Readers of Whittier, the now venerable and famous American poet, will
remember fond allusions to his favourite sister Elizabeth, who during
her life was a bright and stimulating member of the poet's earlier and
later home. The day has not yet come when we can learn much of her
happy influence upon him. She was pre-eminently her brother's sister,
and of her character as such we cannot now know much. She was also
herself a poet, and several of her pieces have been published. A few
particulars of her life cannot be uninteresting.
She was born on December 7, 1815, the younger sister of the poet,
being the fourth and last child of their father, John Whittier.
Elizabeth derived her second name from the family of her mother, whose
maiden name was Abigail Hussey, and who was of English descent. The
Whittiers had for some generations lived in a house built by one of
the ancestors of the family at Haverill, and had been prominent
members of the Society of Friends.
The young Whittiers were happy in their parenthood, as well as in
their early surroundings. Their father was an honest, upright, sturdy
yeoman, to whom a mean and cowardly action was unknown, while their
mother was gifted with the natural refinement of thought and manner
distinguishing the possession of a gentle heart.
Passages in Whittier's "Snowbound" are pleasantly descriptive of his
early home and its members. Of his mother he writes:--
Our mother, while she turned her wheel,
Or run the new-knit stocking heel,
Told how the Indian hordes came down
At midnight on Cochico town.
Then haply, with a look more grave,
And soberer tone, some tale she gave
From painful Sewall's ancient tome,
Beloved in every Quaker home,
And faith fire-winged by martyrdom.