E. Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake) is the youngest child of a family
of four born to the late G. H. M. Johnson (Onwanonsyshon), Head
Chief of the Six Nations Indians, and his wife, Emily S. Howells,
a lady of pure English parentage, her birth-place being Bristol,
England, but the land of her adoption was Canada.
Chief Johnson was of the renowned Mohawk tribe, and of the "Blood
Royal," being a scion of one of the fifty noble families which
composed the historical confederation founded by Hiawatha upwards of
four hundred years ago, and known at that period as the Brotherhood
of the Five Nations, but which was afterwards named the Iroquois by
the early French missionaries and explorers. These Iroquois Indians
have from the earliest times been famed for their loyalty to the
British Crown, in defence of which they fought against both French
and Colonial Revolutionists; and for which fealty they were granted
the magnificent lands bordering the Grand River in the County of
Brant, Ontario, and on which the tribes still live.
It was upon this Reserve, on her father's estate, "Chiefswood,"
that Pauline Johnson was born. And it is inevitable that the loyalty
to Britain and Britain's flag which she inherited from her Red
ancestors, as well as from her English mother, breathes through both
her prose and poetic writings.
At an extremely early age this little Indian girl evinced an intense
love of poetry; and even before she could write, composed many
little childish jingles about her pet dogs and cats. She was also
very fond of learning by heart anything that took her fancy, and
would memorize, apparently without effort, verses that were read to
her. A telling instance of this early love of poetry may be cited,
when on one occasion, while she was yet a tiny child of four, a
friend of her father's, who was going to a distant city, asked her
what he could bring her as a present, and she replied, "Verses,
please."
At twelve years of age she was writing fairly creditable poems, but
was afraid to offer them for publication, lest in after years she
might regret their almost inevitable crudity. So she did not publish
anything until after her school days were ended.
Her education was neither extensive nor elaborate, and embraced
neither High School nor College. A nursery governess for two years
at home, three years at an Indian day school half a mile from her
home, and two years in the central school of the City of Brantford
was the extent of her educational training. But besides this she
acquired a wide general knowledge, having been, through childhood
and early girlhood, a great reader, especially of poetry. Before
she was twelve years old she had read every line of Scott's poems,
every line of Longfellow, much of Byron, Shakespeare, and such books
as Addison's "Spectator," Foster's Essays and Owen Meredith.
The first periodicals to accept her poems and place them before
the public were "Gems of Poetry," a small magazine published in
New York, and "The Week," established by the late Professor Goldwin
Smith, of Toronto, the "New York Independent," and "Toronto Saturday
Night." Since then she has contributed to "The Athenaeum," "The
Academy," "Black and White," "The Pall Mall Gazette," "The Daily
Express," and "Canada," all of London, England; "The Review of
Reviews," Paris, France; "Harper's Weekly," "New York Independent,"
"Outing," "The Smart Set," "Boston Transcript," "The Buffalo
Express," "Detroit Free Press," "The Boys' World" (David C. Cook
Publishing Co., Elgin, Illinois), "The Mothers' Magazine" (David
C. Cook Publishing Co.), "The Canadian Magazine," "Toronto Saturday
Night," and "The Province," Vancouver, B.C.
In 1892 the opportunity of a lifetime came to this young versifier,
when Frank Yeigh, the president of the Young Liberals' Club, of
Toronto, conceived the idea of having an evening of Canadian
literature, at which all available Canadian authors should be
guests and read from their own works.
Among the authors present on this occasion was Pauline Johnson, who
contributed to the programme one of her compositions, entitled "A
Cry from an Indian Wife"; and when she recited without text this
much-discussed poem, which shows the Indian's side of the North-West
Rebellion, she was greeted with tremendous applause from an audience
which represented the best of Toronto's art, literature and culture.
She was the only one on the programme who received an encore, and to
this she replied with one of her favourite canoeing poems.
The following morning the entire press of Toronto asked why this
young writer was not on the platform as a professional reader;
while two of the dailies even contained editorials on the subject,
inquiring why she had never published a volume of her poems, and
insisted so strongly that the public should hear more of her,
that Mr. Frank Yeigh arranged for her to give an entire evening
in Association Hall within two weeks from the date of her first
appearance. It was for this first recital that she wrote the poem
by which she is best known, "The Song my Paddle Sings."
On this eventful occasion, owing to the natural nervousness which
besets a beginner, and to the fact that she had scarcely had time
to memorize her new poem, she became confused in this particular
member, and forgot her lines. With true Indian impassiveness,
however, she never lost her self-control, but smilingly passed over
the difficulty by substituting something else; and completely won
the hearts of her audience by her coolness and self-possession. The
one thought uppermost in her mind, she afterwards said, was that she
should not leave the platform and thereby acknowledge her defeat;
and it is undoubtedly this same determination to succeed which has
carried her successfully through the many years she has been before
the public.
The immediate success of this entertainment caused Mr. Yeigh to
undertake the management of a series of recitals for her throughout
Canada, with the object of enabling her to go to England to submit
her poems to a London publisher. Within two years this end was
accomplished, and she spent the season of 1894 in London, and had
her book of poems, "The White Wampum," accepted by John Lane, of the
"Bodley Head." She carried with her letters of introduction from His
Excellency the Earl of Aberdeen and Rev. Professor Clark, of Toronto
University, which gave her a social and literary standing in London
which left nothing to be desired.
In London she met many authors, artists and critics, who gave this
young Canadian girl the right hand of fellowship; and she was
received and asked to give recitals in the drawing-rooms of many
diplomats, critics and members of the nobility.
Her book, "The White Wampum," was enthusiastically received by the
critics and press; and was highly praised by such papers as the
Edinburgh "Scotsman," "Glasgow Herald," "Manchester Guardian,"
"Bristol Mercury," "Yorkshire Post," "The Whitehall Review," "Pall
Mall Gazette," the London "Athenaeum," the London "Academy," "Black
and White," "Westminster Review," etc.
Upon her return to Canada she made her first trip to the Pacific
Coast, giving recitals at all the cities and towns en route. Since
then she has crossed the Rocky Mountains nineteen times, and
appeared as a public entertainer at every city and town between
Halifax and Vancouver.
In 1903 the George Morang Publishing Company, of Toronto, brought
out her second book of poems, entitled "Canadian Born," which was so
well received that the entire edition was exhausted within the year.
About this time she visited Newfoundland, taking with her letters
of introduction from Sir Charles Tupper to Sir Robert Bond, the
then Prime Minister of the colony. Her recital in St. John was the
literary event of the season, and was given under the personal
patronage of His Excellency the Governor-General and Lady McCallum,
and the Admiral of the British Flagship.
After this recital in the capital Miss Johnson went to all the small
seaports and to Hearts' Content, the great Atlantic Cable station,
her mission being more to secure material for magazine articles on
the staunch Newfoundlanders and their fishing villages than for the
purpose of giving recitals.
In 1906 she returned to England, and made her first appearance in
Steinway Hall, under the distinguished patronage of Lord and Lady
Strathcona, to whom she carried letters of introduction from the
Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Prime Minister of Canada. On
this occasion she was accompanied by Mr. Walter McRaye, who added
greatly to the Canadian interest of the programme by his inimitable
renditions of Dr. Drummond's Habitant poems.
The following year she again visited London, returning by way of the
United States, where she and Mr. McRaye were engaged by the American
Chautauquas for a series of recitals covering eight weeks, during
which time they went as far as Boulder, Colorado. Then, after one
more tour of Canada, she decided to give up public work, settle down
in the city of her choice, Vancouver, British Columbia, and devote
herself to literature only.
Only a woman of tremendous powers of endurance could have borne up
under the hardships necessarily encountered in travelling through
North-Western Canada in pioneer days as Miss Johnson did; and
shortly after settling down in Vancouver the exposure and hardship
she had endured began to tell upon her, and her health completely
broke down. For more than a year she has been an invalid; and as she
was not able to attend to the business herself, a trust was formed
by some of the leading citizens of her adopted city for the purpose
of collecting, and publishing for her benefit, her later works.
Among these is a number of beautiful Indian legends which she has
been at great pains to collect; and a splendid series of boys'
stories, which were exceedingly well received when they ran recently
in an American boys' magazine.
During the sixteen years Miss Johnson was travelling she had many
varied and interesting experiences. She has driven up the old
Battleford trail before the railroad went through, and across the
Boundary country in British Columbia in the romantic days of the
early pioneers; and once she took an 850-mile drive up the Cariboo
trail to the gold-fields. She was always an ardent canoeist, ran
many strange rivers, crossed many a lonely lake, and camped in many
an unfrequented place. These venturous trips she took more from her
inherent love of nature and of adventure than from any necessity
of her profession.
After an illness of two years' duration Miss Johnson died in
Vancouver on March 7, 1913. The heroic spirit in which she endured
long months of suffering is expressed in her poem entitled "And He
Said 'Fight On'" which she wrote after she was informed by her
physician that her illness would prove fatal.
Time and its ally, Dark Disarmament
Have compassed me about;
Have massed their armies, and on battle bent
My forces put to rout,
But though I fight alone, and fall, and die,
Talk terms of Peace? Not I.
It is eminently fitting that this daughter of Nature should have
been laid to rest in no urban cemetery. According to her own request
she was buried in Stanley Park, Vancouver's beautiful heritage of
the forest primeval. A simple stone surrounded by rustic palings
marks her grave and on this stone is carved the one word "Pauline."
There she lies among ferns and wild flowers a short distance from
Siwash Rock, the story of which she has recorded in the legends of
her race. In time to come a pathway to her grave will be worn by
lovers of Canadian poetry who will regard it as one of the most
romantic of our literary shrines.