In 1842 Lowell and Cobert G. Carter, who was about the same sort of a

business man as the poet himself, started a periodical which they

called the _Pioneer_. They had no capital; but they did have literary

connections, and they were able to get together for the three numbers

they published a larger number of contributions from distinguished

contributors than has often fallen to the lot of any American

periodical. It is true that these men were not as famous in those days

as they have since become; still, their names were known and their

reputations were rapidly growing. The best known were Poe, Hawthorne,

Longfellow, Whittier and Emerson; but there were not a few others

whose names are well known to-day. The magazine had a high literary

character, and was well worthy of the future greatness of the

contributors. Unfortunately, it takes something more than literary

excellence to make a successful magazine. Sometimes the literary

quality is too high for the public to appreciate. This was true of the

_Pioneer_. A magazine also requires a large capital and commercial

ability in the business office. It is not at all strange that the

venture did not succeed. It could not have done so. Three numbers only

were issued, and those three left behind them a debt which the young

publishers were unable to pay until some time after.

At the same time that Lowell was having trouble with his magazine, he

found his eyes becoming affected, and he was obliged to spend the

greater part of the winter of 1842-43 in New York to undergo

treatment. Here he made many new literary acquaintances, among others

that of Charles F. Briggs, who started the _Broadway Journal_ with the

assistance of Poe. In the meantime, he kept on writing poetry with

more vigor than ever, and in 1843 published a second volume of verse,

containing his best work since "A Year's Life" appeared.

His contributions to the periodicals included much prose as well as

poetry. Among other things, he wrote a series of "Conversations on

some of the Old Poets," which was published in a volume the same year

that the second book of poems came out. It consisted mainly of essays

on Chaucer, Chapman, Ford, and the old dramatists. He never cared to

reprint this first excursion into the realm of literary criticism; but

it opened up a field which he was to work with distinction in after

years.

Lowell's prose is delicate, airy, and fanciful, but at the same time

keenly critical and sharp in its thought. "Fireside Travels" and "From

My Study Window" are books which are known all over the world and

which are everywhere voted "delightful".

CHAPTER VII

HOSEA BIGLOW, YANKEE HUMORIST

In December, 1844, Lowell felt that his income from his literary work,

though very small and precarious, was sufficient to justify him in

marrying, and accordingly he was united to Miss White. She was

delicate in health, and after their marriage the couple went to

Philadelphia, where they spent the winter in lodgings. Lowell became a

regular contributor to the _Freeman_, an antislavery paper once edited

by Whittier. From this he derived a very small but steady income; and

the next year he was engaged to write every week for the _Anti-Slavery

Standard_ on a yearly salary of five hundred dollars. This connection

he maintained for the next four years.

In June, 1846, the editor of the _Boston Courier_, a weekly paper well

known in the "Hub" for its literary character even to this day,

received a strange communication. It was a letter signed "Ezekiel

Biglow," enclosing a poem written by his son Hosea. This is the way

the letter began:

Jaylem, June, 1846.

Mister Eddyter:--Our Hosea wuz down to Boston last week, and he see a

cruetin Sarjunt a struttin round as popler as a hen with 1 chicking,

with 2 fellers a drummin and fifin arter him like all nater, the

sarjunt he thout Hosea hedn't gut his i teeth cut cos he looked a

kindo's though he 'd jest cum down, so he cal'lated to hook him in,

but Hosy woodn't take none o his sarse for all he hed much as 20

Rooster's tales stuck onto his hat and eenamost enuf brass a bobbin up

and down on his shoulders and figureed onto his coat and trousis, let

alone wut nater hed sot in his featers, to make a 6 pounder out on.

The letter was rather a long one, and closed thus. Referring to the

verses enclosed, the writer says:--

If you print em I wish you'd jest let folks know who hosy's father is,

cos my ant Kesiah used to say it's nater to be curus ses she, she aint

livin though and he's a likely kind o lad.

Ezekiel Biglow.

The poem itself began with this stanza:

Thrash away, you'll _hev_ to rattle

On them kittle-drums o' yourn,--

'Taint a knowin' kind o' cattle

Thet is ketched with mouldy corn;

Put in stiff, you fifer feller,

Let folks see how spry you be,--

Guess you'll toot till you are yeller

'Fore you git ahold o' me!

The letter and the poem were printed together in the _Courier_, and

immediately were the talk of the town. You will remember that in 1846

the war with Mexico was just beginning, and many people were opposed

to it as the work of "jingo" politicians, controlled in some degree by

the slavery power. Southern slaveholders wished to increase the

territory of the United States in such a way as to enlarge the

territory where slavery would be lawful. The antislavery people of New

England were violently opposed to the war, and this poem by the Yankee

Hosea Biglow immediately became popular, because it put in a humorous,

common-sense way what everybody else had been saying with deadly

earnest.

Charles Sumner saw the common sense of the poem, but didn't see the

fun in the bad spelling. Said he, "This Yankee poet has the true

spirit. He puts the case admirably. I wish, however, he could have

used good English." Evidently Sumner did not suspect that so cultured

and polished a poet as James Russell Lowell was the author of a stanza

like this:

'Wut 's the use o' meetin'-goin'

Every Sabbath, wet or dry,

Ef it's right to go amowin'

Feller-men like oats and rye?

I dunno but wut it's pooty

Trainin' round in bobtail coats.--

But it's curus Christian dooty,

This 'ere cuttin' folks's throats.

The fact is, however, Lowell had written all this, even the letter

with bad spelling purporting to come from Ezekiel Biglow. He was

deeply interested in the antislavery cause, in good politics and sound

principles; yet he saw that it would be useless for him to get up and

preach against what he did not like. There were plenty of other

earnest, serious-minded men like Garrison and Whittier who were

fighting against the evil in the straightforward, blunt way. Lowell

was as interested as they in having the wrongs righted; but he was

more cool-headed than the rest. He considered the matter. A joke, he

said to himself, will carry the crowd ten times as quickly as a

serious protest; and people will listen to one of their own number, a

common, every-day, sensible fellow with a spark of wit in him, where

they would go away bored by polished and cultured writing full of

Latin quotations. This is how he came to begin the Biglow papers.

Their instant success proved that he was quite right.

Of course it was not long before shrewd people began to see that this

fine humor, with its home-thrusts, was not in reality written by a

country bumpkin. Through the rough dialect and homely way of stating

the case, there shone the fine intellect of a cultivated and skillful

writer. The _Post_ guessed that James Russell Lowell was the real

author. This was regarded only as a rumor, however, and many people

scouted the idea that a young poet, whose books sold only in small

numbers and were known only to literary people, could have written

anything as good as this.

"I have heard it demonstrated in the pauses of a concert," wrote

Lowell afterward, "that I was utterly incompetent to have written

anything of the kind."

It was early in this same summer of 1846 that Lowell made his contract

to write regularly for the _Anti-Slavery Standard_; and he soon began

sending the "Biglow" poems to that paper instead of to the _Courier_.

The most popular of the whole series of poems by Hosea Biglow was the

one on John P. Robinson. Robinson was a worthy gentleman who happened

to come out publicly on the side of a political wire-puller.

Immediately Hosea caught up his name and wrote a comic poem on voting

for a bad candidate for office. Looked at in that light, the poem

applies just as well to political candidates to-day as it did then.

Here are a few stanzas of the poem. You will want to turn to "Lowell's

Poetical Works" and read the whole piece.

WHAT MR. ROBINSON THINKS.

Guvener B. is a sensible man;

He stays to his home an' looks arter his folks;

He draws his furrer ez straight ez he can,

An' into nobody's tater-patch pokes;

But John P.

Robinson he

Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.

My! aint it terrible? Wut shall we du?

We can't never choose him o' course--thet's flat;

Guess we shall hev to come round, (don't you?)

An' go in fer thunder an' guns, an' all that,

Fer John P.

Robinson he

Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.

Gineral C. is a dreffle smart man:

He's ben on all sides thet give places or pelf;

But consistency still wuz a part of his plan--

He's been true to _one_ party--an' thet is himself;

So John P.

Robinson he

Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C.

Gineral C. he goes in fer the war;

He don't vally principle more'n an old cud;

Wut did God make us raytional creeturs fer,

But glory an' gunpowder, plunder an' blood?

So John P.

Robinson he

Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C.

The side of our country must ollers be took,

An' President Polk, you know, _he_ is our country.

An' the angel that writes all our sins in a book

Puts the _debit_ to him, an' to us the _per contry_;

And John P.

Robinson he

Sez this is his view o' the thing to a T.

There is a story that Mr. Robinson couldn't go anywhere after this

poem was published without hearing some one humming or reciting,

Fer John P.

Robinson he

Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.

School children shouted it everywhere, people on the street repeated

it as they met, and the funny rhyme was heard even in polite

drawing-rooms, amid roars of laughter. Mr. Robinson went abroad, but

scarcely had he landed in Liverpool before he heard a child crooning

over to himself,

Fer John P.

Robinson he

Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.

In Genoa, Italy, it was a parody, telling what John P.--Robinson

he--would do down in Judee.

CHAPTER VIII

PARSON WILBUR

In the course of time the "Biglow Papers" were published in book form.

Not only was Lowell's name not yet connected publicly with the Yankee

humor, but the poems were provided with an elaborate introduction,

notes and comments, by the learned pastor of the church at Jaalam,

Homer Wilbur. His notes and introduction are filled with Latin

quotations, and he appears as much a scholar as Hosea Biglow does a

natural. He says he tried to teach Hosea better English, but decided

to let him work out his own ideas in his own way. Still, he endorses

Hosea's principles, and is in every way thoroughly his friend.

This Parson Wilbur is almost as much of a character in the book as

Hosea himself, and his prose, printed at the beginning and end of each

poem in small type, is almost as clear and effective and interesting

as Hosea's poems. We are always tempted to skip anything printed in

small type, and placed in brackets; but in this case that would be a

great mistake.

Speaking of "What Mr. Robinson Thinks," Parson Wilbur says, "A bad

principle is comparatively harmless while it continues to be an

abstraction, nor can the general mind comprehend it fully till it is

printed in that large type which all men can read at sight, namely the

life and character, the sayings and doings, of particular persons....

"Meanwhile, let us not forget that the aim of the true satirist is not

to be severe upon persons, but only upon falsehood, and as Truth and

Falsehood start from the same point, and sometimes even go along

together for a little way, his business is to follow the path of the

latter after it diverges, and to show her floundering in the bog at

the end of it. Truth is quite beyond the reach of satire. There is so

brave a simplicity in her, that she can no more be made ridiculous

than an oak or a pine. The danger of the satirist is, that continual

use may deaden his sensibility to the force of language. He becomes

more and more liable to strike harder than he knows or intends. He may

put on his boxing gloves, and yet forget that the older they grow, the

more plainly may the knuckles inside be felt. Moreover, in the heat of

contest, the eye is insensibly drawn to the crown of victory, whose

tawdry tinsel glitters through the dust of the ring which obscures

Truth's wreath of simple leaves."

There is another very interesting passage which is said to be an

extract from one of the Parson's sermons, describing the modern

newspaper.

"Wonderful, to him that has eyes to see it rightly, is the newspaper.

To me, for example, sitting on the critical front bench of the pit, in

my study here in Jaalam, the advent of my weekly journal is as that of

a strolling theater, or rather of a puppet-show, on whose stage,

narrow as it is, the tragedy, comedy, and farce of life are played in

little. Behold the huge earth sent to me hebdomidally in a brown paper

wrapper."

You see that what he says is very learned in its choice of words; but

if you read it carefully you will find it interesting.

But after all, Parson Wilbur is a humorous character, though he has

his sense, too. At the end of his introduction are some fragmentary

notes which are intended as a general satire on editors of books. He

goes on at some length to say that he thought he ought to have his

picture printed in the book which he professes to be editing. But he

has only two likenesses, one a black profile, the other a painting in

which he is made cross-eyed. He speaks of it as "strabismus," which

sounds very learned of course, and he goes on to explain that in

actual fact this is not a bad thing, for he can preach very directly

at his congregation, and no one will think the preacher has him

particularly in his eye. He also says Mrs. Wilbur objected to having a

cross-eyed picture reproduced, and he is therefore driven to take the

position of those great people who refuse to have their features

copied at all. Then he puts in a lot of absurd genealogical notes.

At the beginning of the book there are also a number of imaginary

notices of "the independent press." Of course there are no such papers

as those mentioned, and the praise and the blame are alike satirical.

In the original volume of "Biglow Papers," part of a page at the end

of these "Notices of the Press" remained unfilled, and the printer

asked Lowell if he could not send in something to occupy that space.

As poetry came easiest, Lowell wrote a number of stanzas about

"Zekle's Courtin'." There were only six stanzas in the original

edition. Lowell wrote more, but told the printer to break off when the

page was filled. This the printer did, and the stanzas which were not

put in type were lost, as Lowell had kept no copy. This piece became

so popular that friends urged the poet to finish the story, and he

wrote a few more stanzas. Then he wrote still others. In the course of

time it developed into the long poem printed with the second series of

"Biglow Papers," under the title of "The Courtin'."

This is the way it runs in the first version; but you will want to

read it also in its complete form:

Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown,

An' peeked in thru the winder,

An' there sot Huldy all alone,

'ith no one nigh to hender.

He kin' o' l'itered on the mat,

Some doubtfle o' the sekle,

His heart kep' goin' pitypat,

But hern went pity Zekle.

He stood a spell on one foot fust,

Then stood a spell on tother,

An' on which one he felt the wust

He could n't ha' told ye, nuther.

Sez he, "I'd better call agin;"

Sez she, "Think likely, _Mister_;"

The last word pricked him like a pin,

An'--wal, he up and kist her.

When in the course of the publication of the second series of "Biglow

Papers," twenty years after the first, it was announced that Parson

Wilbur was dead, people who had read the first series felt very much

as though they had lost a personal friend. The public had learned to

love the pedantic, vain old man as if he were a real human being.

Lowell had created in him a great character of fiction, almost as if

he were a novelist instead of a poet.

CHAPTER IX

A FABLE FOR CRITICS

Lowell's next attempt in the satirical and humorous line was a long

poem written somewhat after the style of the old Latin fable writers,

and hence called "A Fable for Critics." It was written in double

rhymes, for the most part, which are very hard to make, and not

altogether easy to read; but they help the humorous impression.

This poem was published anonymously, and in it the author hits off all

the prominent authors of the day, speaking as the god Apollo. Of

course he did not attach his name to it, and as it appeared

anonymously he felt that he could say what he liked--in other words,

tell the truth about his friends and acquaintances, or at least give

his opinion of them. Incidentally, he pokes fun at the literary fads

of the day.

Among other things, to give the impression that he was not the author

of the poem, he puts in a free criticism of himself:

There is Lowell, who's striving Parnassus to climb

With a whole bale of _isms_ tied together with rhyme.

He might get on alone, spite of brambles and boulders,

But he can't with that bundle he has on his shoulders.

The top of the hill he will never come nigh reaching

Till he learns the distinction 'twixt singing and preaching;

His lyre has some chords that would ring pretty well,

But he'd rather by half make a drum of the shell,

And rattle away till he's old as Mathusalem,

At the head of a march to the last new Jerusalem.

Evidently he thought that he paid too much attention to politics, as

in the "Biglow Papers," and to lecturing, and various side issues,

when he ought to be cultivating pure poetry more assiduously; or

rather, he would have liked to be a simple poet and do nothing else,

not even earn a living.

The way he characterizes in this poem the great writers whom we know

is both amusing and interesting, and he generally tells the truth. For

instance, he writes--

There comes Poe, with his raven, like Barnaby Rudge,

Three fifths of him genius and two fifths sheer fudge.

The best of his criticisms are not satirical, but true and appreciative.

Thus, Hawthorne:

There is Hawthorne, with genius so shrinking and rare

That you hardly at first see the strength that is there;

A frame so robust, with a nature so sweet,

So earnest, so graceful, so lithe, and so fleet,

Is worth a descent from Olympus to meet.

His reference to Whittier, too, is a noble tribute by one poet to

another:

There is Whittier, whose swelling and vehement heart

Strains the strait-breasted drab of the Quaker apart,

And reveals the live Man, still supreme and erect,

Underneath the bemummying wrappers of sect.

Bryant was the oldest of the American poets, and the generation to

which Lowell belonged had been taught to look up to him as the head of

American poetical literature. Of course the younger poets felt that

they ought to receive a share of the homage, and perhaps they were a

little jealous of Bryant.

There is Bryant, as quiet, as cool, and as dignified,

As a smooth, silent iceberg that never is ignified,

Save when by reflection 't is kindled o' nights

With a semblance of flame by the chill Northern Lights.

This is not at all complimentary, it would seem, but a little farther

along Lowell makes up for it in part by saying--

But, my dear little bardlings, don't prick up your ears,

Nor suppose I would rank you and Bryant as peers;

If I call him an iceberg I don't mean to say,

There is nothing in that which is grand in its way;

He is almost the one of your poets that knows

How much grace, strength, and dignity lie in Repose.

You will remember that in one of his college letters, written while he

was at Concord because rusticated, Lowell did not seem to care for

Emerson. He afterward became his great admirer, and in this fable

leads off with Emerson, saying:

There comes Emerson first, whose rich words, every one,

Are like gold nails in temples to hang trophies on,

Whose prose is grand verse, while his verse, the Lord knows,

Is some of it pr--No, 'tis not even prose.

Irving and Holmes are two more of his favorites. Of the first he says:

What! Irving? Thrice welcome, warm heart and fine brain,

You bring back the happiest spirit from Spain,

And the gravest sweet humor, that ever were there

Since Cervantes met death in his gentle despair.

Holmes he happily hits off thus:

There's Holmes, who is matchless among you for wit;

A Leyden jar always full charged, from which flit

The electrical tingles of hit after hit.

His are just the fine hands, too, to weave you a lyric

Full of fancy, fun, feeling, or spiced with satiric;

In a measure so kindly, you doubt if the toes

That are trodden upon are your own or your foe's.

And he ends by saying:

Nature fits all her children with something to do;

He who would write and can't write, can surely review,

Can set up a small booth as critic and sell us his

Petty conceit and his pettier jealousies.

Lowell was a good critic, and clearly saw the merit of the really

great writers of his time. We have quoted his characterizations of

those he admires. His keen thrusts at those who are not half as great

as they would have us believe are both amusing and true, and no doubt

made their victims smart sharply enough, for instance that--

One person whose portrait just gave the least hint

Its original had a most horrible squint.

CHAPTER X

THE TRUEST POETRY

While Lowell was becoming famous indirectly as the anonymous author of

the "Biglow Papers" and "A Fable for Critics," he was writing and

publishing over his own name sweet, simple lines that came straight

from his heart and which will no doubt be remembered when the uncouth

Yankee dialect of Hosea Biglow and the hard rhymes of the "Fable" are

forgotten. The simpler a true poet is the more beautiful and really

poetic he is likely to be. The simplest thing Lowell ever wrote was

"The First Snow-Fall," composed in 1847 after the death of his little

daughter Blanche, with the sorrow for whose loss was mingled the joy

at the coming of another child.

THE FIRST SNOW-FALL.

The snow had begun in the gloaming,

And busily all the night

Had been heaping field and highway

With a silence deep and white.

I stood and watched by the window

The noiseless work of the sky,

And the sudden flurries of snow-birds,

Like brown leaves whirling by.

I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn

Where a little headstone stood;

How the flakes were folding it gently,

As did robins the babes in the wood.

Up spoke our own little Mabel,

Saying, "Father, who makes it snow?"

And I told of the good All-father

Who cares for us here below.

Again I looked at the snow-fall,

And thought of the leaden sky

That arched o'er our first great sorrow,

When that mound was heaped so high.

I remembered the gradual patience

That fell from that cloud like snow,

Flake by flake, healing and hiding

The scar that renewed our woe.

And again to the child I whispered,

"The snow that husheth all,

Darling, the merciful Father

Alone can make it fall!"

Then with eyes that saw not, I kissed her;

And she, kissing back, could not know

That my kiss was given to her sister,

Folded close under deepening snow.

Lowell's greatest poem, "The Vision of Sir Launfal," was written in

the same simple, beautiful spirit of "The First Snow-Fall," and that

is why we all like to read it over and over again. "Sir Launfal" was a

favorite with Mrs. Lowell from the beginning. She probably knew better

that it was a great poem than the poet himself did.

The "Prelude" to the first part is beautiful because it contains so

much that cannot but touch the heart of every one, however he may

dislike poetry. A great poem like this cannot be read hastily, nor

must we stop with reading it once. Great poetry must be read so many

times that it is committed entirely to memory before we begin to reach

the end of the beauties in it. Each time we reread we see new

beauties, we feel new thrills.

Over his keys the musing organist,

Beginning doubtfully and far away,

First lets his fingers wander as they list,

And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay;

Then, as the touch of his loved instrument

Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme,

First guessed by faint auroral flashes sent

Along the wavering vista of his dream.

The first time you read this passage it may mean little to you; but as

you read again and again you gradually picture in your mind a grand

cathedral, just filling with people for the morning worship. The

organist begins with a few light notes, fanciful, merely suggestive;

then louder and louder swells the strain; the music begins to bring up

before your mind pictures of waterfalls, cities, men and women with

passionate hearts; at last, in the grand flood of the music, you

forget yourself, the world around you, the church, the thronging

congregation, everything.

After this pretty and suggestive prelude, describing the musician, we

read such passages as this, which suggest the theme as by a "faint

auroral flash":

And what is so rare as a day in June?

Then, if ever, come perfect days;

Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,

And over it softly her warm ear lays.

A little farther along the music seems to broaden and deepen:

Now is the high-tide of the year,

And whatever of life hath ebbed away

Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer,

Into every bare inlet and creek and bay;

Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it,

We are happy now because God wills it.

You must read the rest of the poem for yourself, ever remembering that

to read poetry so that you understand it and love it means that you

yourself are a poet at heart; and if you come to love a great poem you

may be proud of your achievement.

CHAPTER XI

PROFESSOR, EDITOR, AND DIPLOMAT

There was a touching and very warm affection between Longfellow and

Lowell. Mrs. Lowell says of it, "I have never seen such a beautiful

friendship between men of such distinct personalities, though closely

linked together by mutual tastes and affections. They criticise and

praise each other's performances with frankness not to be surpassed,

and seem to have attained that happy height of faith where no

misunderstanding, no jealousy, no reserve exists." Often in his diary

Longfellow speaks of "walking to see Lowell," who was either "musing

before his fire in his study," or occupied in his "celestial study,

with its pleasant prospect through the small square windows."

Longfellow was some dozen years the elder; and when the time came that

he wished to retire from the professorship of belles-lettres in

Harvard College, he was very desirous that Lowell should take the

place. There were others who wanted it; but it was arranged that

Lowell should become Longfellow's successor. Lowell had never before

been a professor and he did not particularly like the work. In 1867 he

speaks of "beginning my annual dissatisfaction of lecturing next

week." Still, he was popular with the students and highly successful

because of his fine gift of literary criticism. Here, for instance, is

his definition of poetry: "Poetry, as I understand it, is the

recognition of something new and true in thought or feeling, the

recollection of some profound experience, the conception of some

heroic action, the creation of something beautiful and pathetic."

In his diary Longfellow sometimes refers to Mrs. Lowell, "slender and

pale as a lily"; and once when he and Charles Sumner had gone to see

Lowell and found that he was not at home, Longfellow adds, "but we saw

his gentle wife, who, I fear, is not long for this world."

His words were prophetic. She gradually failed in strength. Of their

four children, three died while mere babes. In 1853 Mrs. Lowell

herself died.

The appointment to Longfellow's professorship did not come until a

little over a year after the death of Mrs. Lowell. During her life Mr.

Lowell's income was very small and irregular, a few hundred dollars a

year in payment of royalties on his books and for articles and poems

contributed to various periodicals. With his appointment to the

Harvard professorship he became financially independent for the first

time. To prepare for it he went abroad, spending most of his time at

Dresden.

He returned sooner than he expected, and for a reason that very well

illustrates his business habits. When he set out he had a limited

amount of money. This he placed with London bankers, arranging to draw

on them for such sums as he might need from time to time. He asked

that when he had drawn down to a certain sum the bankers should notify

him, and then he would immediately prepare to return home. He settled

down, and thought that he was getting on moderately well and had a

considerable sum still to draw. What was his surprise when he was

notified by his bankers that he had drawn his account down to the

amount he had mentioned! As there was nothing better for him to do, he

packed his trunk and went home.

Some years after that, he received a letter from these London bankers

informing him that an error had been made in his account, and that a

draft for a hundred pounds sterling (five hundred dollars) which had

been drawn by some other person named Lowell had by mistake been

charged to his account. This money, with compound interest, was now at

his disposal. The bankers suggested, however, that if he was not in

immediate need of the money, they would use it for an admirable

investment they knew of which might considerably increase it within a

year. At the end of a year he received a draft for seven hundred

pounds. This he used to refurnish Elmwood. "Now, you, who are always

preaching figures and Poor Richard, and business habits," said he, in

telling the story to some friends, "what do you say to that? If I had

kept an account and known how it stood, _I should have spent that

money_ and you would not now be sitting in those easy chairs, or

walking on Wilton carpet. No; hang accounts and figures!"

In 1857 the _Atlantic Monthly_ was started, and Lowell was made

editor, with a salary of three thousand dollars a year, of course in

addition to his salary as a Harvard professor. Though he was the

editor, he recognized that the success of the magazine would be made

by Holmes. Said he, "You see, the doctor is like a bright mountain

stream that has been dammed up among the hills and is waiting for an

outlet into the Atlantic. You will find that he has a wonderful store

of thought--serious, comic, pathetic, and poetic,--of comparisons,

figures, and illustrations. I have seen nothing of his preparation,

but I imagine he is ready. It will be something wholly new, and his

reputation as a prose writer will date from this magazine." When you

recollect the success of the "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" you

cannot help remarking that Lowell was a veritable prophet.

President Hayes, soon after his inauguration, offered Lowell an

appointment as minister to Austria, but Lowell declined. When he was

asked if he would accept an appointment as minister to Spain, he

consented, and thither he went in the early part of President Hayes'

administration. After a time he was transferred to London, where he

became a striking diplomatic figure.

He was one of the most popular and polished gentlemen ever sent as

ambassador to a European nation, and as such his presence at the Court

of Saint James was highly appreciated by the English people. When, in

1884, on the election of Cleveland to the presidency, he prepared to

leave London, many glowing tributes were paid him by the English

press, but none was more hearty than this, printed in _Punch_:

Send you away? No, Lowell, no.

That phrase, indeed, is scarce well chosen.

We're glad, of course, to have you go

More like a brother than a cousin;

True, we must "speed the parting guest,"

If such a guest from us _must_ sever;

But what we all should like the best

Would be to keep you here forever.

You've won our hearts; your words, your ways,

Are what we like. Without desiring

To sicken you with fulsome praise,

We think you've seen no signs of tiring.

Of graceful speech, of pleasant lore,

How much to you the English mind owes!

We're sad to think we'll see no more

Of you--save through your Study Windows.

Well, well, the best of friends must part;

That's commonplace, like Gray, but true, sir.

Commend us to the Yankee heart;

If you can come again, why, _do_, sir.

What Biglow calls our "English sarse,"

Is not _all_ tarts and bitters, is it?

Farewell!--if from us you must pass,

But try, _do_ try, another visit!

After his return from England, Mr. Lowell did comparatively little

literary work. Some years before this, he had married the lady who was

educating his only daughter. He now spent the most of his time at

Elmwood among his books and in the society of his friends. In 1888 a

volume of his later poems appeared, bearing the title of "Heartsease

and Rue." About the same time "Democracy," a collection of the

addresses which he had delivered in England, was published. But

neither of these volumes added materially to his fame.

On the twelfth of August, 1891, the famous poet, essayist, and man of

affairs died. He was nearly seventy-three years of age.

* * * * *

[NOTE.--The thanks of the publishers are due Messrs. Harper & Brothers

for permission to use extracts from "Letters of James Russell Lowell,

edited by Charles Eliot Norton," and to Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin &

Co. for permission to use extracts from the Poetical Works of Lowell.]

THE STORY OF BAYARD TAYLOR

[Illustration: BAYARD TAYLOR.]

BAYARD TAYLOR

CHAPTER I

HIS BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD

Bayard Taylor was born in the country village of Kennett Square,

Chester County, Pennsylvania, Jan. 11, 1825, "the year when the first

locomotive successfully performed its trial trip. I am, therefore," he

says, "just as old as the railroad." He was descended from Robert

Taylor, a rich Friend, or Quaker, who had come to Pennsylvania with

William Penn in 1681, and settled near Brandywine Creek. Bayard's

grandfather married a Lutheran of pure German blood, and on that

account was expelled from the Society of Friends, which at that time

had very strict rules regarding the marriage of its members. Although

the family still used the peculiar speech of the Quakers, and clung to

the Quaker principles of peace and order, none of them ever returned

to the society.

When Bayard was four years old, the family moved to a farm about a

mile from the village. There they lived, until, years afterward, the

successful traveler and poet bought an estate near by and built a

magnificent house upon it, into which he received his father and

mother and brothers and sisters, with that open-hearted generosity and

hospitality which was so much a part of his nature.

He was the fourth child of his parents; but the three older children

had died in infancy, and he remained as the eldest of the family.

Chester County, Pennsylvania, has always been a rich farming region,

peopled by solid, well-to-do farmers, many of whom are Quakers. Here

the northern elms toss their arms to the southern cypresses, as the

poet has it; the two climates seem to meet and mingle, in a sort of

calm, neutral zone, and the vegetation of the North is united with the

vegetation of the South, to produce a peculiar richness and variety.

In such surroundings the boy grew up, a farmer's lad, and learned that

love of nature which was a part of his being till the day he died.

"The child," says he, "that has tumbled into a newly plowed furrow

never forgets the smell of the fresh earth.... Almost my first

recollection is of a swamp, into which I went barelegged at morning,

and out of which I came, when driven by hunger, with long stockings of

black mud, and a mask of the same. If the child was missed from the

house, the first thing that suggested itself was to climb upon a mound

which overlooked the swamp. Somewhere among the tufts of rushes and

the bladed leaves of the calamus, a little brown ball was sure to be

seen moving, now dipping out of sight, now rising again, like a bit of

drift on the rippling green. It was my head. The treasures I there

collected were black terrapins with orange spots, baby frogs the size

of a chestnut, thrush's eggs, and stems of purple phlox."

He loved his home with a passionate intensity; but he also had

yearnings for the unknown world beyond the horizon. "I remember," says

he, "as distinctly as if it were yesterday the first time this passion

was gratified. Looking out of the garret window, on a bright May

morning, I discovered a row of slats which had been nailed over the

shingles for the convenience of the carpenters in roofing the house,

and had not been removed. Here was, at least, a chance to reach the

comb of the steep roof, and take my first look abroad into the world!

Not without some trepidation I ventured out, and was soon seated

astride of the sharp ridge. Unknown forests, new fields and houses,

appeared to my triumphant view. The prospect, though it did not extend

more than four miles in any direction, was boundless. Away in the

northwest, glimmering through the trees, was a white object, probably

the front of a distant barn; but I shouted to the astonished servant

girl, who had just discovered me from the garden below, 'I see the

Falls of Niagara!'"

He was a sensitive child and had a horror of dirty hands, "and," says

he, "my first employments--picking stones and weeding corn--were

rather a torture to this superfine taste." In his mother, however, he

had a friend who understood and protected him. So his life on the farm

was as happy as it well could be, in spite of its roughness. He

himself has described it with a zest which no one else could lend it.

"Almost every field had its walnut tree, melons were planted among the

corn, and the meadow which lay between never exhausted its store of

wonders. Besides, there were eggs to hide at Easter; cherries and

strawberries in May; fruit all summer; fishing parties by torchlight;

lobelia and sumac to be gathered, dried and sold for pocket money; and

in the fall, chestnuts, persimmons, wild grapes, cider, and the grand

butchering after frost came, so that all the pleasures I knew were

incidental to a farmer's life. The books I read came from the village

library, and the task of helping to 'fodder' on the dark winter

evenings was lightened by the anticipation of sitting down to

'Gibbon's Rome' or 'Thaddeus of Warsaw' afterwards."

He was fond of reading, and especially fond of poetry, and his wife in

her biography says: "In the evening after he had gone to bed, his

mother would hear him repeating poem after poem to his brother, who

slept in the same room with him."

CHAPTER II

SCHOOL LIFE

Bayard had the advantage of regular attendance at the country schools

near his father's home, with two or three years at the local academy;

but his father could not afford to send him to college. He enjoyed his

school life, and in after years wrote to one of his early Quaker

teachers thus:

"I have never forgotten the days I spent in the little log schoolhouse

and the chestnut grove behind it, and I have always thought that some

of the poetry I then copied from thy manuscript books has kept an

influence over all my life since. There was one verse in particular

which has cheered and encouraged me a thousand times when prospects

seemed rather gloomy. It ran thus:

'O, why should we seek to anticipate sorrow

By throwing the flowers of the present away,

And gathering the dark-rolling, cloudy to-morrow

To darken the generous sun of to-day?'

Thou seest I have good reason to remember those old times, and to be

grateful to thee for encouraging instead of checking the first

developments of my mind."

You may easily guess from this letter that Bayard's school life was

very sedate and Quakerish. Nearly all the people in Kennett Square

were Quakers, and though Bayard's father and mother were not, they had

all the Quaker habits. Among other things, he was taught the

wickedness of all kinds of swearing. His mother "talked so earnestly

on this point that his mind became full of it; his observation and

imagination were centered upon oaths, until at last he was so

fascinated that he became filled with an uncontrollable desire to

swear. So he went out into a field, beyond hearing, and there

delivered himself of all the oaths he had ever heard or could invent,

and in as loud a voice as possible." After this he felt quite

satisfied to swear no more.

When Bayard was about twelve years old, his father was elected sheriff

of the county and went to live at West Chester for three years. The

young lad was sent to Bolmar's Academy at that place; and when the

family went back to the farm he was sent to the academy at Unionville,

three or four miles from his home. Here, at the age of sixteen, he

finished his regular schooling. During the last two years he studied

Latin and French, and during the last year Spanish. His Latin and

French he continued by private study for three years longer.

He now went back to work on the farm for a season, and, as he says,

"first felt the delight and refreshment of labor in the open air. I

was then able to take the plow handle, and I still remember the pride

I felt when my furrows were pronounced even and well turned. Although

it was already decided that I should not make farming the business of

my life, I thrust into my plans a slender wedge of hope that I might

one day own a bit of ground, for the luxury of having, if not the

profit of cultivating, it. The aroma of the sweet soil had tinctured

my blood; the black mud of the swamp still stuck to my feet."

After a few weeks of farm life he was apprenticed to a printer in West

Chester for a term of four years.

CHAPTER III

HIS FIRST POEM

It is the will and the spirit that makes every life seem happy or the

reverse. If Bayard Taylor had remained a farmer in Kennett Square all

his life, he would not have looked back on his early experiences with

so much pleasure as he did. Indeed, we may safely say that he would

not have liked his life so well at the time had it not been for his

buoyant and hopeful nature, which made him feel that he was destined

for higher and better things, for a world beyond the horizon.

Already he was a poet, with all a poet's aspirations and eagerness. A

year before he left the academy his first printed poem appeared in the

_Saturday Evening Post_ of Philadelphia. It is not wonderful as

poetry. Yet we read it with interest, because it shows so plainly the

earnest and ambitious, yet cheerful, nature of the boy. He did not

merely sit and hope; he was determined to _win his way_. It is

entitled, "Soliloquy of a Young Poet."

A dream!--a fleeting dream!

Childhood has passed, with all its joy and song,

And my life's frail bark on youth's impetuous stream

Is swiftly borne along.

High hopes spring up within;

Hopes of the future--thoughts of glory--fame,

Which prompt my mind to toil, and bid me win

That dream--a deathless name.

* * * * *

I know it all is vain,

That earthly honors ever must decay,

That all the laurels bought by toil and pain

Must pass with earth away.

But still my spirit high,

Longing for fame won by the immortal mind--

On fancy's pinion fain would scale the sky,

And leave dull earth behind.

Yes, I would write my name

With the star's burning ray on heaven's broad scroll,

That I might still the restless thirst for fame

Which fills my soul.

Bayard Taylor was not a great genius, and he did not succeed in

winning quite all of that high fame for which he struggled throughout

his life. He never expected to have earth's blessings showered upon

him without working for them; and the fact that he failed somewhat in

his highest ambition--to be a far-famed poet--makes his life seem

nearer to our own. We call him a great man because he did well what

came to him to do, working hard all his life. In this we can all

follow his example.

CHAPTER IV

SELF-EDUCATION AND AMBITION

"The Village Record" (to the proprietor of which Bayard was

apprenticed) was printed upon an old-fashioned hand press, and it was

the business of the apprentices to set the type, help make up the

paper, pull the forms, and send the weekly issues off to the

subscribers.

The mechanical work was soon learned, and the young apprentice

found considerable time for reading. He now began that work of

self-education which he carried on through his whole life. Already,

before he left the academy, he had become acquainted with the works of

Charles Dickens, and had secured the great man's autograph. "I went to

the Academy," says he, "where I received a letter that had come on

Saturday. It was from Hartford; I knew instantly it was from Dickens.

It was double, and sealed neatly with a seal bearing the initials C.D.

In the inside was a sheet of satin notepaper, on which was written,

'Faithfully yours, Charles Dickens, City Hotel, Hartford, Feb. 10,

1842'; and below, 'with the compliments of Mr. Dickens.' I can long

recollect the thrill of pleasure I experienced on seeing the autograph

of one whose writings I so ardently admired, and to whom, in spirit, I

felt myself attached; and it was not without a feeling of ambition

that I looked upon it that as he, a humble clerk, had risen to be the

guest of a mighty nation, so I, a humble pedagogue [he was then pupil

teacher at the Academy], might by unremitted and arduous intellectual

and moral exertion become a light, a star, among the names of my

country. May it be!"

When he went to work at West Chester his reading was chiefly poetry

and travel. The result of his "fireside travels" we shall soon see.

The way in which he read poetry may be gathered from the following

extract from a letter to one of his comrades:

"By the way, what do you think of Bryant as a poet, and especially of

'Thanatopsis? For my part, my admiration knows no bounds. There is an

all-pervading love of nature, a calm and quiet but still deep sense of

everything beautiful. And then the high and lofty feeling which

mingles with the whole! It seems to me when I read his poetry that our

hearts are united, and that I can feel every throb of his answered

back by mine. This is what makes a poet immortal. There are but few

who make me feel so thrillingly their glowing thoughts as Bryant,

Longfellow, Whittier, and Lowell (all Americans, you know), and these

I _love_. It is strange, the sway a master mind has over those who

have felt his power."

Another poet of whom he was an enthusiastic admirer was Tennyson. He

had read a criticism by Poe. "I still remember," he wrote afterward,

"the eagerness with which as a boy of seventeen, after reading his

paper, I sought for the volume; and I remember also the strange sense

of mental dazzle and bewilderment I experienced on the first perusal

of it. I can only compare it to the first sight of a sunlit landscape

through a prism; every object has a rainbow outline. One is fascinated

to look again and again, though the eyes ache."

He contributed several poems to the _Saturday Evening Post_, and then

wrote to Rufus W. Griswold, who, besides being connected with the

_Post_, was the editor of _Graham's Magazine_, the leading literary

periodical at that time. Those of us who know the life of Poe remember

Griswold as the man who pretended to be his friend, but who after

Poe's death wrote his life, filling it with all the scandalous

falsehoods he could hear of or invent. To Bayard Taylor, however, he

seems to have been a helpful friend.

"I have met with strange things since I wrote last," writes Taylor to

a school friend in March, 1843. "Last November I wrote to Mr.

Griswold, sending a poem to be inserted in the _Post_. However, I said

that it was my highest ambition to appear in _Grahams Magazine_. Some

time ago I got an answer. He said he had read my lines 'To the

Brandywine,' which appeared in the _Post_, with much pleasure, and

would have put them in the magazine if he had seen them in time. He

said the poem I sent him would appear in April in the magazine, and

requested me to contribute often and to call on him when I came to

town. I never was more surprised in my life."

He went to Philadelphia the next autumn, and consulted Griswold

regarding a poetic romance he had written--about a thousand lines in

length--and Griswold advised him to publish it in a volume with other

poems. He wrote to a friend to inquire how much the printing and

binding would cost, and finding that the expense would not be very

great, he concluded to ask his friends to subscribe for the volume.

When he had received enough subscriptions to pay the cost of

publication, he brought the volume out. It was entitled "Ximena; or,

The Battle of the Sierra Morena, and Other Poems. By James Bayard

Taylor." (The James was added by mistake by Griswold.) It was

dedicated "To Rufus W. Griswold, as an expression of gratitude for the

kind encouragement he has shown the author."

The poems contained in this volume were never republished in after

years. The book was fairly successful, and was distinctly a step

upward; but it did not fill the young writer with undue conceit. In

writing to a friend of his ambition at this time, he says: "It is

useless to deny that I have cherished hopes of occupying at some

future day a respectable station among our country's poets. I believe

all poets are possessed in a greater or less degree of ambition; it is

inseparable from the nature of poetry. And though I may be mistaken, I

think this ambition is never given without a mind of sufficient power

to sustain it, and to achieve its lofty object. Although I am desirous

of the world's honors, yet with all the sincerity I possess I declare

that my highest hope is to do good; to raise the hopes of the

desponding; to soothe the sorrows of the afflicted. I believe that

poetry owns as its true sphere the happiness of mankind."

What could be nobler and more sensible than that! Even his earliest

poetry has in it no false, slipshod sentiment. Its subject is nature

and heroic incident, and is indeed a faithful attempt to carry out the

aim so well stated above. Some have doubted whether Bayard Taylor

really had the power which he says he thinks is given to all who have

the ambition which he felt. But none can fail to admire the spirit in

which he worked, and to feel satisfied with the results, whatever they

may be.

CHAPTER V

A TRAVELER AT NINETEEN

It was not as a poet, however, that Bayard Taylor was to win his first

fame. At the age of nineteen, when he had but half completed his four

years' term of apprenticeship, he made up his mind to go to Europe. He

had no money; but that did not appear to him an insurmountable

obstacle. He thought he could work his way by writing letters for the

newspapers. So he went up to Philadelphia and visited all the editors.

For three days he went about; but all in vain. The editors gave him

little encouragement. He was on the point of going home, but with no

thought of giving up his project.

At last two different editors offered him each fifty dollars in

advance for twelve letters, and the proprietor of _Graham's Magazine_

paid him forty dollars for some poems. So he went back to Kennett

Square the jubilant possessor of a hundred and forty dollars.

He succeeded in buying his release from the articles of

apprenticeship, and immediately prepared to set out on foot for New

York, where he and two others were to take ship for England. That was

the beginning of a career of travel which lasted many years, and

brought him both fame and money.

In a delightful essay on "The First Journey I Ever Made," he says that

while other great travelers have felt in childhood an inborn

propensity to go out into the world to see the regions beyond, he had

the intensest desire to climb upward--so that without shifting his

horizon, he could yet extend it, and take in a far wider sweep of

vision. "I envied every bird," he goes on, "that sat singing on the

topmost bough of the great, century-old cherry tree; the weathercock

on our barn seemed to me to whirl in a higher region of the air; and

to rise from the earth in a balloon was a bliss which I would almost

have given my life to enjoy." His desire to ascend soon took the

practical form of wishing to climb a mountain. By great economy he

saved up fifteen dollars, and with a companion who had twenty-seven

dollars (enormous wealth!) he set out for a walking tour to the

Catskills, with the hope of going even so far as the Connecticut

valley.

No doubt the feelings he experienced in setting out on that excursion,

at the end of his first year as an apprentice, would apply equally

well to the greater journey he was to attempt a year later.

"The steamboat from Philadelphia deposited me at Bordentown, on the

forenoon of a warm, clear day. I buckled on my knapsack, inquired the

road to Amboy, and struck off, resolutely, with the feelings of an

explorer on the threshold of great discoveries. The sun shone

brightly, the woods were green, and the meadows were gay with phlox

and buttercups. Walking was the natural impulse of the muscles; and

the glorious visions which the next few days would unfold to me, drew

me onward with a powerful fascination. Thus, mile after mile went by;

and early in the afternoon I reached Hightstown, very hot and hungry,

and a little footsore. Twenty-five cents only had been expended thus

far--and was I now to dine for half a dollar? The thought was banished

as rapidly as it came, and six cakes, of remarkable toughness and

heaviness, put an effectual stop to any further promptings of appetite

that day.

"The miles now became longer, and the rosy color of my anticipations

faded a little. The sandy level of the country fatigued my eyes; the

only novel objects I had yet discovered were the sweep-poles of the

wells....The hot afternoon was drawing to a close, and I was wearily

looking out for Spotswood, when a little incident occurred, the memory

of which has ever since been as refreshing to me as the act in itself

was at the time.

"I stopped to get a drink from a well in front of a neat little

farmhouse. While I was awkwardly preparing to let down the bucket, a

kind, sweet voice suddenly said: 'Let me do it for you.' I looked up,

and saw before me a girl of sixteen, with blue eyes, wavy auburn hair,

and slender form--not strikingly handsome, but with a shy, pretty

face, which blushed the least bit in the world, as she met my gaze.

"Without waiting for my answer, she seized the pole and soon drew up

the dripping bucket, which she placed upon the curb. 'I will get you a

glass,' she then said, and darted into the house--reappearing

presently with a tumbler in one hand and a plate of crisp tea-cakes in

the other. She stood beside me while I drank, and then extended the

plate with a gesture more inviting than any words would have been. I

had had enough of cake for one day; but I took one, nevertheless, and

put a second in my pocket, at her kind persuasion.

"This was the first of many kindnesses which I have experienced from

strangers all over the wide world; and there are few, if any, which I

shall remember longer.

"At sunset I had walked about twenty-two miles, and had taken to the

railroad track by way of change, when I came upon a freight train,

which had stopped on account of some slight accident.

"'Where are you going?' inquired the engineer.

"'To Amboy.'

"'Take you there for a quarter!'

"It was too tempting; so I climbed upon the tender and rested my weary

legs, while the pines and drifted sands flew by us an hour or more--

and I had crossed New Jersey!"

This little description may be taken as a type of the way in which he

traveled and the way in which he described his travels--a way that

almost immediately made him famous, and caused the public to call for

volume after volume from his pen.

CHAPTER VI

TWO YEARS IN EUROPE FOR FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS

A journey to Europe was not the common thing in those days that it has

since become, and no American had then thought of tramping over

historic scenes with little or no money. So this journey, projected

and carried out by Bayard Taylor, was really an original and daring

undertaking. It was all the more remarkable from the fact that the

people of the community where he had been born and brought up had

scarcely ever gone farther from their homesteads than Philadelphia.

In New York he visited all the editors with an introduction from

Nathaniel P. Willis; but none of them gave him any encouragement,

except Horace Greeley, the famous editor of the _Tribune_. Here is

Bayard Taylor's own description of the interview: "When I first called

upon this gentleman, whose friendship it is now my pride to claim, he

addressed me with that honest bluntness which is habitual to him: 'I

am sick of descriptive letters, and will have no more of them. But I

should like some sketches of German life and society, after you have

been there and know something about it. If the letters are good, you

shall be paid for them, but don't write until you know something.'

This I faithfully promised, and kept my promise so well that I am

afraid the eighteen letters which I afterward sent from Germany, and

which were published in the _Tribune_, were dull in proportion as they

were wise."

The journey was indeed to Taylor a serious thing. "It did not and does

not seem like a pleasure excursion," he writes; "it is a duty, a

necessity."

On the 1st of July, 1844, Taylor and his two companions embarked on

the ship "Oxford," bound for Liverpool. They had taken a second-cabin

passage, the second cabin being a small place amidships, flanked with

bales of cotton and fitted with temporary and rough planks. They paid

ten dollars each for the passage, but were obliged to find their own

bedding and provisions. These latter the ship's cook would prepare for

them for a small compensation. All expenses included, they found they

could reach Liverpool for twenty-four dollars apiece.

At last they were actually afloat. "As the blue hills of Neversink

faded away, and sank with the sun behind the ocean, and I felt the

first swells of the Atlantic," he writes, "and the premonitions of

seasickness, my heart failed me for the first and last time. The

irrevocable step was taken; there was no possibility of retreat, and a

vague sense of doubt and alarm possessed me. Had I known anything of

the world, this feeling would have been more than momentary; but to my

ignorance and enthusiasm all things seemed possible, and the

thoughtless and happy confidence of youth soon returned."

The experiences of the next two years he has also told briefly and

tersely. "After landing in Liverpool," he says, "I spent three weeks

in a walk through Scotland and the north of England, and then traveled

through Belgium, and up the Rhine to Heidelberg, where I arrived in

September, 1844. The winter of 1844-45 I spent in Frankfurt on the

Main [in the family in which N.P. Willis's brother Richard was

boarding], and by May I was so good a German that I was often not

suspected of being a foreigner. I started off again on foot, a

knapsack on my back, and visited the Brocken, Leipsic, Dresden,

Prague, Vienna, Salzburg, and Munich, returning to Frankfurt in July.

A further walk over the Alps and through Northern Italy took me to

Florence, where I spent four months learning Italian. Thence I

wandered, still on foot, to Rome and Civita Vecchia, where I bought a

ticket as deck-passenger to Marseilles, and then tramped on to Paris

through the cold winter rains. I arrived there in February, 1846, and

returned to America after a stay of three months in Paris and London.

I had been abroad two years, and had supported myself entirely during

the whole time by my literary correspondence. The remuneration which I

received was in all $500, and only by continual economy and occasional

self-denial was I able to carry out my plan. I saw almost nothing of

intelligent European society; my wanderings led me among the common

people. But literature and art were nevertheless open to me, and a new

day had dawned in my life."

CHAPTER VII

THE HARDSHIP OF TRAMP TRAVEL

Making a journey without money, without knowing the language of the

people, and without any experience in travel is not at all the sort of

thing it seems to one who has not gone through its toils, but only

sees the glow and glamour of success. We cannot pass on without giving

some of the details of commonplace hardship which Bayard Taylor

endured on this first European journey.

Taylor knew a little book French, but neither he nor either of his

companions could speak it or understand it when spoken, and they knew

nothing at all of German. When they reached Frankfurt they tried to

inquire the way to the house of the American consul. At first they

were not at all able to make themselves understood; but finally they

found a man who could speak a little French and who told them that the

consul resided in "Bellevue" street. It was in reality "Shone

Aussicht," which is the German for beautiful view, as Bellevue is the

French. But the young travelers knew nothing of this. They went in

search of "Bellevue" street, and though they wandered over the greater

part of the town and suburbs, they did not find it. At last they

decided to try all the streets which had a beautiful view, and in this

way soon found the consul's house.

Not only did they have very little money in any case, but they were

frequently obliged to wait months for remittances. While in Italy,

Taylor's funds ran so low, and he became so discouraged, that he gave

up going to Greece, as he had at first planned. He was expecting a

draft for a hundred dollars; but that would barely pay his debts. "My

clothes," he writes to one of his companions, "are as bad as yours

were when you got to Heidelberg, nearly dropping from me; and I cannot

get them mended. What is worse, they must last till I get to Paris."

Later he speaks of spending three dollars for a pair of trousers, as

those he wore would not hold together any longer. In despair, he

exclaims, "It is really a horrible condition. If there ever were any

young men who made the tour of Europe under such difficulties and

embarrassments as we, I should like to see them."

But all this only urged him to greater efforts. "I tell you what,

Frank," he writes almost in his next letter, "I am getting a real rage

in me to carve out my own fortune, and not a poor one, either.

Sometimes I almost desire that difficulties should be thrown in my

way, for the sake of the additional strength gained in surmounting

them."

These words were written from Italy; but yet harder things were in

store for him. "I reached London for the second time about the middle

of March, 1846," he writes in his paper on "A Young Author's Life in

London," "after a dismal walk through Normandy and a stormy passage

across the Channel. I stood upon London Bridge, in the raw mist and

the falling twilight, with a franc and a half in my pocket, and

deliberated what I should do. Weak from sea-sickness, hungry, chilled,

and without a single acquaintance in the great city, my situation was

about as hopeless as it is possible to conceive. Successful authors in

their libraries, sitting in cushioned chairs and dipping their pens

into silver inkstands, may write about money with a beautiful scorn,

and chant the praise of Poverty--the 'good goddess of Poverty,' as

George Sand, making 50,000 francs a year, enthusiastically terms

her;--but there is no condition in which the Real is so utterly at

variance with the Ideal, as to be actually out of money, and hungry, with

nothing to pawn and no friend to borrow from. Have you ever known it,

my friend? If not, I could wish that you might have the experience for

twenty-four hours, only once in your life."

On this occasion Bayard Taylor went to a chop-house where he could get

a wretched bed for a shilling. The next morning he took a sixpenny

breakfast, and started out to look for work. By good fortune he met

Putnam, the American publisher, who lent him a sovereign (five

dollars) and gave him work that would enable him to earn his living

until he could get money from America for his return passage.

CHAPTER VIII

HIS FIRST LOVE AND GREATEST SORROW

At the very first school which Bayard Taylor attended there was a

little Quaker girl who would whisper with a blush to her teacher, "May

I sit beside Bayard?" Her name was Mary Agnew. As schoolmates and

neighbors the two children grew up together; and in time Bayard began

to confide to his diary his dream of happiness with her. Toward this

object, all his thoughts and plans were gradually directed.

Mary Agnew's father did not countenance this neighbor lover, however,

and when Bayard set out for Europe he was not allowed to write to her.

He sent messages through his mother, and occasionally heard from the

young girl in the same way. On his return, however, he grew more bold,

and soon became openly engaged to her. The romance is a sadly

beautiful one; for this fair girl who was his inspiration during the

years of his hardest struggles, finally fell into a decline and died

just as he was beginning to earn the money that would have made them

happy together.

"I remember him," says a neighbor, speaking of the two at this time,

"as a bright, blushing, diffident youth, just entering manhood; and

with him I always associate that gentle and beautiful girl, with

matchless eyes, who inspired many of his early lyrics, and whose death

filled the nest of love with snow."

Mary Agnew reminds us of Poe's beautiful Virginia Clemm, his "Annabel

Lee." Grace Greenwood wrote of her as "a dark-eyed young girl with the

rose yet unblighted on cheek and lip, with soft brown, wavy hair,

which, when blown by the wind, looked like the hair oft given to

angels by the old masters, producing a sort of halo-like effect about

a lovely head."

And Taylor at this time was evidently her match in looks as well as

spirit. A German friend describes him thus: "He was a tall, slender,

blooming young man, the very image of youthful beauty and purity. His

intellectual head was surrounded by dark hair; the glance of his eyes

was so modest, and yet so clear and lucid, that you seemed to look

right into his heart."

On his return from Europe, young Taylor found that his letters to the

newspapers had attracted some attention, perhaps largely owing to the

fact that one who was almost a boy had made the journey on foot, with

little or no money. At the same time he had told his story in a

simple, straightforward way, which proved him to be a good reporter.

Friends advised him to gather the letters into a volume, which he did

under the title, "Views Afoot; or Europe Seen with Knapsack and

Staff." Within a year six editions were sold, and the sale continued

large for a number of years.

Yet this success, quick as it was, did not solve all his difficulties

at once. He was anxious to earn a good living as soon as possible,

that he might marry Mary Agnew. After looking the field over, he and a

friend bought a weekly paper published in Phoenixville, a lively

manufacturing town in the same county as his home. This, with the aid

of his friend, he edited and managed for a year. He not only failed to

make money, but accumulated debts which he was three years in paying

off. At the same time he found that he could no longer endure a narrow

country life. He tried to give his paper a literary tone; but the

people did not want a literary paper. They cared more for local news

and gossip, which he hated.

The old ambition and aspiration to be and to do something really worth

doing was still uppermost with him. In a letter to Mary Agnew he says:

"Sometimes I feel as if there were a Providence watching over me, and

as if an unseen and uncontrollable hand guided my actions. I have

often dim, vague forebodings that an eventful destiny is in store for

me; that I have vast duties yet to accomplish, and a wider sphere of

action than that which I now occupy. These thoughts may be vain; they

spring only from the ceaseless impulses of an upward-aspiring spirit;

but if they _are_ real, and to be fulfilled, I shall the more need thy

love and the gladness of thy dear presence."

He wrote to his friends in New York about getting work there, but they

did not encourage him much. Horace Greeley bluntly advised him to stay

where he was. The editor of the _Literary World,_ however, offered him

employment at five dollars a week. He thereupon sold out his interest

in his country paper at a loss, and went to try his fortunes in New

York. Before he had been there many weeks, Horace Greeley offered him

a position on the _Tribune_ at twelve dollars a week. The connection

thus begun lasted for the rest of his life. It was as the _Tribunes_

correspondent that he traveled all over the world. He was soon able to

buy stock in the _Tribune_ company, and this was the foundation of his

future fortune.

He had many literary and other distinguished friends in New York. And

during these first few years he worked very hard indeed, hoping soon

to earn enough money to provide for Mary Agnew. In 1850, after three

years in New York, he was able to set the date of their marriage. But

it was postponed from time to time on account of her illness. At last

he knew that she could never be well again; yet in any case he wished

the marriage ceremony performed. They were accordingly married October

24, 1850; and two months later she was dead.

CHAPTER IX

"THE GREAT AMERICAN TRAVELER"

It had been Bayard Taylor's boyhood ambition to become a great poet;

but it seemed as if fate meant him for a great traveler. He was sorry

that this was so: yet he was fond of travel, and never refused any

opportunity to visit other lands. In 1849, when the California gold

fever was at its height, he was sent by the _Tribune_ to the Pacific

Coast.

"I went," he says, "by way of the Isthmus of Panama--the route had

just been opened--reached San Francisco in August, and spent five

months in the midst of the rough, half-savage life of a new country. I

lived almost entirely in the open air, sleeping on the ground with my

saddle for a pillow, and sharing the hardships of the gold diggers,

without taking part in their labors."

On his return he gathered his letters into a volume entitled

"Eldorado, or Adventures in the Path of Empire: comprising a voyage to

California, via Panama; Life in San Francisco and Monterey; Pictures

of the Gold Region, and Experiences of Mexican Travel."

He now began to feel the strength and confidence of success; his brain

was seething with new ideas, and he felt as if he could do that which

would realize the destiny of which he had dreamed. But sorrow was

already at his door. His hopes were for the time broken and thrown

back by the death of Mary Agnew.

In the summer of 1851 he found himself worn out and depressed. His

health was shattered and his mind was overpowered. But a change and

rest were at hand. The editors of the _Tribune_ suggested his going to

Egypt and the Holy Land. In the autumn he set out, and spent the

winter in ascending the Nile to Khartoum. He even went up the White

Nile to the country of the Shillooks, a region then scarcely known to

white men.

Bayard Taylor fancied that he had two natures, one a southern nature

and one a northern nature. Of course the northern nature was his

regular and ordinary one. In one of his later journeys, when he had

entered Spain from France and was sitting down to a breakfast of red

mullet and oranges fresh from the trees, "straightway," he says, "I

took off my northern nature as a garment, folded it and packed it

neatly away in my knapsack, and took out in its stead the light,

beribboned and bespangled southern nature, which I had not worn for

eight or nine years."

He donned this southern nature for the first time on his trip to

California by way of Panama. Horace Greeley especially commended his

letter from Panama. But it was during his journey in Egypt that he

became most saturated with the south, and composed his "Poems of the

Orient"--perhaps the best he ever wrote. He had not been in Alexandria

a day and a half before he wrote to his mother that he had never known

such a delicious climate. "The very air is a luxury to breathe," he

said. "I am going to don the red cap and sash," he wrote from Cairo,

"and sport a saber at my side. To-day I had my hair all cut within a

quarter of an inch of the skin, and when I look in the glass I see a

strange individual. Think of me as having no hair, a long beard, and a

copper-colored face." So much like a native did he become that when he

entered the bank in Constantinople for his letters and money, they

addressed him in Turkish.

He made the journey up the Nile on a boat with a wealthy German

landowner, a Mr. Bufleb, who became to him like a brother, though he

was nearly twice the age of Taylor. Some years later the young man

married Mrs. Bufleb's niece.

When he reached Constantinople he received a letter from the managers

of the _Tribune_ suggesting that he go across Asia to Hong-Kong,

China, and join the expedition of Commodore Perry to Japan. As the

expedition would not reach Hong-Kong for some months, however, he had

time to visit his German friend and go on to London. From London he

returned through Spain and went by way of the Suez, Bombay, and

Calcutta to China, stopping on the way to view the Himalayas.

Commodore Perry made the young journalist "master's mate," and gave

him a place on the flagship. This was necessary, because no one not a

member of the navy was allowed to accompany the expedition.

There is not space to detail the wonderful sights he saw or the

interesting experiences he had. He reached New York, December 20,

1853, after an absence of more than two years, and found that in his

absence he had become almost famous. His letters in the _Tribune_ had

been read all over the country, and everybody wanted to know more of

the "great American traveler."

He at once prepared for the press three books. They were "A Journey to

Central Africa; or, Life and Landscapes from Egypt to the Negro

Kingdoms of the Nile "; "The Land of the Saracens; or, Pictures of

Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain"; and "A Visit to India,

China, and Japan in the Year 1853."

He had hundreds of calls to lecture; and thereafter for several years

he made lecturing his principal business. From his books and his

lectures he received large sums of money, so that before he was thirty

he had accumulated a modest fortune.

In 1856 Bayard Taylor took his two sisters and his youngest brother to

Europe. He left them in Germany, while he himself carried out a plan

long in his mind, of visiting northern Sweden and Lapland in winter.

The following summer he visited Norway, and later published the

results of these journeys in "Northern Travel."

While in Germany, after his trip to Sweden, he became engaged to Marie

Hansen, daughter of Prof. Peter A. Hansen, the noted astronomer and

founder of Erfurt Observatory. They were married in the following

autumn, October 27, 1857.

He now hurried home with his wife and prepared to build a house and

lay out the country estate which he called Cedarcroft. The land had

belonged to one of his ancestors, and he was very proud of his fine

country house; but he found it a rather expensive enjoyment.

CHAPTER X

HIS POETRY

We have seen how in youth Bayard Taylor conceived the ambition to be

known as one of his country's great poets. He saw his books of travel

sell by the hundred thousand; but while this brought him money and

notoriety, he clung still to his poetry. He even felt annoyed when he

heard himself spoken of as "the great American traveler" instead of

the great American poet. The truth is, he had not been able to give to

poetry the time or energy he could have wished; and he afterwards

worked with desperate energy to recover those lost poetic

opportunities.

Yet in his busiest days he was always writing verses, which in the

minds of excellent judges are the best he ever did. From time to time

he published volumes of poetry, and with certain of his intimate

friends he always maintained himself on the footing of a poet.

We remember the publication of his first volume, entitled "Ximena,"

which he never cared to reprint in his collected works. During his

first European trip he wrote a great deal. Some of his shorter poems

he afterwards published under the title "Rhymes of Travel." The fate

of a longer poem we must hear in his own words.

"I had in my knapsack," he says, "a manuscript poem of some twelve

hundred lines, called 'The Liberated Titan,'--the idea of which I

fancied to be something entirely new in literature. Perhaps it was. I

did not doubt for a moment that any London publisher would gladly

accept it, and I imagined that its appearance would create not a

little sensation. Mr. Murray gave the poem to his literary adviser,

who kept it about a month, and then returned it with a polite message.

I was advised to try Moxon; but, by this time, I had sobered down

considerably, and did not wish to risk a second rejection.

"I therefore solaced myself by reading the immortal poem at night, in

my bare chamber, looking occasionally down into the graveyard, and

thinking of mute, inglorious Miltons.

"The curious reader may ask how I escaped the catastrophe of

publishing the poem at last. That is a piece of good fortune for which

I am indebted to the Rev. Dr. Bushnell, of Hartford. We were

fellow-passengers on board the same ship to America, a few weeks later,

and I had sufficient confidence in his taste to show him the poem. His

verdict was charitable; but he asserted that no poem of that length

should be given to the world before it had received the most thorough

study and finish--and exacted from me a promise not to publish it

within a year. At the end of that time I renewed the promise to myself

for a thousand years."

Of other poems written at that time he thought better. In the preface

to his volume he says of them,--"They are faithful records of my

feelings at the time, often noted down hastily by the wayside, and

aspiring to no higher place than the memory of some pilgrim who may,

under like circumstances, look upon the same scenes. An ivy leaf from

a tower where a hero of old history may have dwelt, or the simplest

weed growing over the dust that once held a great soul, is reverently

kept for memories it inherited through the chance fortune of the

wind-sown seed; and I would fain hope that these rhymes may bear with

them a like simple claim to reception, from those who have given me their

company through the story of my wanderings."

Soon after he went to New York he began a series of Californian

ballads, which were published anonymously in the _Literary World_, and

attracted considerable attention. They appeared before he had made his

trip to California; but while on that trip he wrote still others. At

the same time he began several more ambitious poems, among them

"Hylas," and just before he set out for Egypt he had another volume of

poems ready for the press. It was entitled "A Book of Romances, Lyrics

and Songs," and was published in Boston just after he set out on his

Eastern journey. But while his volumes of travel sold edition after

edition his volumes of verse scarcely paid expenses.

The previous year, however,--1850,--he had had a bit of success which

caused him no end of annoyance. Jenny Lind had been brought to America

to sing, and her manager had offered a prize of $200 for the best song

that might be written for her. "Bayard Taylor came to me one

afternoon early in September," says Mr. R.H. Stoddard, "and confided

to me the fact that he was to be declared the winner of this perilous

prize, and that he foresaw a row. They will say it was given to me

because Putnam, who is my publisher, is one of the committee, and

because Ripley, who is my associate on the _Tribune_, is another.'"

Mr. Stoddard kindly suggested to him that if he feared the results, he

might substitute his (Stoddard's) name for the real one, and take the

money while Stoddard got the abuse. He did not choose to do this,

however, and the indignation of the seven or eight hundred

disappointed contributors was unbounded. Taylor bore their abuse well

enough, but he was heartily ashamed of the reputation which the poem

brought him.

CHAPTER XI

"POEMS OF THE ORIENT"

During the months he spent in Egypt, Syria, and Asia Minor, Bayard

Taylor wrote his "Poems of the Orient," of which Mr. Stoddard says, "I

thought, and I think so still when I read these spirited and

picturesque poems, that Bayard Taylor had captured the poetic secret

of the East as no English-writing poet but Byron had. He knew the East

as no one can possibly know it from books."

Certainly these poems of the East have a haunting ring that can never

be forgotten. What more stirring than this Bedouin love song!

From the desert I come to thee

On a stallion shod with fire;

And the winds are left behind

In the speed of my desire.

Under thy window I stand,

And the midnight hears my cry:

I love thee, I love but thee,

With a love that shall not die,

_Till the sun grows cold,

And the stars are old,

And the leaves of the Judgment

Book unfold_!

Or what more grand and affectionate than this from "Hassan to his

Mare":

Come, my beauty! come, my desert darling!

On my shoulder lay thy glossy head!

Fear not, though the barley-sack be empty,

Here's the half of Hassan's scanty bread.

Thou shalt have thy share of dates, my beauty!

And thou know'st my water-skin is free;

Drink and welcome, for the wells are distant,

And my strength and safety lie in thee.

Bend thy forehead now, to take my kisses!

Lift in love thy dark and splendid eye:

Thou art glad when Hassan mounts the saddle,--

Thou art proud he owns thee: so am I.

Let the Sultan bring his boasted horses,

Prancing with their diamond-studded reins;

They, my darling, shall not match thy fleetness

When they course with thee the desert plains!

Let the Sultan bring his famous horses,

Let him bring his golden swords to me,--

Bring his slaves, his eunuchs, and his harem;

He would offer them in vain for thee.

We have seen Damascus, O my beauty!

And the splendor of the Pashas there:

What's their pomp and riches? Why, I would not

Take them for a handful of thy hair!

Another stirring poem of the East is "Tyre."

The wild and windy morning is lit with lurid fire;

The thundering surf of ocean beats on the rocks of Tyre,--

Beats on the fallen columns and round the headlands roars,

And hurls its foamy volume along the hollow shores,

And calls with hungry clamor, that speaks its long desire:

"Where are the ships of Tarshish, the mighty ships of Tyre?"

In his "L'Envoi" at the end of these poems, Bayard Taylor gives us a

hint of his meaning when he spoke of his "southern nature" as

distinguished from his "northern nature."

I found, among those Children of the Sun,

The cipher of my nature,--the release

Of baffled powers, which else had never won

That free fulfillment, whose reward is peace.

For not to any race or any clime

Is the complete sphere of life revealed;

He who would make his own that round sublime,

Must pitch his tent on many a distant field.

Upon his home a dawning lustre beams,

But through the world he walks to open day,

Gathering from every land the prismal gleams,

Which, when united, form the perfect ray.

CHAPTER XII

BAYARD TAYLOR'S FRIENDSHIPS

A biography of Bayard Taylor would not be complete without some

account of his friendships. He was always on the best of terms with

all living beings, and this subtle attraction of his nature was an

important part of his greatness.

In "Views Afoot" he tells of a charming little incident which is

enough in itself to make us love the man. It occurred in Florence,

Italy, where he was a stranger, a foreigner; and this makes the

incident in itself seem the more wonderful. "I know of nothing," he

writes, "that has given me a more sweet and tender delight than the

greeting of a little child, who, leaving his noisy playmates, ran

across the street to me, and taking my hand, which he could barely

clasp in both his soft little ones, looked up in my face with an

expression so winning and affectionate that I loved him at once."

We recall the girl with the tea-cakes whom he met on his first journey

while tramping across New Jersey. There was also something of human

love and fellowship in his familiarity with wild animals in Egypt. In

a free, joyous letter to his betrothed, Mary Agnew, he tells a curious

incident of a similar kind, which occurred while he was editing the

paper at Phoenixville. "On Sunday," says he, "I took [Schiller's] 'Don

Carlos' with me in our boat, and rowed myself out of sight of the

village into the solitude of the autumn woods. The sky was blue and

bright as that of Eden, and the bright trees waved over me like

gorgeous banners from the hilltops. I sat on a sunny slope and read

for hours; it was a rare enjoyment! As I moved to rise I found a

snake, which had crept up to me for warmth, and was coiled up quietly

under my arm. I was somewhat startled, but the reptile slid

noiselessly away, and I could not harm it."

A pretty story is told of Taylor by one who called on him when he was

on one of his lecture tours. He was a stranger in the house of

strangers, and no doubt as much a stranger to the cat as to any of the

people; but it did not take him long to slip into easy intercourse

with men or animals. "I had listened for some time to his intelligent

descriptions, enunciated with extreme modesty in the modulated tones

of his pleasing voice, when Tom, a large Maltese cat, entered the

room. At Mr. Taylor's invitation Tom approached him, and as he stroked

the fur of the handsome cat, a sort of magnetism seemed to be imparted

to the family pet, for he rolled over at the feet of his new-made

friend, and seemed delighted with the beginning of the interview. In

the most natural manner possible, Mr. Taylor slid off, as it were,

from the sofa on which he had been sitting, and assumed the position

of a Turk on the rug before the sofa, playing with delighted Tom in

the most buoyant manner, still continuing his conversation, but

changing the subject, for the nonce, to that of cats, and narrating

many stories respecting the weird and wise conduct of these animals,

which are at once loved and feared by the human race."

He even felt a sort of personal tenderness for the old trees on his

place at Kennett. He said that friends were telling him to cut this

tree and cut that. To him this would have been almost a sacrilege. The

trees seemed to depend on him for _protection_, and they should have

it. Writing from this country home which he had built, he says, "The

birds know me already, and I have learned to imitate the partridge and

rain-dove, so that I can lure them to me."

And Bayard Taylor was the accepted friend of nearly all the

distinguished men of letters of his time. He knew Longfellow, Lowell,

Whittier, and Holmes in Boston, and even in his early years, when he

first went to New York to work, he was able to pay them such flying

visits as he describes in the following to Mary Agnew: "Reached Boston

Sunday morning, galloped out to Cambridge, and spent the evening with

Lowell; went on Monday to the pine woods of Abingdon to report

Webster's speech, and dispatched it to the _Tribune_; got up early on

Tuesday and galloped to Brookline to see Colonel Perkins; then off in

the cars to Amesbury, and rambled over the Merrimac hills with

Whittier; then Wednesday morning to Lynn, where I stopped a while at

Helen Irving's; back in the afternoon to Cambridge, where I smoked a

cigar with Lowell, and then stayed all night at Longfellow's."

In New York his enjoyment of his friends, whom he met often and

familiarly, was of the keenest. Says Mr. R. H. Stoddard, "I recall

many nights which Bayard Taylor spent in our rooms.... Great was our

merriment; for if we did not always sink the shop, we kept it solely

for our own amusement. Fitz-James O'Brien was a frequent guest, and an

eager partaker of our merriment, which sometimes resolved itself into

the writing of burlesque poems. We sat around a table, and whenever

the whim seized us, we each wrote down themes on little pieces of

paper, and putting them into a hat or box we drew out one at random,

and then scribbled away for dear life. We put no restriction upon

ourselves: we could be grave or gay, or idiotic even; but we must be

rapid, for half the fun was in noting who first sang out, 'Finished!'"

The reader will remember Taylor's joy when a boy at receiving the

autograph of Dickens. The time was coming when he should be on terms

almost of intimacy with all the leading poets and writers of London.

"I spent two days with Tennyson in June," he writes to a literary

friend in 1857, "and you take my word for it, he is a noble fellow,

every inch of him. He is as tall as I am, with a head which Read

capitally calls that of a dilapidated Jove, long black hair, splendid

dark eyes, and a full mustache and beard. The portraits don't look a

bit like him; they are handsomer, perhaps, but haven't half the

splendid character of his face. We smoked many a pipe together, and

talked of poetry, religion, politics, and geology.... Our intercourse

was most cordial and unrestrained, and he asked me, at parting, to be

sure and visit him every time I came to England."

A similar tale might be told of his relations with Thackeray and a

score of others.

But an account of his friendships would not be complete without a

reference to Mr. Bufleb, whom he met on his journey up the Nile.

Taylor writes to his mother from Nubia: "I want to speak of the friend

from whom I have just parted, because I am very much moved by his

kindness, and the knowledge may be grateful to you. His friendship for

me is something wonderful, and it seems like a special Providence that

in Egypt, where I anticipated the want of all near sympathy and

kindness, I should find it in such abundant measure. He is a man of

totally different experience from myself: accustomed all his life to

wealth, to luxury, and to the exercise of authority. He was even

prejudiced against America and the Americans, and he confessed to me

that he was by nature stubborn and selfish. Yet few persons have ever

placed such unbounded confidence in me, or treated me with such

devotion and generosity.... For two days before our parting he could

scarcely eat or sleep, and when the time drew near he was so pale and

agitated that I almost feared to leave him. I have rarely been so

moved as when I saw a strong, proud man exhibit such an attachment for

me.... I told him all my history, and showed him the portrait I have

with me [that of Mary Agnew]. He went out of the cabin after looking

at it, and when he returned I saw that he had been weeping."

Surely, there must have been something peculiarly noble and sweet in

Bayard Taylor's nature to have drawn to him so powerfully a man of

another nation and another race. The friendship was lasting, and

Taylor spent many happy weeks at Mr. Bufleb's home in Gotha, Germany.

The latter even bought a little house and garden adjoining his own

estate, which was for the special use of his friend, and he closes the

letter which describes it by saying: "You see how I have written to

you, my dear Taylor. In spite of our long separation and remoteness

from each other, your heart I know could never tell you of any change

in my feelings and thoughts. On the contrary, this _rapport_ which we

enjoy has for me a profound meaning; whilst you were dedicating your

glorious work on Central Africa to me, I was setting in order for you

the most cherished part of my possessions."

CHAPTER XIII

LAST YEARS

With the building of Cedarcroft, and the publication of his "Poet's

Journal," Bayard Taylor's fame and fortune reached their height. The

Civil War was now on the point of breaking out. He entered into the

Northern cause with ardor, and even sold a share of _Tribune_ stock to

raise a thousand dollars with which to fit out his brother Frederick

and provide arms for his neighbors to defend their homes.

But the war put an end to his lectures, and cut off other sources of

his income. In 1862 he was appointed secretary of legation at the

court of St. Petersburg, and not long after was left there as _charge

d'affaires_. The cause of the Union had received some heavy reverses,

and France had invited England and Russia to join her in intervening

between the combatants. But, perhaps owing to Bayard Taylor's

diplomatic skill, Russia refused to take part in such an enterprise

without the express desire of the United States.

About this time, also, Taylor began to write a series of novels, in

the hope of bettering his fortunes thereby. The books brought him some

reputation, but to-day "Hannah Thurston" and "John Godfrey's Fortunes"

are seldom read.

A more important undertaking was his translation of "Faust," which was

accepted abroad as a monument of his scholarship, and remains to-day

one of the best translations into English of the great Goethe's most

famous work.

Other books of travel were written and published, and various fresh

volumes of poems. During this period of his life he produced most of

his longer descriptive and philosophic poems, such as "The Picture of

St. John," "Lars," and "Prince Deukalion"; but his songs and ballads

have proved more popular than these, though he threw into them all his

energy and ambition.

On July 4, 1876, he delivered his stately National Ode at the

Philadelphia Centennial, and the same year he returned to his desk at

the _Tribune_ office. But failing health compelled him to give up this

drudgery, and in the following year he was nominated United States

minister to Berlin. A grand banquet at which Bryant presided was given

him in New York, on April 4, the eve of his departure; but before the

year was finished he died in Berlin--December 19, 1878.