The poet had the happiest way of making people feel at ease with
themselves, and so of bringing out their best. A man often left his
presence feeling himself a more worthy fellow than he had done when he
had entered it. And so he ought to have been.
But there were times when peculiar exhibitions of character roused
Whittier to keen comment.
While in Boston he was talking one day to two ladies at the same hotel.
A young woman just out of boarding school coming to pay them a visit,
was introduced to the poet. But she was far from comprehending the
honor done her, and it was impossible then and there to enlighten her.
“Whittier!” she repeated patronizingly. At the school they had just
been reading “Snow Bound.” It was beautiful--“so fine!” And she gushed
inanely in its praise. Had he read it? she questioned.
The poet admitted that _he had looked it over_!
And he admired it, of course? Taking assent for granted, she next asked
Mr. Whittier _if he were any relative of the poet_? He answered her
that he had not studied out what relation.
“_And have you ever seen the Poet Whittier?_” she propounded promptly.
The poet thought that he _had_ met him.
For some time the young woman talked on, happy in the sound of her own
voice and patronizing still more both poem and poet--to say nothing of
the unknown who bore his name.
In speaking of her the poet remarked that he always pitied such young
women.
* * * * *
Among his many experiences of autograph hunters he enjoyed the
following:
He was on his way to the mountains. It was a delightful autumn day.
The sunshine, the brilliant colors of earth and sky, the nectar of the
clear and balmy air, all acted upon his sensitive nerves and brought
a keen pleasure which prepared him for the enjoyment of any amusing
phase of human nature that might present itself. The train drew up at
a junction. As the poet alighted with that alertness of movement which
to the last distinguished him and made his way toward his exchange, a
young woman forced a passage through the rushing crowd and came up to
him.
“Are you Mr. Whittier?” she inquired of him breathlessly.
The poet assented.
“Won’t you please write your name in my album?” And she held out her
book open at the desired page.
His dark eyes lighting with amusement passed swiftly from the puffing
train--his train on which in another moment the bell would ring and
from which the conductor was already shouting, “All aboard!”--to the
eager and entreating face of the speaker. He appreciated the situation;
he liked her pluck. But what was he to write with? Fountain pens were
then uninvented.
He flashed his glance about the station; then with the young woman in
tow, hurried to the telegraph office, seized a pen, dashed off his
autograph, walked swiftly to his train, and in another moment was being
whirled onward.
That must have been one of the occasions when his hand smote his knee
in keen appreciation of the episode.
* * * * *
Although Whittier never perpetrated matrimony, he was far from being
like the melancholy Jacques, and much enjoyed looking at happiness
through other men’s eyes--and through women’s too.
He was vastly amused at the man who complained to him because a certain
young relative of the poet would persist in quitting the room by one
door at the moment he entered it by another.
“The woman ought to do her part!” quoted the poet with great gusto from
the plaint of the complainer who was too dense to read the significant
scorn of the lady’s conduct to him.
* * * * *
A mother boasted to him that she had never done anything to have her
daughters married.
“But thee ought,” retorted the poet.
When one day a young man had come with a span of fine horses and
carried off one of his nieces to drive, Whittier commented on the event
in his most humorous vein. He didn’t think she cared for the young man
in the least, he said. The span was the attraction. As for what her
uncle thought of her going, she cared nothing at all. He didn’t know
what he could do about it--except find a young man with three horses!
* * * * *
But for all the poet’s jesting, love’s young dreamers were very
interesting persons to him. He once said with a laugh which yet had
conviction under it, that he would have made a good husband--if he’d
been caught young!
* * * * *
He was confident that in many instances he could have made better
matches for certain young persons than they had done for themselves.
And with his vision that nothing escaped, his keen perceptions, his
infinite tact, it came about more than once that he turned the
wavering balance of fancy in the head--or heart--of some young man,
or woman, and, like destiny, resolved uncertainty into joy. And where
he was thus successful, the lovers themselves had no inkling of his
co-operation and outsiders could only surmise that the poet’s skill
might have had play.
Only once in this skillful manipulation of the susceptible heart of
youth did the credit for his insinuations recoil upon his own head. A
betrothed couple came one day to pay him a visit. In the course of this
the young man congratulating himself upon the wisdom and success of his
choice, openly commended his host for having suggested it to him--and
this in the presence of the intended bride! It was in vain that the
embarrassed poet hastened to repudiate the charge, of which he could
never have been guilty in the manner of which he was accused. This
only made the young man more insistent. Whittier’s quickness of retort
must have opened to him some way of escape from the situation. And he
had a consolation; for in telling the story, he added that during this
conversation the young woman gazed at her betrothed as if she believed
wisdom would die with him.
* * * * *
On the day of the wedding of the poet’s niece at his Amesbury home the
whole house was in commotion. The poet in a vain attempt to restore
order was overheard saying with authority to his cousin, Mr. Cartland,
who had become infected with the general restlessness:
“Thee sit down, Joseph. Thee isn’t going to be married.”