burns than is to be found in 
 Longfellow's Poem on Robert 
 Burns, which was published in the 
 
I40 
 
 volume called Ultima Thulc in 
 1880. 
 
 ''I see amid the fields of Ayr 
 
 A ploughman, who, in foul and fair. 
 
 Sings at his task 
 So clear, we know not if it is 
 The laverock's song we hear, or his, 
 
 Nor care to ask." 
 
 The Chamber Over the Gate 
 also belongs to this period and is 
 full of the desolation that wrung 
 from David the cry, "O, Absalom, 
 my son, would God I had died for 
 thee." 
 
 Belonging to different periods are 
 many favorites such as My Lost 
 Youth, The Golden Milestone, 
 Santa Filomena, written in mem- 
 ory of Florence Nightingale, The 
 
141 
 
 Children's Hour, The Bridge, The 
 Day is Done, and many others. 
 
 Longfellow's friendships were of 
 long duration and strong devotion 
 and many of his poems are full of 
 the tenderness of them. Many of 
 his dearest friends had passed over 
 the river so dark and swift and he 
 was left to mourn their loss. 
 Charles Sumner was one of these 
 and he ends his tribute to him with 
 these lines. 
 
 "So when a great man dies, 
 For years beyond our ken, 
 
 The light he leaves behind him lies 
 Upon the paths of men." 
 
 On March 15, 1882, Longfellow 
 wrote the final lines in The Bells 
 of San Bias which was his last 
 poem. 
 
142 
 
 "Out of the shadows of the night 
 The world rolls into light. 
 It is daybreak everywhere." 
 On Saturday night March i8 he 
 was seized with a chill and with 
 his usual thoughtfulness for others 
 would not rouse the household un- 
 til morning. He became seriously 
 ill, lingered a week, and passed 
 peacefuly and quietly away on 
 Friday, March 24, 1882. On 
 the Sunday following he was 
 buried in beautiful Mount Au- 
 burn Cemetery where sleep so 
 many of our famous dead. 
 There was universal sorrow when 
 the world knew that the sweet 
 singer was no more and there were 
 many expressions of it. The most 
 remarkable tribute to his memory 
 Y^'as the placing of his bust in the 
 
143 
 
 Poet's Corner in Westminster Ab- 
 bey in March 1884. He was the 
 first American so honored and 
 only Lowell has since been ac- 
 corded a similar honor. Portland, 
 the city of his birth, erected a 
 bronze statue in honor of her il- 
 lustrious son and visitors always go 
 to Longfellow square to render to 
 him the homage that he merits. 
 
 Longfellow has been called the 
 Poet of Childhood, and while this is 
 a fitting title for one whose sym- 
 pathy and love always reached the 
 children, let us rather call him the 
 Poet of the People, for certainly he 
 touched the hearts of all with his 
 simple, tender, earnest messages. 
 That he is our best loved poet there 
 can be little doubt ; that he is our 
 most popular one is certain. 
 
144 
 
 Miss Alice Longfellow, the poet's 
 daughter, still lives in the Craigie 
 House which is now better known 
 as the Longfellow House. Her 
 father's desk stands in its accus- 
 tomed place with a few favorite 
 books near at hand and his pen 
 ready to pick up. But alas, 
 
 ''Hushed now the sweet consoling 
 
 tongue 
 Of him whose lyre the muses 
 
 strung ; 
 His last low swan-song has been 
 
 suns:." 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 SELECTIONS FROM THE POEMS OF 
 LONGFELLOW. 
 
 Prayer is Innocence' friend; and 
 willingly flieth incessant 
 
 'Twixt the earth and the sky, the 
 carrier-pigeon of Heaven. 
 — The Children of the Lord's 
 
 Supper. 
 
 No one is so accursed by fate, 
 No one so utterly desolate, 
 But some heart, though unknown, 
 Responds unto his own. 
 
 — Endymion. 
 
 What I most prize in woman 
 Is her affections, not her intellect! 
 The intellect is finite ; but the affec- 
 tions 
 
 (145) 
 
146 
 
 Are infinite, and cannot be ex- 
 hausted. 
 
 Your supper is like the hidalgo's 
 dinner, very little meat and a great 
 deal of tablecloth. 
 
 There's nothing so undignified as 
 anger. 
 
 — The Spanish Student. 
 
 Silently one by one, in the infinite 
 
 meadows of Heaven, 
 Blossomed the lovely stars, the 
 
 forget-me-nots of the angels. 
 — Evangeline. 
 
 "If you wish a thing to be well 
 done, you must do it yourself, you 
 must not leave it to others !" 
 — Courtship of Miles Standish. 
 
147 
 
 The heights by great men reached 
 and kept 
 Were not attained by sudden 
 flight, 
 But they while their companions 
 slept, 
 Were toiling upward in the night. 
 — The Ladder of St. Augustine. 
 
 Each man's chimney is his Golden 
 
 Milestone ; 
 Is the central point from which 
 
 he measures every distance 
 Through the gateways of the world 
 
 around him. 
 
 ^ ^ ^ ^ 
 
 We may build more splendid habi- 
 tations, 
 
 Fill our room.s with paintings and 
 with sculpture, 
 
148 
 
 But we cannot 
 Buy with g®ld the old associations. 
 — The Golden Milestone, 
 
 Whene'er a noble deed is wrought, 
 Whene'er is spoken a noble thought, 
 
 Our hearts in glad surprise, 
 
 To higher levels rise. 
 
 — Santa Filomena. 
 
 Be discreet ; — 
 For if the flour be fresh and sound. 
 
 And if the bread be light and 
 sweet, 
 Who careth in what mill 'twas 
 ground, 
 
 Or what oven felt the heat, 
 Unless as old Cervantes said, 
 You are looking after better bread 
 
 Than any that is made of wheat? 
 You know that people now-a-days 
 To what is old give little praise; 
 
149 
 
 All must be new in prose and 
 verse ; 
 
 They want hot bread, or some- 
 thing worse, 
 Fresh every morning, and half 
 baked ; 
 
 The wholesome bread of yes- 
 terday, 
 
 Too stale for them, is thrown 
 away. 
 Nor is their thirst with water 
 slaked. 
 
 Do thy duty; that is best; 
 Leave unto thy Lord the rest. 
 
 — Tales of a Wayside Inn. 
 
 No endeavor is in vain; 
 
 Its reward is in the doing. 
 
 And the rapture of pursuing 
 
 Is the prize the vanquished gain. 
 
 — The Wind over the Chimney. 
 
ISO 
 
 Stay, stay at home, my heart, and 
 
 rest; 
 Home keeping hearts are happiest, 
 For those that wander they know 
 
 not where 
 Are full of trouble and full of care ; 
 To stay at home is best. 
 
 — Song. 
 
 Wounds are not healed 
 By the unbending of the bow that 
 made them. 
 
 — Michael Angela. 
 
 Let us be grateful to writers for 
 what is left in the inkstand ; 
 
 When to leave off is an art only 
 attained by the few. 
 
 — Elegiac Verse. 
 
OCT 18 190^