AN INDIANA CHOIR
I. _Early Writers_
The specific talent necessary to the expression of local life is much
rarer than the ability to write of life in the abstract. If the knack
of writing accompanied a sensibility to the life that lay nearest, we
should long ago have had an abundant American literature descriptive of
conditions that have passed and will not, in the very nature of things,
recur. But the line of impressionability may not be controlled; and
though many protests have been launched against minor American poets
for looking beyond the robin to the nightingale, the rejection of the
near continues, though in a diminishing degree. The early poets of the
Ohio Valley did not often approach closely to the Western soil; they
lacked insight and courage and their work was usually not interesting.
When they occasionally essayed a Western subject, they were unable
to bring to bear upon it any novelty of treatment; it was all “icily
regular, splendidly null.” William T. Coggeshall states in the preface
to his “Poets and Poetry of the West” (1864) that in the early years
of the nineteenth century “soldiers, hunters, and boatmen had among
them many songs descriptive of adventures incident to backwoods
life, some of which were not destitute of poetic merit; but they
were known only around campfires, or on ‘broadhorns’” (flat-boats),
and tradition, he adds, preserved none worthy to be included in his
anthology. But these racy songs would have been of greater value than
much of the verse that he has preserved in his pages, though as a
part of the history of development this, too, is not to be spurned.
Coggeshall’s work includes notices of ninety-seven men and fifty-five
women. Twenty-three of the total he attributes to Indiana by reason of
residence, and thirteen of the number were natives of the State. Only
a small proportion of the poets named by Coggeshall survived, though
the writers of the biographical notes accompanying his selections were
cordial and anxious to confer immortality. William D. Howells and John
J. Piatt are included, and Mr. Howells wrote several of the sketches.
It is diverting to read the opinion of Mr. Howells’s biographer that
“some of his prose sketches are quite equal in grace of conception
and individuality of treatment to any of his poems.” He was then
twenty-seven.
Cincinnati and Lexington, Kentucky, were early rivals for literary
prominence at the West: one was the seat of Cincinnati College,
the other of Transylvania University. Many books were published at
Lexington before 1825, and _The Medley_, or _Monthly Miscellany_,
which appeared there in 1803, is believed to have been the first
magazine published west of the Alleghanies. Hunt’s _Western Review_,
which was formerly regarded as the pioneer, dated from 1819, and was
also a Lexington publication. Lexington dropped out, and Louisville
fell into place as a defender of the literary faith with the advent
of George D. Prentice, who became the ardent champion of the muses in
the Ohio Valley. The headquarters of poets for this region was the
office of the Louisville _Journal_ during Prentice’s reign, and all
of the Coggeshall poets laid the tribute of their song before him.
To paraphrase Bishop Butler’s remark about the strawberry, quoted by
Walton, doubtless Prentice might have declined a poem or discouraged a
poet, but doubtless he never did. He was not an exacting critic, and he
encouraged many who were without talent; but he took away the reproach
of the neglected and unappreciated, and now and then he found a few
grains in the chaff to pay him for his trouble.
The _Literary Gazette_, which appeared at Cincinnati in 1824, with
the motto “Not to display learning, but to excite a taste for it,”
numbered Mrs. Julia L. Dumont, of Vevay, among its contributors; and
she was the first Indiana writer to become identified with the group of
aspirants that now began to appear along the Ohio. The prospectus of
another _Western Review_, published at Cincinnati for three years from
May, 1827, declared that “we are a scribbling and forthputting people.
Little as they have dreamed of the fact in the Atlantic country, we
have our thousand orators and poets.” However this may have been,
“the Atlantic country” invaded the Ohio Valley in 1835, when the
_Western Messenger_ was begun at Cincinnati, under the auspices of the
Western Unitarian Association. It was edited first by the Rev. Ephraim
Peabody, and later, at Louisville, by James Freeman Clarke. Clarke left
Louisville in 1840, and the _Messenger_ was continued at Cincinnati
by the Rev. W. H. Channing. John B. Dillon represented Indiana in its
table of contents, and found himself in good company, with Emerson,
William Ellery Channing, Jones Very, and C. P. Cranch. The periodical
was, as Venable calls it, “an exotic--a Boston flower blooming on
the Ohio,” and it ceased to appear in 1841. In the same year, the
_Ladies’ Repository_ made its appearance at Cincinnati, under Methodist
auspices, and was published continuously for thirty-six years. Mrs.
Dumont, Mrs. Sarah T. Bolton, Miss Mary Louise Chitwood, Mrs. Rebecca
S. Nichols, Mrs. A. L. Ruter Dufour, Horace P. Biddle, and Isaac H.
Julian were the principal Indiana contributors. The number of Indiana
writers increased steadily, and the _Genius of the West_, a Cincinnati
magazine dating from 1855, extended the list to include the names
of Benjamin S. Parker, John B. Dillon, and Louise E. Vickroy. Peter
Fishe Reed, also a contributor to the _Genius of the West_ and similar
magazines of the period, combined farming with literary experiments
near Mount Vernon (Indiana), and lived for a time at Indianapolis. The
majority of these pioneer periodicals lived only a short time, and the
Civil War brought a final interruption to most of them; they passed
out with the “annuals,” whose literary flavor was similar. Indiana’s
ante-bellum writers usually looked to Louisville and Cincinnati for
publicity, and no serious effort was made to establish literary
magazines within the State.[45] It curiously happened, however, that
Emerson Bennett, a voluminous producer of “penny dreadfuls,” published
a literary paper called the _Casket_, at Lawrenceburg (1846), but soon
abandoned it. The patient research of Venable discovered the _Western
Censor_, published at Indianapolis in 1823-1824, and _The Family
Schoolmaster_, which had a brief existence at Richmond in 1839. _The
Querist_ was conducted by Mrs. Nichols for a few months at Cincinnati
in 1844, and Henry Ward Beecher’s _Indiana Farmer and Gardener_ was
begun at Indianapolis in 1845, but removed to Cincinnati in the
following year. Beecher’s contributions to this paper were the nucleus
of his book “A Pleasant Talk about Fruits, Flowers, and Farming.” The
_Literary Messenger_ is credited to Versailles, 1854.
Coggeshall included among the Indianians in his anthology William
Wallace Harney, who was born (1832) at Bloomington, where his father
was a professor in Indiana University; and William Ross Wallace, born
(1819) at Lexington, Kentucky, and educated at Bloomington and Hanover
colleges; but as the literary life of both began after they had left
the State, they may hardly be catalogued as Indiana authors. The Rev.
Sidney Dyer, a native of New York State (1814), was for a number of
years (1852-1859), a Baptist minister at Indianapolis. He is the
author of a number of books, and his writings include many popular
songs and poems. Isaac H. Julian, a native of Wayne County (1823),
and the brother of George W. Julian, hardly added subsequently to the
reputation he had gained prior to the publication of Coggeshall’s
book, and the same is true of Granville M. Ballard, who was born in
Kentucky (1833), and after his graduation from Asbury University became
a resident of Indianapolis, where he is still living. Horace P. Biddle,
born in Ohio (1818-1900), removed at an early age to Indiana, where he
became prominent in affairs, and held many public offices before his
retirement. He aided in the early efforts in behalf of common school
education, and was a diligent student and writer. Noble Butler is
placed in Kentucky’s list of early writers, though his residence at
Hanover gives Indiana a claim upon him. He frequently translated German
poetry and wrote original verse occasionally; but the fugitive essays
of his nephew, Noble C. Butler, of Indianapolis, are better literature.
Coggeshall includes also Jonathan W. Gordon and Henry W. Ellsworth, of
Indianapolis, whose contributions to the literature of the period were
slight and without distinction. Ellsworth was a native of Connecticut
and a graduate of Yale (1834). Amanda L. Ruter Dufour (1822-1899) and
Laura M. Thurston (1812-1842) are properly included among Indiana’s
early poets. The latter wrote the lines “On Crossing the Alleghanies”
and “The Green Hills of My Fatherland,” which are above the average in
the collection and were once much applauded. George W. Cutter, whose
“Song of Steam,” beginning,--
“Harness me down with your iron bands;
Be sure of your curb and rein,”--
was once in favor, lived in Indiana, and sat in the General Assembly.
He died at Washington in 1865. Rebecca S. Nichols was long associated
with the little band of writers who printed verses and tales in
Louisville and Cincinnati publications, and her literary instincts were
truer than those of most of her contemporaries. She is still living at
Indianapolis.
A mournful interest attaches to the work of Mary Louise Chitwood, who
was born at Mount Carmel, October 29, 1832, and died there twenty-three
years later, sincerely mourned by the whole choir of Western poets.
Prentice had encouraged her, and he wrote a memoir to accompany a
volume of her verses that appeared in 1857. Her work promised well,
though it shared the defects of most of the verse of the day.
Sarah T. Bolton is one of the most interesting figures in Coggeshall,
and though born in Kentucky (1820), her long life was spent principally
in Indiana. Her husband, Nathaniel Bolton, edited the first newspaper
ever published in Indianapolis. Mrs. Bolton began writing at an early
age, and through many years it may be said that she stood for poetry
in Indiana. Many of her poems are stiff and formal and show little
originality; but often her pieces are free and spontaneous, and she
had humor, which most of the early poets of the West lacked. Her last
volume (1891) is dedicated “To the poets of Indiana, my children after
the spirit.” She was known to Willis and Morris, of the Knickerbocker
group contemporary with her. Her husband was appointed consul at
Geneva in 1855, and she lived for a number of years abroad, finding
fresh material for poems in her travels. She died at Indianapolis in
1893. Her best-known poem is “Paddle Your Own Canoe.” She was a loyal
Indianian and wrote the lines:--
“The winds of Heaven never fanned,
The circling sunlight never spanned
The borders of a better land
Than our own Indiana.”
Benjamin S. Parker, of all the poets discovered in Indiana by
Coggeshall, acquired the greatest skill in versification, and wrote
most comprehensively of the pioneer life. He was born on a farm near
New Castle (1833), and is one, at least, to whom the phrase “racy of
the soil” needs no explanation. He lived in a log cabin, performing the
hardest farm labor, and long observation of life at the West made him
an authority in matters of customs and dialect. His volume “The Cabin
in the Clearing” (1887) contains many poems in which the trials of the
earlier settlers are graphically depicted, and it was his right, as
one who had aided in the rough work of the pioneers, to urge the new
generations to use worthily the opportunities which they inherited. Of
the fauna and flora of his own woodlands Mr. Parker became the especial
celebrant. The following lines from one of his most graceful pieces are
characteristic of his happiest moods:--
“I had a dream of other days,--
In golden luxury waved the wheat;
In tangled greenness shook the maize;
The squirrels ran with nimble feet,
And in and out among the trees
The hangbird darted like a flame;
The cat-bird piped his melodies,
Purloining every warbler’s fame:
And then I heard triumphal song,
’Tis morning and the days are long.”
Mr. Parker felt, more than any other poet of the Ohio Valley, the
grandeur of the vast woodlands as the pioneers found them, and he
has touched upon it constantly in his writings. He lived for several
years in Canada, as a consular officer, and wrote a series of poems
under Northern influences; but he has been most fortunate in subjects
derived from home experiences. He is a connecting link between the
earliest Indiana writers and their successors, and he has been one
of the humblest and most devoted and sincere of all the servants of
literature in his State.
II. _Forceythe Willson_
It is an abrupt transition from these pioneers of poesy to Forceythe
Willson, the only Indiana poet who ever came in contact with the New
England group. Emerson, in the preface to his “Parnassus” (1874), says,
“I have inserted only one of the remarkable poems of Forceythe Willson,
a young Wisconsin poet of extraordinary promise, who died very soon
after this was written.” The poem chosen was “In State.” This placing
of Willson in Wisconsin is, as Piatt says in his eloquent sketch of the
poet,[46] rather needless, for he was never connected with Wisconsin
in any way. He was born at Genesee Falls, New York, April 10, 1837. In
1846 his father removed to Kentucky, and in 1852 to New Albany. Willson
spent about a year at Antioch College, in Ohio, and went afterward
to Harvard, but left in his sophomore year, owing to ill health. His
home was in Indiana from 1852 to 1864. He wrote his best poems,
indeed the greater part of his slender product, at New Albany, and his
residence there, in immediate contact with the seat of war, colored
his distinctive work. He married, in 1863, Elizabeth Conwell Smith,
whom he had met the preceding year at New Albany, and whose literary
gifts created a bond of sympathy between them. They removed shortly
to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where one of Willson’s brothers was in
school. He purchased a house on the Mount Auburn road, near Lowell’s
home, with an outlook on the Charles River. James R. Gilmore (Edmund
Kirke) was his neighbor and saw much of him at Cambridge. He wrote, in
1895, his recollections, testifying to Willson’s unusual qualities, and
giving this description of his personal appearance:--
“Take him, all in all, he was the most lovable man I ever knew; and
as a mere specimen of physical manhood he was a joy to look at. A
little above the medium height, he was perfectly proportioned and of
a sinewy, symmetrical figure. His hair was raven black, wavy, and
glossy as satin. His skin was alight olive, slightly tinged with red,
and his features were regular, somewhat prominent, and exceedingly
flexible, showing an organization of a highly sensitive character.
But his eyes were what riveted the observer’s attention. Mr.
Longfellow told me they were the finest type of the Oriental, but I
never saw eyes--Eastern or Western--to compare with them in luminous
power. They were full, large, and dark, with overhanging lashes; but
for the life of me I cannot tell their precise color. At times they
seemed a deep blue, at other times an intense black, and then they
were balls of fire, as he was stirred by some strong emotion. They
spoke the ready language of a deep, strong, fiery, yet chastened,
nature as it was moved by love, joy, sorrow or indignation.”[47]
Piatt remarks upon his “Oriental look and manner,” and all who knew
him were impressed by his distinguished appearance and grave courtesy.
In 1858 New Albany became interested in spiritualism. Willson fell
under the spell and began a study of the subject. Piatt says that
Willson “soon abandoned the professors, but retained until his death
a serious spiritual theory or faith of his own. He believed--and he
was absolutely honest and sincere, I am sure, in his faith--that the
spirits of the dead could, and at times do, have communication with the
living.”
Willson seems not to have had an active occupation at any time. His
father had been successful in business, and dying at New Albany in
1859, left a comfortable fortune to his children. The poet lived by
himself for a number of years, at New Albany, in a small house where he
surrounded himself with books and led the life of a student. Louisville
is directly across the Ohio from New Albany, and Willson was known
to a few of the literary people on the Kentucky side, particularly
to Prentice. The approach of the Civil War aroused in him a deep
interest in its great issues, and he wrote editorials in support of
the Union cause for Prentice’s _Journal_. He began in the first year
of the war, and concluded later, his poem “In State,” which, in spite
of its occasional vagueness and its despairing view of the political
situation, is written in an effective stanza and is splendidly
imaginative. He gloomily assumed that the nation was dead--hence his
personification of it as a prone figure lying “in state,” and he brings
the rulers of Europe to look upon it,--
“The winds have tied the drifted snow
Around the face and chin; and lo,
The sceptred giants come and go
And shake their shadowy crowns and say: ‘We always feared it would be
so!’”
There is hardly a stanza in the poem that does not contain some
striking image. It moves on in the mournful cadence of a _miserere_:--
“The Sisterhood that was so sweet,
The Starry System sphered complete,
Which the mazed Orient used to greet,
The Four and Thirty fallen Stars glimmer and glitter at her feet.”
He published, January 1, 1863, as a carrier’s address in the Louisville
_Journal_, “The Old Sergeant,” which Piatt believed to have been “the
transcript of a real history, none of the names in it being fictitious,
and the story being reported as exactly as possible from the lips
of a Federal assistant surgeon named Austin, with whom Willson was
acquainted at New Albany.” The poem appeared anonymously, and for some
reason, which was never explained, Willson seemed reluctant at first
to admit its authorship. It attracted wide attention. Gilmore relates
that early in 1863, in the office of the _Atlantic Monthly_, he met
Dr. Holmes, who held in his hand a copy of the Louisville _Journal_,
containing “The Old Sergeant.” “Read that,” said he, “and tell me if
it’s not the finest thing since the war began. Sit down and read it
here; you might lose it if I let you take it away.” The ballad is found
in “The Old Sergeant and Other Poems” (1867). It is a vivid narrative
of sustained power and interest, deriving strength from the earnestness
of the recital and the simple language, sometimes descending to army
slang, of the soldier. The poem is historically accurate and is a fine
celebration of the battle of Shiloh:
“There was where Lew Wallace showed them he was of the canny kin,
There was where old Nelson thundered, and where Rousseau waded in;
There McCook sent ’em to breakfast, and we all began to win--
There was where the grapeshot took me, just as we began to win.
“Now, a shroud of snow and silence over everything was spread;
And but for this old blue mantle and the old hat on my head,
I should not have even doubted, to this moment, I was dead--
For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead!”
There is a suggestion of Poe, whom Willson greatly admired, in the
repetition, with slight variation, of the third line of the stanza;
but such points Willson always considered carefully. He was certainly
not servilely imitative, and he is an ungenerous critic who would pick
flaws in a poem that is so fine as a whole. “The Old Sergeant” is
entitled to a place with the best poems of the war--with Mrs. Howe’s
“Battle Hymn,” Brownell’s stirring pieces, Will H. Thompson’s “High
Tide at Gettysburg,” and Ticknor’s “Little Giffen.” These stand apart
from Lowell’s “Commemoration Ode” and similar poems, which are civic
rather than military. In “The Rhyme of the Master’s Mate,” Willson
turned again to the heroic, and while the poem is less artistic than
“The Old Sergeant,” it has a swing and a stroke that fit his theme
well. His volume contains a number of mystical pieces, colored by his
belief in spiritualism, and a few lyrics, as “The Estray” and “Autumn
Song,” which have an elusive charm and increase admiration for his
talents. Willson was emphatically a masculine character. In literature
and in life he liked what he called “muscle,” and he certainly showed
a sinewy grasp in his best poems. It is related that once during the
war he organized, and armed at his own expense, a home guard to protect
New Albany in a dangerous crisis, and at other times he displayed
great personal courage. If it had not been for his ill health he would
undoubtedly have enlisted.
Willson was not immediately identified at Cambridge as the author of
“The Old Sergeant.” As Dr. Holmes said after Willson’s death, “He came
among us as softly and silently as a bird drops into his nest,” and it
was not like him to call attention to his own performances. After the
death of his wife and infant child, October 13, 1864, Willson was often
at Gilmore’s house, where he first saw Emerson. Gilmore relates that he
returned home one day from Boston to find Lowell lying at full length
on a lounge in the library, in animated conversation with Willson.
On this occasion an incident occurred illustrative of Willson’s gift
of “second sight.” Longfellow was mentioned in the conversation, and
Willson remarked that the poet would be there shortly. No one had
an intimation of the visit, but Willson described the route that
Longfellow was then following toward the house; and when the poet
presently arrived, he affirmed the statement of his itinerary as
Willson had given it. Willson’s interest in life ended with the death
of his wife, whose few poems he published privately. She is remembered
at New Albany as a girl of great beauty and refinement.
Willson left Cambridge in the fall of 1866 for New Albany. While there
he suffered hemorrhages of the lungs and was ill for a month. He never
regained his strength, and his death occurred February 2, 1867, at
Alfred, New York. His convictions as to spiritualism grew firmer after
his wife’s death, and toward the last, so one of his brothers wrote,
“his wife and child seemed to be with him constantly, and he talked
to them in a low voice.” He was buried at Laurel, the home of Mrs.
Willson’s family, in the White Water Valley. His wife and child lie in
one grave beside him. The quiet hilltop cemetery commands a view of one
of the loveliest landscapes in Indiana, and it is fitly touched with
something of the peace, strength, and beauty that are associated with
Willson’s name.
III. _Later Poets_
Willson marked the beginning of better things, and a livelier fancy and
a keener critical spirit is henceforward observable--in the writings
of a veteran like Parker, and in the new company of writers that was
forming. The Civil War had profoundly moved the Central States, and
Indiana had perhaps felt it more than her neighbors. Willson had lifted
his voice for the Union while the war cloud still lay upon the land,
and the Thompson brothers spoke for the South from Indiana soil on the
arrival of the era of better feeling. Ben D. House, who had served
in the Federal armies, wrote with truth and spirit. He ran away from
his home in Vermont when he was seventeen, and entered the army from
Massachusetts. He saw hard service, and received wounds which were a
constant menace for the remainder of his life. He was mustered out
finally at Indianapolis, and lived there almost continuously until
his death in 1887. His idiosyncrasies and affectations were many, and
included the wearing of a great cloak, in which he sombrely wrapped
himself in cold weather. His poems were printed privately by his
friends in 1892. He had fair luck with the sonnet, and wrote, on the
occasion of Grant’s death, “Appomattox,” which follows:--
“To peace-white ashes sunk war’s lurid flame;
The drums had ceased to growl, and died away
The bark of guns, where fronting armies lay,
And for the day the dogs of war were tame,
And resting on the field of blood-fought fame,
For peace at last o’er horrid war held sway
On her won field, a score of years to-day,
Where to her champion forth a white flag came.
O nation’s chief, thine eyes have seen again
A whiter flag come forth to summon thee
Than that pale scarf which gleamed above war’s stain,
To parley o’er the end of its red reign--
The truce of God that sets from battle free
Thy dauntless soul, and thy worn life from pain.”
Lee O. Harris, a native of Pennsylvania (1839), removed to the State
in 1852, and was an Indiana soldier in the Civil War. His verse, as
collected in “Interludes” (1893), shows little of the military feeling,
but is strongly domestic, a forerunner of the work of Mr. Riley, whose
teacher Mr. Harris had been at Greenfield.
Dan L. Paine, an Indianapolis journalist (1830-1895), possessed a
sound taste, and his occasional pieces were well executed. He wrote
an elegy on the death of his friend and fellow-journalist, George C.
Harding, which is a meditation on the courage of such spirits:--
“On Freedom’s heights they stand as sentinels,
Brave tropic suns, delve in earth’s deepest caves,
And climb the ladder of the parallels
To sleep in icy graves.”
Such felicities were not uncommon with him. He was the friend and
helpful critic of all the younger Indiana writers, and literary
reputations have been created from slighter talents than his. His poems
were collected privately, under the title “Club Moss” (1890).
So far nearly every name identified with the literary impulse in
Indiana has been met south of a line drawn across the State at
Crawfordsville; but Evaleen Stein carried it farther north, to
Lafayette. Miss Stein’s verse illustrates happily the growing
emancipation of the younger generation of Western poets from bare
didacticism, and an escape from the landscape of tradition. She finds
her subjects in nature, and draws pictures for the pleasure of it, and
not with the expectation of tacking a moral to the frame. Earnestness
and conviction characterize her verses, and there is often a kind of
exultance in the note when she sings of the rough hill pastures or
the marshes and bayous that invite her study. She has something of
Thoreau’s genius for details, and her volume “One Way to the Woods”
(1897) is an accurate calendar of the moods of nature. Her work marks
really a new generation, the change of fashion, and the passing of the
ante-bellum poets of the region. Twenty years earlier no Ohio Valley
poet would have explored a bayou, or could have written of it so
musically as Miss Stein:--
“Ah, surely none would ever guess
That through that tangled wilderness,
Through those far forest depths remote,
Lay any smallest path, much less
A way wherein to guide a boat!”
A small volume of the poems of M. Genevieve Todd (1863-1896), of the
order of Sisters of Providence, was published after her death. They
are wholly devotional, and are marked by elevation of spirit wedded to
correct taste. Sister Mary Genevieve was born at Vevay, of Protestant
parents, and died at the convent of St. Mary’s of the Woods near Terre
Haute. Albion Fellows Bacon, Mrs. D. M. Jordan, Richard Lew Dawson,
and William R. Williams have also been creditable contributors to the
Hoosier anthology.
Indiana offers, on the whole, a fair field for poets. The prevailing
note of the landscape is tranquillity. There is hardly a spot in the
State that touches the imagination with a sense of power or grandeur,
and yet there are countless scenes of quiet beauty. The Wabash gathers
breadth and grace as it flows southward. Long curves here and there
give to the eye the illusion of a chain of lakes, and the river’s
valley is a rich garden. The Tippecanoe is another beautiful river,
famous among fishermen, and there are a number of charming lakes in the
northern part of the State. The Kankakee marsh was long haunted by the
migrant wild birds, and in recent years a wild goose was found there
with the piece of an Eskimo arrow, made of reindeer bone, through its
breast. Poets and novelists have found inspiration in the Kankakee.
Maurice Thompson and Evaleen Stein have celebrated the region in song;
and there is a tradition that the manuscript of “Ben Hur” visited both
the Kankakee and Lake Maxinkuckee at certain crises in its preparation.
The possibilities of mixed forests are nowhere more happily illustrated
than in Indiana, whether in the earliest wistful days of spring or
in the full glory of autumn. The beech and the elm, the maple, the
hickory and the walnut, and the humbler sassafras and pawpaw are
companions of a royal order of forestry, from which the sycamore--the
self-constituted guardian of rivers and creeks--is excluded by nature’s
decree confirmed by man’s preference. The variety of cereals that may
be grown saves the tilled areas from monotony. There are no vast plains
of corn or wheat as in Kansas or the Dakotas, but the corn ripens
between wheat stubble on one hand, and green pastures or remnants of
woodland on the other. The transitional seasons bring more of delight
to the senses than the full measure of winter and summer, and have for
the observer constant novelty and change. There are qualities in the
spring of the Ohio Valley--qualities of sweetness and wistfulness that
are peculiar to the region; and when the winds are all from the south,
and the winter wheat is brilliant in the fields; when the sap sings
beneath the rough bark of the old forest trees, and the young orchards
are a blur of pink and white, spirits are abroad there with messages
for the sons of men.
INDEX
Abbott, Lyman, 215.
Ade, George, 242.
“Artemus Ward,” 159.
Bacon, Albion Fellows, 269.
Bagehot, Walter, 158, 178.
Banta, D. D., 75, 236.
Baptists, organized first church, 67.
Beales, at New Harmony, 132.
Beecher, Henry Ward, 18, 83, 250.
Beecher, Mrs. H. W., 35, 56.
“Ben Hur,” how written, 189, 193;
MS. of, 270.
Benjamin, Park, 19.
Bennett, Emerson, 248.
Bernard, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, 113, 115.
Biddle, Horace P., 248, 251.
Blackford, Isaac, 22, 83.
Blake family, 18.
Blake, James, 83.
Bolton, Nathaniel, 253.
Bolton, Sarah T., 253.
Boone, Richard G., 234.
Booth, Newton, 16.
Brook Farm, Robert Owen visits, 123.
Brookville, 12.
Brotherton, Alice Williams, 13.
Brown, Admiral George, 212.
Brown, Demarchus C., 242.
Brown, Paul, at New Harmony, 115, 119.
Bull, Ole, 19.
Bush, Rev. George, 66.
Butler College, 26, 82, 95, 228.
Butler, John M., 179.
Butler, John Maurice, 179.
Butler, Noble, 16, 251.
Butler, Noble C., 251.
Butler, Ovid, 82.
Cambridge, 13.
Campbell, Alexander, 123, 238.
Carleton, Emma, 243.
Carleton, Will, 172.
Carrington, H. B., 179.
Cartwright, Peter, 67.
Catherwood, Mary Hartwell, 215.
Centerville, 12.
_Century Magazine_, 14.
Channing, W. E., 248.
Channing, W. H., 248.
Chase, W. M., 12.
Child, Lydia Maria, 227.
Chitwood, Mary L., 248, 252.
“Christian Endeavor,” origin of name, 144.
_Civil Service Chronicle_, 26.
Clark, George Rogers, 4, 5.
Clarke, James Freeman, 248.
Coburn, John, 83.
Coe family, 18.
Coggeshall, W. T., 245, 250, 251.
Corydon, 11, 94.
Costume at New Harmony, 113.
Cox, Millard, 222.
Cox, Sandford C., 36.
Craig, George, 134.
Cranch, C. P., 248.
Crawfordsville, 8, 177, 267.
Cutter, George W., 252.
Dale, David, 102.
D’Arusmont, Phiquepal, 105, 114.
Dawson, Richard Lew, 269.
Dennis, Charles, 28.
DePauw University, 68, 77.
Dillon, John B., 231, 249.
Dooley, A. H., 237.
Dransfields, at New Harmony, 132.
Dufour, Mrs. A. L. Ruter, 248, 251.
Dumont, Mrs. Julia L., 89-94, 247, 248.
Duncan, Robert, 181.
Dunn, Jacob P., 232.
Dyer, Rev. Sidney, 250.
Eads, James B., 12.
Earlham College, 77.
Eaton, Arthur Wentworth, 215.
Edson, Helen Rockwood, 241.
Egan, Maurice Francis, 215.
Eggleston, Edward, 8, 17, 51, 79, 89, 91, 133-155, 225.
Eggleston, George Cary, 134, 224.
Eggleston, Guilford, 138.
Eggleston, Joseph Cary, 134, 137, 139.
Eggleston, Miles, 138, 236.
Ellsworth, Henry W., 251.
Emerson, R. W., 248, 263.
English, William H., 235.
Episcopalians, early difficulties of, 65.
Everett, Edward, 19.
Fauntleroys, at New Harmony, 132.
Feiba Peveli, 111, 112, 122.
Fellenberg, 102, 124.
Field, Eugene, 172.
Finley, John, 29, 34.
Fishback, W. P., 242.
Fiske, John, 8.
Fletcher, Calvin, 83.
Fletcher family, 18.
Fletcher, Julia C., 216.
Fletcher, Rev. J. C., 216.
Flower, Richard, 101.
Flowers in churches, 63.
Fort Wayne, 13.
Foulke, William Dudley, 26, 229.
Franklin College, 26, 77.
Fretageot, Achilles, 105.
Fretageot, Madame, 115, 132.
Fuller, Hector, 242.
Furman, Lucy S., 216.
Gallatin, Albert, 71.
Garland, Hamlin, 172.
Gillilan, S. W., 243.
Gilmore, James R. (“Edmund Kirke”), 257, 260, 263.
Goode, Frances E., 155.
Goodwin, Rev. T. A., 35.
Gordon, Jonathan W., 251.
Hadley, John V., 53.
Halford, E. W., 237.
Hall, Bayard Rush, 73.
Hanover College, 77.
Harding, George C., 240, 267.
Harney, W. W., 250.
Harper, Ida Husted, 241.
Harris, Leo O., 157, 266.
Harrison, Benjamin, 4, 243.
Harrison, Christopher, 16.
Harrison, W. H., 4, 67, 71.
Havens, Rev. James, 67.
Hay, John, 16.
Hayes, Lewis D., 237.
Hayes, President, 190.
Henderson, Rev. C. R., 241.
Hendricks, William, 76.
_Henodelphisterian_ Society, 75.
Higginson, T. W., 157.
Holland, J. G., 19.
Holliday family, 18.
Holliday, John H., 26, 237.
Holliday, Rev. F. C., 65.
Holman, Jesse L., 76.
Holmes, O. W., 260, 263.
“Hoosier Athens,” 177.
Hoosier dialect, 45-62, 152, 163.
Hoosier Fiddle, 41.
Hoosier, origin of word, 29-36.
“Hoosier Schoolmaster,” 145.
Hoosierdom, extent of, 151.
Hoshour, Samuel K., 96, 181.
House, Ben D., 265.
Hovey, Edmund O., 80.
Howard, Tilghman A., 35.
Howe, Daniel Wait, 234.
Howells, W. D., 246.
Howland, John D., 12.
Howland, Livingston, 12.
Howland, Louis, 26, 237.
Indiana: relation to national life, 3-5;
slavery in, 5;
foreign and native element, 11;
political preferences, 26;
pioneers, 36, 39;
religious influences, 65-69;
education in, 70;
illiteracy in, 81, 87;
early poets, 245;
landscape of, 36, 219, 269.
Indiana University, 26, 73-76.
Indianapolis, 17-20.
Indianapolis Literary Club, 19.
Ingersoll, Robert G., 189.
James, G. P. R., 181.
Jennings, Governor, 22.
Jewett, Milo Parker, 80.
Johnson, Robert Underwood, 13.
Jordan, David S., 78.
Jordan, Mrs. D. M., 269.
Judah, Mary Jameson, 221.
Julian, George W., 226, 251.
Julian, Isaac H., 248, 251.
Ketcham, W. A., 44.
Keenan, Henry F., 215.
Krout, Caroline V., 212.
Krout, Mary H., 212.
Lafayette, 14, 267.
Lane, Henry S., 180.
Lee, John, 202.
Lehmanowski, Colonel, 32.
Lesueur, Charles A., 104, 106.
Lewis, Allen, 26.
Lewis, Charles S., 26.
Lincoln, Abraham, 38, 125, 152.
Lodge, Harriett Newell, 241.
Longfellow, H. W., 258, 263.
Lowell, J. R., 160, 172, 263.
Lynching, 43.
Maclure, William, 104, 105, 115, 129.
McCulloch, Hugh, 14.
McCutcheon, John T., 242.
McDonald, Joseph E., 179.
McGinnis, Gen. George F., 184.
Macluria, 111, 112, 122.
Macdonald, Donald, 105, 107.
Madison, 11, 155.
Major, Charles, 223.
“Mark Twain,” 164.
Martindale, E. B., 160.
Mason, A. L., 242.
Matthews, Claude, 21.
Matthews, G. C., 237.
Matthews, James Newton, 215.
Meredith, Solomon, 83.
Merrill family, 18.
Merrill, Miss Catharine, 94.
Merrill, Samuel, 94.
Militia, early, 39.
Miller, Joaquin, 215.
Millerites, 148.
Mills, Caleb, 79, 80, 85-88.
Moody, Martha Livingstone, 241.
Morris family, 18.
Morrison, John I., 16.
Morton, Oliver P., 22, 229.
Morton, Oliver T., 26, 229.
Mount, James A., 21.
Murphy, Dr. Edward, 130.
Nadal, E. S., 204, 216.
Nadal, Rev. Bernard H., 216.
Nashoba, 105.
Neef, Joseph, 105, 106.
Neef, Madame, 115.
Nelson, Thomas H., 15.
New Albany, 140, 143, 256, 257, 258, 259.
New Harmony, 21, 98-132.
_New Harmony Disseminator_, 128.
_New Harmony Gazette_, 111, 118, 128.
Nicholas, Anna, 220, 237.
Nichols, Rebecca S., 248, 250, 252.
Noble, Harriet, 241.
North Carolina, influence of, in dialect, 52.
Notre Dame University, 77, 215.
Oliphant, Laurence, 126.
Owen, David Dale, 126.
Owen, Richard, 127.
Owen, Robert, 99, 101, 103, 104, 110, 115, 121, 122, 123, 124, 131.
Owen, Robert Dale, 24, 76, 104, 111, 114, 124, 125.
Owen, William, 104, 128.
Paine, Dan L., 267.
Parker, Benj. S., 56, 249, 254, 265.
Parker, Theodore, 19.
Peabody, Rev. Ephraim, 248.
Pestalozzi, 102, 107.
Piatt, John James, 215, 246, 256, 258, 260.
Pioneers, books of, 38.
Poe, Edgar A., 261.
Poetry, characteristics of early Western, 244.
“Poor Whites,” 8, 44.
Posey, Thomas, 21.
Prentice, George D., 246, 247, 253.
Protestantism, phases of, in Indiana, 64.
Rabb, Kate Milner, 241.
Ralston, Alexander, 17.
Rapp, George, 98-101.
Rariden, James, 236.
Ray family, 18.
Reed, Peter Fishe, 249.
Reeves, Arthur M., 230.
Reid, Whitelaw, 185.
Richmond, 13.
Ridpath, John Clark, 233.
Riley, James Whitcomb, 27, 42, 49, 57, 133, 156-176, 217.
Riley, Reuben A., 157.
Ross, Morris, 273.
Salem, 16, 17.
Say, Thomas, 104, 106, 115, 128.
Scotch-Irish, 7, 51, 65.
Sharpe family, 18.
Smith, Elizabeth Conwell (Willson), 257.
Smith, O. H., 31, 83, 236.
Smith, Roswell, 14.
Sorin, Father, 64.
Stein, Evaleen, 267, 270.
Stevenson, R. D., 243.
Stoddard, Charles Warren, 215.
Sulgrove, Berry, 15, 49, 181, 237.
Sullivan, Jeremiah, 17.
Swift, Lucius B., 26.
Tarkington, Booth, 217-221.
Taylor, Bayard, 19.
Taylor, Dr. H. W., 40, 58.
Teal, Angelina, 241.
Terre Haute, 14, 215.
Terrell, Rev. William, 140.
Test, John, 180, 236.
Thomas, Edith M., 159.
Thompson, Maurice, 27, 199-211, 270.
Thompson, Richard W., 14, 76, 83.
Thompson, Will H., 202, 211.
Thurston, Laura M., 252.
Todd, M. Genevieve, 268.
Troost, Gerard, 105, 106, 115.
Tuttle, Joseph F., 80.
Unitarians, in Ohio Valley, 248.
Upfold, Bishop, 63.
Venable, W. H., 249.
Very, Jones, 248.
Vevay, 89, 134.
Vickroy, Louise E., 249.
Vincennes, 5, 11.
Vincennes University, 72.
Voorhees, Daniel W., 15.
Wabash College, 77, 80, 88, 173, 211.
Wallace, David, 22, 76, 180, 236.
Wallace, General Lew, 22, 56, 180-199, 261.
Wallace, Mrs. Lew, 198.
Wallace, William Ross, 250.
Warren, Josiah, 129.
Wheatcrofts, at New Harmony, 132.
Whitcomb, Governor, 22.
Whitecaps, 43.
Whitwell, Stedman, 105.
Wickersham, James A., 222.
Willard, Governor, 22.
Williams, Charles R., 237, 242.
Williams, Henry M., 26.
Williams, James D., 20.
Williams, Jesse Lynch, 14.
Williams, W. R., 269.
Willson, Forceythe, 256-264.
Wilson, W. L., 243.
Wilstach, J. A., 241.
Woodlands, influence of on pioneers, 36.
Woods, Rev. Aaron, 33.
Woollen, William Wesley, 236.
Wright, Frances (D’Arusmont), 105, 124.
Wright, Joseph A., 22, 31.
Yandes family, 18.
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FOOTNOTES:
[1] Dunn’s “Indiana,” p. 302 _et seq._
[2] Preface to “The Hoosier Schoolmaster,” Library Edition.
[3] McCulloch’s “Men and Measures,” p. 78.
[4] Preface to “The Hoosier Schoolmaster,” Library Edition.
[5] “Old Virginia and Her Neighbors,” II, 320.
[6] Statistical Atlas, U. S. Census, 1890, p. 24.
[7] Smith’s “Early Indiana Trials,” p. 6.
[8] “History of Indianapolis and Marion County,” p. 72.
[9] “Early Indiana Trials,” p. 450.
[10] “Sketches,” p. 45.
[11] Woollen’s “Sketches,” p. 265.
[12] Banta’s “Johnson County,” p. 55.
[13] The _Current_, November, 1884.
[14] “The New Purchase,” p. 401.
[15] “Neighborly Poems,” p. 26.
[16] Report of W. A. Ketcham, attorney-general, 1897-8, p. 173.
[17] Fifth Edition, 1872, pp. 171-172.
[18] _The Forum_, Vol. 14, p. 465.
[19] Sulgrove, p. 90.
[20] “Dialect Notes,” Part VIII, p. 392.
[21] “The New Purchase,” p. 143.
[22] “Dialect Notes,” Part IV, p. 211.
[23] _D_ before _i_ or _u_ does not become _j_ in cultivated usage
anywhere at the west. Personally, I have never heard _Injiana_ within
the State; but I have heard it from a Bostonian, a native of Maine, who
had never lived outside of New England.
[24] “Souvenir of the Western Association of Writers,” 1891.
[25] “Indiana Methodism,” p. 317.
[26] Edson’s “Early Indiana Presbyterianism,” p. 171.
[27] Evans’s “Pioneer Preachers,” p. 43; Edson’s “Early Indiana
Presbyterianism,” p. 40.
[28] Goodwin’s “Heroic Women of Indiana Methodism,” p. 9.
[29] Woodburn’s “Higher Education in Indiana,” p. 31.
[30] Woodburn, p. 75.
[31] In Dr. Hall’s narrative “Woodville,” “Spiceburg,” “Sugartown,”
“Sproutsburg,” and “Timberopolis” are respectively Bloomington,
Spencer, Crawfordsville, Lafayette, and Indianapolis. The author
assumes the names “Carlton” and “Mr. Clarence.” “Cutswell” became
Governor Whitcomb; “The Rev. James Hilsbury” is the Rev. Isaac Reed;
“Dr. Bloduplex” is Dr. Wiley, and “Dr. Shrub” is the Rev. George Bush.
[32] Banta’s “History of Indiana University,” p. 44.
[33] Boone’s “History of Education in Indiana,” p. 87.
[34] “Caleb Mills and Indiana Common Schools,” _Tuttle Miscellany_,
Vol. 38.
[35] Boone’s “Education in Indiana,” p. 87.
[36] Boone, _supra_, p. 104 _et seq._
[37] In 1899 Indiana’s total school fund, exclusive of college
endowment, was $10,312,000. The school revenue for that year, from all
sources, was $6,534,300. The census of 1890 showed the per cent of
illiterates (ten years of age and older) in Indiana to be 6.32; in Ohio
5.24; in Illinois 5.25; in Michigan 5.92. In Massachusetts it was 6.22;
in New York 5.53; in New Jersey 6.50; in Pennsylvania 6.78.
[38] “Some Western Schoolmasters,” _Scribner’s Magazine_, Vol. 17, p.
747.
[39] _Scribner’s_, _supra_.
[40] One of the passengers on “the boat load of knowledge,” Victor
Duclas, is still living (July, 1900) at New Harmony.
[41] _The Forum_, November, 1890.
[42] _The Forum_, _supra_.
[43] “War Papers,” Indiana Commandery, Loyal Legion, 1898.
[44] “Essays at Home and Elsewhere,” p. 211.
[45] “Beginnings of Literary Culture in the Ohio Valley,” by W. H.
Venable, LL.D., p. 58 _et seq._
[46] _Atlantic Monthly_, Vol. 35.
[47] Indianapolis _News_, March 2, 1895.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.