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diff --git a/39406.txt b/39406.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6d40f88 --- /dev/null +++ b/39406.txt @@ -0,0 +1,14959 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Kentucky in American Letters, v. 1 of 2, by +John Wilson Townsend + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license + + +Title: Kentucky in American Letters, v. 1 of 2 + 1784-1912 + +Author: John Wilson Townsend + +Release Date: July 6, 2012 [EBook #39406] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KENTUCKY IN AMERICAN *** + + + + +Produced by Brian Sogard, Douglas L. Alley, III and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by The Internet Archive/Million Book Project) + + + + + + + +KENTUCKY IN +AMERICAN LETTERS + + + + +OTHER WORKS BY MR. TOWNSEND + + +_Richard Hickman Menefee_. 1907 +_Kentuckians in History and Literature_. 1907 +_The Life of James Francis Leonard_. 1909 +_Kentucky: Mother of Governors_. 1910 +_Lore of the Meadowland_. 1911 + + + + +KENTUCKY IN +AMERICAN LETTERS + +1784-1912 + +BY +JOHN WILSON TOWNSEND + +WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY +JAMES LANE ALLEN + +IN TWO VOLUMES +VOL. I + +THE TORCH PRESS +CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA +NINETEEN THIRTEEN + + + + +_Of this edition one thousand sets have been printed, of which +this is number_ + +241 + +COPYRIGHT 1913 +BY THE TORCH PRESS +PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 1913 + +[Illustration: (Printers' Union Logo)] + + + + + +To My Mother + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Mr. Townsend's fellow countrymen must feel themselves to be put under +a beautiful obligation to him by his work entitled _Kentucky in +American Letters_. He has thus fenced off for the lovers of New World +literature a well watered bluegrass pasture of prose and verse, which +they may enter and range through according to their appetites for its +peculiar green provender and their thirst for the limestone spring. +This strip of pasture is a hundred years long; its breadth may not be +politely questioned! + +For the backward-looking and for the forward-looking students of +American literature, not its merely browsing readers, he has wrought a +service of larger and more lasting account. Whether his patiently done +and richly crowned work be the first of its class and kind, there is +slight need to consider here: fitly enough it might be a pioneer, a +path-blazer, as coming from the land of pioneers, path-blazers. + +But whether or not other works of like character be already in the +field of national observation, it is inevitable that many others soon +will be. There must in time and in the natural course of events come +about a complete marshalling of the American commonwealths, especially +of the older American commonwealths, attended each by its women and +men of letters; with the final result that the entire pageant of our +literary creativeness as a people will thus be exhibited and reviewed +within those barriers and divisions, which from the beginning have +constituted the peculiar genius of our civilization. + +When this has been done, when the States have severally made their +profoundly significant showing, when the evidence up to some century +mark or half-century mark is all presented, then for the first time +we, as a reading and thoughtful self-studying people, may for the +first time be advanced to the position of beginning to understand what +as a whole our cis-Atlantic branch of English literature really is. + +Thus Mr. Townsend's work and the work of his fellow-craftsmen are all +stations on the long road but the right road. They are aids to the +marshalling of the American commonwealths at a great meeting-point of +the higher influences of our nation. + +Now, already American literature has long been a subject in regard to +which a library of books has been written. The authors of by far the +most of these books are themselves Americans, and they have thus +looked at our literature and at our civilization from within; the +authors of the rest are foreigners who have investigated and +philosophized from the outside. Altogether, native and foreign, they +have approached their theme from divergent directions, with diverse +aims, and under the influence of deep differences in their critical +methods and in their own natures. But so far as the writer of these +words is aware, no one of them either native or foreign has ever set +about the study of American literature, enlightened with the only +solvent principle that can ever furnish its solution. + +That solvent principle is contained within a single proposition. That +single proposition is the one upon which our forefathers deliberately +chose to found the civilization of the Anglo-Saxon race in the New +World: that it should not be a civilization of States which were not a +Nation; that it should not be the civilization of a nation without +states; but that it should be a Nation of States. + +Now, if any man aspires to draw from American literature the +philosophy of its traits, if he sets it as the goal of his wisdom to +explain its breadth and its narrowness, its plenty here and its lack +there, its color in one place and its pallor in another, let him go +back to the will of the fathers in the foundation of the Republic and +find the explanation of our literature at the basis of our whole +civilization. He will never find it anywhere else. He will find it +there as he there finds the origin of our system of government, of our +system of industry, of our system of political barriers, of our system +of education: in the entire nature of our institutions as derived and +unfolded from the idea that we should be a nation of states. Our +literature--our novels and our poetry--have been as rigorously +included in this development as all the other elements of our life. + +For the first time in this way he may come to see a great light; and +with that light shining about him he may be prepared to write the +first history of American literature. + +None has yet been written. + +[Illustration] + + + + +PREFACE + + +I + +What is a Kentucky book, is the one great question this work has +elicited. Surely a Kentucky book is one written by a Kentuckian about +Kentucky or Kentuckians and printed in Kentucky; surely it is a book +written by a Kentuckian upon any subject under the sun, and published +in any clime; surely it is one written in Kentucky by a citizen of any +other state or country, regardless of the subject or place of +publication, for, "in general, I have regarded the birthplace of a +piece of literature more important than that of the author." But is a +book, though treating of Kentucky or Kentuckians, regardless of its +place of publication, whose author was not born in, nor for any +appreciable period resided in, this state, entitled to be properly +classified as a Kentucky work? The writer has responded in the +negative to this question in the present work. + +There have been several noted American authors who have written volumes +about Kentucky or Kentuckians, and they themselves were not natives of +this state, nor resided within its confines. Those early Western +travelers rarely omitted Kentucky from their journeys. The first of +them, F. A. Michaux, published his famous _Travels to the West of the +Alleghany Mountains, in the States of Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee_, at +London, in 1805; two years later F. Cuming's _Tour to the Western +Country, through Ohio and Kentucky_, was printed at Pittsburg; and in +1817 John Bradbury got out the first edition of his now noted _Travels +in the Interior of America_, at London. Bradbury died in 1823 and +to-day lies buried in the cemetery at Middletown, Kentucky, near +Louisville. George W. Ogden's _Letters from the West_ (New Bedford, +1823); W. Bullock's _Sketch of a Journey through the Western States_ +(London, 1827); and Tilly Buttrick's _Voyages, Travels, and Discoveries_ +(Boston, 1831), round out fairly well that group of Scotchmen, +Englishmen, New Englanders, and what not, who found many interesting +things in Kentucky a hundred years and more ago. Ogden spent two summers +in Kentucky; Bullock owned a river-side tract near Ludlow, Kentucky, and +old Bradbury sleeps in a quiet Kentucky hamlet, but neither of them may +be properly classified as a real Kentuckian. + +The Beauchamp-Sharp tragedy of 1825 was the one Kentucky event that +kindled the imaginations of more alien writers than any other happening +in our history. Edgar Allan Poe, William Gilmore Simms, Charles Fenno +Hoffman, G. P. R. James, James Hall, and several others, wrote plays, +novels, and poems based upon this tragedy. In 1832 James Kirke Paulding, +the friend of Washington Irving, published one of the earliest Kentucky +romances, entitled _Westward Ho!_ which name he got from the old +Elizabethan drama of John Webster and Thomas Dekker. Two years after the +appearance of Paulding's tale, William A. Caruthers, the Virginia +novelist, printed _The Kentuckian in New York_; and in the same year +Thomas Chandler Haliburton ("Sam Slick"), put forth one of his earliest +works, _Kentucky, a Tale_ (London, 1834). In 1845 Charles Winterfield's +_My First Days With the Rangers_, appeared, to be followed the next year +by William T. Porter's _A Quarter Race in Kentucky_. + +These writers hardly did more than point the way to Kentucky for Mrs. +Harriet Beecher Stowe, whose world-famous novel, _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ +(Boston, 1852), was set against a background of slave-holding +Kentucky. This is the most famous example our literature affords of a +writer of another state or country coming to Kentucky for the +materials out of which to build a book. + +In 1860 David Ross Locke, the Ohio journalist and satirist, discovered +the _Rev. Petroleum V. Nasby_, postmaster at "Confedrit X Roads, +Kentucky," and his political satires on Kentucky, the _Nasby Letters_, +tickled the readers of his paper, _The Toledo Blade_, through many +years. These alleged communications from poor Petroleum may be read +to-day in Locke's _Swingin' Round the Cirkel_, and _Ekkoes from +Kentucky_. J. G. Marshall's _The Outlaw Brothers_ (New York, 1864); Miss +Martha Remick's _Millicent Halford: a Tale of the Dark Days of Kentucky +in the year 1861_ (Boston, 1865); two novels by Edward Willett, entitled +_Kentucky Border Foes_, and _Old Honesty: a Tale of the Early Days of +Kentucky_, both of which were issued in the late sixties; Constance F. +Woolson's _Two Women_ (New York, 1877), and Mrs. Anna Bowman Dodd's +story, _Glorinda_ (Boston, 1888), concludes the group of writers of the +comparatively modern school who did not linger long in the "meadowland," +but who found it good literary soil, and helped themselves accordingly. + +In recent years Mr. Winston Churchill's _The Crossing_, Dr. James Ball +Naylor's _The Kentuckian_, Mr. Augustus Thomas's _The Witching Hour_, +and the Kentucky lyrics of Mrs. Alice Williams Brotherton, the Ohio +poet, have drawn fresh attention to Kentucky as a background for +literary productions, although they are written by those who cannot +qualify as Kentuckians. But to claim any of these writers for the +Commonwealth, would be to make one's self absurd. Dr. Naylor's lines +upon this point are _apropos_: + + I must admit--although it hurts!-- + That I was born unlucky; + I've never, literally, had + A home in Old Kentucky. + And yet I feel should wayward Chance + Direct my steps to roam there, + I'd meet you all and greet you all-- + And find myself _at home_ there! + +As has already been indicated, the good physician-poet is not by any +manner of means the only alien bard who has remembered Kentucky in his +work. No less a poet than the great Sir Walter Scott celebrated +Kentucky in _Marmion_--the State's first appearance in English poetry. +The passage may be found near the close of the ninth stanza in the +third canto. Lord Marmion and his followers have ridden "the livelong +day," and are now quartered at a well-known Scottish hostelry. They +have all eaten and drunk until they are on the borderland of dreams +when their leader, seeing their condition, + + ... called upon a squire:-- + "Fitz-Eustace, know'st thou not some lay, + To speed the lingering night away? + We slumber by the fire."-- + + VIII + + "So please you," thus the youth rejoined + "Our choicest minstrel's left behind." + +And while Fitz realizes that he cannot, in any degree, equal the famous +singer to whom he has referred, he now further praises him, calls down +curses on the cause that kept him from following Marmion, and ventures + + "To sing his favourite roundelay." + + IX + + A mellow voice Fitz-Eustace had, + The air he chose was wild and sad; + Such have I heard, in Scottish land, + Rise from the busy harvest band, + When falls before the mountaineer, + On lowland plains, the ripened ear. + Now one shrill voice the notes prolong, + Now a wild chorus swells the song: + Oft have I listened, and stood still, + As it came soften'd up the hill, + And deem'd it the lament of men + Who languish'd for their native glen; + And thought how sad would be such sound, + On Susquehannah's swampy ground, + _Kentucky's wood-encumber'd brake_, + Or wild Ontario's boundless lake, + Where heart-sick exiles, in the strain, + Recall'd fair Scotland's hills again! + +After Sir Walter, the next English poet to tell the world of Kentucky +and one of her sons, was George Gordon (Lord) Byron. His references +are found in the eighth canto and the sixty-first to the sixty-seventh +stanzas inclusive, of _Don Juan_. This poem was begun in 1819 and +published, several cantos at a time, until the final sixteenth +appeared in 1824. The sixty-first stanza will serve our purpose. + + LXI + + Of all men, saving Sylla, the man-slayer, + Who passes for in life and death most lucky, + Of the greatest names which in our faces stare, + _The General Boone, back-woodsman of Kentucky_, + Was happiest amongst mortals anywhere; + For killing nothing but a bear or buck, he + Enjoy'd the lonely, vigorous, harmless days + Of his old age in wilds of deepest maze. + +In 1827 Alfred Tennyson, with his brother Charles, published a slender +sheaf of juvenile verses, entitled _Poems By Two Brothers_. _On +Sublimity_ contains eleven stanzas of ten lines each. The poet +disdains "vales in tenderest green," and asks for "the wild cascade, +the rugged scene," the sea, the mountains, dark cathedrals, storms, +"Niagara's flood of matchless might," and Mammoth Cave. + + The hurricane fair earth to darkness changing, + _Kentucky's chambers of eternal gloom_,[1] + The swift-pac'd columns of the desert ranging + Th' uneven waste, the violent Simoom + The snow-clad peaks, stupendous Gungo-tree! + Whence springs the hallow'd Jumna's echoing tide, + Hear Cotopaxi's cloud-capt majesty, + Enormous Chimborazo's naked pride, + The dizzy Cape of winds that cleaves the sky, + Whence we look down into eternity, + The pillar'd cave of Morven's giant king + The Yanar, and the Geyser's boiling fountain, + The deep volcano's inward murmuring, + The shadowy Colossus of the mountain; + Antiparos, where sun-beams never enter; + Loud Stromboli, amid the quaking isles; + The terrible Maelstroom, around his centre + Wheeling his circuit of unnumber'd miles: + These, these are sights and sounds that freeze the blood, + Yet charm the awe-struck soul which doats on solitude. + +Tennyson was the third and last English poet of the nineteenth century +to make mention of Kentucky in his works. + +Much writing has been done by Kentuckians from the beginning until the +present time, but most of what is usually termed literature is the work +of the school of today. That much, however, of the early productions, +especially the anonymous and fugitive poems, have been forever lost, may +be gathered from a letter written to Edwin Bryant, editor of _The +Lexington Intelligencer_, by an Ohio correspondent, which appeared in +that paper in January, 1834, a part of which is as follows: + + There were a vast number of rural and sentimental songs, sung by + the hunters and pioneers, that, in this our day, to the present + generation would be truly interesting. Would it not be wise for + you, Messrs. Editors, to publish a note in your valuable paper, + offering the "Poets' Corner," and save what you can of the + fragments of "Olden Times?"... I know that there were many + sentimental pieces--some written by a Mr. Bullock--many war songs; + one on St. Clair's defeat; and there was a wonderful flow of + poetical effusions on the first discovery of a settlement of + Kentucky. There was a wooing song of the hunter--one stanza I can + only repeat: + + "I will plough and live, and you may knit and sowe, + And through the wild woods, I'll hunt the buffaloe!" + + To many these things may appear as ... light as empty air, but + look to the future, and you will at once discover the inquisitive + mind will earnestly desire to look into such matters and things. + +The pity is, this admonition passed unheeded by Bryant and his +contemporaries, and much that "the inquisitive mind" would revel in +to-day, was thus lost. The most famous, however, of the pioneer songs +that the above quoted writer probably had in mind, _The Hunters of +Kentucky_, the celebrated ballad of the Battle of New Orleans, has come +down to us, but it was written by the alien hand of Samuel Woodworth, +who achieved a double triumph over oblivion by also writing _The Old +Oaken Bucket_. And were other "wooing songs of the hunter" extant, we +would certainly discover that many of them were done by non-Kentuckians. +Even _Kentucky Belle_, ballad of Morgan and his men, was the work of +Constance Fenimore Woolson, the famous author of _Anne_. + +In recent years the ballads of the Kentucky mountains have been +investigated by a group of scholars, and Dr. Hubert Gibson Shearin +will shortly publish a collection of them. It is impossible to discuss +them at this time; and as nearly all of them are offshoots of the old +English ballads and Scottish songs, done over by their Kentucky +descendants, the ever-recurring question: "Are they Kentucky +productions?" will not down. + + +II + +THE KENTUCKY MAGAZINES + +Kentucky has failed to produce and maintain a respectable literary +magazine for any considerable length of time. Many magazines have been +born in Kentucky with high hopes, and a few of them have braved the +storms for a number of years, but all of them have gone the way of all +the earth after a pathetic struggle for existence. + +The reasons for this lie not far afield: the leading magazines and +periodicals of the east through the immensity of their circulation +secure that large patronage necessary to maintain a publication +conducted on a generous basis, ensuring variety and excellence. +Experience has long since demonstrated even to the bravest of the +inland publishers that the point of distribution is the controlling +factor in success. The means of transportation which have so +miraculously improved, have annihilated distance and along with it to +no small extent the Western and Southern periodical of literary +flavor. The opulent publications are enabled through their very +prosperity to command contributors not to be approached by a +periodical circumscribed in means and constituency. Again, the +Kentucky magazines have all along made the fatal mistake of truckling +to dead prejudices and sectionalism. The material and the moulders +have long been with us, but the wide popular support, which after all +is the first essential, has failed to materialise, and it may be +regretfully apprehended that it now lies as far away as ever. + +The first magazine issued in Kentucky or the West was _The Medley, or +Monthly Miscellany, for the year 1803_, which was edited and published +by Daniel Bradford, son of old John Bradford, the editor of _The +Kentucky Gazette_. _The Medley_ lived through the year of 1803, but in +January, 1804, Editor Bradford announced that he was compelled, from +lack of appreciation, to abandon its publication. The twelve parts were +bound for those of the subscribers who cared to have them made into a +single volume, and probably not more than two copies are extant to-day. +_The Medley's_ literary merit was not impressive, and its death can only +be deplored because it happened to be the first Western magazine. + +_The Almoner_, a religious periodical, the first issue of which was +dated from Lexington, April, 1814, and which died a twelvemonth later, +was published by Thomas T. Skillman, the pioneer printer. Its account +of the preacher, John Poage Campbell, and his many theological works, +is about all one finds of interest in it. + +William Gibbes Hunt, a Harvard man, who later took a degree from +Transylvania University, established _The Western Review_ at +Lexington, in August, 1819, and this was the first literary magazine +in the West worthy the name. Hunt was a man of fine tastes, and he had +a proper conception of what a magazine should be. He worked hard for +two years, but in July, 1821,--the number for which month is notable +as having contained the first draft of General William O. Butler's +famous poem, _The Boatman's Horn_, which is there entitled _The Boat +Horn_,--Hunt rehearsed the pathetic tale of the lack of support and +appreciation for a Western magazine, and, without any expressed +regret, entitled it his valedictory. He had survived twice as long as +any of his predecessors, and he probably felt that he had done fairly +well, as he undoubtedly had. The four bound volumes of _The Western +Review_ may be read to-day with more than an historical interest. Hunt +returned to his home in New England; and the only other thing of his +that is preserved is _An Address on the Principles of Masonry_ +(Lexington, 1821), and a very excellent oration it is, too. + +There were brave men after Hunt, however. _The Literary Pamphleteer_ was +born and died at Paris, Kentucky, in 1823; and in the following year +Thomas T. Skillman established _The Western Luminary_ at Lexington. This +was a semi-religious journal, but its publication was shortly suspended. +_The Microscope_ seems to have been the first magazine published at +Louisville, it being founded in 1824, but its life was ephemeral. Under +a half a dozen different names, with many lapses between the miles, _The +Transylvanian_, which Professor Thomas Johnson Matthews, of Transylvania +University, established at Lexington in 1829, has survived until the +present time. It is now the literary magazine of Transylvania +University. Mr. James Lane Allen, Mr. Frank Waller Allen, and one or two +other well-known Kentucky writers saw their earliest essays and stories +first published in _The Transylvanian_. John Clark's _Lexington Literary +Journal_, a twice-a-week affair, was founded in 1833; and the +_Louisville Literary News-Letter_, edited by Edmund Flagg and issued by +George D. Prentice, lived in the Kentucky metropolis from December, +1838, to November, 1840. + +Far and away the most famous literary periodical ever published in +Kentucky, was _The Western Messenger_, founded at Cincinnati in 1835, +and removed to Louisville in April, 1836. James Freeman Clarke +(1810-1888), the noted Boston Unitarian preacher and author, was editor, +publisher, and agent of _The Messenger_ while it was at Louisville; and +he solicited subscriptions throughout Kentucky. Ralph Waldo Emerson +first appeared as a poet in his friend Clarke's magazine. His _Goodby +Proud World_, _The Rhodora_, _The Humble Bee_, and several of his other +now noted poems, were printed for the first time in _The Messenger_. +Clarke also published papers from the hands of Hawthorne, Oliver Wendell +Holmes, William Ellery Channing, Margaret Fuller, and nearly all of the +writers now grouped as the New England school. He printed a poem of John +Keats, which had never been previously published, the manuscript of +which was furnished by George Keats, brother of the poet, who lived at +Louisville for many years. Clarke later wrote an interesting sketch of +George Keats for his magazine. During parts of the four years he +published _The Messenger_ at Louisville he had as assistant editors +Christopher P. Cranch and Samuel Osgood, now well-known names in +American letters. Clarke returned to Boston in 1840, and _The Messenger_ +returned to Cincinnati, where it was suspended in April, 1841. "The +periodical was an exotic," wrote William Henry Venable, "a Boston flower +blooming in the Ohio Valley;" and this is the one-line history of it. +Its like was never seen before, never since, and will never be seen +again in the West. + +Thirteen years after _The Western Messenger_ left Louisville, _The +Western Literary Magazine_, a monthly publication, was begun; and +three years later, or in 1856, _The Louisville Review_, another +monthly, was established. But the war clouds of civil strife were +gradually gathering, and the endless pen scratching of the Kentucky +magazinist was lost in the cannon's roar. Newspapers were the only +things Kentuckians had time to peruse. + +Since the war Kentucky periodicals have been, almost without exception, +rather tame affairs. They have all been most mushroomish. A few of them +may be singled out, such as _The Southern Bivouac_, which was conducted +at Louisville for several years by General Basil W. Duke and Richard W. +Knott; _The Illustrated Kentuckian_, founded at Lexington, in 1892; _The +Southern Magazine_, of Louisville, published papers by Mr. Allen, +stories by Mr. John Fox, Jr., and several other now well-known writers; +and Charles J. O'Malley's _Midland Review_ ran for some time. These are +the comparatively recent Kentucky periodicals which have bloomed in a +day and wilted with the earliest winter. _The Register_, official organ +of the State Historical Society, is still being issued three times a +year. It is unique among Kentucky magazines in that it is the only one +that has had adequate financial support, which, however, comes to it in +the form of a State appropriation. For the last twenty-five years _The +Courier-Journal_, of Louisville, has devoted space in its Saturday +edition to reviews of new books; and in recent years _The Evening Post_, +also of Louisville, has maintained a similar department. + + J. W. T. + + Lexington, Kentucky + June 13, 1913 + +FOOTNOTE: + +[1] The italics in which the three Kentucky lines are set, are my own. + + + + +ACKNOWLEDGMENTS + + +The last several years have been devoted to the collecting and +classifying of Kentucky books and authors from Filson, in 1784, to Mr. +Allen, in 1912. While the author has done other things, this has been +his most serious business. + +Of the more than a thousand Kentucky writers, one hundred and +ninety-six, or those who achieved considerable reputation in their day +and generation, or others to whom fame came late, are now discussed. +The author hopes to publish within the next two or three years a +_Dictionary of Kentucky Writers_, which will attempt to bring together +in brief biographical and critical notes all of Kentucky's literary +workers from the beginning until the present time. The crossroads poet +is a most elusive, most diffident figure, but I shall do my best to +bring him into the _Dictionary_ that is to be. + +I have received assistance from many quarters. Colonel Reuben T. +Durrett, Dr. Henry A. Cottell, General Bennett H. Young, Colonel +Robert M. Kelly, Mrs. Evelyn Snead Barnett, Mrs. Elvira Miller +Slaughter, and Mr. George T. Settle, of Louisville, Kentucky, have +aided me in many directions. Mr. George McCalla Spears, of Dallas, +Texas, author of _Dear Old Kentucky_, and the owner of one of the best +collections of Kentucky books ever gotten together, I have to thank +for a catalogue of his library and a dozen informing letters. Judge +James H. Mulligan, Miss Anna Totten, Mrs. Annie Gratz Clay, Miss Jo +Peter, and Mr. James M. Roach, of Lexington, Kentucky, have loaned and +given me many rare Kentucky items; to Mr. William Kavanaugh Doty, of +Richmond, Kentucky, Mrs. Daniel Henry Holmes, of Covington, Kentucky, +Mrs. Lucien Beckner, of Winchester, Kentucky, Dr. Thomas E. Pickett, +of Maysville, Kentucky, State Librarian Frank K. Kavanaugh, of +Frankfort, Kentucky, Mr. Alexander Hill, and Miss Marian Prentice +Piatt, of Cincinnati, Ohio, Mr. Henry Cleveland Wood, of Harrodsburg, +Kentucky, Mr. Paul Weir, of Owensboro, Kentucky, Mr. Ingram Crockett, +of Henderson, Kentucky, Mrs. Mary Addams Bayne, of Shelbyville, +Kentucky, Miss Leigh Gordon Giltner, of Eminence, Kentucky, and Mrs. +Caroline S. Valentine, of New Castle, Kentucky, the majority of whom +are writers, I am doubly indebted for facts regarding their own work, +as well as for what I now more especially thank them--information +concerning other Kentucky writers. + +Death found the two best friends, perhaps, this work had during the +course of its preparation, when it took Charles J. O'Malley, the +Kentucky poet and critic, and Jahu Dewitt Miller, the Philadelphia +lecturer and bookman. Both of these men had just gotten into the +spirit of the work when they died within a year of each other. +O'Malley wrote the most illuminating letters concerning Kentucky +authors it has been my good fortune to receive; Miller made the most +gratifying and surprising additions to my collection of Kentuckiana, +exceedingly scarce volumes and pamphlets which he alone seemed able to +unearth from the old bookshops of the country. The memories of them +both must be ever green with me and in this work. + +I have to thank Mr. Allen for his very fine introduction. To have +one's name associated with his is reward sufficient for the years of +toil and sacrifice this work has demanded of its author. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +JOHN FILSON 1 + THE AIR AND CLIMATE OF KENTUCKY 2 + QUADRUPEDS 3 + BOONE'S FIRST VIEW OF KENTUCKY 4 + +JOHN BRADFORD 5 + NOTES ON KENTUCKY. SECTION I 6 + +MATTHEW LYON 8 + REPLY TO JOHN RANDOLPH OF ROANOKE 9 + +GILBERT IMLAY 11 + THE FLIGHT OF A FLORID LOVER 13 + +ADAM RANKIN 17 + ON THE EXTENT OF THE GOSPEL OFFER 18 + UPON MARRIAGE BY LICENSE 18 + +THOMAS JOHNSON 19 + EXTEMPORE GRACE 21 + DANVILLE 21 + KENTUCKY 21 + HUDSON, WIFE-MURDERER 22 + PARSON RICE 22 + THE POET'S EPITAPH 22 + +GEORGE BECK 23 + FIFTEENTH ODE OF HORACE 24 + ANACREON'S FIFTY-FIFTH ODE 25 + ANACREON'S FIRST ODE 26 + +HUMPHREY MARSHALL 26 + PRIMEVAL KENTUCKY 28 + +STEPHEN T. BADIN 30 + EPICEDIUM 31 + +CHARLES CALDWELL 34 + GENERAL GREENE'S EARLY LIFE 35 + +ALLAN B. MAGRUDER 37 + CITIZEN GENET AND JEFFERSON 38 + +HENRY CLAY 39 + REPLY TO JOHN RANDOLPH 42 + ADDRESS TO LA FAYETTE 43 + +JOHN J. AUDUBON 45 + INDIAN SUMMER ON THE OHIO 48 + +HORACE HOLLEY 52 + MR. CLAY AND COL. MEADE 53 + +CONSTANTINE S. RAFINESQUE 56 + GEOLOGICAL ANNALS 58 + +MANN BUTLER 59 + PIONEER VISITORS 60 + +ZACHARY TAYLOR 62 + A LETTER TO HENRY CLAY 63 + +DANIEL DRAKE 65 + MAYSLICK, KENTUCKY, IN 1800 67 + +MARY A. HOLLEY 69 + TEXAS WOMEN 70 + +JOHN J. CRITTENDEN 71 + EULOGY UPON JUSTICE MCKINLEY 73 + +JOHN M. HARNEY 74 + ECHO AND THE LOVER 76 + THE WIPPOWIL 77 + SYLPHS BATHING 78 + +GEORGE ROBERTSON 78 + ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS 80 + EARLY STRUGGLES 80 + LITERARY FAME 81 + +SHADRACH PENN 82 + THE COMING OF GEORGE D. PRENTICE 83 + +WILLIAM O. BUTLER 84 + THE BOATMAN'S HORN 86 + +HEW AINSLIE 87 + THE BOUROCKS O' BARGENY 89 + THE HAUGHS O' AULD KENTUCK 89 + THE INGLE SIDE 90 + THE HINT O' HAIRST 91 + +JAMES G. BIRNEY 91 + THE NO-GOVERNMENT DOCTRINES 93 + +THOMAS CORWIN 95 + THE MEXICAN WAR 96 + +HENRY B. BASCOM 98 + A CLERGYMAN'S VIEW OF NIAGARA 99 + +JAMES T. MOREHEAD 102 + JOHN FINLEY 103 + +LEWIS COLLINS 104 + PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION 105 + +JULIA A. TEVIS 107 + THE MAY QUEEN 108 + +ROBERT J. BRECKINRIDGE 112 + SANCTIFICATION 113 + +CAROLINE L. HENTZ 114 + BESIDE THE LONG MOSS SPRING 115 + +JOHN P. DURBIN 117 + IMPRESSIONS OF LONDON 118 + +FORTUNATUS COSBY, JR. 119 + FIRESIDE FANCIES 120 + +THOMAS F. MARSHALL 123 + TEMPERANCE: AN ADDRESS 124 + +JEFFERSON J. POLK 126 + THE BATTLE OF THE BOARDS 127 + +GEORGE D. PRENTICE 129 + THE CLOSING YEAR 131 + ON REVISITING BROWN UNIVERSITY 133 + PARAGRAPHS 135 + +ROBERT M. BIRD 135 + NICK OF THE WOODS 137 + +JOHN A. MCCLUNG 139 + THE WOMEN OF BRYANT'S STATION 140 + +JAMES O. PATTIE 142 + THE SANTA FE COUNTRY 143 + +WILLIAM F. MARVIN 145 + EPIGRAM 146 + THE FIRST ROSES OF SPRING 146 + SONG 147 + +ELISHA BARTLETT 147 + JOHN BROWDIE OF "NICHOLAS NICKLEBY" 148 + +SAMUEL D. GROSS 150 + KENTUCKY 151 + THE DEATH OF HENRY CLAY 152 + +THOMAS H. CHIVERS 152 + THE DEATH OF ALONZO 154 + GEORGIA WATERS 156 + +JEFFERSON DAVIS 156 + FROM THE FAREWELL SPEECH 158 + +WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER 160 + THE MOTHERS OF THE WEST 162 + +THOMAS H. SHREVE 163 + I HAVE NO WIFE 164 + +ORMSBY M. MITCHEL 166 + ASTRONOMICAL EVIDENCES OF GOD 167 + +ALBERT T. BLEDSOE 169 + SEVEN CRISES CAUSED THE CIVIL WAR 171 + +RICHARD H. MENEFEE 173 + KENTUCKY: A TOAST 174 + +GEORGE W. CUTTER 176 + THE SONG OF STEAM 177 + +MARY P. SHINDLER 179 + THE FADED FLOWER 180 + +MARTIN J. SPALDING 181 + A BISHOP'S ARRIVAL 182 + +JOHN W. AUDUBON 185 + LOS ANGELES 186 + TULARE VALLEY 186 + CHRISTMAS IN 'FRISCO 187 + +ADRIEN E. ROUQUETTE 187 + SOUVENIR DE KENTUCKY 189 + +EMILY V. MASON 191 + THE DEATH OF LEE 192 + +EDMUND FLAGG 194 + THE ANCIENT MOUNDS OF THE WEST 195 + +CATHERINE A. WARFIELD 197 + CAMILLA BOUVERIE'S DIARY 198 + A PLEDGE TO LEE 199 + +J. ROSS BROWNE 200 + LAPDOGS IN GERMANY 201 + +ROBERT MORRIS 205 + THE LEVEL AND THE SQUARE 206 + +AMELIA B. WELBY 207 + THE RAINBOW 209 + ON THE DEATH OF A SISTER POET 210 + +CHARLES W. WEBBER 211 + TROUTING ON JESSUP'S RIVER 212 + +LEWIS J. FRAZEE 216 + HAVRE 217 + +THEODORE O'HARA 218 + THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD 220 + THE OLD PIONEER 223 + SECOND LOVE 225 + A ROLLICKING RHYME 225 + THE FAME OF WILLIAM T. BARRY 226 + +SARAH T. BOLTON 228 + PADDLE YOUR OWN CANOE 229 + +JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE 231 + HENRY CLAY 232 + +JAMES WEIR, SR. 234 + SIMON KENTON 235 + +MARY E. W. BETTS 237 + A KENTUCKIAN KNEELS TO NONE BUT GOD 238 + +REUBEN T. DURRETT 239 + LA SALLE: DISCOVERER OF LOUISVILLE 241 + +RICHARD H. COLLINS 244 + PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION 245 + +ANNIE C. KETCHUM 247 + APRIL TWENTY-SIXTH 248 + +FRANCIS H. UNDERWOOD 250 + ALOYSIUS AND MR. FENTON 252 + AN AMAZING PROPHECY 254 + +STEPHEN C. FOSTER 255 + MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME, GOOD-NIGHT 256 + +ZACHARIAH F. SMITH 258 + EARLY KENTUCKY DOCTORS 259 + +JOHN A. BROADUS 261 + OXFORD UNIVERSITY 263 + +MARY J. HOLMES 265 + THE SCHOOLMASTER 266 + +ROSA V. JEFFREY 269 + A GLOVE 270 + A MEMORY 271 + +SALLIE R. FORD 272 + OUR MINISTER MARRIES 273 + +JOHN E. HATCHER 276 + NEWSPAPER PARAGRAPHS 277 + +WILLIAM C. WATTS 279 + A WEDDING AND A DANCE 280 + +J. PROCTOR KNOTT 282 + FROM THE DULUTH SPEECH 283 + +GEORGE G. VEST 285 + JEFFERSON'S PASSPORTS TO IMMORTALITY 286 + EULOGY OF THE DOG 286 + +WILLIAM P. JOHNSTON 288 + BATTLE OF SHILOH--SUNDAY MORNING 289 + +WILL WALLACE HARNEY 291 + THE STAB 292 + +J. STODDARD JOHNSTON 292 + "CAPTAIN MOLL" 293 + +JULIA S. DINSMORE 295 + LOVE AMONG THE ROSES 295 + +HENRY T. STANTON 297 + THE MONEYLESS MAN 299 + "A MENSA ET THORO" 300 + A SPECIAL PLEA 301 + SWEETHEART 301 + +SARAH M. PIATT 303 + IN CLONMEL PARISH CHURCHYARD 304 + A WORD WITH A SKYLARK 305 + THE GIFT OF TEARS 306 + +BOYD WINCHESTER 307 + LAKE GENEVA 308 + +THOMAS GREEN 310 + THE CONSPIRATORS 312 + +FORCEYTHE WILLSON 313 + THE OLD SERGEANT 314 + +W. C. P. BRECKINRIDGE 319 + IS NOT THIS THE CARPENTER'S SON 321 + +BASIL W. DUKE 323 + MORGAN, THE MAN 324 + +HENRY WATTERSON 325 + OLD LONDON TOWN 327 + +GILDEROY W. GRIFFIN 331 + THE GYPSIES 332 + +JOHN L. SPALDING 334 + AN IVORY PAPER-KNIFE 335 + +NATHANIEL S. SHALER 336 + THE ORPHAN BRIGADE 337 + TOM MARSHALL 339 + LINCOLN IN KENTUCKY 341 + +WILLIAM L. VISSCHER 342 + PROEM 343 + +BENNETT H. YOUNG 344 + PREHISTORIC WEAPONS 345 + +JAMES H. MULLIGAN 348 + IN KENTUCKY 350 + OVER THE HILL TO HUSTONVILLE 351 + +NELLY M. MCAFFEE 353 + FINALE 353 + +MARY F. CHILDS 356 + DE NAMIN' OB DE TWINS 357 + +WILLIAM T. PRICE 359 + THE OFFENBACH AND GILBERT OPERAS 361 + +GEORGE M. DAVIE 363 + "FRATER, AVE ATQUE VALE" 363 + HADRIAN, DYING, TO HIS SOUL 364 + +JOHN URI LLOYD 364 + "LET'S HAVE THE MERCY TEXT" 366 + + + + +KENTUCKY IN AMERICAN LETTERS + + + + +JOHN FILSON + +John Filson, the first Kentucky historian, was born at East +Fallowfield, Pennsylvania, in 1747. He was educated at the academy of +the Rev. Samuel Finley, at Nottingham, Maryland. Finley was afterwards +president of Princeton University. John Filson looked askance at the +Revolutionary War, and came out to Kentucky about 1783. In Lexington +he conducted a school for a year, and spent his leisure hours in +collecting data for a history of Kentucky. He interviewed Daniel +Boone, Levi Todd, James Harrod, and many other Kentucky pioneers; and +the information they gave him was united with his own observations, +forming the material for his book. Filson did not remain in Kentucky +much over a year for, in 1784, he went to Wilmington, Delaware, and +persuaded James Adams, the town's chief printer, to issue his +manuscript as _The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of +Kentucke_; and then he continued his journey to Philadelphia, where +his map of the three original counties of Kentucky--Jefferson, +Fayette, and Lincoln--was printed and dedicated to General Washington +and the United States Congress. This Wilmington edition of Filson's +history is far and away the most famous history of Kentucky ever +published. Though it contained but 118 pages, one of the six extant +copies recently fetched the fabulous sum of $1,250--the highest price +ever paid for a Kentucky book. The little work was divided into two +parts, the first part being devoted to the history of the country, and +the second part was the first biography of Daniel Boone ever +published. Boone dictated this famous story of his life to the +Pennsylvania pedagogue, who put it into shape for publication, yet +several Western writers refer to it as "Boone's autobiography." Boone +is the author's central hero straight through the work, and he is +happier when discussing him than in relating the country's meager +history. Filson's _Kentucky_ was translated into French by M. Parraud, +and issued at Paris in 1785; and in the same year a German version was +published. Gilbert Imlay incorporated it into the several editions of +his _Topographical Description of the Western Territory of North +America_ (London, 1793). And several subsequent Western writers also +reproduced it in their works, seldom giving Filson the proper credit +for it. The last three or four years of his life John Filson spent in +Kentucky, Illinois, and Indiana. He was one of the founders of +Cincinnati, which he named "Losantiville;" and a short time later, in +1788, he wandered into the Miami woods one day and was never seen +again. Col. Reuben T. Durrett, the Louisville historian, wrote his +biography, and established an historical organization, in 1884, which +he named the "Filson Club." Filson's fame is secure in Kentucky, and +Colonel Durrett and his work have made it so. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Life and Writings of John Filson_, by R. T. + Durrett (Louisville, Kentucky, 1884); _Kentuckians in History and + Literature_, by John Wilson Townsend (New York, 1907); _The First + Map of Kentucky_, by P. Lee Phillips (Washington, 1908). + + +THE AIR AND CLIMATE OF KENTUCKY + +[From _The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucky_ +(Wilmington, Delaware, 1784)] + +This country is more temperate and healthy than the other settled parts +of America. In summer it has not the sandy heats which Virginia and +Carolina experience, and receives a fine air from its rivers. In winter, +which at most lasts three months, commonly two, and is but seldom +severe, the people are safe in bad houses; and the beasts have a goodly +supply without fodder. The winter begins about Christmas, and ends about +the first of March, at farthest does not exceed the middle of that +month. Snow seldom falls deep or lies long. The west winds often bring +storms and the east winds clear the sky; but there is no steady rule of +weather in that respect, as in the northern states. The west winds are +sometimes cold and nitrous. The Ohio running in that direction, and +there being mountains on that quarter, the westerly winds, by sweeping +along their tops, in the cold regions of the air, and over a long tract +of frozen water, collect cold in their course, and convey it over the +Kentucky country; but the weather is not so intensely severe as these +winds bring with them in Pennsylvania. The air and seasons depend very +much on the winds as to heat and cold, dryness and moisture. + + +QUADRUPEDS + +[From the same] + +Among the native animals are the urus, bison, or zorax, described by +Cesar, which we call a buffalo, much resembling a large bull, of a +great size, with a large head, thick, short, crooked horns, and +broader in his forepart than behind. Upon his shoulder is a large lump +of flesh, covered with a thick boss of long wool and curly hair, of a +dark brown color. They do not rise from the ground as our cattle, but +spring up at once upon their feet; are of a broad make, and clumsy +appearance, with short legs, but run fast, and turn not aside for any +thing when chased, except a standing tree. They weigh from 500 to 1000 +weight, are excellent meat, supplying the inhabitants in many parts +with beef, and their hides make good leather. I have heard a hunter +assert, he saw above 1000 buffaloes at the Blue Licks at once; so +numerous were they before the first settlers had wantonly sported away +their lives. There still remains a great number in the exterior parts +of the settlement. They feed upon cane and grass, as other cattle, and +are innocent, harmless creatures. + +There are still to be found many deer, elks, and bears, within the +settlement, and many more on the borders of it. There are also +panthers, wild cats, and wolves. + +The waters have plenty of beavers, otters, minks, and muskrats: nor +are the animals common to other parts wanting, such as foxes, rabbits, +squirrels, racoons, ground-hogs, pole-cats, and opossums. Most of the +species of the domestic quadrupeds have been introduced since the +settlement, such as horses, cows, sheep, and hogs, which are +prodigiously multiplied, suffered to run in the woods without a +keeper, and only brought home when wanted. + + +BOONE'S FIRST VIEW OF KENTUCKY + +[From the same] + +It was on the 1st of May, in the year 1769, that I resigned my +domestic happiness for a time, and left my family and peaceable +habitation on the Yadkin river, in North Carolina, to wander through +the wilderness of America, in quest of the country of Kentucky, in +company with John Finley, John Stewart, Joseph Holden, James Monay, +and William Cool. We proceeded successfully; and after a long and +fatiguing journey, through a mountainous wilderness, in a westward +direction, on the seventh day of June following we found ourselves on +Red river, where John Finley had formerly been trading with the +Indians, and, from the top of an eminence, saw with pleasure the +beautiful level of Kentucky. Here let me observe, that for some time +we had experienced the most uncomfortable weather as a prelibation of +our future sufferings. At this place we encamped, and made a shelter +to defend us from the inclement season, and began to hunt and +reconnoiter the country. We found everywhere abundance of wild beasts +of all sorts, through this vast forest. The buffaloe were more +frequent than I have seen cattle in the settlements, browsing on the +leaves of the cane, or cropping the herbage on those extensive plains, +fearless, because ignorant, of the violence of man. Sometimes we saw +hundreds in a drove, and the numbers about the salt springs were +amazing. In this forest, the habitation of beasts of every kind +natural to America, we practiced hunting with great success, until the +22d day of December following. + + + + +JOHN BRADFORD + + +John Bradford, Kentucky's pioneer journalist, was born near Warrenton, +Virginia, in 1749. He saw service in the Revolutionary War, and came +to Kentucky when thirty years of age. He fought against the Indians at +Chillicothe, and, in 1785, brought his family out from Virginia to +Kentucky, locating at Cane Run, near Lexington. Two years later he and +his brother, Fielding Bradford, founded _The Kentucke Gazette_, the +first issue of which appeared Saturday, August 18, 1787--the second +newspaper west of the Alleghanies. The following year John Bradford +published _The Kentucke Almanac_, the first pamphlet from a Western +press; and this almanac was issued every twelvemonth for many years. +Fielding Bradford withdrew from the _Gazette_ in May, 1788, and "Old +Jawn," as he was called, carried the entire burden until 1802, when +his son, Daniel Bradford, assumed control. In March, 1789, under +instructions from the Virginia legislature, Bradford discarded +"Kentucke" for "Kentucky," one of the many interesting facts connected +with the _Gazette_. John Bradford was the first state printer; and the +first book he published was the laws passed by the first Kentucky +legislature, which assembled at Lexington in 1792. The Bradfords +published many of the most important early Western books, and a +"Bradford" brings joy to the heart of any present-day collector of +Kentuckiana. The column in the _Gazette_ devoted to verse, headed +"Sacred to the Muses," preserved many early Western poems; but the +little anecdotes which seldom failed to be tucked beneath the verse, +were nearly always coarse and vulgar, giving one a rather excellent +index to the editor's morals or the morals of his readers. Bradford +appears to have taken a great fancy to the poems of Philip Freneau +(1752-1832), the first real American poet, for he "picked up" more +than twenty of them from the _Freeman's Journal_. The most complete +files of the _Kentucky Gazette_ are preserved in the Lexington Public +Library, though the vandals that have consulted them from time to time +have cut and inked out many valuable things. John Bradford was a +public-spirited citizen, being, at different times, chairman of the +town trustees, and of the board of trustees of Transylvania +University. He was a profound mathematician, astronomer, and +philosopher, his contemporaries tell us, and in proof thereof they +have handed down another of his sobriquets, "Old Wisdom." Though his +fame as the first Kentucky editor is fixed, as an author his +reputation rests upon _The General Instructor; or, the Office, Duty, +and Authority of Justices of the Peace, Sheriffs, Coroners, and +Constables, in the State of Kentucky_ (Lexington, Ky., 1800), a legal +compilation; and upon his more famous work, _Notes on Kentucky_ +(Xenia, Ohio, 1827). These sixty-two articles were originally printed +in the _Gazette_ between August 25, 1826, and January 9, 1829. Upon +this work John Bradford is ranked among the Kentucky historians. At +the time of his death, which occurred at Lexington, Kentucky, March +31, 1830, he was sheriff of Fayette county. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. No biography of Bradford has been written, but any + of the histories of Kentucky contain extended notices of his life + and work. + + +NOTES ON KENTUCKY. SECTION I + +[From the _Kentucky Gazette_ (August 25, 1826)] + +This country was well known to the Indian traders many years before +its settlement. They gave a description of it to Lewis Evans, who +published his first map of it as early as 1752. + +In the year 1750,[2] Dr. Thomas Walker, Colby Chew, Ambrose Powell +and several others from the counties of Orange and Culpepper, in the +state of Virginia, set out on an excursion to the Western Waters; they +traveled down the Holstein river, and crossed over the Mountains into +Powell's valley, thence across the Cumberland mountain at the gap +where the road now crosses, proceeded on across what was formerly +known by the name of the Wilderness until they arrived at the +Hazlepath; here the company divided, Dr. Walker with a part continued +north until they came to the Kentucky river which they named Louisa or +Levisa river. After traveling down the excessive broken or hilly +margin some distance they became dissatisfied and returned and +continued up one of its branches to its head, and crossed over the +mountains to New River at the place called Walker's Meadows. + +In the year 1754 James McBride with some others, passed down the Ohio +river in canoes, and landed at the mouth of the Kentucky river, where +they marked on a tree the initials of their names, and the date of the +year. These men passed through the country and were the first who gave +a particular account of its beauty and richness of soil to the +inhabitants of the British settlements in America. + +No further notice seems to have been taken of Kentucky until the year +1767, when John Finlay with others (whilst trading with the Indians) +passed through a part of the rich lands of Kentucky. It was then +called by the Indians in their language, the Dark and Bloody Grounds. +Some difference took place between these traders and the Indians, and +Finlay deemed it prudent to return to his residence in North Carolina, +where he communicated his knowledge of the country to Col. Daniel +Boone and others. This seems to have been one of the most important +events in the history of Kentucky, as it was the exciting cause which +prompted Col. Boone shortly afterwards to make his first visit to the +Dark and Bloody Grounds. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[2] Marshall in his _History_, v. i, p. 7, says it was 1758. Mr. H. +Taylor thinks Dr. Walker informed him it was in 1752, but Col. Shelby +states implicitly that, in 1779 in company with Dr. Walker on Yellow +creek a mile or two from Cumberland mountain, the Doctor observed "upon +that tree," pointing to a beech across the road to the left hand, +"Ambrose Powell marked his name and the date of the year." I examined +the tree and found _A. Powell 1750_ cut in legible characters. + + + + +MATTHEW LYON + + +Matthew Lyon, "the Hampden of Congress," was born in County Wicklow, +Ireland, July 14, 1750. He emigrated to America when he was fifteen +years old, and settled in Woodbury, Connecticut, as an apprentice of +Jabez Bacon, the wealthiest merchant in all New England. Lyon left +Connecticut, in 1774, and removed to Vermont, where he became one of the +famous Green Mountain Boys of the Revolution. He was a member of the +Vermont legislature for four years; and in 1783 he founded the town of +Fair Haven, Vermont. Lyon became one of the great men of Vermont, a +disciple of Thomas Jefferson, "the pioneer Democrat of New England." In +1796 he was elected to Congress and he went to Philadelphia in May, +1797, to enter upon his duties. He at once became one of the powerful +men in that body. Lyon had published a newspaper at Fair Haven for +several years, besides issuing a number of books from his press, but +during the years of 1798 and 1799 he edited the now famous _Scourge of +Aristocracy_, a semi-monthly magazine. At the present day this is a rare +volume, and much to be desired. In 1801 Lyon cast Vermont's vote for +Thomas Jefferson against Aaron Burr for the presidency, and this vote is +said to have made certain Jefferson's election. Late in this year of +1801 Lyon left Vermont for Kentucky, and he later became the founder of +Eddyville, Lyon county, Kentucky. The county, however, was named in +honor of his son, Chittenden Lyon. In 1802 Matthew Lyon was a member of +the Kentucky legislature; and from 1803 to 1811 he was in the lower +House of Congress from his Kentucky district. His opposition to the War +of 1812 retired him to private life. At Eddyville he was engaged in +shipbuilding, in which he had great success, but after his defeat for +reelection to Congress, in 1812, disasters came fast upon him, and he +was reduced from affluence to comparative poverty. At the age of +sixty-eight years, however, he recovered himself, paid all his debts, +and died in easy circumstances. In 1820 Lyon was appointed United States +Factor to the Cherokee Indians of Arkansas territory, and he set out for +his future home at Spadra Bluff, Arkansas. He was later elected as +Arkansas's second delegate to Congress, but he did not live to take his +seat, dying at Spadra Bluff, August 1, 1822. Eleven years later his +remains were returned to Kentucky, and re-interred at Eddyville, where a +proper monument marks the spot to-day. Matthew Lyon's reply to John +Randolph of Roanoke, in 1804, in regard to the old question of the Yazoo +frauds, is his only extant speech that is at all remembered at the +present time. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins + (Covington, Kentucky, 1882); _Matthew Lyon_, by J. F. McLaughlin + (New York, 1900). + + +REPLY TO JOHN RANDOLPH OF ROANOKE[3] + +[From _Matthew Lyon_, by J. F. McLaughlin (New York, 1900)] + +The Postmaster General [Gideon Granger] has not lost my esteem, nor do +I think his character can be injured by the braying of a jackal, or +the fulminations of a madman. But, sir, permit me to inquire from whom +these charges of bribery, of corruption, and of robbery, come? Is it +from one who has for forty years, in one shape or other, been +intrusted with the property and concerns of other people, and has +never wanted for confidence, one whose long and steady practice of +industry, integrity, and well doing, has obtained for him his standing +on this floor? Is it from one who sneered with contempt on the +importunity with which he has solicited to set a price on the +important vote he held in the last Presidential election? No, sir, +these charges have been fabricated in the disordered imagination of a +young man whose pride has been provoked by my refusing to sing encores +to all his political dogmas. I have had the impudence to differ from +him in some few points, and some few times to neglect his fiat. It is +long since I have observed that the very sight of my plebeian face has +had an unpleasant effect on the gentleman's nose, for out of respect +to this House and to the State he represents, I will yet occasionally +call him gentleman. I say, sir, these charges have been brought +against me by a person nursed in the bosom of opulence, inheriting the +life services of a numerous train of the human species, and extensive +fields, the original proprietors of which property, in all +probability, came no honester by it than the purchasers of the Georgia +lands did by what they claim. Let that gentleman apply the fable of +the thief and the receiver, in Dilworth's Spelling Book, so +ingeniously quoted by himself, in his own case, and give up the stolen +men in his possession. I say, sir, these charges have come from a +person whose fortune, leisure and genius have enabled him to obtain a +great share of the wisdom of the schools, but who in years, +experience, and the knowledge of the world and the ways of man, is +many, many years behind those he implicates--a person who, from his +rant in this House, seems to have got his head as full of British +contracts and British modes of corruption as ever Don Quixote's was +supposed to have been of chivalry, enchantments and knight errantry--a +person who seems to think no man can be honest and independent unless +he has inherited land and negroes, nor is he willing to allow a man to +vote in the people's elections unless he is a landholder. + +I can tell that gentleman I am as far from offering or receiving a +bribe as he or any other member on this floor; it is a charge which no +man ever made against me before him, who from his insulated situation, +unconversant with the world, is perhaps as little acquainted with my +character as any member of this House, or almost any man in the +nation, and I do most cordially believe that, had my back and my mind +been supple enough to rise and fall with his motions, I should have +escaped his censure. + +I, sir, have none of that pride which sets men above being merchants +and dealers; the calling of a merchant is, in my opinion, equally +dignified, and no more than equally dignified with that of a farmer, +or a manufacturer. I have a great part of my life been engaged in all +the stations of merchant, farmer and manufacturer, in which I have +honestly earned and lost a great deal of property, in the character of +a merchant. I act like other merchants, look out for customers with +whom I can make bargains advantageous to both parties; it is all the +same to me whether I contract with an individual or the public; I see +no constitutional impediment to a member of this House serving the +public for the same reward the public gives another. Whenever my +constituents or myself think I have contracts inconsistent with my +duties as a member of this House, I will retire from it. + +I came to this House as a representative of a free, a brave, and a +generous people. I thank my Creator that He gave me the face of a man, +not that of an ape or a monkey, and that He gave me the heart of a man +also, a heart which will spare to its last drop in defence of the +dignity of the station my generous constituents have placed me in. I +shall trouble the House no farther at this time, than by observing +that I shall not be deterred by the threats of the member from +Virginia from giving the vote I think the interest and honor of the +nation require; and by saying if that member means to be understood +that I have offered contracts from the Postmaster-General, the +assertion or insinuation has no foundation in truth, and I challenge +him to bring forward his boasted proof. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[3] This reply was made in answer to one of Randolph's ranting Yazoo +philippics, several of which are among the bitterest speeches ever heard +in Congress. Lyon at this time (1804) was a member of Congress from +Kentucky. The Yazoo land grant frauds had aroused the public mind, and a +commission had endeavored to settle by compromise the claims of Georgia, +and those holding under the Georgia act of 1795, to the vast territory +in dispute. Randolph denounced the frauds committed, and opposed any +settlement of the controversy, while Lyon desired to see the country +settled, and the compromise of the commissioners carried out. + + + + +GILBERT IMLAY + + +Gilbert Imlay, the first Kentucky novelist, was born in New Jersey, +about 1755. He was captain of a company in the Revolution. The war over, +Imlay turned his face toward the West; and he reached the Falls of the +Ohio--Louisville--in 1784. In the little river town he worked under +George May as a "commissioner for laying out lands in the back +settlements." Imlay had not been a Kentuckian many months before he had +obtained patents for many thousand acres of land--all of which he +subsequently lost. It is not certainly known how long he remained in +Kentucky, but it was about eight years. He went to London in 1792 and, +in that year, the first edition of his _Topographical Description of the +Western Territory of North America_ was published. This work is made up +of a series of descriptive letters which the author wrote from Kentucky +to an English friend. The second edition of 1793, and the third edition +of 1797, reproduced John Filson's _Kentucke_ and Thomas Hutchins's +_History_, together with much new material. While a resident of Kentucky +Gilbert Imlay wrote the first Kentucky novel, entitled _The Emigrants, +or the History of an Expatriated Family, being a Delineation of English +Manners drawn from Real Characters. Written in America, by G. Imlay, +Esq._ (London, 1793, 3 vols.; Dublin, 1794, 1 vol.). The epistolary form +is adopted throughout, and the narrative relates the fortunes of "an +eminent merchant in the city of London," Mr. T----n, who loses his great +fortune and emigrates with his family to America. His daughter, the +beautiful Caroline, is the heroine of the story. Landing in +Philadelphia, they travel to Pittsburgh, and from there drift down the +Ohio river in a Kentucky flatboat, or "ark," to Louisville. Caroline's +lover, Capt Arl----ton, had preceded the family and gone on to +Lexington, but he soon returned to Louisville when he learned that his +sweetheart awaited his coming. "The emigrants" remained in Kentucky some +three months, or from June until August. Caroline's capture by the +Indians in August decided the family to forsake the "dark and bloody +ground," though she was safely rescued. They finally find their way to +London, and all ends well. _The Emigrants_, in the three-volume edition, +is exceedingly scarce, but the Dublin one-volume edition may be +occasionally procured in the rare book shops of London. In 1793 Gilbert +Imlay went to Paris, where he met the famous Mary Wollstonecraft, with +whom he was soon living, as they both held mutual affection equivalent +to marriage. In 1794 a daughter was born to them, Fanny Imlay, who +committed suicide at Swansea, October 10, 1816. In April, 1796, Imlay +and Mary agreed to go separate paths after much stormy weather together; +and a short time later she became the wife of William Godwin, the +English philosopher and novelist. In giving birth to the future wife of +the poet Shelley, she surrendered her own life. Mary Wollstonecraft's _A +Vindication of the Rights of Woman_ is the chief memorial of her +pathetic and eventful career. After having parted on that April morning +of 1796 with the woman he had so outrageously treated, Gilbert Imlay, +"the handsome scoundrel," is lost to history. When, where, or how he +died is unknown. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _London Monthly Review_ (August, 1793); _Kentuckians + in History and Literature_, by John Wilson Townsend (New York, + 1907); _Dictionary of National Biography_; biographies of Shelley, + Godwin, and Mary Wollstonecraft. + + +THE FLIGHT OF A FLORID LOVER + +[From _The Emigrants_ (Dublin, 1794)] + +LETTER XLVI. CAPT. ARL--TON TO MR. IL--RAY. + + Louisville, June. + +It is impossible for me to see Caroline in the present state of my +mind, and therefore I hope you will not look upon it in the least +disrespectful, my friend, if I should happen to be absent when you +arrive; for to be candid with you, I shall make a journey purposely to +Lexington. + +Your obliging favour from Pittsburg, which you meant should give me +spirits, has had quite a contrary effect. + +By attempting to soothe my mind, I discover that secret poison, +flattery, ever contains, and which I consider the principal cause of +my present wretchedness. + +The image you have given of Caroline makes her appear to me more +lovely than ever; and when you say that enchantment seems to spring up +where e'er she treads, I feel the full force of all her charms, and +conceive that I behold her in this season of fragrance and beauty, +decorating those gardens which you passed through on your return from +the fatal view upon the Allegany, + + While the blushing rose, drooping hides its head, + As Caroline's sweets more odorous prove, + And op'ning lilies look faint, sick, and dead,-- + For things inanimate, feel the force of love. + +She is irresistible--and it is only by absence that I shall ever be +enabled to forget my misfortunes, and therefore, my dear friend, I +must request that in your future letters, when you mention that divine +woman, you will not appreciate that beauty which has ten thousand +charms to fascinate and fetter the soul. + +She has not only all the symmetry of form, the softness of love, and +the enchantment of a goddess; but she can assume an animation and that +surprising activity of motion, that while you are suspended in the +transports of astonishment, you are lost in admiration at the +gracefulness with which she moves--I have seen her bound over a rock, +and pluck a wild honey-suckle, that grew upon the side of a precipice, +and while I stood gazing at her in amazement, she has brought it as a +trophy of her exertions. + +Believe, my friend, that if ever nature formed one woman to excel +another in personal charms, it must be Caroline. + + * * * * * + +I leave this enclosed in a packet for General W----. I am this moment +informed there are boats making round Diamond Island. Who knows but one +of them contains the lovely Caroline? Ah! my friend, I feel every +emotion of love and shame so powerfully, that I must instantly fly to +avoid exposing myself--curse that mandate which banished me from the +lovely tyrant of my heart--curse the vanity which exposed my +weakness;--for damnable is that fate which compels a man to avoid the +object of all others, which to him is the most interesting--I must this +instant be off. O Caroline!--Caroline! while my soul deadens at the +thought, I abandon the spot which will be converted into elysium the +moment you arrive. Forgive me, my friend, this effusion of nature--this +weakness, for it prepares us for those delicious raptures, that flow +from the source of sympathy, and while it softens us to that tender +texture, which is congenial to feminine charms, it invigorates our +actions, and fosters every generous and noble sentiment. + +The streamers of your vessels, for it must be you, are playing in the +wind, as if enraptured with the treasure over which they impend, seem +eradiated with the charms of Caroline; while the gentle Ohio, as if +conscious of its charge, proudly swells, and appears to vie with the +more elevated earth, in order to secure to its divinity, upon which to +tread at her disembarkation, the flowery carpet of its banks. + + Adieu. I am off. J. A. + + +AN EXASPERATED MATCHMAKER + +LETTER XLVII. MR. IL--RAY TO CAPT. ARL--TON. + + Louisville, June. + +My dear James, + +From the time we left Pittsburg until our arrival here, which was ten +days after our embarkation, we were all appreciating the pleasure we +should derive from finding you at this place. + +I had expatiated largely upon the satisfaction we should experience +from the information you would give us of the country; and no sooner +were we in sight of the town that we hung out a flag of invitation; +not doubting that you would observe it, and immediately come off to us +in a barge; but what was the surprise of the whole part, and my +mortification, when we learned upon landing, you had left the place +not more than half an hour. + +The letter you left enclosed for me in General W----'s packet, to be +sure, informed me of the cause of your absence; but it by no means +justified the action. And I demand as a proof of your respect for your +old friends, that you instantly return. + +Remember, James, this is the command of a friend, who is anxious to +restore you to a state of reason, which it appears you have not +possessed for some time past. + +Caroline was in tolerable spirits until within two days of our +arrival, when she suddenly appeared to be pensive and in a state of +extreme trepidation; and since we arrived she has been confined by +indisposition. + +If you have a delicate and tender regard for this charming girl, you +will fly immediately to enquire after her health. But to put it out of +your power to frame a shadow for an excuse, I inform you that it is my +intention first to visit the Illinois, and to view this country on my +return. + +I waited during yesterday for an opportunity to send this, and as I +could not meet with one, I send a person I have hired for that +purpose, as my men are unacquainted with the country. + +Believe me to be your sincere, but unhappy friend, + + G. Il--ray. + + +THE BASHFUL LOVER'S RETURN + +LETTER XLVIII. CAPT. ARL--TON TO MR. IL--RAY. + + Lexington, June. + +Your express has this moment reached me: and to convince you, my dear +Il--ray, that no man can be more alive to every sentiment of love and +friendship, I shall not defer my return to Louisville a single hour; and +I merely dispatch this by the return of your messenger, to let you know +I shall be with you tomorrow in the evening; and that in my present +distracted state of mind, I think it most advisable to make my _entre_ +under the cover of the dark, to prevent my being perceived, as I wish to +devote the whole evening in sequestered converse with you, my friend. + +Caroline is ill! Ah! Il--ray I am wretched in the extreme. I am burnt +up with a scorching fever--I am wrecked in the elements of every +painful passion, and my every effort to reason is baffled by my +reflections upon past occurrences. + +But I am your indissoluble friend, + + J. Arl--ton. + + + + +ADAM RANKIN + + +Rev. Adam Rankin, author of the first book ever printed in Kentucky, +was born in Pennsylvania, March 24, 1755. He was graduated from +Liberty Hall, now Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia, +when about twenty-five years of age; and two years later he was +licensed to preach by the Virginia Presbytery. Rev. Rankin came to +Lexington, Kentucky, in 1784, to accept the pastorate of the +Presbyterian church. He also conducted a school for some time, but his +one thought was Psalmody, which became "his monomania." He created a +schism in his church by insisting that Dr. Watts's imitation of the +Psalms of David be expelled from the church worship, and that the +Psalms in their most literal dress be chanted. His brethren +disapproved of his views, but they could not discourage him or cause +him to discard his contention. Everywhere he went he preached and +wrote upon his favorite subject. Rev. Rankin's Kentucky brethren made +life unbearable for him, and he went to London, where he remained for +two years. When he did return to Kentucky it was to face accusation +after accusation, and church trial after church trial, until he was +finally suspended. Rev. Rankin was a strange, eccentric man, a dreamer +of dreams, a Kentucky Luther, and, perhaps, a bit crazed with the +bitter opposition his views received. His latest, boldest dream was +that Jerusalem was about to be rebuilt and that he must hurry there in +order to assist in the rebuilding. He bade his Lexington flock +farewell, and started to the Holy City, but, on November 25, 1827, +death overtook him at Philadelphia. Rev. Rankin was the author of +several theological works, but his _A Process in the Transylvania +Presbytery, &c._ (Maxwell and Gooch, At the Sign of the Buffalo, Main +Street, Lexington, 1793), is the first book ever printed in Kentucky, +if the _Kentucky Acts_ which John Bradford published in the same year +be excepted. Many days were required to print this little book of +Rankin upon the hand-press of the publishers, though it contained but +ninety-six pages, divided into five parts. Although it is not great +literature, it is the first book that can, in any wise, come under +that term published in this State. It is surely of more literary +importance than Bradford's _Acts_. Rev. Rankin was, as were nearly all +of the early Kentucky theologians, a prolific pamphleteer. His +_Dialogues_ (Lexington, 1810), is really his most important +publication, but it has been greatly overlooked in the recent rush +among Kentucky historical writers to list _A Process_ as the first +book published in Kentucky. His eccentric career as a man and preacher +is, after all, of more interest than his work as an author. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of the Presbyterian Church in Kentucky_, by + R. H. Davidson (New York, 1847); _The Centenary of Kentucky_, by + R. T. Durrett (Louisville, Kentucky, 1892). + + +ON THE EXTENT OF THE GOSPEL OFFER + +[From _A Process in the Transylvania Presbytery_ (Lexington, Ky., +1793)] + +We believe, that as it respects the outward means, the ambassadors are +authorised to publish, proclaim, and declare the counsel of God, as it +stands connected with our salvation; and that all, who hear the sound, +have an equal and indefinite warrant, not only to embrace the means as +offered to them indiscriminately, by which comes faith, but have a +right to believe, that Christ, with all his benefits, is freely +offered to them, as sinners, without ever enquiring, into the secret +purposes of God, whether they are elect, or non-elect. + + +UPON MARRIAGE BY LICENSE + +[From the same] + +Seeing, under our government, it is not purchasing a liberty by +pecuniary rewards, further, than compensating a prothonotary, for +taking bond and security, that guardians are agreed, and keeping a +just register, for the credit and safety of the rising family. And as +the contract is partly civil in its nature, and civil government is +bound to defend the civil rights--we believe it perfectly consonant to +the analogy of faith, which might be evinced from the fourth chapter +of Ruth. But as it is partly social, and the parties contracting come +under the mutual obligations to fulfil their relative duties, it ought +to be consummated before witnesses. And as it is partly religious, +every family appertaining to the Church of Christ, commences a +nursery, or infant society, to train up their family in the nurture +and admonition of the Lord. We believe it right, that whenever a +church in full order exists, that the pastor, or church officer should +consecrate them, to the business assigned them as a Church of Christ, +taking their obligations for the due performance of their duty. + + + + +THOMAS JOHNSON, Jr. + + +Thomas Johnson, Junior, the first Kentucky poet, who, for many years, +enjoyed the sobriquet of the "Drunken Poet of Danville," was born in +Virginia about 1760, and he came to Kentucky when twenty-five years of +age. He settled at Danville, then a village, and immediately entered +into the role of poet, punster, and ne'er-do-weel. Documentary +evidence is extant to prove that Danville was a gay little town when +the young Virginian arrived there about 1785; and he was early drawn +into excesses, or led others into them. Johnson was a rather prolific +maker of coarse satirical rhymes, which he finally assembled into a +small pamphlet, and published them as _The Kentucky Miscellany_ +(Lexington, 1796). This was the first book of poems, if they may be so +termed, printed in Kentucky. The original price of this pamphlet was +nine pence the copy, but it is impossible to procure it today for any +price, and there is not an extant copy of this first edition. _The +Kentucky Miscellany_ went into a second edition in 1815, and a third +edition was published a few years later, but no copies of either +edition are extant. The fourth and final edition appeared from the +_Advertiser_ office at Lexington, in 1821, and a dog-eared, +much-mutilated copy of this is in the collection of the Filson Club in +Louisville--perhaps the only copy in the world. _The Miscellany_ +contained but thirty-six small pages, about the size of the medical +almanacs of to-day. Many of the little verses are very vulgar and +actually obscene, perhaps due to the fact that Johnson could never +quite bury John Barleycorn alive. The most famous of them is the +_Extempore Grace_, which the bard delivered one day in the tavern of +old Erasmus Gill in Danville. In his cups he stumbled into the tavern +dining-room, where he found the meal over, and the guests gone, +nothing being left but the crumbs. He glanced at the tables, then at +Gill, and offered _Extempore Grace_. His lines on Danville, on +Kentucky, and on several other subjects reveal the satirist; and the +verses to Polly, his sweetheart, and to his favorite physician the +better elements in his nature. That these rather vulgar verses of +Johnson did not escape the censorship of Western advocates of the pure +food law in literature, is made certain by a letter from an Ohio +critic which appeared in the _Lexington Intelligencer_ for January 28, +1834. After having made a strong plea for the preservation of early +Western verse, the writer added: "I do not mean to embrace the low +doggerel of _Tom Johnson_; this was published some years ago, and I +never felt _decency_ more outraged than when it was handed me to read +by _mine landlady_! My stars! Save us from the _blackguardism_, for +the world is sufficiently demoralized." Had this early critic of Tom's +verses presented a bundle of them to some library, how many Western +writers would rise up and call him blessed! Johnson died and was +buried at Danville, but the date of his death or the exact place of +his burial is unknown. He had passed and was almost forgotten by 1830. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of the Presbyterian Church in Kentucky_, by + R. H. Davidson (New York, 1847); _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. + Collins (Covington, Kentucky, 1882); _Centre College Cento_ + (Danville, Kentucky, January, 1907); _Kentuckians in History and + Literature_, by J. W. Townsend (New York, 1907). + + +EXTEMPORE GRACE + +[From _The Kentucky Miscellany_ (Lexington, Kentucky, 1821)] + + O! Thou who blest the loaves and fishes + Look down upon these empty dishes; + And that same power that did them fill, + Bless each of us, but d---- old Gill! + + +DANVILLE + +[From the same] + + Accursed Danville, vile, detested spot, + Where knaves inhabit, and where fools resort-- + Thy roguish cunning, and thy deep design, + Would shame a Bluebeard or an Algerine. + O, may thy fatal day be ever curst, + When by blind error led, I entered first. + + +KENTUCKY + +[From the same] + + I hate Kentucky, curse the place, + And all her vile and miscreant race! + Who make religion's sacred tie + A mask thro' which they cheat and lie. + Proteus could not change his shape, + Nor Jupiter commit a rape + With half the ease those villains can + Send prayers to God and cheat their man! + I hate all Judges here of late, + And every Lawyer in the State. + Each quack that is called Physician, + And all blockheads in Commission-- + Worse than the Baptist roaring rant, + I hate the Presbyterian cant-- + Their Parsons, Elders, nay, the whole, + And wish them gone with all my soul. + + +HUDSON, WIFE MURDERER + +[From the same] + + Strange things of Orpheus poets tell, + How for a wife he went to Hell; + Hudson, a wiser man no doubt, + Would go to Hell to be without! + + +PARSON RICE + +[From the same] + + Ye fools! I told you once or twice, + You'd hear no more from canting R----e; + He cannot settle his affairs, + Nor pay attention unto prayers, + Unless you pay up your arrears. + Oh, how in pulpit he would storm, + And fill all Hell with dire alarm! + Vengeance pronounced against each vice, + And, more than all, curs'd avarice; + Preach'd money was the root of ill; + Consigned each rich man unto Hell; + But since he finds you will not pay, + Both rich and poor may go that way. + 'Tis no more than I expected-- + The meeting-house is now neglected: + All trades are subject to this chance, + No longer pipe, no longer dance. + + +THE POET'S EPITAPH + +[From the same] + + Underneath this marble tomb, + In endless shades lies drunken Tom; + Here safely moored, dead as a log, + Who got his death by drinking grog. + By whiskey grog he lost his breath-- + Who would not die so sweet a death? + + + + +GEORGE BECK + + +George Beck, classicist, born in England in 1749, became instructor of +mathematics at Woolwich Academy, near London, at the age of +twenty-seven years; but he was later dismissed. Beck married an +English woman of culture and emigrated to the United States in 1795, +reaching these shores in time to serve "Mad Anthony" Wayne as a scout +in his Indian campaign. The wanderlust was upon George Beck, and he +became one of the first of that little band of nomadic painters that +came early to the Blue Grass country, and having once come remained. +He arrived at Lexington in 1800; and it was not long before he began +to send short original poems and spirited translations of Anacreon, +Homer, Horace, and Virgil to old John Bradford's _Gazette_. At about +this time, too, Beck was doing many portraits and a group of +landscapes in oils of the Kentucky river country, a few of which have +come down to posterity. Eighteen hundred and six seems to have been +Beck's best year in Kentucky from the literary viewpoint, as the +_Gazette_ is full of his verses and translations. He was widely known +as the "Lexington Horace." Besides painting and poetry, George Beck +was a rather learned astronomer, as his _Observations on the Comet_ of +1811 prove. With his wife he conducted an "Academy for Young Ladies" +for several years. His last years were much embittered by the lack of +appreciation upon the part of the Western public. The Kentucky of 1800 +was not a whirlpool of art or literature by any means, and this +cultured man languished and finally died among a people who cared +very little for his fine learning or his manners. George Beck, poet, +translator, mathematician, astronomer, artist, died in Lexington, +Kentucky, December 14, 1812. His wife survived him until the cholera +year of 1833, which swept away nearly two thousand citizens of +Lexington and the Blue Grass. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Kentucky Gazette_ (Lexington, December 22, 1812); + Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New York, 1887, v. + i). + + +FIFTEENTH ODE OF HORACE + + A New Translation of the Fifteenth Ode of Horace, or Prophecy of + Nerceus, from which (according to Count Algorotti and Dr. Johnson) + Gray took his beautiful Ode, _The Bard_. + +[From _The Kentucky Gazette_ (October 27, 1806)] + + What time the fair perfidious shepherd bore + The beauteous Helen back to Ilion's shore, + To sleep the howling waves were won + By Nerceus, Ocean's hoary son, + While round the liquid realms he sung, + From guilty love, what dire disasters sprung. + + Thee, tainted Youth, what omens dire attend! + Thy neck and Ilion's soon to Greece shall bend. + To man and horse what sweat and blood, + What carnage float down Xanthus' flood! + What wrath on Troy shall Greece infuriate turn! + What glittering domes, and spires, and temples burn! + + In vain you boast the Queen of beauty's smiles, + Her charms, her floating curls, her amourous wiles, + These, these alas! will nought avail + While Cretan arrows round you sail! + And, tho' the fates awhile such guilt may spare, + Vile dust at length shall smear that golden hair! + + Trace back, vain Youth! sad Ilion's fate of old! + Ulysses' sons and Nestor's yet behold, + Teucer's and Diomede's more dread + Horrific war shall round you shed; + Then shall ye trembling fly like timid deer + When hungry wolves are howling in their rear. + + By promise Vain of Universal Sway + Lur'd you from Greece the beauteous Queen away? + In less than ten revolving years + Achilles' dreadful fleet appears! + His bloody trains of Myrmidonians dire + Shall wrap proud Ilion's domes in Grecian fire! + + +ANACREON'S FIFTY-FIFTH ODE + +[From _The Kentucky Gazette_ (November 3, 1806)] + + What deathless Artist's mimic hand + Shall paint me here the Ocean bland, + Shall give the waves such kindling glows + As when immortal Venus rose? + Who, in phrenzy's flight of mind + Such touch and tinctures bright may find + To match her form and golden hair + And naked paint the heavenly fair? + While every amorous rival billow + Strives her buoyant breast to pillow? + 'Tis done! behold the wavelets green + Softly press the Paphian Queen, + Around her heavenly bosom play, + Kiss its warm blush and melt away. + Her graceful neck of pearl behold, + Her wavy curls of floating gold: + But none but lips divine may tell + What Graces on that bosom dwell! + Such bloom a bed of lilies shows + Illumin'd by the crimson'd rose. + Rounding off with grace divine + Like hills of snow her shoulders shine. + While streaming thro' the waves she swims + The silvery maze half veils her limbs, + Else where's the eye that durst behold + Such beauty stream'd on heavenly mold? + Th' enamour'd Triton's glittering train + Sporting round the liquid main + Waving their gold and silver pinions, + Bear her o'er their deep dominions, + While infant Loves and young desires + Dancing 'mid the choral choirs + Clasp the beauteous Queen around + And sail in triumph o'er the bright profound. + + +ANACREON'S FIRST ODE + +[From _The Western Review_ (Lexington, March, 1821)] + + I would Atrides' glory tell, + I would to Cadmus strike my shell; + I try the vocal cords--in vain! + Love, only love, breathes through the strain. + I strip away the truant wire, + And string with deeper chords the lyre, + Then great Alcides' toils would sing: + Soft love still sighs through every string. + Hence, themes of Glory, hence! adieu! + For what have I to do with you? + My heart and lyre in union make + Resounding Love and only Love. + + + + +HUMPHREY MARSHALL + + +Humphrey Marshall, author of the first _History of Kentucky_ that was +in any wise comprehensive, was born near Warrenton, Virginia, in 1760. +What little school instruction he received was from the young woman +whom he afterwards married. Marshall removed to Kentucky in 1782, +after having served as an officer in the Revolutionary War. He was a +member of the Virginia convention of 1788, as a representative of the +district of Kentucky, which adopted the Federal constitution. +Marshall was in the Kentucky legislature for several terms and, from +1795 to 1801, he was United States Senator from Kentucky. Some years +later he was again in the State legislature; and at about that time +his famous duel with Henry Clay took place. The first edition of his +_History of Kentucky_ (Frankfort, 1812), appeared in a single volume +of 407 pages; but the second and final edition was greatly revised and +augmented and published in two octavo volumes (Frankfort, 1824). +Humphrey Marshall's pen was pointed with poison for his enemies (and +he had more of them than any other Kentuckian of his time, perhaps), +and in his book he lashed them ruthlessly. He was the first as well as +the last of Kentucky's "personal" historians. He first endeavored to +silence his foes with newspapers and pamphlets, but, not being +satisfied with the results, he poured out his wrath in book form to +the extent of a thousand pages and more. While prejudice is the most +descriptive word possible to use in characterizing Marshall's work, it +is not all prejudice. He wrote with wonderful keenness concerning the +Spanish conspiracy in Kentucky, his views upon the men that were +guilty of bartering Kentucky to Spain in order to obtain free +navigation of the Mississippi river having been abundantly affirmed by +the latest historical work upon that subject. He also wrote of the +Burr conspiracy with great clearness of vision, all of which is very +remarkable when one stops to consider that nearly every one of the men +connected with these two conspiracies were his bitterest enemies. That +Marshall was an able writer all of the Kentucky historians have freely +admitted, notwithstanding the fact they have quarreled with his "copy" +many times. He is, as his biographer writes, "the stormy petrel of +Kentucky's earlier years," a most remarkable man from several points +of view. His _History of Kentucky_, in either edition, is rather +scarce at this time, and it is not to be found in many of the rare +book shops of the country. Humphrey Marshall died at Lexington, +Kentucky, July 3, 1841. He lies buried upon the banks of the Kentucky +river, near the capitol of the Commonwealth, Frankfort. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); _Life and Times of Hon. Humphrey Marshall_, by A. + C. Quisenberry (Winchester, Kentucky, 1892). + + +PRIMEVAL KENTUCKY + +[From _The History of Kentucky_ (Frankfort, Kentucky, 1824, v. i)] + +The country, once seen, held out abundant inducements to be re-visited, +and better known. Among the circumstances best adapted to engage the +attention, and impress the feelings of the adventurous hunters of North +Carolina, may be selected the uncommon fertility of the soil, and the +great abundance of wild game, so conspicuous at that time. And we are +assured that the effect lost nothing of the cause. Forests those hunters +had seen--mountains they had ascended--valleys they had traversed--deer +they had killed--and bears they had successfully hunted. They had heard +the howl of the wolf; the whine of the panther; and the heart-rending +yell of the savage man; with correspondent sensations of delight, or +horror. But these were all lost to memory, in the contemplation of +Kentucky; animated with all the enchanting variety, and adorned with all +the majestic grace and boldness of nature's creative energy. To nature's +children, she herself is eloquent, and affecting. Never before had the +feelings of these rude hunters experienced so much of the pathetic, the +sublime, or the marvellous. Their arrival on the plains of Elkhorn was +in the dawn of summer; when the forests, composed of oaks of various +kinds, of ash, of walnut, cherry, buck-eye, hackberry, sugar trees, +locust, sycamore, coffee tree, and an indefinite number of other trees, +towering aloft to the clouds, overspread the luxuriant undergrowth, with +their daily shade; while beneath, the class of trees--the shrubs, the +cane, the herbage, and the different kinds of grass, and clover, +interspersed with flowers, filled the eye, and overlaid the soil, with +the forest's richest carpet. The soil itself, more unctuous and fertile +than Egypt's boasted Delta, from her maternal bosom, gave copious +nutriment; and in rich exuberance sustained the whole, in matchless +verdure. + +Here it was, if Pan ever existed, that without the aid of fiction, he +held his sole dominion, and Sylvan empire, unmolested by Ceres, or +Lucina, for centuries. + +The proud face of creation here presented itself, without the disguise +of art. No wood had been felled; no field cleared; no human habitation +raised: even the red man of the forest had not put up his wigwam of +poles and bark for habitation. But that mysterious Being, whose +productive power we call Nature, ever bountiful, and ever great--had +not spread out this replete and luxurious pasture without stocking it +with numerous flocks and herds: nor were their ferocious attendants, +who prey upon them, wanting, to fill up the circle of created beings. +Here was seen the timid deer; the towering elk; the fleet stag; the +surly bear; the crafty fox; the ravenous wolf; the devouring panther; +the insidious wild-cat; and the haughty buffaloe: besides innumerable +other creatures, winged, fourfooted, or creeping. And here, at some +time unknown, had been, for his bones are yet here, the leviathan of +the forest, the monstrous mammoth; whose trunk, like that of the +famous Trojan horse, would have held an host of men; and whose teeth, +nine feet in length, inflicted death and destruction, on both animals +and vegetable substances--until exhausting all within its range, +itself became extinct. Nor is it known, although the race must have +abounded in the country, from the great number of bones belonging to +the species, found in different places, that there is one of the kind +living on the American continent, if in the universe. + + + + +STEPHEN T. BADIN + + +Stephen Theodore Badin, Kentucky's earliest Catholic bard, was born at +Orleans, France, in 1768. Though very poor he received a classical and +theological training in Paris and Tours; and in 1792 he emigrated to +America. In the following year Badin was ordained by Bishop John Carroll +at Baltimore, he being the first Roman Catholic priest ordained in the +United States. He was subsequently appointed to do missionary work in +Kentucky, which was then in the old Baltimore diocese, and he made his +home at Georgetown, Kentucky. During the next few years Badin rode more +than one hundred thousand miles on horseback in order to meet all of his +appointments. He was then the only Catholic priest in Kentucky, though +he did have assistants from time to time. In 1797 Badin was made +vicar-general, and the large Catholic emigrations from Maryland to +Kentucky about this time greatly increased his labors. His _Principles +of Catholics_ (1805) was the first Catholic book published in the West, +and it gave him a larger audience than his voice could well reach. Badin +later organized missions and built churches in Louisville and Lexington, +St. Peter's in Lexington being made possible by the generosity of his +Protestant friends, of whom he had many. Badin and Bishop Benedict +Joseph Flaget, of the Bardstown diocese, had a misunderstanding as to +the settlement of titles to certain church properties which Badin had +acquired before Flaget came to Kentucky, and, rather than to have an +acrimonious argument with the Bishop, he quit Kentucky, in 1819, and +spent the next nine years in European travel. From 1830 to 1836 he +worked among the Pottawatomie Indians in Indiana with marked success. +Father Badin died at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1853. He was the author of +several Latin poems in hexameters, among them being _Carmen Sacrum_, a +translation of which was published at Frankfort; _Epicedium_, an elegy +upon the death of Col. Joseph Hamilton Daviess at the battle of +Tippecanoe; and _Sanctissimae Trinitatis Laudes et Invocatis_ +(Louisville, 1843). His brief in memoriam for Colonel Daviess is his +best known work and, perhaps, his masterpiece. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Sketches of Early Catholic Missions in Kentucky_, + by M. J. Spalding (Louisville, 1846); _The Centenary of + Catholicity in Kentucky_, by B. J. Webb (Louisville, 1884). + + +EPICEDIUM + + In Gloriosam Mortem + Magnanimi Equitum Ducis + Joseph Hamilton Daviess, Patrii Amoris Victimae + In Tippecanoe Pugna ad Amnem + Wabaschum, 7. Die Nov. 1811. + Epicedium; + Honorabili Viro Joanni Rowan + Meo Ipsiusque Amico Dicatum. + +[From _The Kentucky Gazette_ (February 18, 1812)] + + Autumnus felix aderat granaria complens + Frugibus; umbrosas patulis jam frondibus ulmos + Exuerat brumoe proprior, cum Fama per orbem + Non rumore vago fatalia nuncia defert: + "Sub specie pacis Slyvaecola perfidus atra + "Nocte viros inopino plumbo occidit et hasta; + "Dux equitum triplici confossus vulnere, fortis + "Occubuit; turmoe hostiles periere fugatoe, + "Hostilesque casas merito ultrix flamma voravit." + Mensibus AEstivis portenderat ista Cometes + Funera; Terra quatit repetitis motibus; aegre + Volvit sanguineas Wabaschus tardior undas + Ingeminant Dryades suspiria longa; Hymenoeus + Deficit audita clade, et solatia spernit + Omnia; triste silet Musarum turba; fidelis + Luget Amicities, lugubri tegmine vestit + Et caput et laevam, desiderioque dalentis + Non pudor aut modus est. Lacrymas at fundere inanes + Quid juvat? Heu lacrymis nil Fata moventur acerba! + Ergo piae Themidis meliora oracula poscunt + Unanimes; diram causam Themis aure benigna + Excipit, et mox decretum pronunciat oequum: + "Davidis effigies nostra appendatur in aula; + "Tempora sacra viri quercus civilis adornet, + "Ac non immeritam jungat Victoria laurum. + "Signa sui Legislator det publica luctus; + Historioe chartis referat memorabile Clio. + "Praelium, et alta locum cyparissus contegat umbra. + "Tristis Hymen pretiosa urna cor nobile servet; + "Marmoreo reliquos cineres sincera sepulcro + "Condat Amicities; praesens venturaque laudet + "AEtas magnanimum David, virtute potentem + "Eloquii, belli et pacis decus immortale." + Vita habet angustos fines, et gloria nullos: + Qui patrioe reddunt vitam, illi morte nec ipsa + Vincuntur; virtutum exempla nepotibus extant. + Pro Patria vitam profundere maxima laus est. + + Stephanus Theodorus Badin, + Cathol. Mission. + + Moerens canebat 15. Dec. 1811. + + +A TRANSLATION BY "WOODFORDENSIS" + +[From the same] + + On the glorious death of Joseph Hamilton Daviess, Commander + of the Horse, who fell a victim to his love of country, in + the late battle on the Wabash, the 7th. Nov., 1811. + Dedicated to John Rowan, Esq. + + 'Twas late in autumn, and the thrifty swain + In spacious barns secur'd the golden grain; + November's chilly mornings breath'd full keen; + No leafy honors crown'd the sylvan scene. + When Fame with those sad tidings quickly flew + Throughout our land; (her tale, alas! too true): + "The savage Indian, our perfidious foe, + Pretending peace with hypocritic show, + Surpris'd our legions in the dead of night + And urg'd with lead and steel the mortal fight; + Our valiant warriors strew th' ensanguin'd plain, + Ev'n our great Captain of the Horse is slain + With triple wound!!! At length the foe retires, + With loss; and leaves his town to our avenging fires." + + When summer gilded our nocturnal sky + With astral gems; a comet blazed on high, + Portentous of these fates!--the earth, in throes + Repeated labors; rueful Wabash flows + With slower current, stain'd with mingling blood! + The _Dryads_ fill with plaints the echoing wood! + Hymen, the slaughter heard, dissolves in grief! + Naught can console him, naught can yield relief. + In woeful silence sits the muses' train + And Friendship mourns her fav'rite hero slain. + The funeral crape, vain badge of grief! she wears + Upon her head, her arms the emblem bears, + Her sorrowing mind no moderation knows, + Admits no measure to her boundless woes. + + Ah, what avails the vain expense of tears? + Fate still unmov'd this fruitless anguish bears! + Therefore to Themis' shrine, with one accord, + They come to crave a more benign award. + The direful cause the attentive Goddess hears, + And soon this just decree her record bears: + "Let Daviess still in semblance grace my halls, + Let his bright portraiture adorn my walls; + The civic oak his sacred brows entwine, + And vict'ry to the wreath his laurel join. + Let Legislative acts of mourning show + The voted ensigns of the public woe; + In the historic page be ever read + The fierce encounter, when great Daviess bled, + And be the fatal spot with cypress shade o'erspread; + His noble heart let Hymen's care enclose + In the rich urn, and friendship's hand compose + His other relics in the marble tomb. + Then let the ages present and to come + Just praises render to his glorious name; + Let honor'd Daviess gild the page of fame, + A hero, fit a nation's pow'r to wield, + In council wise, and mighty in the field." + + His mortal life a narrow space confines, + But glory with unbounded lustre shines. + Those virtuous souls, who shed their noble blood + A willing off'ring to the public good, + Who to their country's welfare freely give + The sacrifice of life, forever live + As bright examples to the unborn brave, + To shew how virtue rescues from the grave. + The noblest act the patriot's fame can tell, + Is, that he bravely for his country fell. + + Thus sung the missionary bard, and paid + This mournful tribute to the mighty dead. + + + + +DR. CHARLES CALDWELL + + +Dr. Charles Caldwell, versatile and voluminous writer of prose, was +born at Caswell, North Carolina, May 14, 1772. He entered the medical +school of the University of Pennsylvania, in 1792; and he won the +city's gratitude in the following year by his medical services during +the yellow fever epidemic. In 1810 Dr. Caldwell became professor of +natural history in the University of Pennsylvania; and four years +later he succeeded Nicholas Biddle (1786-1844) as editor of _The +Port-Folio_, a Philadelphia magazine of high character. In 1819 Dr. +Caldwell came to Lexington, Kentucky, to accept the chair of materia +medica in Transylvania University. Some months later he was sent to +Europe to purchase books and apparatus for his department. He returned +to Transylvania and continued there until 1837, when he removed to +Louisville and established a medical institute. Some years later he +and the trustees disagreed and he left. After leaving the institute, +Dr. Caldwell continued to reside at Louisville, in which city he died, +July 9, 1853. Dr. Caldwell was the first distinguished American +practitioner of phrenology, if he did not actually discover this +alleged science. From 1794 until his death, Dr. Caldwell was an +indefatigable literary worker. He was the author of more than two +hundred pamphlets, essays, and books. He translated Blumenbach's +_Elements of Physiology_ (1795); _Bachtiar Nameh_ (1813), a Persian +tale which he translated from the Arabic; edited Cullen's _Practice of +Physic_ (1816); _Memoirs of the Life and Campaigns of the Hon._ +[General] _Greene_ (Philadelphia, 1819); _Elements of Phrenology_ +(1824); _A Discourse on the Genius and Character of the Rev. Horace +Holley, LL.D., late President of Transylvania University_ (Boston, +1828); and _Thoughts and Experiments on Mesmerism_ (1842). + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. His _Autobiography_ (Philadelphia, 1855), published + posthumously, has been regarded by many as an unfortunate work, as + in it he made some rather severe pictures of his contemporaries. + That the work contains much excellent writing, and is often very + happy in the descriptions of the country through which the author + passed, no one has arisen to gainsay; _Autobiography of Samuel D. + Gross, M. D._ (Philadelphia, 1887, v. ii). + + +GENERAL GREENE'S EARLY LIFE + +[From _Memoirs of the Life and Campaigns of the Hon. Nathaniel Greene_ +(Philadelphia, 1819)] + +Nathaniel Greene, although descended from ancestors of elevated +standing, was not indebted to the condition of his family for any +part of the real lustre and reputation he possessed. As truly as is +the case with any individual, he was the founder of his own fortune, +and the author of his own fame. He was the second son of Nathaniel +Greene, an anchor-smith, of considerable note, who is believed to have +had the earliest establishment of the kind erected in America, and, by +persevering industry in the line of his profession, an extensive and +lucrative concern in iron-works, and some success in commercial +transactions, had acquired a sufficiency to render him comfortable, if +not wealthy. + +He was born in the year 1741, in the town of Warwick, and county of +Kent, in the province of Rhode Island. As far as is known, his childhood +passed without any peculiar or unequivocal indications of future +greatness. But this is a point of little moment. The size of the oak it +is destined to produce, can rarely be foretold from an examination of +the acorn. Nor is it often that any well defined marks of genius in the +child afford a premonition of the eminence of the man. + +Several of his contemporaries, however, who are still living, have a +perfect recollection that young Greene had neither the appearance nor +manners of a common boy; nor was he so considered by his elder, and +more discerning acquaintance. + + * * * * * + +Being intended by his father for the business which he had himself +pursued, young Greene received at school nothing but the elements of a +common English education. But, to himself, an acquisition so humble +and limited, was unsatisfactory and mortifying. Even now, his aim was +lofty; and he had a noble ambition, not only to embark in high +pursuits, but to qualify himself for a manly and honourable +acquittance in them. Seeming, at this early period of life, to realize +the important truth that, knowledge is power, a desire to obtain it +became, in a short time, his ruling passion. + +He accordingly procured, in part by his own economy, the necessary +books, and, at intervals of leisure, acquired, chiefly without the aid +of an instructor, a competent acquaintance with the Latin tongue. + +This attainment, respectable in itself, was only preliminary to higher +efforts. With such funds as he was able to raise, he purchased a +small, but well selected library, and spent his evenings, and all the +time he could redeem from business, in regular study. He read with a +view to general improvement; but geography, travels, and military +history--the latter, more especially--constituted his delight. Having, +also, a predilection for mathematics and mechanical philosophy, and +pursuing, in most cases, the bent of his inclination, as far as +prudence and opportunity would admit, his knowledge, in the more +practical departments of these sciences, became highly respectable. + + + + +ALLAN B. MAGRUDER + + +Allan Bowie Magruder, poet and historian, was born in Kentucky, about +1775. He received an academic education, studied law, and was admitted +to the Lexington bar in 1797. He contributed very fair verse to the +_Kentucky Gazette_ in 1802 and 1803, which attracted considerable +comment in the West. That his fame as a poet was wide-spread, is +indicated by a letter from an Ohio writer published in the _Lexington +Intelligencer_, January 28, 1834, in which Magruder's verse is highly +praised and further information concerning his career is sought. After +stabbing poor Tom Johnson's little pamphlet of rhymes to the heart, +Magruder is placed upon his pedestal as the first real Kentucky poet; +and that his work was superior to either Johnson's or George Beck's is +obvious, continues the caustic correspondent. The truth is, of course, +that the verses of neither of the three men merit mention for anything +save their priority; and the young Lexington lawyer's muse was not as +productive as Tom's or Beck's, no more than three or four of his poems +having come down to us. His first prose work was entitled _Reflections +on the late Cession of Louisiana to the United States_ (Lexington, +1803). This little volume of 150 pages was issued by Daniel Bradford, +for whose periodical, _The Medley_, Magruder wrote _The Character of +Thomas Jefferson_ (June; July, 1803). This essay attracted the attention +of the President, and he appointed Magruder commissioner of lands in +Louisiana, to which territory he shortly afterwards removed. He was +later a member of the State legislature; and from November 18, 1812, to +March 3, 1813, Magruder was United States Senator from his adopted +State. The next few years he devoted to collecting materials for a +history of the North American Indians; and he also made notes for many +years for a history of Kentucky, which he finally abandoned, and which +he turned over to his old friend, John Bradford, who made use of them in +his _Notes on Kentucky_. Allan B. Magruder died at Opelousas, Louisiana, +April 16, 1822, when but forty-seven years of age. He was a man of +culture and of high promise, but once in the politics of the country his +early literary triumphs were not repeated, and he appears to have never +done any writing worth while after his removal from Kentucky. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Lexington Intelligencer_ (Lexington, Kentucky, + January 28, 1834); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1888, v. iv). + + +CITIZEN GENET AND JEFFERSON + +[From _The Medley_ (Lexington, Ky., July, 1803)] + +When Citizen Genet, the ex-minister of the Robesperian fanaticism, +appeared in America, he attempted to impose his new philosophy of +light and liberty upon the government. He had nothing to boast of, on +the score of superior diplomatic skill. His communications to the +secretary of state, were evidently of the tampering kind. They were +impressed with all the marks of that enthusiastic insanity, which +regulated the councils of the faction; and which, were calculated to +mistake their object, by disgusting their intended victims. The mind +of Mr. Jefferson, discovered itself, in an early period of his +correspondence with the French minister. The communications of Genet +were decorated with all the flowers of eloquence, without the force +and conviction of rhetorical energy. Accustomed to diplomatic +calculation, and intimately combining cause with effect, Mr. Jefferson +apprehended the subject, with strength and precision; considered +it--developed it--viewed it on all sides--listened to every appeal, +and attended to every charge--and in every communication, burst forth +with a strength of refutation, that at once detected and embarrassed, +the disappointed minister of a wily and fanatic faction. + +It is, in most instances, useless to oppose enthusiasm with the +deliberate coolness of reason and argument. They are the antipodes of +each other; and of that imperious nature, which mutually solicit +triumph and disdain reconciliation. The tyranny of the Robesperian +principles, were calculated to inveigle within the vortex of European +politics, the American government and people. The coolness and +sagacity of the secretary of state, composed their defence and +protection. The appeal was mutually made to the government; and it is +a fortunate circumstance, that there existed this tribunal to +approbate the measures of the secretary, and to silence forever, the +declamatory oracle of an insidious faction. Checked and defeated on +all sides, his doctrines stripped of their visionary principles, and +himself betrayed into the labyrinth of diplomatic mystery, their +ex-divinity, shrank into the silence of contempt; declaring with his +last breath, that Mr. Jefferson was the only man in America, whose +talents he highly respected. + + + + +HENRY CLAY + + +Henry Clay, the most famous Kentuckian ever born, first saw the light +in the "Slashes," Hanover county, Virginia, April 12, 1777. When +twenty years of age, he settled in Lexington, Kentucky, as a lawyer; +and Lexington was his home henceforth. In 1803 Henry Clay was elected +to the State legislature; and before he was thirty years old he was +filling an unexpired term in the United States Senate. In 1811 he was +sent to the National House of Representatives from the old Lexington +district. He was immediately chosen Speaker of that body, a position +to which he was subsequently elected five times. This was the period +of his greatest speeches. His utterances upon American rights did much +to bring about the War of 1812. In 1814 Henry Clay went to Europe as a +peace commissioner, and the Treaty of Ghent was signed on December 24, +1814. He had resigned the Speakership in order to go to Ghent, but on +his return in 1815, he found himself reelected; and he presided as +Speaker until 1820, declining two diplomatic posts and two cabinet +offices in order to continue in the chair. In 1820 Henry Clay +advocated the Missouri Compromise, and a short time afterwards he +retired from public life to devote his attention to his private +affairs. He was, however, in 1823, again elected to the lower House of +Congress, and was again chosen Speaker, serving as such until 1825. In +1824 he announced himself as a candidate for president, but he was +defeated by John Quincy Adams, who made him his Secretary of State. +Andrew Jackson was elected president, in 1828, and Mr. Clay--to give +him the name he was always known by, regardless of the many positions +he held--once more retired from American politics. In 1831 the people +elected him United States Senator from Kentucky, and in that body he +fought Jackson's policies so strenuously that the Whig party was born, +with Mr. Clay as its legitimate parent. The Whigs nominated him as +their first candidate for president, but he was overwhelmingly +defeated by his old-time enemy, Andrew Jackson. He was the author of +the Compromise tariff of 1832-1833, which did much toward winning him +the sobriquet of the "Great Compromiser." Mr. Clay was reelected to +the Senate, in 1837; and two years later his great debates with John +C. Calhoun took place. Late in this year of 1839, the Whig political +bosses set him aside and nominated William Henry Harrison for +president and he was elected. In 1842 Henry Clay was retired to +private life for the third time, but two years later he was again the +candidate of the Whigs for president, and he was defeated by a +comparatively unknown man, James K. Polk of Tennessee--the only +Speaker of the House who has ever been elected president of the United +States. The year of 1849 found Henry Clay once more in the Senate, but +he was now old and very feeble. The great Compromise of 1850 sapped +his rapidly waning strength, though it greatly added to his fame as a +statesman. On June 29, 1852, Henry Clay died at Washington City, in +the seventy-sixth year of his age. His body was brought back to the +land he loved so well, and to which he had brought world-wide fame, +and was buried at Lexington, where a grateful people have erected a +cloud-tipped monument to his memory. He is one of the American +immortals, though it is not at all difficult to quarrel with many of +his public acts. He carried the name and fame of Kentucky into the +remotest corners of the universe, and it would be indeed surprising if +it were not possible to find flaws in a record that was as long as +his. His connection with the Graves-Cilley duel in 1838 appears +unpardonable at this time, but perhaps the whole truth regarding this +infamous affair has not yet been brought out. Considering the patent +fact that few orators can stand the printed page, and that the methods +by which Clay's addresses were preserved were crude and +unsatisfactory, many of the speeches are very readable even unto this +day. They undoubtedly prove, however, that the man behind them, and +not the manner or matter of them, was the thing that made Henry Clay +the most lovable character in American history. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. There are many biographies of Clay, and numerous + collections of his speeches. Carl Schurz's _Henry Clay_ (Boston, + 1887, two vols.), is the best account of the statesman; _Henry + Clay_, by Thomas H. Clay (Philadelphia, 1910), is adequate for + Clay the man; and Daniel Mallory's _Life and Speeches of the Hon. + Henry Clay_ (New York, 1844), is the finest collection of his + speeches made hitherto. + + +REPLY TO JOHN RANDOLPH[4] + +[From _The Life and Speeches of the Hon. Henry Clay_, edited by Daniel +Mallory (New York, 1844, v. i., 4th edition)] + +Sir, I am growing old. I have had some little measure of experience in +public life, and the result of that experience has brought me to this +conclusion, that when business, of whatever nature, is to be transacted +in a deliberative assembly, or in private life, courtesy, forebearance, +and moderation, are best calculated to bring it to a successful +conclusion. Sir, my age admonishes me to abstain from involving myself +in personal difficulties; would to God that I could say, I am also +restrained by higher motives. I certainly never sought any collision +with the gentleman from Virginia. My situation at this time is peculiar, +if it be nothing else, and might, I should think, dissuade, at least, a +generous heart from any wish to draw me into circumstances of personal +altercation. I have experienced this magnanimity from some quarters of +the house. But I regret, that from others it appears to have no such +consideration. The gentleman from Virginia was pleased to say, that in +one point at least he coincided with me--in an humble estimate of my +grammatical and philological acquirements, I know my deficiencies. I was +born to no proud patrimonial estate; from my father I inherited only +infancy, ignorance, and indigence. I feel my defects; but, so far as my +situation in early life is concerned, I may, without presumption, say +they are more my misfortune than my fault. But, however I regret my want +of ability to furnish to the gentleman a better specimen of powers of +verbal criticism, I will venture to say, it is not greater than the +disappointment of this committee as to the strength of his argument. + + +ADDRESS TO LA FAYETTE + +[From the same] + +General, + +The house of representatives of the United States, impelled alike by its +own feelings, and by those of the whole American people, could not have +assigned to me a more gratifying duty than that of presenting to you +cordial congratulations upon the occasion of your recent arrival in the +United States, in compliance with the wishes of Congress, and to assure +you of the very high satisfaction which your presence affords on this +early theatre of your glory and renown. Although but few of the members +who compose this body shared with you in the war of our revolution, all +have, from impartial history, or from faithful tradition, a knowledge of +the perils, the sufferings, and the sacrifices, which you voluntarily +encountered, and the signal services, in America and in Europe, which +you performed for an infant, a distant, and an alien people; and all +feel and own the very great extent of the obligations under which you +have placed our country. But the relations in which you have ever stood +to the United States, interesting and important as they have been, do +not constitute the only motive of the respect and admiration which the +house of representatives entertain for you. Your consistency of +character, your uniform devotion to regulated liberty, in all the +vicissitudes of a long and arduous life, also commands its admiration. +During all the recent convulsions of Europe, amidst, as after the +dispersion of, every political storm, the people of the United States +have beheld you, true to your old principles, firm and erect, cheering +and animating with your well-known voice, the votaries of liberty, its +faithful and fearless champion, ready to shed the last drop of that +blood which here you so freely and nobly spilt, in the same holy cause. + +The vain wish has been sometimes indulged, that Providence would allow +the patriot, after death, to return to his country, and to contemplate +the intermediate changes which had taken place; to view the forest +felled, the cities built, the mountains levelled, the canals cut, the +highways constructed, the progress of the arts, advancement of learning, +and the increase of population. General, your present visit to the +United States is a realization of the consoling object of that wish. You +are in the midst of posterity. Every where, you must have been struck +with the great changes, physical and moral, which have occurred since +you left us. Even this very city, bearing a venerated name, alike +endeared to you and to us, has since emerged from the forest which then +covered its site. In one respect you behold us unaltered, and this is in +the sentiment of continued devotion to liberty, and of ardent affection +and profound gratitude to your departed friend, the father of his +country, and to you, and to your illustrious associates in the field and +in the cabinet, for the multiplied blessings which surround us, and for +the very privilege of addressing you which I now exercise. This +sentiment, now fondly cherished by more than ten millions of people, +will be transmitted, with unabated vigor, down the tide of time, through +the countless millions who are destined to inhabit this continent, to +the latest posterity.[5] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[4] This reply to Randolph was made in the House of Representatives, +in 1824, in the course of the debate between Clay and Randolph. +"During the session of 1823-4, attempts wore made to run at Mr. Clay, +on account of his peculiar situation in being named for the presidency +while Speaker of the House of Representatives, and for his zealous +support of the American system. In a debate on an improvement bill he +encountered Mr. Randolph of Virginia, who had endeavored to provoke +him to reply," and the bit of the debate reproduced here is the answer +the gentleman from Virginia received for his pains. + +[5] After the above address, La Fayette rose, and in a tone influenced +by powerful feeling, made an eloquent reply. In 1824 La Fayette +visited the United States, as "the guest of the Nation," and he was +gladly welcomed in many parts of the country. And "on the tenth of +December, 1824, he was introduced in the House of Representatives by a +committee appointed for that purpose. The general, being conducted to +the sofa placed for his reception, the Speaker (Mr. Clay), addressed +him" in the very happy words given above. + + + + +JOHN J. AUDUBON + + +John James Audubon, the celebrated ornithologist, was born at +Mandeville, Louisiana, May 5, 1780. He was educated in France under +private tutors, but his consuming love of Nature and especially of +bird-life, was too strong to keep him in a beaten path of study, so +most of his time was spent in the woods and fields. When seventeen +years old Audubon returned to the United States to settle upon his +father's estate, "Mill Grove," near Philadelphia. There he devoted his +entire time to hunting, fishing, drawing, and music. Some months later +he met and fell in love with his nearest neighbor, Lucy Bakewell, a +young English girl. "Too young and too useless to be married," as he +himself afterwards wrote, his about-to-be father-in-law, William +Bakewell, advised Audubon to become a New York business man. With his +friend, Ferdinand Rozier, whom he had met in France, and who was then +connected with a French firm in Philadelphia, he visited Kentucky, +late in 1806, "thought well of it, and liked it exceedingly." But his +great love of Nature was not to be denied, and his business suffered +accordingly. On April 8, 1808, Audubon was married to Miss Bakewell, +and the next morning left for Pittsburgh, where he and his bride, +accompanied by Rozier, floated down the Ohio river in a flatboat, +which was their bridal tour, with Louisville, Kentucky, as their +destination. Upon reaching Louisville Audubon and Rozier opened a +large store which prospered when Audubon attended to it; "but birds +were birds then as now, and my thoughts were ever and anon turning +toward them as the objects of my greatest delight." His first child, +Victor, was born at Louisville, in 1809. Rozier conducted the store, +and Audubon spent his days in "the darling forests." In 1810 Alexander +Wilson, the Scotch ornithologist and poet, called upon Audubon at his +store in Louisville hoping to obtain his subscription to his work +upon American birds, but Audubon showed him birds he had never seen +before, which seemingly angered the Scot as he afterwards wrote +slightingly of the Kentucky naturalist. Late in 1810 Audubon and +Rozier removed their stock of goods to Henderson, Kentucky, where +their trade was so poor that Rozier was left behind the counter, while +Audubon was compelled to fish and hunt for food. A short time after +their arrival in Henderson, the two partners decided to move to St. +Genevieve on the Mississippi river, but Audubon disliked the +community, sold out to Rozier, and returned to his home in Henderson. +His second son, John Woodhouse, was born at Henderson, in 1812. Two +daughters were also born at Henderson, the first of whom, Lucy, died +in infancy and was buried in her father's garden. His pecuniary +affairs were now greatly reduced, but he continued to draw birds and +quadrupeds. He disposed of Mill Grove and opened a small store in +Henderson, which prospered and put him on his feet again. Audubon was +doing so finely in business now that he purchased a small farm and was +adding to it from time to time. His brother-in-law, Thomas Bakewell, +arrived at Henderson about 1816, and finally persuaded Audubon to +erect a steam-mill on his property at a great expense. For a time this +mill did all the sawing for the country, but in the end it ruined +Audubon and his partners. He left Henderson in 1819, after having +resided in the town for nearly ten years, and set up as a portrait +painter in Louisville, where he was very successful. From Louisville +Audubon went to Cincinnati and from there to New Orleans. In October, +1823, he again settled at Louisville as a painter of "birds, +landscapes, portraits, and even signs." His wife was the only person +in the world who had any faith in his ultimate "arrival" as a famous +naturalist, and the outlook was indeed dark. Audubon quitted +Louisville in March, 1824, and two years later he went to England, +where the first public exhibition of his drawings was held. His first +and most famous work, _Birds of America_, was published at London from +1827 to 1838, issued in numbers, each containing five plates, without +text, the complete work consisting of four folio volumes. Audubon +returned to America in 1829, and he was with his sons at Louisville +for a short time, both of whom were engaged in business there. He went +to New Orleans to see his wife, and together they came to Louisville, +in 1830, to bid the "Kentucky lads," as he called them, goodbye, +before sailing for England. At "the fair Edinburgh," in the fall of +1830, Audubon began the _Ornithological Biographies_ (Edinburgh, +1831-39, 5 vols.), the text to the plates of the _Birds_. In 1840-44 +the work was republished in seven volumes, text and plates together, +as _Birds of America_. In 1831 Audubon and his wife returned to +America, and they were again in Louisville with the boys for some +time. In 1833 his famous trip to Labrador was taken, and the following +year found the family in England. The next ten years were passed in +wandering from country to country in search of birds, but, in 1842, +Audubon purchased "Minniesland," now Audubon Park, New York. With his +sons and the Rev. John Bachman he planned the _Quadrupeds of America_, +the last volume of which was issued after his death, which occurred at +"Minniesland" on January 27, 1851. His wife, who wrote his life, +survived him many years, dying at Shelbyville, Kentucky, June 19, +1874, but she is buried by his side on the banks of the Hudson. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life of John James Audubon_, edited by his Widow + (New York, 1869); _Audubon and His Journals_, edited by Maria R. + Audubon (New York, 1900); _John James Audubon_, by John Burroughs + (Boston, 1902). + + +INDIAN SUMMER ON THE OHIO IN 1810[6] + + [From _Audubon and His Journals_, edited by Maria R. Audubon (New + York, 1900, v. ii)] + +When my wife, my eldest son (then an infant), and myself were returning +from Pennsylvania to Kentucky, we found it expedient, the waters being +unusually low, to provide ourselves with a _skiff_, to enable us to +proceed to our abode at Henderson. I purchased a large, commodious, and +light boat of that denomination. We procured a mattress, and our friends +furnished us with ready prepared viands. We had two stout negro rowers, +and in this trim we left the village of Shippingport [now within the +corporate limits of Louisville], in expectation of reaching the place of +our destination in a very few days. + +It was in the month of October. The autumnal tints already decorated the +shores of that queen of rivers, the Ohio. Every tree was hung with long +and flowing festoons of different species of vines, many loaded with +clustered fruits of varied brilliancy, their rich bronzed carmine +mingling beautifully with the yellow foliage which now predominated over +the yet green leaves, reflecting more lively tints from the clear stream +than ever landscape painter portrayed, or poet imagined. The days were +yet warm. The sun had assumed the rich and glowing hue which at that +season produces the singular phenomenon called there the "Indian +Summer." The moon had rather passed the meridian of her grandeur. We +glided down the river, meeting no other ripple of the water than that +formed by the propulsion of our boat. Leisurely we moved along, gazing +all day on the grandeur and beauty of the wild scenery around us. + +Now and then a large catfish rose to the surface of the water, in +pursuit of a shoal of fry, which, starting simultaneously from the +liquid element like so many silver arrows, produced a shower of light, +while the pursuer with open jaws seized the stragglers, and, with a +splash of his tail, disappeared from our view. Other fishes we heard, +uttering beneath our bark a rumbling noise, the strange sound of which +we discovered to proceed from the white perch, for on casting our net +from the bow, we caught several of that species, when the noise ceased +for a time. + +Nature, in her varied arrangements, seems to have felt a partiality +towards this portion of our country. As the traveler ascends or +descends the Ohio, he cannot help remarking that alternately, nearly +the whole length of the river, the margin, on one side, is bounded by +lofty hills and a rolling surface, while on the other, extensive +plains of the richest alluvial land are seen as far as the eye can +command the view. Islands of varied size and form rise here and there +from the bosom of the water, and the winding course of the stream +frequently brings you to places where the idea of being on a river of +great length changes to that of floating on a lake of moderate extent. +Some of these islands are of considerable size and value; while +others, small and insignificant, seem as if intended for contrast, and +as serving to enhance the general interest of the scenery. These +little islands are frequently overflowed during great freshets or +floods, and receive at their heads prodigious heaps of drifted timber. +We foresaw with great concern the alterations that cultivation would +soon produce along those delightful banks. + +As night came, sinking in darkness the broader portions of the river, +our minds became affected by strong emotions, and wandered far beyond +the present moments. The tinkling of bells told us that the cattle +which bore them were gently roving from valley to valley in search of +food, or returning to their distant homes. The hooting of the Great +Owl, or the muffled noise of its wings, as it sailed smoothly over the +stream, were matters of interest to us; so was the sound of the +boatman's horn, as it came winding more and more softly from afar. +When daylight returned, many songsters burst forth with echoing notes, +more and more mellow to the listening ear. Here and there the lonely +cabin of a squatter struck the eye, giving note of commencing +civilization. The crossing of the stream by a Deer foretold how soon +the hills would be covered with snow. + +Many sluggish flatboats we overtook and passed; some laden with +produce from the different head-waters of the small rivers that pour +their tributary streams into the Ohio; others, of less dimensions, +crowded with emigrants from distant parts, in search of a new home. +Purer pleasures I never felt; nor have you, reader, I ween, unless +indeed you have felt the like, and in such company. + +The margins of the shores and of the river were, at this season amply +supplied with game. A Wild Turkey, a Grouse, or a Blue-winged Teal, +could be procured in a few moments; and we fared well, for, whenever +we pleased we landed, struck up a fire, and provided as we were with +the necessary utensils, procured a good repast. + +Several of these happy days passed, and we neared our home, when, one +evening, not far from Pigeon Creek (a small stream which runs into the +Ohio from the State of Indiana), a loud and strange noise was heard, +so like the yells of Indian warfare, that we pulled at our oars, and +made for the opposite side as fast and as quietly as possible. The +sounds increased, we imagined we heard cries of "murder;" and as we +knew that some depredations had lately been committed in the country +by dissatisfied parties of aborigines, we felt for a while extremely +uncomfortable. Ere long, however, our minds became more calmed, and we +plainly discovered that the singular uproar was produced by an +enthusiastic set of Methodists, who had wandered thus far out of the +common way for the purpose of holding one of their annual +camp-meetings, under the shade of a beech forest. Without meeting with +any other interruption, we reached Henderson, distant from +Shippingport, by water, about two hundred miles. + +When I think of these times, and call back to my mind the grandeur and +beauty of those almost uninhabited shores; when I picture to myself +the dense and lofty summits of the forests, that everywhere spread +along the hills and overhung the margins of the stream, unmolested by +the axe of the settler; when I know how dearly purchased the safe +navigation of that river has been, by the blood of many worthy +Virginians; when I see that no longer any aborigines are to be found +there, and that the vast herds of Elk, Deer, and Buffaloes which once +pastured on these hills, and in these valleys, making for themselves +great roads to the several salt-springs, have ceased to exist; when I +reflect that all this grand portion of our Union, instead of being in +a state of nature, is now more or less covered with villages, farms, +and towns, where the din of hammers and machinery is constantly +heard; that the woods are fast disappearing under the axe by day, and +the fire by night; that hundreds of steamboats are gliding to and fro, +over the whole length of the majestic river, forcing commerce to take +root and to prosper at every spot; when I see the surplus population +of Europe coming to assist in the destruction of the forest, and +transplanting civilization into its darkest recesses; when I remember +that these extraordinary changes have all taken place in the short +period of twenty years, I pause, wonder, and although I know all to be +a fact, can scarcely believe its reality. + +Whether these changes are for the better or for the worse, I shall not +pretend to say; but in whatever way my conclusions may incline, I feel +with regret that there are on record no satisfactory accounts of the +state of that portion of the country, from the time when our people +first settled in it. This has not been because no one in America is +able to accomplish such an undertaking. Our Irvings and our Coopers +have proved themselves fully competent for the task. It has more +probably been because the changes have succeeded each other with such +rapidity as almost to rival the movements of their pens. However, it +is not too late yet; and I sincerely hope that either or both of them +will ere long furnish the generations to come with those delightful +descriptions which they are so well qualified to give, of the original +state of a country that has been rapidly forced to change her form and +attire under the influence of increasing population. Yes, I hope to +read, ere I close my earthly career, accounts from those delightful +writers of the progress of civilization in our Western Country. They +will speak of the Clarks, the Croghans, the Boones, and many other men +of great and daring enterprise. They will analyze, as it were, into +each component part the country as it once existed, and will render +the picture, as it ought to be, immortal. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[6] Copyright, 1897, by Charles Scribner's Sons. + + + + +HORACE HOLLEY + + +Horace Holley, old Transylvania University's celebrated president, was +born at Salisbury, Connecticut, February 13, 1781, the son of Luther +Holley, a wealthy merchant. He was fitted at Williams College for Yale, +from which institution he was graduated in 1803. Holley studied law in +New York for awhile, but soon relinquished it for theology, which he +returned to Yale to pursue. In 1805 he was appointed to his first +pastorate. Going to Boston in 1809, as pastor of the Hollis Street +Unitarian church, he at once made a great reputation for himself as an +eloquent pulpit orator. Holley was at Hollis Street for nine years, +during which time he was a member of the Board of Overseers of Harvard +University, as well as a member of several civic boards. He was elected +president of Transylvania University, of Lexington, in 1817, and he +journeyed to Kentucky in the following spring, where he went carefully +over the ground and finally decided to accept the position. He entered +almost at once upon the most difficult task of converting a grammar +school into a great university. Success soon crowned his efforts, +however, and Transylvania took her place by the side of Harvard, Yale, +and Princeton, as one of the higher seats of learning in the United +States. In at least one year under the Holley regime, Transylvania had +the largest student body in this country. The institution was as well +known in New York or London, among scholars, as it was in the West. +Several of the professors were men of national reputation, and the +students came from all parts of the United States. Never before in the +South or West has a seat of learning had higher hopes for the future, or +greater success or reputation than had Transylvania under Horace Holley. +Then the Kentucky Presbyterians and others launched Dame Rumor, +freighted with falsehoods and misrepresentations galore. The president +was charged with every crime in the calendar: he was an atheist, an +agnostic, a blasphemer, a wine-bibber, and all that was evil. The whole +truth was this: he was a Unitarian, holding the Christ to be the +greatest personality in history, but denying him as the very Son of God. +This his prejudiced, ill-advised enemies were unable to understand. +Driven to desperation by the bitter crusade that was being waged against +him, Holley resigned, in March, 1827, after nine years of great success +as head of the University, which after his departure, fell away to +almost nothing. He went from Kentucky to Louisiana, where he endeavored +to re-organize the College of New Orleans, and in which work he wore +himself out. Late in the summer he and his wife took passage for New +York, but he contracted yellow-fever, and, on July 31, 1827, he died. +His body was consigned to the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, but his fame +is secure as an American educator of distinguished ability. The finest +bit of prose he ever wrote, perhaps, is contained in one of his Kentucky +letters to his wife in Boston, written while he was in Lexington looking +over the lay of the land, which, as subsequent events proved, he utterly +failed to anticipate in its most dangerous and damning aspect. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _A Discourse on the Genius and Character of the Rev. + Horace Holley, LL. D._, by Charles Caldwell, M. D. (Boston, 1828); + _More Colonial Homesteads_, by Marion Harland (New York, 1899); + _Lore of the Meadowland_, by J. W. Townsend (Lexington, Kentucky, + 1911). + + +MR. CLAY AND COLONEL MEADE + + [From _A Discourse on the Genius and Character of the Rev. Horace + Holley, LL. D._, by Charles Caldwell, M. D. (Boston, 1828)] + + Lexington, May 27th, 1818. + +I wrote a hasty letter to you on the night of my arrival. I shall now +he able to speak a little more in detail. + +The town and the vicinity are very handsome. The streets are broad, +straight, paved, clean, and have rows of trees on each side. The +houses are of brick almost universally, many of them in the midst of +fields, and have a very rural and charming appearance. The taste is +for low houses, generally two, sometimes even but one story high, like +English cottages. This taste gives an effect that eyes accustomed to +the high buildings of an Atlantic city, where there is but little +room, are not at first pleased with. But it is a taste adapted to the +circumstances, and to me is not unpleasant. + +I have taken lodgings at the principal hotel of the place, where I have +a drawing-room to receive calls, which were yesterday until dinner +almost innumerable.... In the afternoon I walked about town with Mr. +Clay, and called at a few charming houses. I visited also the Athenaeum, +an institution not yet furnished with many books, but well supplied with +newspapers, and the best periodicals. I find everything of this sort, +which is valuable, from Boston and the other Atlantic cities. + +This morning I breakfasted at Mr. Clay's, who lives a mile and a half +from town. He arrived here only three days before me. Ashland is a +very pleasant place, handsomer than I anticipated. The grounds are +beautiful, the lawns and walks extensive, the shrubbery luxuriant, and +the garden well supplied. The native forest of ash in the rear adds a +charming effect to the whole. After breakfast Mr. Clay rode in with +me, and we went with the trustees, by appointment, to the college, to +visit the professors and students. They were all collected in the +largest hall to receive us. I made a short address, which was received +in a kind manner. I was then conducted to the library, the apparatus, +and the recitation rooms. The library is small, and the apparatus +smaller. There is no regular division of students into classes as in +other colleges, and but few laws. Everything is to be done, and so +much the better, as nothing is to be reformed. Almost the whole is +proposed to be left to me to arrange. I am now making all necessary +inquiries, and a meeting of the trustees is to be called next week. + +After this visit, I went with a party of ladies and gentlemen, nine +miles into the country to the seat of Colonel [David] Meade [1744-1838] +where we dined and passed the day. This gentleman, who is near seventy, +is a Virginian of the old school. He has been a good deal in England, +in his youth, and brought home with him English notions of a country +seat, though he is a great republican in politics. He and his wife dress +in the costume of the olden time. He has the square coat and great +cuffs, the vest of the court, short breeches, and white stockings, at +all times. Mrs. Meade has the long waist, the white apron, the stays, +the ruffles about the elbows, and the cap of half a century ago. She is +very mild and ladylike, and though between sixty and seventy, plays upon +the piano-forte with the facility and cheerfulness of a young lady. Her +husband resembles Colonel Pickering in the face, and the shape of the +head. He is entirely a man of leisure, never having followed any +business, and never using his fortune but in adorning his place and +entertaining his friends and strangers. No word is ever sent to him that +company is coming. To do so offends him. But a dinner--he dines at the +hour of four--is always ready for visitors; and servants are always in +waiting. Twenty of us went out today, without warning, and were +entertained luxuriously on the viands of the country. Our drink +consisted of beer, toddy, and water. Wine, being imported and expensive, +he never gives; nor does he allow cigars to be smoked in his presence. +His house consists of a cluster of rustic cottages, in front of which +spreads a beautiful, sloping lawn, as smooth as velvet. From this +diverge, in various direction, and forming vistas terminated by +picturesque objects, groves and walks extending over some acres. Seats, +Chinese temples, verdant banks, and alcoves are interspersed at +convenient distances. The lake, over which presides a Grecian temple, +that you may imagine to be the residence of the water nymphs, has in it +a small island, which communicates with the shore by a white bridge of +one arch. The whole is surrounded by a low rustic fence of stone, +surmounted and almost hidden by honey-suckle and roses, now in full +flower, and which we gathered in abundance to adorn the ladies. +Everything is laid out for walking and pleasure. His farm he rents, and +does nothing for profit. The whole is in rustic taste. You enter from +the road, through a gate between rude and massive columns, a field +without pretension, wind a considerable distance through a noble park to +an inner gate, the capitals to whose pillars are unique, being formed of +the roots of trees, carved by nature. Then the rich scene of +cultivation, of verdure and flower-capped hedges, bursts upon you. There +is no establishment like this in our country. Instead of a description, +I might have given you its name, "_Chaumiere du Prairies_." + + + + +CONSTANTINE S. RAFINESQUE + + +Constantine Samuel Rafinesque, the learned, eccentric scientist of +Kentucky and the West, was born near Constantinople, Turkey, October +22, 1783. He was of French-German descent. His boyhood years were +spent in Italy and in traveling on the Continent. Rafinesque came to +America in 1802, and he remained in this country but three years, when +he returned to Italy; and there the subsequent ten years of his life +were passed. In 1809 he married, after a fashion, a Sicilian woman, +Josephine Vaccaro, who bore him two children. Rafinesque returned to +America in 1815, and a short time after his arrival, he met his former +friend, John D. Clifford, of Philadelphia and Lexington--twin-towns in +those days--"the only man he ever loved," who persuaded him to come +out to Kentucky. At Henderson, Kentucky, Rafinesque met the great +Audubon, who took him under his roof, and who told him many amusing +tales of the fishes of the Ohio--which the little scientist believed, +as coming from a famous man--and which caused him no end of trouble +and work in after years. Audubon ridiculed him to his face, which the +simple-minded man could not understand; and in his _Journals_ the +ornithologist has much fun at his guest's expense. That he treated him +very badly, no one can deny. Through Clifford's influence, probably, +Rafinesque was appointed, in 1819, to the chair of natural science and +modern languages in Transylvania University. This was during the +presidency of Horace Holley, when the old University was at the +high-tide of its history, but the diminutive scientist, though +heralded as "the most learned man in America," was not received as +such in the Blue Grass region of Kentucky an hundred years ago. From +the president down to the children of the little city he was looked +upon as an impossible creature. Seven of the best years of his life +were spent in the service of the University and of the town. His +boldest dream for the town was a Botanical Garden, modeled upon the +gardens of France, and though he did actually make a splendid start +toward this ideal, in the end all his plans came to nothing. In June, +1825, Rafinesque left Lexington, never to return. He went to +Philadelphia, where the remaining fifteen years of his life were +spent. Death discovered the little fellow among his books, plants, and +poverty, September 18, 1840, in a miserable, rat-ridden garret on Race +street, Philadelphia. Rafinesque's publications reach the surprising +number of 447, consisting of books, pamphlets, magazine articles, +translations, and reprints. His most important works are _Ichthyologia +Ohiensis, or Natural History of the Fishes Inhabiting the River Ohio +and its Tributary Streams_ (Lexington, 1820), a reprint of which his +biographer, Dr. Call, has published (Cleveland, 1899); and his +_Ancient Annals of Kentucky_, which Humphrey Marshall printed as an +introduction to his _History of Kentucky_ (Frankfort, 1824). The +oversheets of this were made into a pamphlet of thirty-nine pages. The +little work considers the antiquities of the State, and is the +starting point for all latter-day writers upon "the prehistoric men of +Kentucky." Imagination and fact run riotously together, yet the work +has been correctly characterized as "the most remarkable history of +Kentucky that was ever written, or ever will be." + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _A Kentucky Cardinal_, by James Lane Allen (New + York, 1894); _Life and Writings of Rafinesque_, by Richard E. + Call (Louisville, Kentucky, 1895); _Rafinesque: A Sketch of his + Life_, by T. J. Fitzpatrick (Des Moines, Iowa, 1911). + + +GEOLOGICAL ANNALS OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF NATURE IN KENTUCKY + + [From _Ancient Annals of Kentucky_ (Frankfort, Kentucky, 1824)] + +1. Every complete history of a country ought to include an account of +the physical changes and revolutions, which it may have undergone. + +2. The documents for such geological survey, are to be found +everywhere in the bowels of the earth, its rocks and strata, with the +remains of organized bodies imbedded therein, which are now considered +as the medals of nature. + +3. The soil of Kentucky shows, like many other countries, that it has +once been the bed of the sea. In James's Map, the primitive ocean is +supposed to have covered North America, by having a former level of +6000 feet above the actual level. Since the highest lands in Kentucky +do not exceed 1800 feet above the level of the actual ocean, they were +once covered with at least 4200 feet of water. + +4. The study of the soil of Kentucky, proves evidently the successive +and gradual retreat of the salt waters, without evincing any proofs of +any very violent or sudden disruptions or emersions of land, nor +eruptions of the ocean, except some casual accidents, easily ascribed +to earthquakes, salses and submarine volcanoes. + +5. There are no remains of land or burning volcanoes in Kentucky, nor +of any considerable fresh water lake. All the strata are nearly +horizontal, with valleys excavated by the tides and streams during the +soft state of the strata. + +6. After these preliminary observations, I shall detail the successive +evolution of this soil and its productions, under six distinct periods +of time, which may be compared to the six epochs or days of creation, +and supposed to have lasted an indefinite number of ages. + + + + +MANN BUTLER + + +Mann Butler, the first Kentucky historian who worked with +comparatively modern methods, eliminating personal prejudices and +imagination, was born at Baltimore, July, 1784. At the age of three +years he was taken to the home of his grandfather in Chelsea, England. +Mann Butler returned to the United States, in 1798, and entered St. +Mary's College, Georgetown, D. C., from which institution he was +afterwards graduated in the arts, medicine, and law. His tastes were +decidedly literary, and he preferred law to medicine as being, +perhaps, more in line with literature. He emigrated to Kentucky, +locating at Lexington, in 1806, for the practice of law. He later +abandoned law for pedagogy, opening an academy at Versailles, +Kentucky. Some years later he taught in Maysville and Frankfort, and +was then called to a professorship in Transylvania University, +Lexington, where he remained for several years. In 1831 Butler removed +to Louisville, where he was engaged in teaching for fifteen years. His +_History of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1834; Cincinnati, 1836) was, after +Filson's florid sentences, Rafinesque's imagination, and Marshall's +prejudices and castigations, most welcome and timely. He was +microscopic in finding facts, fair, having no enemies to punish, an +excellent chronicler, in short, and doing a work that was much needed. +The Kentucky legislature took a keen interest in his history, +rendering him great assistance. Butler's _Appeal from the +Misrepresentations of James Hall, Respecting the History of Kentucky +and the West_ (Frankfort, 1837), was a just criticism of the +Cincinnati writer's _Sketches of History in the West_ (Philadelphia, +1835), a work in which fact and fiction are well-nigh inseparable. +Mann Butler spent the last seven years of his life in St. Louis, +teaching and in preparing a history of the Ohio valley, which he left +in manuscript, but which, together with his library, was afterwards +destroyed by Federal soldiers during the Civil War. He was killed in +Missouri, in 1852, while a passenger on a Pacific train which was +wrecked by the falling of a bridge spanning the Gasconade river. Mann +Butler had many of the qualities required in a great historian, and +the work he did has lived well and will live longer. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + 1882); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New York, + 1887, v. i). + + +PIONEER VISITORS + + [From _A History of the Commonwealth of Kentucky_ (Louisville, + Kentucky, 1834)] + +During this same year [1769], a party of about forty stout hunters, +"from New River, Holstein and Clinch" united in a hunting expedition +west of the Cumberland Mountains. + +Nine of this party, led on by Col. James Knox, reached Kentucky; and, +from the time they were absent from home, they "obtained the name of +the _Long Hunters_." This expedition reached "the country south of the +Kentucky river," and became acquainted with Green river, and the lower +part of the Cumberland. + +In addition to these parties, so naturally stimulated by the ardent +curiosity incident to early and comparatively, idle society, the +claimants of military bounty lands which had been obtained from the +British crown, for services against the French, furnished a new and keen +band of western explorers. Their land warrants were surveyed on the +Kenhawa and the Ohio; though most positively against the very letter of +the royal proclamation of '63. But at this distance from the royal +court, it was nothing new in the history of government that edicts +emanating, even from the king in council, should be but imperfectly +regarded. However, this may be, land warrants were actually surveyed on +the Kenhawa as early as 1772, and in 1773, several surveyors were +deputied to lay out bounty lands on the Ohio river. + +Amongst others Thomas Bullitt, uncle to the late Alexander Scott +Bullitt, first lieutenant governor of Kentucky; and Hancock Taylor, +engaged in this adventurous work. These gentlemen with their company +were overtaken on the 28th of May, 1773, by the McAfees, whose exertions +will hereafter occupy a conspicuous station in this narrative. + +On the 29th, the party in one boat and four canoes, reached the Ohio +river, and elected Bullitt their captain. + +There is a romantic incident connected with this gentleman's descent of +the Ohio, evincing singular intrepidity and presence of mind; it is +taken from his journal, as Mr. [Humphrey] Marshall says, and the author +has found it substantially confirmed by the McAfee papers. While on his +voyage, he left his boat and went alone through the woods to the Indian +town of Old Chillicothe, on the Scioto. He arrived in the midst of the +town undiscovered by the Indians, until he was waving his white flag as +a token of peace. He was immediately asked what news? Was he from the +Long Knife? And why, if he was a peace-messenger, he had not sent a +runner? Bullitt, undauntedly replied, that he had no bad news; was from +the Long Knife, and as the red men and the whites were at peace, he had +come among his brothers to have friendly talk with them, about living on +the other side of the Ohio; that he had no runner swifter than himself; +and, that he was in haste and could not wait the return of a runner. +"Would you," said he, "if you were very hungry, and had killed a deer, +send your squaw to town to tell the news, and wait her return before you +eat?" This simple address to their own feelings, soon put the Indians in +good humor, and at his desire a council was assembled to hear his talk +the next day. Captain Bullitt then made strong assurances of friendship +on the part of the whites and acknowledged that these "Shawanees and +Delawares, our nearest neighbors," "did not get any of the money or +blankets given for the land, which I and my people are going to settle. +But it is agreed by the great men, who own the land, that they will make +a present to both the Delawares and the Shawanees, the next year; and +the year following, that shall be as good." On the ensuing day, +agreeably to the very deliberate manner of the Indians in council, +Captain Bullitt was informed, that "he seemed kind and friendly, and +that it pleased them well." That as "to settling the country on the +other side of the Ohio with your people, we are particularly pleased +that they are not to _disturb_ us in our hunting. For we must hunt, to +kill meat for our women and children, and to get something to buy our +powder and lead with, and to get us blankets and clothing." In these +talks, there seems a strange want of the usual sagacity of the Indians +as to the consequences of white men settling on their hunting grounds; +so contrary to their melancholy experience for a century and a half +previous; yet, the narrative is unimpeachable. On the part of Bullitt, +too, the admission of _no compensation_ to the Delawares and Shawanees, +appears to be irreconcilable with the treaty at Fort Stanwix with the +master tribes of the confederacy, the Six Nations. However, this may be, +the parties separated in perfect harmony, and Captain Bullitt proceeded +to the Falls. Here he pitched his camp above the mouth of Bear-grass +creek, retiring of a night to the upper point of the shoal above _Corn +Island_, opposite to the present city of Louisville. It was this +gentleman, who, according to the testimony of Jacob Sodowsky, a +respectable farmer, late of Jessamine county, in this State, first laid +off the town of Louisville, in August, 1773. He likewise surveyed +Bullitt's Lick in the adjoining county, of the same name. + + + + +ZACHARY TAYLOR + + +Zachary Taylor, twelfth president of the United States, was a Kentuckian +save for his accidental birth near Orange, Virginia, September 24, 1784. +His father, Richard Taylor, had been planning for many years to remove +to Kentucky, but his vacillation gave Virginia another president. When +but nine months old Zachary Taylor was brought to Kentucky, the family +settling near Louisville. He "grew up to manhood with the yell of the +savage and the crack of the rifle almost constantly ringing in his +ears." The first twenty-four years of his life were passed wholly in +Kentucky amid all the dangers of the Western wilderness. He was +fighting Indians almost before he could hold a rifle at arm's length, +and in such an environment his education was, of course, very limited. +Taylor entered the army, in 1808, serving in the War of 1812, in Black +Hawk's war of 1832, and against the Seminole Indians (1836-1837). In +1837 he was brevetted brigadier-general. In 1838 General Taylor was +placed in command of the military stations in Florida; and in 1845 he +took command of the army on the Texas border. The next five years of +General Taylor's life is the history of the Mexican War. At Palo Alto, +Monterey, and at Buena Vista, on February 22-23, 1847, where he crushed +Santa Anna, he was the absolute man of the hour, the hero of the +country. On the strength of his military renown, General Taylor was +elected as the Whig candidate for president of the United States, in +1848, defeating General Lewis Cass of Michigan, and former president, +Martin Van Buren, of New York. He was inaugurated in March, 1849, but he +died at the White House, Washington, July 9, 1850. The country was torn +asunder with many important questions during Taylor's administration, +which, though brief, was a stormy one. His remains were interred at his +old home near Louisville--the only president ever buried in this +State--and a ruined monument marks the grave at this time. In 1908 a +volume of his _Letters from the Battlefields of the Mexican War_ +appeared. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Some Notable Families of America_, by Annah + Robinson Watson; _The War with Mexico_, by H. O. Ladd (New York, + 1835); _General Taylor_, by O. O. Howard (New York, 1892). + + +A LETTER TO HENRY CLAY + + [From _The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay_, edited by Calvin + Colton (New York, 1855)] + + Baton Rouge, La., December 28, 1847. + +My dear Sir,--Your kind and acceptable letter of the 13th instant, +congratulating me on my safe return to the United States, and for the +complimentary and flattering terms you have been pleased to notice my +services, I beg leave to tender you my sincere thanks. + +The warm and hearty reception I have met with from so many of my +fellow-citizens, where I have mingled among them since my return, in +addition to their manifestations of their high appreciation and +approval of my conduct while in Mexico, has been truly gratifying, and +has ten-fold more than compensated me for the dangers and toils +encountered in the public service, as well as for the privations in +being so long separated from my family and friends; yet there are +circumstances connected with my operations in that country which I can +never forget, and which I must always think of with feelings of the +deepest sorrow and regret. + +I left Mexico after it was determined the column under my orders was +to act on the defensive, and after the capital of the enemy had fallen +into our hands, and their army dispersed, on a short leave of absence, +to visit my family, and to attend to some important private affairs, +which could not well be arranged without my being present, and which +had been too long neglected. After reaching New Orleans, I informed +the Secretary of War that should my presence in Mexico be deemed +necessary at any time, I was ready to return, and that a communication +on that or any other subject connected with my public duties would +reach me if addressed to this place. I therefore feel bound to remain +here, or in the vicinity, until the proper authorities at Washington +determine what disposition is to be made of or with me. Under this +state of things I do not expect to have it in my power to visit +Kentucky, although it would afford me much real pleasure to mix once +more with my numerous relatives and friends in that patriotic State, +to whom I am devotedly attached; as well as again to visit, if not the +place of my nativity, where I was reared from infancy to early +manhood. And let me assure you I duly appreciate your kind invitation +to visit you at your own hospitable home, and should anything occur +which will enable me to avail myself of it, I will embrace the +opportunity with much real pleasure. + +I regret to say, I found my family, or rather Mrs. Taylor, on my +return, in feeble health, as well as my affairs in any other than a +prosperous condition; the latter was, however, to be expected, and I +must devote what time I can spare, or can be spared from my public +duties, in putting them in order as far as I can do so. + +Should circumstances so turn out as will induce you to visit Washington +the present winter, I trust you will take every precaution to protect +yourself while traveling from the effects of the severe cold weather you +must necessarily encounter in crossing the mountains, particularly so +after having passed several of the last winters in the South. + +The letter which you did me the honor to address to me, referred to, +reached me on the eve of my leaving Monterey to return to the United +States, and was at once replied to, which reply I flatter myself +reached you shortly after writing your last communication; in which I +stated, although I had received some letters from individuals in +Kentucky, calculated, or perhaps intended, to produce unkind feelings +on my part toward you, even admitting such was the case, their object +has not been accomplished in the slightest degree, and I hope it will +never be the case. + +Please present me mostly kindly to your excellent lady, and wishing +you and yours continued health and prosperity, I remain, with respect +and esteem, etc. + + + + +DANIEL DRAKE + + +Daniel Drake, "the Franklin of the West," was born at Plainfield, New +Jersey, October 20, 1785. When he was but three years old, his family +removed to Mayslick, Mason county, Kentucky, where they dwelt in a log +cabin for some time. When he was sixteen years of age, Drake went to +Cincinnati to study medicine, the city's first medical student. He +later attended lectures at the medical school of the University of +Pennsylvania. On his return to Kentucky, Dr. Drake practiced his +profession near his home at Mayslick, Kentucky, but he shortly +afterwards went to Cincinnati, where he became a distinguished +physician and author. In 1816 he was appointed professor of materia +medica and botany in the medical school of Transylvania University, +and he held this chair for one year. He returned to Transylvania, in +1823, and this time he remained for four years. In 1835 Dr. Drake +organized the medical department of Cincinnati College. Four years +later he went to Louisville to accept the chair of clinical medicine +and pathological anatomy in the University of Louisville, which he +occupied for ten years. He returned to Cincinnati two years before his +death, which occurred there, November 6, 1852. Dr. Drake's +publications include _Topography, Climate, and Diseases of Cincinnati_ +(1810); _Picture of Cincinnati_ (Cincinnati, 1815); _Practical Essays +on Medical Education_ (1832); _Systematic Treatise on the Principal +Diseases of the Interior Valley of North America_ (Philadelphia, 1850; +1852), a work which was characterized by Judge James Hall of +Cincinnati as "the most important and valuable work ever written in +the United States. The subject is large. The work could not be +compiled. The subject was new, and the materials were to be collected +from original sources, from observation, personal inspection, oral +evidence, etc. It occupied many years; and was, probably, in +contemplation during the whole or most part of Dr. Drake's long +professional life." To-day Dr. Drake's most popular work is _Pioneer +Life in Kentucky_, a series of reminiscential letters addressed to his +children, concerning early times in Kentucky. It was issued by Robert +Clarke, the Cincinnati publisher in his well-known Ohio Valley +Historical Series. This is a charming volume and it has been much +quoted and praised by Western writers. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. ii); _Beginnings of Literary Culture in the Ohio + Valley_, by W. H. Venable (Cincinnati, 1891); Allibone's + _Dictionary of Authors_ (Philadelphia, 1897). + + +MAYSLICK, KENTUCKY, IN 1800 + + [From _Pioneer Life in Kentucky_ (Cincinnati, 1870)] + +Mayslick, although scarcely a village, was at once an emporium and +capital for a tract of country six or eight miles in diameter, and +embracing several hundred families, of which those in father's +neighborhood were tolerably fair specimens. Uncle Abraham Drake kept a +store, and Shotwell and Morris kept taverns; besides them there were a +few poor mechanics. Uncle Cornelius Drake was a farmer merely, and +lived a little out of the center of the station; the great men of +which were the three I have just named. With this limited population, +it seems, even down to this time, wonderful to me that such gatherings +and such scenes should have been transacted there. They commenced +within five years after its settlement, and increasing with the +progress of surrounding population, continued in full vigor long after +I left home for Cincinnati. It was the place for holding regimental +militia musters, when all the boys and old men of the surrounding +country, not less than those who stood enrolled, would assemble; and +before dispersing at night, the training was quite eclipsed by a +heterogeneous drama of foot racing, pony racing, wrestling, fighting, +drunkenness and general uproar. It was also a place for political +meetings and stump conflict by opposing candidates, and after +intellectual performances there generally followed an epilogue of +oaths, yells, loud blows, and gnashing of teeth. Singing-schools were +likewise held at the same place in a room of Deacon Morris's tavern. I +was never a scholar, which I regret, for it has always been a grief +with me that I did not learn music in early life. I occasionally +attended. As in all country singing-schools, sacred music only was +taught, but in general there was not much display of sanctity. I have +a distinct remembrance of one teacher only. He was a Yankee, without a +family, between forty and fifty years of age, and wore a matted mass +of thick hair over the place where men's ears are usually found. Thus +protected, his were never seen, and after the opinion spread abroad +that by some misfortune they had been cut off, he "cut and run." + +The infant capital was, still further, the local seat of justice; and +Saturday was for many years, at all times I might say, the regular term +time. Instead of trying cases at home, two or three justices of the +peace would come to the Lick on that day, and hold their separate +courts. This, of course, brought thither all the litigants of the +neighborhood with their friends and witnesses; all who wished to +purchase at the store would postpone their visit to the same day; all +who had to replenish their jugs of whiskey did the same thing; all who +had business with others expected to meet them there, as our city +merchants, at noon, expect to meet each other on 'change; finally, all +who thirsted after drink, fun, frolic, or fighting, of course, were +present. Thus Saturday was a day of largely suspended field labor, but +devoted to public business, social pleasure, dissipation, and beastly +drunkenness. You might suppose that the presence of civil magistrates +would have repressed some of these vices, but it was not so. Each day +provided a bill of fare for the next. A new trade in horses, another +horse race, a cock-fight, or a dog-fight, a wrestling match, or a +pitched battle between two bullies, who in fierce encounter would lie on +the ground scratching, pulling hair, choking, gouging out each other's +eyes, and biting off each other's noses, in the manner of bull-dogs, +while a Roman circle of interested lookers-on would encourage the +respective gladiators with shouts which a passing demon might have +mistaken for those of hell. In the afternoon, the men and boys of +business and sobriety would depart, and at nightfall the dissipated +would follow them, often two on a horse, reeling and yelling as I saw +drunken Indians do in the neighborhood of Fort Leavenworth, in the +summer of 1844. But many would be too much intoxicated to mount their +horses, and must therefore remain till Sunday morning. + + + + +MARY A. HOLLEY + + +Mrs. Mary Austin Holley, the historian of Texas, was born at New +Haven, Connecticut, in 1786. On January 1, 1805, she was married to +the Rev. Horace Holley, who, in the fall of that year, became pastor +of a church at Greenfield Hill, Connecticut. Mrs. Holley, of course, +was in Boston with her husband from 1809 to 1818; and she accompanied +him to Lexington, Kentucky, when he accepted the presidency of +Transylvania University. Mrs. Holley was one of the few persons whom +the eccentric scientist, Rafinesque, set down as having been very kind +to him while he was connected with the University. She lived in +Lexington until the spring of 1827, when she went with her husband to +New Orleans. She wrote a poem, _On Leaving Kentucky_, the first stanza +of which is as follows: + + Farewell to the land in which broad rivers flow, + And vast prairies bloom as in Eden's young day! + Farewell to the land in which lofty trees grow, + And the vine and the mistletoe's empire display. + +She later embarked with her husband for New York, and it was her pen +that so vividly described his death on shipboard. After Dr. Holley's +death his widow returned to Lexington, Kentucky, and wrote the memoir +for Dr. Charles Caldwell's _Discourse on the Genius and Character of the +Rev. Horace Holley, LL. D._ (Boston, 1828). Mrs. Holley left Kentucky in +1831 and emigrated to Texas under the protection of her celebrated +kinsman, General Stephen Fuller Austin, a Transylvania University man, +and the founder of Texas. Her _Texas_ (Lexington, Kentucky, 1836), was +one of the first histories of that country ever published. Mrs. Holley +was a widely read woman, theology being her favorite study, and, like +her husband, she was a Unitarian. In person she was said to be a very +charming woman. Mrs. Holley spent the last several years of her life at +New Orleans, in which city she died on August 2, 1846. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Transylvanian_ (Lexington, January, 1829); + Adams's _Dictionary of American Authors_ (Boston, 1905). + + +TEXAS WOMEN + + [From _Texas_ (Lexington, Kentucky, 1836)] + +Living in a wild country under circumstances requiring constant +exertion, forms the character to great and daring enterprise. Women thus +situated are known to perform exploits, which the effeminate men of +populous cities might tremble at. Hence there are more Dianas and +_Esther Stanhopes_ than one in Texas. It is not uncommon for ladies to +mount their mustangs and hunt with their husbands, and with them to camp +out for days on their excursions to the sea shore for fish and oysters. +All visiting is done on horseback, and they will go fifty miles to a +ball with their silk dresses, made perhaps in Philadelphia or New +Orleans, in their saddle-bags. Hardy, vigorous constitutions, free +spirits, and spontaneous gaiety are thus induced, and continued a rich +legacy to their children, who, it is to be hoped, will sufficiently +value the blessing not to squander it away, in their eager search for +the luxuries and refinements of polite life. Women have capacity for +greatness, but they require occasions to bring it out. They require, +perhaps, stronger motives than men--they have stronger barriers to break +through of indolence and habit--but, when roused, they are quick to +discern and unshrinking to act. _Lot was unfortunate in his wife._ Many +a wife in Texas has proved herself the better half, and many a widow's +heart has prompted her to noble daring. + +Mrs. ---- left her home in Kentucky with her six sons, and _no other +jewels_. There was good land and room in Texas. Hither she came with +the first settlers, at a time when the Indians were often troublesome +by coming in large companies and encamping near an isolated farm, +demanding of its helpless proprietors, not then too well provided for, +whatever of provisions or other things struck their fancies. One of +these _foraging_ parties, not over nice in their demands, stationed +themselves in rather too near proximity to the dwelling of this +veteran lady. They were so well satisfied with their position, and +scoured the place so completely, that she ventured to remonstrate, +gently at first, then more vehemently. All would not do: the +_pic-nics_ would not budge an inch; and moreover threatened life if +she did not forbear from further expressions of impatience. The good +woman was _armed_. She buckled on her _breastplate_ of _courage_, if +not of _righteousness_, and with her children and women servants, all +her household around her, sent for the chief, and very boldly +expostulating with him, _commanded_ him to depart on the instant at +the peril of his tribe; or by a signal she would call in her whole +_people_, numerous and formidable, and exterminate his race. She was +no more troubled with the Indians. She lives comfortably with her +thriving family and thriving fortune, and with great credit to +herself, on the road between Brazoria and San Felipe, in the same +house now famed for its hospitality and comfort. It is the usual +stopping place for travellers on that route, who are not a little +entertained with the border stories and characteristic jests there +related, by casual companies meeting for the night and sharing the +same apartment. It was thus that the above incident, much more +exemplified, was drawn from the hostess herself. A volume of +_reminiscences_ thus collected, racy with the marvellous, would not be +_unapt_ to modern taste, and the modern science of book-making. + + + + +JOHN J. CRITTENDEN + + +John Jordan Crittenden, a Kentucky statesman and orator of national +reputation, was born near Versailles, Kentucky, September 10, 1787. He +was graduated from the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, +Virginia, studied law, and was admitted to the Frankfort bar. +Crittenden served in the War of 1812; and in 1816 he was a member of +the Kentucky legislature. In the following year he was elected United +States Senator from Kentucky, his party, the Whig, then being in power +in this State. From 1827 to 1829 Crittenden was United States +Attorney for the district of Kentucky; and in 1835 he was again sent +to the Senate, with Henry Clay as his colleague. President William +Henry Harrison made him his Attorney-General, in 1841, and he resigned +his seat in the Senate. When John Tyler succeeded to the presidency +six months later, on the death of Harrison, Crittenden withdrew from +the cabinet portfolio, and he was almost immediately returned to the +Senate by the legislature of Kentucky. He served until 1848, when he +was elected Governor of Kentucky. Governor Crittenden was the most +distinguished, if not indeed the ablest, chief executive this +Commonwealth has ever known. He resigned the governorship, in 1850, in +order to become President Fillmore's Attorney-General, which position +he held for three years. In 1855 Crittenden was for the fourth time +elected United States Senator from Kentucky. As the war between the +States approached, Senator Crittenden, though a Southerner, chose the +cause of the Union, lining up with the administration heart and soul. +In the beginning he did his utmost to prevent the war, and, failing, +he exerted his entire energies to aid Abraham Lincoln and the North to +prosecute it. In 1860 the Senator urged his famous Compromise, +providing for the reestablishment of the old slave-line of 36' 30 N., +and for the enforcement of the fugitive-slave laws, but it was never +moulded into law. The last two years of his life were spent as a +member of the lower House of Congress, where he continued his fight +for the supremacy of the Constitution. Senator Crittenden died near +Frankfort, Kentucky, July 26, 1863, thus surviving his greatest friend +and fellow patriot, Henry Clay, more than eleven years. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life of John J. Crittenden_, by Mrs. Chapman + Coleman (Philadelphia, 1871); _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. + Collins (Covington, 1882). + + +EULOGY UPON ASSOCIATE JUSTICE McKINLEY + + [From _The Life of John J. Crittenden_, edited by his daughter, + Mrs. Chapman Coleman (Philadelphia, 1871)] + +At the opening of the court this morning, Mr. Crittenden, the +Attorney-General of the United States, addressed the court as follows: + +"Since its adjournment yesterday, the members of the bar and officers +of the court held a meeting and adopted resolutions expressive of +their high sense of the public and private worth of the Hon. John +McKinley, one of the justices of this court, and their deep regret at +his death. By the same meeting I was requested to present those +resolutions to the court, and to ask that they might be entered on its +records, and I now rise to perform that honored task. + +"Besides the private grief which naturally attends it, the death of a +member of this court, which is the head of the great, essential, and +vital department of the government, must always be an event of public +interest and importance. + +"I had the good fortune to be acquainted with Judge McKinley from my +earliest manhood. In the relations of private life he was frank, +hospitable, affectionate. In his manners he was simple and unaffected, +and his character was uniformly marked with manliness, integrity, and +honor. Elevation to the bench of the Supreme Court made no change in +him. His honors were borne meekly, without ostentation or presumption. + +"He was a candid, impartial, and righteous judge. Shrinking from no +responsibility, he was fearless in the performance of his duty, seeking +only to do right, and fearing nothing but to do wrong. Death has now set +her seal to his character, making it unchangeable forever; and I think +it may be truly inscribed on his monument that as a private gentleman +and as a public magistrate he was without fear and without reproach. + +"This occasion cannot but remind us of other afflicting losses which +have recently befallen us. The present, indeed, has been a sad year for +the profession of the law. In a few short months it has been bereaved of +its brightest and greatest ornaments. Clay, Webster, and Sergeant have +gone to their immortal rest in quick succession. We had scarcely +returned from the grave of one of them till we were summoned to the +funeral of another. Like bright stars they have sunk below the horizon, +and have left the land in widespread gloom. This hall that knew them so +well shall know them no more. Their wisdom has no utterance now, and the +voice of their eloquence shall be heard here no more forever. + +"This hall itself seems as though it was sensible of its loss, and +even these marble pillars seem to sympathize as they stand around us +like so many majestic mourners. + +"But we will have consolation in the remembrance of these illustrious +men. Their _names_ will remain to us and be like a light kindled in the +sky to shine upon us and to guide our course. We may hope, too, that the +memory of them and their great examples will create a virtuous emulation +which may raise up men worthy to be their successors in the service of +their country, its constitution, and its laws. + +"For this digression, and these allusions to Clay, Webster, and +Sergeant, I hope the occasion may be considered as a sufficient excuse, +and I will not trespass by another word, except only to move that these +resolutions in relation to Judge McKinley, when they shall have been +read by the clerk, may be entered on the records of this court." + + + + +JOHN M. HARNEY + + +John Milton Harney, the first of the Kentucky poets to win and retain +a wide reputation, a man with the divine afflatus, whose whole body of +song is slender but of real worth, was born near Georgetown, Delaware, +March 9, 1789. He was the second son of Major Thomas Harney, of +Revolutionary War fame, and the elder brother of General William S. +Harney, a hero of Cerro Gordo. When John Milton Harney was but two +years old, his family emigrated to Tennessee, and later removed to +Louisiana. He studied medicine and settled at Bardstown, Kentucky. In +1814 Dr. Harney married a daughter of Judge John Rowan, the early +Kentucky statesman; and her death four years later was such a shock +to her husband that he was compelled to abandon his practice, and seek +solace in travel and new scenes. Dr. Harney spent some time in +England, and on his return to America he settled at Savannah, Georgia. +He over-exerted himself at a disastrous fire in Savannah, which +resulted in a violent fever and ended in breaking his health. He +returned to Bardstown, Kentucky, became a convert to Roman +Catholicism, and in that place he died, January 15, 1825, when but +thirty-five years of age. At the age of twenty-three years, Dr. Harney +wrote _Crystalina, a Fairy Tale_, in six cantos, but his extreme +sensitiveness caused him to hold it in manuscript for four years, or +until 1816, when it was issued anonymously at New York. This work was +highly praised by Rufus W. Griswold, John Neal, and other well-known +critics, but the unfavorable criticism far outweighed the favorable +criticism, so the author held, and he published nothing more in book +form; and he did all in his power to suppress the edition of +_Crystalina_. William Davis Gallagher, poet and critic of a later time +in the West, went over Dr. Harney's manuscripts and from them rescued +his masterpiece, the exquisite _Echo and the Lover_. This Gallagher +published in his _Western Literary Journal_ for 1837--the first form +in which the public saw it. No Western poem has had a wider audience +than the _Echo_. It has been parodied in Europe and America many +times, and is the finest expression of Dr. Harney's genius. It is to +be regretted that no comprehensive account of the poet's life and +literary labors has come down to posterity. As a poet and as a man his +merits were of the truest sort, but a handful of facts, a suppressed +book, a lyric or so, are all that have been brought to the attention +of the literary world. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860); _Blades o' Bluegrass_, by + Fannie P. Dickey (Louisville, 1892). + + +ECHO AND THE LOVER + + [From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)] + + _Lover._ Echo! mysterious nymph, declare + Of what you're made and what you are-- + _Echo._ "Air!" + + _Lover._ 'Mid airy cliffs, and places high, + Sweet Echo! listening, love, you lie-- + _Echo._ "You lie!" + + _Lover._ You but resuscitate dead sounds-- + Hark! how my voice revives, resounds! + _Echo._ "Zounds!" + + _Lover._ I'll question you before I go-- + Come, answer me more apropos! + _Echo._ "Poh! poh!" + + _Lover._ Tell me, fair nymph, if e'er you saw + So sweet a girl as Phoebe Shaw! + _Echo._ "Pshaw!" + + _Lover._ Say, what will win that frisking coney + Into the toils of matrimony! + _Echo._ "Money!" + + _Lover._ Has Phoebe not a heavenly brow? + Is it not white as pearl--as snow? + _Echo._ "Ass, no!" + + _Lover._ Her eyes! Was ever such a pair? + Are the stars brighter than they are? + _Echo._ "They are!" + + _Lover._ Echo, you lie, but can't deceive me; + Her eyes eclipse the stars, believe me-- + _Echo._ "Leave me!" + + _Lover._ But come, you saucy, pert romancer, + Who is as fair as Phoebe? Answer. + _Echo._ "Ann, sir!" + + +THE WHIPPOWIL + + [From the same] + + There is a strange, mysterious bird, + Which few have seen, but all have heard: + He sits upon a fallen tree, + Through all the night, and thus sings he: + Whippowil! + Whippowil! + Whippowil! + + Despising show, and empty noise, + The gaudy fluttering thing he flies: + And in the echoing vale by night + Thus sings the pensive anchorite: + Whippowil! + + Oh, had I but his voice and wings, + I'd envy not a bird that sings; + But gladly would I flit away, + And join the wild nocturnal lay: + Whippowil! + + The school-boy, tripping home in haste, + Impatient of the night's repast, + Would stop to hear my whistle shrill, + And answer me with mimic skill: + Whippowil! + + The rich man's scorn, the poor man's care, + Folly in silk, and Wisdom bare, + Virtue on foot, and Vice astride, + No more should vex me while I cried: + Whippowil! + + How blest!--Nor loneliness nor state, + Nor fame, nor wealth, nor love, nor hate, + Nor av'rice, nor ambition vain, + Should e'er disturb my tranquil strain: + Whippowil! + Whippowil! + Whippowil! + + +SYLPHS BATHING + + [From _Crystalina_ (New York, 1816)] + + The shores with acclamations rung, + As in the flood the playful damsels sprung: + Upon their beauteous bodies, with delight, + The billows leapt. Oh, 'twas a pleasant sight + To see the waters dimple round, for joy, + Climb their white necks, and on their bosoms toy: + Like snowy swans they vex'd the sparkling tide, + Till little rainbows danced on every side. + Some swam, some floated, some on pearly feet + Stood sidelong, smiling, exquisitely sweet. + + + + +GEORGE ROBERTSON + + +George Robertson, the most widely quoted Kentucky jurist, and an able +writer, was born near Harrodsburg, Kentucky, November 18, 1790. He was +educated in the arts and in law at Transylvania University, and +entered upon the practice of his profession at Lancaster, Kentucky, in +1809. In 1816 Robertson was elected to Congress, where he remained for +two terms. He drew up the bill for the establishment of Arkansaw +territory; and he projected the system of cutting public lands into +small lots, selling them to actual settlers for one dollar and +twenty-five cents per acre. He declined another term in the House, as +well as the attorney-generalship of Kentucky, in order to devote his +whole attention to the law. Robertson was elected against his desire +to the Kentucky legislature, in 1822, and he was a member of that body +for the next five years. This was the time of the struggle between the +Old-Court and New-Court parties, which was one of the most bitter +political fights ever seen in Kentucky. Robertson consistently and +vigorously championed the cause of the Old-Court party, which finally +won. That this disgusted him with political life in any dress, is +shown by his subsequent declination of the governorship of Arkansaw, +and the Columbian and Peruvian missions. In 1828 he was elected an +associate justice of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, and, in the +following year, chief justice. This position was George Robertson's +heart's desire--he hated politics with a never-dying hatred, the law +and the bench being his earthly paradise. He was chief justice of +Kentucky for fourteen years, when he resigned to return to the active +practice of law. From 1834 to 1857 Judge Robertson was professor of +law in Transylvania University at Lexington. He died at Lexington, May +16, 1874, generally regarded as the ablest jurist Kentucky has +produced. He was also the author of four books: _Introductory Lecture +to the Transylvania Law Class_ (Lexington); _Biographical Sketch of +John Boyle_ (Frankfort, 1838); _Scrap-Book on Law and Politics, Men +and Times_ (Lexington, 1855), his best known book; and his very +interesting and well-written autobiography, entitled _An Outline of +the Life of George Robertson, written by Himself_ (Lexington, 1876), +to which his son contributed an introduction and appendix. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. The chief authority for the facts of Judge + Robertson's life is, of course, his autobiography; Samuel M. + Wilson's study in _Great American Lawyers_ (Philadelphia, 1908). + + +ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS ON THE SETTLEMENT OF KENTUCKY + + [From _Scrap Book on Law and Politics, Men and Times_ (Lexington, + Kentucky, 1855)] + +Yet we have hopes that are immortal--interests that are +imperishable--principles that are indestructible. Encouraged by those +hopes, stimulated by those interests, and sustained by and sustaining +those principles, let us, come what may, be true to God, true to +ourselves, and faithful to our children, our country, and mankind. And +then, whenever or wherever it may be our doom to look, for the last +time, on earth, we may die justly proud of the title of "Kentuckian," +and, with our expiring breath, may cordially exclaim--Kentucky, as she +was;--Kentucky, as she is;--Kentucky, as she will be;--Kentucky forever. + + +EARLY STRUGGLES + + [From _An Outline of the Life of George Robertson, written by + Himself_ (Lexington, Kentucky, 1876)] + +Yet, thus juvenile, poor, and proud, I ventured not only on the rather +hopeless prospects of professional life, but, on the 28th of November, +1809, when I was only ten days over nineteen years of age, I ventured +on the far more momentous contingencies of marriage, and, linking my +destinies with a wife only fifteen years and seven months old, we +embarked without freight or pilotage, on the untried sea of early +marriage. I had never made a cent, and had nothing but ordinary +clothes, a horse, an old servant, a few books, and the humble talents +with which God had blessed me. I borrowed thirteen dollars as an +outfit, and out of that fund I paid for my license and handed to my +groomsman, R. P. Letcher, five dollars for paying the parson, Randolph +Hall, father of Rev. Nathan H. Hall. Some days afterwards Letcher +rather slyly put into my hand a dollar, suggesting that he had saved +that much for me by paying the preacher only four dollars. This looked +to me as such minute parsimony as to excite my indignation, important +as was only one dollar then to me. And I manifested that feeling in a +manner both emphatic and censurious; to which Letcher replied that +four dollars was more than was then customary, and that Mr. Hall, when +he received it, expressed the warmest gratitude, and said that, old +as he was, he had never received so large a fee for solemnizing the +matrimonial rite! This reconciled me to the return of the dollar. + +My wife and myself lived with her mother until the 9th of September, +1810, when we set up for ourselves in a small buckeye house with only +two rooms, built and first occupied by Judge [John] Boyle, and +respecting which I may here suggest this remarkable coincidence of +successive events:--That Boyle commenced housekeeping in that house, +and, while he occupied it, was elected to Congress; that Samuel McKee +commenced housekeeping in the same house, and succeeded Boyle in +Congress; that I commenced housekeeping in the same house, and +succeeded McKee in Congress; and that R. P. Letcher commenced +housekeeping in the same house, and, after an interval of two years, +succeeded me in Congress. I was unable to furnish it with a carpet, +and our only furniture consisted of two beds, one table, one bureau, +six split-bottomed chairs, and a small supply of table and kitchen +furniture, which I bought with a small gold watch. I had bought a bag +of flour, a bag of corn meal, a half barrel of salt, and two hams and +two middlings of bacon; and these, together with the milk of a small +cow given to my wife by her mother, and a few chickens and some +butter, constituted our entire outfit of provisions. But all our +supplies were stolen the night we commenced housekeeping. This was, at +that time, a heavy blow. I had no money; and, though I had good +credit, I resolved not to buy anything on credit. And that was one of +the best resolutions I ever made. It stimulated my industry and +economy, and soon secured to me peace and a comfortable sense of +independence. In adhering to my privative, but conservative resolve, I +often cut and carried on my shoulders wood from a neighboring forest. + + +LITERARY FAME + + [From the same] + +The classical reader remembers that, when almost all the Greeks, +captured with Nicias at Syracuse, had died in dungeons, a remnant of the +survivors saved themselves by the recitation of beautiful extracts from +Euripides. How potent was the shadowed genius of the immortal Athenian, +when it alone melted the icy hearts that nothing else could touch, and +broke the captive's chains, which justice, and prayers, and tears, had +in vain tried to unloose! And hence "the glory of Euripides had all +Greece for a monument." He too was elevated by the light of other minds. +It is said that he acquired a sublime inspiration whenever he read +Homer--whose Iliad and whose Odyssey--the one exhibiting the fatality of +strife among leading men, the other portraying the efficacy of +perseverance--have stamped his name on the roll of fame in letters of +sunshine, that will never fade away. No memorial tells where Troy once +stood--Delphi is now mute--the thunder of Olympus is hushed, and +Apollo's lyre no longer echoes along the banks of the Peneus--but the +fame of Homer still travels with the stars. + + + + +SHADRACH PENN + + +Shadrach Penn, one of the ablest of Kentucky journalists, was born at +Frederick, Maryland, in 1790. His family settled near Georgetown, +Kentucky, when he was a mere boy. Penn began his newspaper career at +Georgetown when he was but nineteen years of age; and he subsequently +served in the War of 1812. In 1818 Penn removed to Louisville and +established _The Public Advertiser_, which was a weekly for the first +few years of its history, then a semi-weekly, and, on April 4, 1826, a +final change was made "and the first daily newspaper west of the +Alleghanies was flung to the public." After the establishment of the +_Kentucky Gazette_, this marked the second most epoch-making event in +Kentucky journalism. Penn was an able editor, the very ablest in +Kentucky, and he was having things his own way in the West, advocating +Jacksonian Democracy. In 1828 President Jackson showed his appreciation +of Penn's services by offering him a place in his cabinet, which he +declined, but he did spend a winter at Washington as the President's +warm friend and adviser. Then, _mirabile dictu!_ the Whigs brought +George D. Prentice to Kentucky and, in 1830, he established the +_Louisville Journal_, and began a most bitter fight upon Penn's paper. +Penn fought back as best he could, but he was quite unequal for the +contest. For nearly twelve years the warfare was waged without either +editor asking quarter, and to the infinite amusement of the whole +country. In 1841 Penn ran up the white flag and went to St. Louis to +become editor of the _St. Louis Reporter_. Prentice bade him farewell in +the best of temper, and when he died at St. Louis, on June 15, 1846, the +old Whig's tribute to his memory was the finest one written. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Pioneer Press of Kentucky_, by W. H. Perrin + (Louisville, 1888); _Memorial History of Louisville, Kentucky_, by + J. Stoddard Johnston (Chicago, 1896). + + +THE COMING OF GEORGE D. PRENTICE + + [From _The Public Advertiser_ (Louisville, September 10, 1830)] + +This gentleman and Mr. Buxton, of Cincinnati, have issued proposals for +publishing a daily paper in Louisville, which is to be edited by Mr. +Prentice. Willing that the gentleman shall be known by the people whose +patronage he is seeking, we copy today from a Cincinnati paper his +account of the late elections in Kentucky. The production may be viewed +as a fair specimen of his "fine literature, his drollery, strong powers +of sarcasm," and, above all, his "poetical capacity." The respect and +attachment he displays toward Kentucky (to say nothing of the Jackson +party), must be exquisitely gratifying to the respectable portion of Mr. +Clay's friends in this city. To them we commend the letter of Mr. +Prentice as an erudite, chaste, and veritable production, worthy of the +"great editor" who is hereafter to figure as Mr. Clay's champion in the +West. We may, moreover, congratulate them in consequence of the fair +prospect before them; for with the aid of such an editor they cannot +fail to effect miraculous revolutions or revulsions in the political +world. The occupants of all our fish markets will be confirmed in their +devotion to the opposition beyond redemption. + + + + +WILLIAM O. BUTLER + + +William Orlando Butler, one of General Lew Wallace's favorite poets, +was born near Nicholasville, Kentucky, in 1791. He was the son of +Percival Butler, a noted Revolutionary soldier. He was graduated from +Transylvania University, Lexington, in 1812. Butler studied law for a +short time, but the War of 1812 called him and he enlisted. At the +River Raisin he was wounded and captured and carried through Canada to +Fort Niagara, but he was later exchanged. Butler was with General +Jackson at the battle of New Orleans, and his gallantry attracted the +attention of the general, who placed him upon his staff. In 1817 +Butler returned to the law, married, and settled in the little river +town of Carrollton, Kentucky, on the Ohio, his home henceforth. In +July, 1821, the first draft of his famous poem, _The Boatman's Horn_ +(then called _The Boat Horn_), was published in _The Western Review_, +a monthly magazine of Lexington, Kentucky. In describing his boyhood +days at Covington, Indiana, General Lew Wallace very charmingly writes +of his early love for the Wabash river, and for old Nebeker, the +lonesome ferryman, who "welcomed me for my company. On the farther +side, chained to a tree, he kept a long tin horn. A traveller, coming +to the bank and finding us on the townward side, blew to get our +attention ... when the voice of the big horn on the thither side +called to us--How it startled me! What music there was in it! What +haste I made to unship my oar!... And if since then I have been an +ardent fisherman, believing with my friend Maurice Thompson that + + "Halcyon prophecies come to pass + In the haunts of the bream and bass;" + +and if the song of Butler, the soldier-poet of Kentucky-- + + "Oh, boatman, wind that horn again! + For never did the joyous air + Upon its lambent bosom bear + So wild, so soft, so sweet a strain"-- + +is still a favorite of mine, with power to stir my pulses and return +me to a freak of childhood full of joyousness alloyed only with +thought of my mother's fears, the shrewd reader will know at once how +such tastes inured to me. And as swimming seems to have been one of my +natural accomplishments, I must have acquired it during my days at the +ferry." This is far and away the best background for Butler's poem +that has been done, and with it before the reader the famous poem must +mean more to him. The poem was subsequently published as the +title-poem in a small collection of his verse, entitled _The Boatman's +Horn and Other Poems_. From 1839 to 1843 Butler was a Kentucky +Congressman; and in 1844 the unsuccessful candidate for governor of +Kentucky. Upon his Mexican War record, General Butler was nominated by +the Democratic party for vice-president of the United States with +General Lewis Cass, of Michigan, as the head of the ticket, but they +were defeated by Martin Van Buren and Charles Francis Adams. In 1855 +General Butler declined the governorship of the territory of Nebraska; +and in 1861 he went to Washington as a member of the famous "Peace +Congress." General Butler died at his home, Carrollton, Kentucky, +August 6, 1880, in the ninetieth year of his age. Though famous as a +soldier and politician, _The Boatman's Horn_ is the work that will +keep his name green for many years; and several of his other poems are +not to be utterly despised. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Biographical Sketch of Gen. William O. Butler_, by + F. P. Blair, Senior (Washington, 1848), was reprinted in full in + _The Kentucky Yeoman_ (Frankfort, June 15, 1848); _The Poets and + Poetry of the West_, by W. T. Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860); + Lew Wallace's _Autobiography_ (New York, 1906). + + +THE BOATMAN'S HORN + + [From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)] + + O, boatman! wind that horn again, + For never did the list'ning air + Upon its lambent bosom bear + So wild, so soft, so sweet a strain! + What though thy notes are sad and few, + By every simple boatman blown, + Yet is each pulse to nature true, + And melody in every tone. + + How oft, in boyhood's joyous day, + Unmindful of the lapsing hours, + I've loitered on my homeward way + By wild Ohio's bank of flowers; + While some lone boatman from the deck + Poured his soft numbers to the tide, + As if to charm from storm and wreck + The boat where all his fortunes ride! + + Delighted, Nature drank the sound, + Enchanted, Echo bore it round + In whispers soft and softer still, + From hill to plain and plain to hill, + Till e'en the thoughtless frolic boy, + Elate with hope and wild with joy, + Who gambolled by the river's side + And sported with the fretting tide, + Feels something new pervade his breast, + Change his light steps, repress his jest, + Bends o'er the flood his eager ear, + To catch the sounds far off, yet dear-- + Drinks the sweet draught, but knows not why + The tear of rapture fills his eye. + And can he now, to manhood grown, + Tell why those notes, simple and lone, + As on the ravished ear they fell, + Bind every sense in magic spell? + + There is a tide of feeling given + To all on earth, its fountains, heaven, + Beginning with the dewy flower, + Just ope'd in Flora's vernal bower, + Rising creation's orders through, + With louder murmur, brighter hue-- + That tide is sympathy! its ebb and flow + Give life its hue, its joy, and woe. + + Music, the master-spirit that can move + Its waves to war, or lull them into love-- + Can cheer the sinking sailor 'mid the wave, + And bid the warrior on! nor fear the grave, + Inspire the fainting pilgrim on the road, + And elevate his soul to claim his God. + + Then, boatman, wind that horn again! + Though much of sorrow mark its strain, + Yet are its notes to sorrow dear; + What though they wake fond memory's tear? + Tears are sad memory's sacred feast, + And rapture oft her chosen guest. + + + + +HEW AINSLIE + + +Hew Ainslie, the foremost Scottish-Kentucky poet, was born at Bargery +Mains, Ayrshire, April 5, 1792. Ill-health cut short Ainslie's +education at the Ayr Academy, but some years later he went up to +Glasgow to study law. Law and Hew Ainslie were not congenial fellows, +and he shortly embarked upon the art of landscape gardening. He was +next a clerk in Edinburgh, and also amanuensis for Professor Dugald +Stewart. "Gradually the clouds of [Ainslie's] tobacco smoke began to +curl into seven letters which looked like America." He was thirty +years of age when he arrived at New York. He spent his first years in +New York and Indiana as a farmer, but he soon relinquished this work +and went, in 1829, to Louisville, Kentucky, where, three years later, +an Ohio river flood swept his property away. And two years after this +disastrous flood, fire destroyed his property in Indiana. Undismayed +by misfortune, Ainslie became a contractor and supervised the erection +of many large business structures in Louisville and other cities. +During all these years he was assiduously courting the Muse, and +making a great reputation for himself as a poet. Ainslie's first book, +_A Pilgrimage to the Land of Burns_ (Deptford, 1822), is the English +edition of his charming lyrics; and his _Scottish Songs, Ballads, and +Poems_ (New York, 1855), is the only American edition of his work. In +1864, forty-two years after his departure, Ainslie revisited the land +of his birth, where he was hailed as one of Scotland's finest singers +since Robert Burns. Kentucky was in the poet's blood, however, and a +year later he returned to his home at Louisville. His American friends +were not to be outdone by his home people, and they arranged a great +home-coming for him. In 1871, when the Scots of Louisville assembled +to celebrate the birthday of Burns, Ainslie, the toastmaster, arose +and smilingly confessed to having once kissed "Bonnie Jean," Burns's +widow. He died at Louisville, March 11, 1878. A comprehensive Scottish +edition of his _A Pilgrimage to the Land of Burns, and Poems_, was +issued in 1892. _The Ingle Side_, a little song of sixteen lines, is +Ainslie's masterpiece; but it was as a poet of the sea that he won his +great reputation. "As Lloyd Mifflin is America's greatest sonneteer, +so Hew Ainslie, the adopted Kentuckian, may perhaps be ranked as +America's most ardent singer of the sea." + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. i); _Hew Ainslie_, by A. S. Mackenzie (Library of + Southern Literature, Atlanta, Georgia, 1909, v. i). + + +THE BOUROCKS O' BARGENY + + [From _A Pilgrimage to the Land of Burns, and Poems_ (Paisley, + Scotland, 1892)] + + I left ye, Jeanie, blooming fair, + 'Mang the bourocks o' Bargeny; [bowers] + I've found ye on the banks o' Ayr, + But sair ye're altered, Jeanie. + + I left ye 'mang the woods sae green, + In rustic weed befitting; + I've found ye buskit like a queen, [attired] + In painted chaumbers sitting. [chambers] + + I left ye like the wanton lamb + That plays 'mang Hadyed's heather; + I've found ye noo a sober dame, + A wife and eke a mither. + + Ye're fairer, statelier, I can see, + Ye're wiser, nae dou't, Jeanie; + But ah! I'd rather met wi' thee + 'Mang the bourocks o' Bargeny. + + +THE HAUGHS O' AULD KENTUCK + + [From the same] + + Welcome, Edie, owre the sea, + Welcome to this lan' an' me, + Welcome from the warl' whaur we + Hae whistled owre the lave o't. [rest] + + Come, gie your banes anither hitch, + Up Hudson's stream, thro' Clinton's ditch, + An' see our watlin meadows rich [cane-brake] + Wi' corn an' a' the lave o't. [all the rest of it] + + We've hizzie here baith swank and sweet [maidens agile] + An' birkies here that can stan' a heat [young men] + O' barley bree, or aqua vit [brew; water of life] + Syne whistle owre the lave o't. + + Gude kens, I want nae better luck [Goodness knows] + Than just to see ye, like a buck, + Spanking the haughs o' auld Kentuck, [speeding over the meadows] + An' whistling owre the lave o't. + + +THE INGLE SIDE + + [From the same] + + It's rare to see the morning bleeze, [blaze] + Like a bonfire frae the sea; + It's fair to see the burnie kiss [streamlet] + The lip o' the flowery lea; + An' fine it is on green hillside, + When hums the hinny bee; + But rarer, fairer, finer far, + Is the ingle side to me. + + Glens may be gilt wi' gowans rare [daisies] + The birds may fill the tree, + An' haughs hae a' the scented ware [river meadows] + That simmer's growth can gie; + But the canty hearth where cronies meet, [cheerful] + An' the darling o' our e'e-- + That makes to us a warl' complete, + Oh! the ingle side for me. + + +THE HINT O' HAIRST + + [From the same] + + It's dowie in the hint o' hairst, [dreary; end; harvest] + At the wa'-gang o' the swallow, [away-going] + When the wind blows cauld an' the burns grow bauld, [bold] + An' the wuds are hingin' yellow; + But oh! it's dowier far to see + The deid-set o' a shining e'e + That darkens the weary warld on thee. + + There was muckle love atween us twa-- + Oh! twa could ne'er been fonder; + An' the thing on yird was never made + That could hae gart us sunder. + But the way of Heaven's aboon a' ken, [above all knowing] + And we maun bear what it likes to sen'-- [must] + It's comfort, though, to weary men, + That the warst o' this warld's waes maun en'. + + There's mony things that come and gae, + Just kent and syne forgotten; + The flow'rs that busk a bonnie brae [deck; slope] + Gin anither year lie rotten. + But the last look o' that lovin' e'e, + An' the dying grip she gied to me, + They're settled like eternitie-- + O Mary! that I were with thee. + + + + +JAMES G. BIRNEY + + +James Gillespie Birney, leader of the Conservative Abolitionists, +opposed to the radicalism of William Lloyd Garrison and all his ilk, +yet as earnest and sincere in his hatred of slavery, was born at +Danville, Kentucky, February 4, 1792. He was at Transylvania +University for a short time, then proceeded to Princeton, from which +institution he was graduated in 1810. In 1814 he became a lawyer in +his native town of Danville. In 1816 Birney was in the Kentucky +legislature; but two years later he removed to Alabama, settling upon +a plantation near Huntsville. The slavery question was appealing to +him more and more, and he finally became an agent for the American +Colonization Society. In the fall of 1833 Birney returned to Kentucky, +and went to Danville, where he freed his own slaves, and organized the +Kentucky Anti-Slavery Society. On January 1, 1836, the first issue of +his anti-slavery sheet, _The Philanthropist_, appeared from his +Cincinnati office. This soon became the Bible of the Conservative +Abolitionists, who opposed the drastic methods of Garrison and his +followers. In his speeches Birney denounced all violence and +fanaticism in the handling of the slavery problem, though he himself +received much violence at the hands of mobs and almost insane +partisans. His strong addresses through the North won him the +secretaryship of the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1837. In this +capacity he was soon recognized as the real leader of the +"Constitutional Abolitionists," who said they stood upon the +Constitution, fought against secession, and desired to wipe slavery +from the face of the American continent with decency and in order. In +1840 and again in 1844 Birney was the candidate of the Liberty party +for president of the United States. In the second campaign he +multiplied his very small vote received in the first race by nine. He +was thrown from his horse, in 1845, and the final twelve years of his +life were passed as an invalid. Birney died at Perth Amboy, New +Jersey, November 25, 1857. Besides numerous contributions to the +press, his principal writings are _Letter on Colonization_ (1834); +_Addresses and Speeches_ (1835); _American Churches the Bulwarks of +American Slavery_ (1840); _Speeches in England_(1840); and _An +Examination of the Decision of the_ _United States Supreme Court in +the Case of Strader et al. v. Graham_ (1850). + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); _James G. Birney and His Times_, by his son, + William Birney (New York, 1890). + + +THE NO-GOVERNMENT DOCTRINES + + [From _A Letter on the Political Obligations of Abolitionists_ + (Boston, 1839)] + +Within the last twelve or eighteen months, it is believed--after +efforts, some successful, some not, had been begun to affect the +elections--and whilst the most indefatigable exertions were being made +by many of our influential, intelligent and liberal friends to +convince the great body of the abolitionists of the necessity--the +indispensable necessity--of breaking away from their old "_parties_," +and uniting together in the use of the elective franchise for the +advancement of the cause of human freedom in which we were +engaged;--at this very time, and mainly, too, in that part of the +country where _political action_ had been most successful, and whence, +from its promise of soon being wholly triumphant, great encouragement +was derived by abolitionists everywhere, a sect has arisen in our +midst, whose members regard it as of religious obligation, in no case, +_to exercise the elective franchise_. This persuasion is part and +parcel of the tenet which it is believed they have embraced--that as +Christians have the precepts of the Gospel to direct, and the Spirit +of God to guide them, all human governments, as necessarily including +the idea of _force to secure obedience_, are not only superfluous, but +unlawful encroachments on the Divine government, as ascertained from +the sources above mentioned. Therefore, they refuse to do anything +voluntarily, by which they would be considered as acknowledging the +lawful existence of human governments. Denying to civil governments +the right to use force, they easily deduce that family governments +have no such right. Thus they would withhold from parents any power of +personal chastisement or restraint for the correction of their +children. They carry out to the full extent the "non-resistance" +theory. To the first ruffian who would demand our purse, or oust us +from our houses, they are to be unconditionally surrendered, unless +_moral suasion_ be found sufficient to induce him to decline from his +purpose. Our wives, our daughters, our sisters--our mothers we are to +see set upon by the most brutal, without any effort on our part, +except argument, to defend them--and even they themselves are +forbidden to use in defense of their purity such powers as God has +endowed them with for its protection, if resistance should be attended +with any injury or destruction to the assailant. In short, the +"No-Government" doctrines, as they are believed now to be embraced, +seem to strike at the root of the social structure; and tend--so far +as I am able to judge of their tendency--to throw society into entire +confusion, and to renew, under the sanction of religion, scenes of +anarchy and license that have generally heretofore been the offspring +of the rankest infidelity and irreligion. + +It is but justice to say--judging from the moral deportment of the +adherents of the "No-Government" scheme--that so far from admitting, +what I have supposed to be, its legitimate consequences, they would +wholly deny and repudiate them. + +These Sectaries have not as yet separated themselves from the American +[Anti-Slavery] society. Far from it. They insist that their views are +altogether harmonious with what is required for membership by the +constitution.... But is this really so? Is the difference between +those who seek to abolish any and every government of human +institution, and those who prefer _any_ government to a state of +things in which every one may do what seemeth good in his own eyes--is +the difference between them, I say, so small that they can act +harmoniously under the same organization? When, in obedience to the +principles of the society, I go to the polls and there call on my +neighbors to unite with me in electing to Congress men who are in +favor of Human Rights, I am met by a No-Government abolitionist +inculcating on them the doctrine that Congress has _no rightful +authority_ to act at all in the premises--how can we proceed together? +When I am animating my fellow-citizens to aid men in infusing into the +government salutary influences which shall put an end to all +oppression--my No-Government brother cries out at the top of his +lungs, _all_ governments are of the Devil(!) where is our harmony! +Our efficiency? We are in the condition of the two physicians called +in to the same patient--one of whom should be intent on applying the +proper remedies for expelling the disease from the body and thus +restoring and purifying its functions; the other equally intent on +utterly destroying body, members, functions and all. Could they be +agreed, and could they walk together? It seems to me not. And simply +because their aim, their objects are radically and essentially +different. So with the No-Government and the Pro-Government +abolitionists. One party is for sustaining and purifying governments, +and bringing them to a perfect conformity with the principles of the +Divine government--the other for destroying _all_ government. + + + + +THOMAS CORWIN + + +Thomas Corwin, witty, delightful "Tom" Corwin, was born near Paris, +Kentucky, July 29, 1794. Before he was five years old, his father had +taken him into the wilds of Ohio, the Lebanon of today. "Tom" Corwin was +admitted to the bar, in 1818, after a slender education and a brief +reading of the law. His wit and eloquence made his reputation rapidly +and, in 1830, he found himself in the lower House of Congress. The whole +country laughed at his inimitable speeches; and that he had a strong +hold on the Ohio Whigs is certain as they returned him to the House for +ten years. In 1840 Corwin was elected governor of Ohio, after a +brilliant and successful state-wide campaign. He was incomparable on the +stump, and he rode into the gubernatorial chair on an overwhelming Whig +tide. Two years later, however, his former opponent, Wilson Shannon, +defeated him for reelection. In 1844 Corwin was sent to the United +States Senate, in which body he renewed his House reputation as an +orator. On the eve of the Mexican War, he made his memorable anti-war +speech, which practically ruined his future political career, as the +country desired to fight the hated men on the border. But a more bravely +beautiful speech was never made. President Fillmore chose Corwin his +Secretary of the Treasury, in 1850. At the expiration of Fillmore's +term, Corwin returned to the practice of law at Lebanon, Ohio. In 1858 +he reentered public life, serving a term in Congress; and, in 1861, +President Lincoln appointed him minister to Mexico. Corwin remained in +Mexico until the coming of Maximilian, when he returned to Washington to +practice law. In the capital of the country he died, December 18, 1865. +"Tom" Corwin was one of the most captivating of American orators, and +most lovable of men. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life and Speeches of Thomas Corwin_, by Isaac + Strohn (Dayton, Ohio, 1859); _The Library of Oratory_ (New York, + 1902, v. vi). + + +THE MEXICAN WAR + + [From _Life and Speeches of Thomas Corwin_, by Isaac Strohn + (Dayton, Ohio, 1859)] + +Mr. President, this uneasy desire to augment our territory has depraved +the moral sense and blunted the otherwise keen sagacity of our people. +What has been the fate of all nations who have acted upon the idea that +they must advance! Our young orators cherish this notion with a fervid +but fatally mistaken zeal. They call it by the mysterious name of +"destiny." "Our destiny," they say, is "onward," and hence they argue, +with ready sophistry, the propriety of seizing upon any territory and +any people that may lie in the way of our "fated" advance. Recently +these progressives have grown classical; some assiduous student of +antiquities has helped them to a patron saint. They have wandered back +into the desolated Pantheon, and there, among the polytheistic relics of +that "pale mother of dead empires," they have found a god whom these +Romans, centuries gone by, baptized "Terminus." + +Sir, I have heard much and read somewhat of this gentleman Terminus. +Alexander, of whom I have spoken, was a devotee of this divinity. We +have seen the end of him and his empire. It was said to be an +attribute of this god that he must always advance and never recede. So +both republican and imperial Rome believed. It was, as they say, their +destiny. And for a while it did seem to be even so. Roman Terminus did +advance. Under the eagles of Rome he was carried from his home on the +Tiber to the farthest East on the one hand, and to the far West, among +the then barbarous tribes of western Europe, on the other. + +But at length the time came when retributive justice had become "a +destiny." The despised Gaul calls out the contemned Goth, and Attila, +with his Huns answers back the battle-shout to both. The "blue-eyed +nations of the North," in succession or united, pour forth their +countless hosts of warriors upon Rome and Rome's always-advancing god +Terminus. And now the battle-axe of the barbarian strikes down the +conquering eagle of Rome. Terminus at last recedes, slowly at first, but +finally he is driven to Rome, and from Rome to Byzantium. Whoever would +know the further fate of this Roman deity, so recently taken under the +patronage of American democracy, may find ample gratification of his +curiosity in the luminous pages of Gibbon's _Decline and Fall_. + +Such will find that Rome thought as you now think, that it was her +destiny to conquer provinces and nations, and no doubt she sometimes +said, as you say, "I will conquer a peace," and where now is she, the +mistress of the world? The spider weaves his web in her palaces, the +owl sings his watch-song in her towers. Teutonic power now lords it +over the servile remnant, the miserable memento of old and once +omnipotent Rome. Sad, very sad, are the lessons which time has written +for us. Through and in them all I see nothing but the inflexible +execution of that old law which ordains as eternal that cardinal rule, +"Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods, nor anything which is +his." Since I have lately heard so much about the dismemberment of +Mexico I have looked back to see how, in the course of events, which +some call "Providence," it has fared with other nations who engaged in +this work of dismemberment. I see that in the latter half of the +eighteenth century three powerful nations, Russia, Austria, and +Prussia, united in the dismemberment of Poland. They said, too, as +you say, "It is our destiny." They "wanted room." Doubtless each of +these thought, with his share of Poland, his power was too strong ever +to fear invasion, or even insult. One had his California, another his +New Mexico, and the third his Vera Cruz. Did they remain untouched and +incapable of harm? Alas! no--far, very far, from it. Retributive +justice must fulfill its destiny, too. + + + + +HENRY B. BASCOM + + +Henry Bidleman Bascom, the distinguished Methodist preacher and orator, +was born at Hancock, New York, May 27, 1796. He received a scanty +education, and when but eighteen years of age he was licensed to preach +by the Ohio conference of the Methodist church. He was a circuit-rider, +traveling more than four hundred miles upon horseback his first year in +the work, and receiving the princely salary of $12.10 for his year's +services. Bascom was too florid for the Ohio brethren, and they caused +him to be transferred to Tennessee and Kentucky circuits. In this work +he won a wide reputation as a pulpit orator. In 1823 Henry Clay had +Bascom appointed chaplain of the House of Representatives, but his long +sermons did not please the members, and he was not a great success in +Washington. Bascom was elected as the first president of Madison +College, Uniontown, Pennsylvania, in 1827, but two years later he became +an agent for the American Colonization Society. From 1831 to 1841 he was +professor of moral science and belles-lettres in Augusta College, +Augusta, Kentucky, the first Methodist college in the world. The +Methodist church having taken over Transylvania University, at +Lexington, Dr. Bascom was elected president of that institution in 1842. +He revived the ancient seat of learning to a wonderful degree, becoming +another Horace Holley, but the rebirth proved ephemeral. In 1844 +President Bascom protested against the action of the General Conference +of the Methodist church concerning slavery, and, in the Louisville +conference of 1845, he took a most prominent part, winning for himself +the title of "father of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South." Dr. +Bascom was editor of the _Southern Methodist Review_ for several years; +and in 1848 he resigned the presidency of Transylvania University, only +to be elected a bishop in the branch of the Methodist church he had +helped to establish. He was ordained as bishop in May, 1850, and almost +immediately set out for Missouri, where he held his first and only +conference. On his return to Kentucky he was in very poor health; and he +died at Louisville, September 8, 1850. Bishop Bascom was the greatest +Methodist preacher Kentucky can claim; and he was also an able writer. +His works include _Sermons from the Pulpit_; _Lectures on Infidelity_; +_Lectures and Essays on Moral and Mental Science_; and _Methodism and +Slavery_. In 1910 a portrait in oils of Bishop Bascom was painted by +Paul Sawyier, the Kentucky artist, for Transylvania University. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life of Henry Bidleman Bascom, D.D., LL.D._, by M. + M. Henkle (Nashville, Tennessee, 1856); _The Transylvanian_ + (Lexington, Kentucky, June, 1910). + + +A CLERGYMAN'S VIEW OF NIAGARA + + [From _The Life of Henry Bidleman Bascom, D. D., LL. D._, by Rev. + M. M. Henkle (Nashville, Tennessee, 1856)] + +I have seen, surveyed, and communed with the whole!--and awed and +bewildered, as if enchanted before the revealment of a mystery, I +attempt to write. You ask me, in your last, for some detailed, +veritable account of the Falls, and I should be glad to gratify you; +but how shall I essay to paint a scene that so utterly baffles all +conception, and renders worse than fruitless every attempt at +description? In five minutes after my arrival, on the evening of the +fifth, I descended the winding-path from the "Pavillion," on the +Canadian side, and, for the first time in my life, saw this unequaled +cascade from "Table Rock;" the whole indescribable scene, in bold +outline, bursting on my view. I had heard and read much, and imagined +more of what was before me. I was perfectly familiar with the +often-told, the far-traveled story of what I saw; but the overpowering +_reality_ on which I was gazing, motionless as the rock on which I +stood, deprived me of recollection, annihilated all curiosity; and +with emotions of sublimity till now unfelt, and all unearthly, the +involuntary exclamation escaped me, "_God of Grandeur! what a scene!_" + +But the majesty of the sight, and the interest of the moment, how +depict them? The huge amplitude of water, tumbling in foam above, and +dashing on, arched and pillared as it glides, until it reaches the +precipice of the _chute_, and then, in one vast column, bounding with +maddening roar and rush, into the depths beneath, presents a spectacle +so unutterably appalling, that language falters; words are no longer +signs, and I despair giving you any idea of what I saw and felt. Yet +this is not all. The eye and mind necessarily take in other objects, +as parts of the grand panorama, forests, cliffs, and islands; banks, +foam, and spray; wood, rock, and precipice; dimmed with the rising fog +and mist, and obscurely gilded by the softening tints of the rainbow. +These all belong to the picture; and the effect of the whole is +immeasurably heightened by the noise of the cataract, now reminding +you of the reverberations of the heavens in a tempest, and then of the +eternal roar of ocean, when angered by the winds! + +The concave bed of rock, from which the water falls some two hundred +feet into the almost boundless reservoir beneath, is the section of a +circle, which, at first sight, from "Table Rock," presents something +like the geometrical curve of the rainbow; and the wonders of the +grand "crescent," thus advantageously thrown upon the eye in +combination, and the appropriate sensations and conceptions heightened +by the crash and boom of the waters, render the sight more +surpassingly sublime, than anything I have ever looked upon, or +conceived of. As it regards my thoughts and feelings at the time, I +can help you to no conception of their character. Overwhelming +astonishment was the only bond between thought and thought; and wild, +vague, and boundless were the associations of the hour! Before me, the +strength and fullness of the congregated "lakes of the north," were +enthroned and concentrated within a circumference embraced by a single +glance of the eye! Here I saw, rolling and dashing, at the rate of +_twenty-five hundred millions of tons per day_, nearly one half of all +the fresh water upon the surface of the globe! On the American side, I +beheld a vast deluge, nine hundred feet in breadth, with a fall of one +hundred and eighty or ninety, met, fifty feet above the level of the +gulf, by a huge projection of rock, which seems to break the descent +and continuity of the flood, only to increase its fierce and +overwhelming bound. And turning to the "crescent," I saw the mingled +rush of foam and tide, dashing with fearful strife and desperate +emulation--four hundred yards of the sheet rough and sparry, and the +remaining three hundred a deep sealike mass of living green--rolling +and heaving like a sheet of emerald. Even imagination failed me, and I +could think of nothing but ocean let loose from his bed, and seeking a +deeper gulf below! The fury of the water, at the termination of its +fall, combined with the columned strength of the cataract, and the +deafening thunder of the flood, are at once inconceivable and +indescribable. No imagination, however creative, can correspond with +the grandeur of the reality. + +I have already mentioned, and it is important that you keep it in +view, the ledge of rock, the verge of the cataract, rising like a wall +of equal height, and extending in semicircular form across the whole +bed of the river, a distance of more than two thousand feet; and the +impetuous flood, conforming to this arrangement, in making its plunge, +with mountain weight, into the great horseshoe basin beneath, exhibits +a spectacle of the sublime, in geographical scenery, without, perhaps, +a parallel in nature. As I leaned from "Table Rock," and cast my eye +downward upon the billowy turbulence of the angry depth, where the +waters were tossing and whirling, coiling and springing, with the +energy of an earthquake, and a rapidity that almost mocked my vision, +I found the scene sufficient to appal a sterner spirit than mine; and +I was glad to turn away and relieve my mind by a sight of the +surrounding scenery; bays, islands, shores, and forests, everywhere +receding in due perspective. The rainbows of the "crescent" and +American side, which are only visible from the western bank of the +Niagara, and in the afternoon, seem to diminish somewhat from the +awfulness of the scene, and to give it an aspect of rich and mellow +grandeur, not unlike the bow of promise, throwing its assuring +radiance over the retiring waters of the deluge. + + + + +JAMES T. MOREHEAD + + +James Turner Morehead, Kentucky's most scholarly governor, was born +near Shepherdsville, Kentucky, May 24, 1797. He was prepared for +Transylvania University, Lexington, and there he studied from 1813 to +1815. He studied law under John J. Crittenden and, in 1818, entered +upon the practice at Bowling Green, Kentucky. Ten years later Morehead +was in the Kentucky legislature, and he was returned for several +sessions. In 1832 he was a delegate to the Baltimore convention which +nominated Henry Clay for the presidency; and while in Baltimore he +himself was nominated for lieutenant-governor of Kentucky, with John +Breathitt for governor. They were elected in August, 1832, but the +Governor died on February 21, 1834, and Morehead succeeded to his +office on the following day. He served until September, 1836. Upon the +expiration of his term, Governor Morehead resumed the practice of law +at Frankfort. He was elected United States Senator from Kentucky, in +1841, and he served until 1847. Senator Morehead was an attractive +public speaker, and when it was known in Washington that he was to +make a speech the galleries were usually well filled. After the +expiration of his term, he practiced law at Covington, Kentucky. +Senator Morehead had the most extensive collection of books and +manuscripts upon the history of Kentucky and the West of any man of +his day and generation. After his death, which occurred at Covington, +Kentucky, December 28, 1854, his library was purchased by the Young +Men's Mercantile Library Association of Cincinnati. Morehead's +_Address in Commemoration of the First Settlement of Kentucky, at +Boonesborough_ (Frankfort, 1840, 181 pp.), rescued and preserved +numerous documents of great historical importance. In the preparation +of his great _History of the United States_, George Bancroft is said +to have relied upon this famous address of Morehead for much of his +information concerning the early history of the West. Morehead also +published _Practice and Proceedings at Law in Kentucky_ (1846). The +fine face of this scholar and statesman is one of Matthew Harris +Jouett's most luminous canvasses.[7] + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1888, v. iv); _National Cyclopaedia of American + Biography_ (New York, 1906, v. xiii). + + +JOHN FINLEY + + [From _An Address in Commemoration of the First Settlement of + Kentucky_ (Frankfort, Kentucky, 1840)] + +The first successful attempt to explore the Kentucky country was made by +John Finley, a backwoodsman of North Carolina, in 1767. He was attended +by a few companions, as adventurous as himself, whose names have escaped +the notice of history. They were evidently a party of hunters, and were +prompted to the bold and hazardous undertaking, for the purpose of +indulging in their favorite pursuits. Of Finley and his comrades, and of +the course and extent of their journey, little is now known. That they +were of the pure blood, and endowed with the genuine qualities, of the +pioneers, is manifestly undeniable. That they passed over the +Cumberland, and through the intermediate country to the Kentucky river, +and penetrated the beautiful valley of the Elkhorn, there are no +sufficient reasons to doubt. It is enough, however, to embalm their +memory in our hearts, and to connect their names with the imperishable +memorials of our early history, that they were the first adventurers +that plunged into the dark and enchanted wilderness of Kentucky--that of +all their contemporaries they saw her first--and saw her in the pride of +her virgin beauty--at the dawn of summer--in the fullness of her +vegetation--her soil, instinct with fertility, covered with the most +luxuriant verdure--the air perfumed with the fragrance of flowers, and +her tall forests looming in all their primeval magnificence. + +How long Finley lived, or where he died, the silence of history does not +enable us to know. That his remains are now mingled with the soil that +he discovered, there is some reason to hope, for he conducted Boone to +Kentucky in 1769--and there the curtain drops upon him forever. It is +fit it should be raised. It is fit that justice, late and tardy that it +be, should be done to the memory of the first of the pioneers. And what +can be more appropriate, than that the first movement should be made for +the performance of such a duty, on the day of the commemoration of the +discovery and settlement of the Commonwealth? + +FOOTNOTE: + +[7] Governor Morehead's widow, Mrs. L. M. Morehead, who died several +years ago, published a slender volume of verse, _Christmas Is Coming +and Other Poems for the "House Mother" and her Darlings_ +(Philadelphia, 1871). + + + + +LEWIS COLLINS + + +Lewis Collins, the Kentucky historian, was born near Lexington, +Kentucky, on Christmas Day, 1797. When a boy he entered the printing +office of Joel R. Lyle, editor of _The Paris Citizen_, where he worked +for more than a year as a printer. He removed to Mason county, +Kentucky, to become associate editor of the _Washington Union_. On +November 1, 1820, Lewis Collins purchased the _Maysville Eagle_, which +had been established six years prior to his purchase, and he made it +one of the best country newspapers ever published in Kentucky. In 1823 +he was married to a sister of Benjamin O. Peers, afterwards president +of Transylvania University. Collins was editor of the _Eagle_ for +twenty-seven years, when he retired in order to give his entire +attention to his _Historical Sketches of Kentucky_ (Maysville, 1847). +This was the first illustrated history of Kentucky, and easily the +most comprehensive that had appeared. The histories of Marshall and +Butler began at the beginning, but both concluded with the year of +1812, while Collins brought his work down to 1844. His was a mine of +historic lore, arranged in departments, and not altogether readable as +a continuous narrative. It was the foundation upon which his son, +Richard H. Collins, was later to build the most magnificent state +history ever published. Lewis Collins was presiding judge of the Mason +county court from 1851 to 1854. He was a just judge, a painstaking +chronicler of his people's past, and a fine type of Christian citizen. +Judge Collins died at Lexington, Kentucky, January 29, 1870. The +Kentucky legislature passed an appropriate resolution in which his +life was commended and his death deplored. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by Z. F. Smith (Louisville, + Kentucky, 1892); _Kentucky in the Nation's History_, by R. M. + McElroy (New York, 1909). + + +PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION + + [From _Historical Sketches of Kentucky_ (Maysville and Cincinnati, + 1847)] + +The late H. P. Peers, of the city of Maysville, laid the foundation +for the work which is now presented to the reading community. Mr. +Peers designed it to be simply a small _Gazetteer_ of the State; and +had collected, and partially arranged for publication, the major part +of the materials, comprising a description of the towns and counties. +Upon his decease, the materials passed into the hands of the Author, +who determined to remodel them, and make such additions as would give +permanency and increased value to the work. He has devoted much labor +to this object; but circumstances having rendered its publication +necessary at an earlier day than was contemplated, some errors may +have escaped, which more time, and a fuller investigation, would have +enabled him to detect. + +Serious obstacles have been encountered in the preparation of the +Biographical Sketches. Many of those which appear in the work, were +prepared from the personal recollections of the Author; while others +have been omitted because he did not know to whom he could apply for +them, or having applied, and in some instances repeatedly, failed in +procuring them. This is his apology for the non-appearance of many +names in that department which are entitled to a distinguished place +in the annals of Kentucky. + +In the preparation of the work, one design of the Author has been to +preserve, in a durable form, those rich fragments of local and +personal history, many of which exist, at present, only in the +ephemeral form of oral tradition, or are treasured up among the +recollections of the aged actors in the stirring scenes, the memory of +which is thus perpetuated. These venerable witnesses from a former +age, are rapidly passing away from our midst, and with them will be +buried the knowledge of much that is most interesting in the primitive +history of the commonwealth. It is from sources such as we have +mentioned, that the materials for the future historian are to be +drawn; and, like the scattered leaves of the Sybil, these frail +mementos of the past should be gathered up and preserved with +religious veneration. If the Author shall have succeeded, in thus +redeeming from oblivion any considerable or important portion of the +early history of the State, his design will be fully accomplished, and +his labor amply rewarded. + +Of all the members of this great republican confederacy, there is none +whose history is more rich in the variety, quality, and interest of +its materials. The poet, the warrior, and the statesman, can each find +subjects, the contemplation of which will instruct him in his art; and +to the general reader, it would, perhaps, be impossible to present a +field of more varied and attractive interest. + + + + +JULIA A. TEVIS + + +Mrs. Julia Ann (Hieronymous) Tevis, author of a delightful +autobiography, was born near Winchester, Kentucky, December 5, 1799. +When but seven years old her parents removed to Virginia, settling at +Winchester, and at the female academy of the town her education was +begun. In 1813 Miss Hieronymous's family removed to Georgetown, D. C., +where her education was continued under private teachers--"a +considerable portion of my time was devoted to music, drawing, and +French, with various kinds of embroidery." Two years later she was +placed in the finishing school of an English woman in Washington where +French and music continued to be her major subjects. Miss Hieronymous +completed her training at the school of Mrs. Stone in Washington when +nineteen years of age, and returned to her home to read and study. She +spent many hours at the Capital meeting and hearing most of the famous +men of her time. At the age of twenty years she became a school-ma'am at +Wytheville, Virginia, and the following sixty years of her life were +devoted to teaching. She later taught at Abingdon, Virginia, where she +united with the Methodist church, and where she was married on March 9, +1824, to Rev. John Tevis (1792-1861), a Kentucky Methodist preacher. +Mrs. Tevis desired to continue teaching, and upon her removal to her +husband's home at Shelbyville, Kentucky, she opened Science Hill +Academy. This famous old institution for the instruction of young +women--founded March 25, 1825, and the second Protestant female academy +established in the Mississippi Valley--has continued without +interruption until the present time. The remaining years of the +founder's life were filled with the school, her girls, her children, her +cares and perplexities. In 1875 the semi-centennial of the founding of +Science Hill was celebrated in a fitting manner. Some time later Mrs. +Tevis closed the manuscripts of her autobiography, entitled _Sixty Years +in a School-Room_ (Cincinnati, 1878), a large work of nearly five +hundred pages, in which the details of her splendid service are ably set +forth. Mrs. Tevis died at Shelbyville, Kentucky, April 21, 1880. Her +pupils erected a fitting monument to her memory. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. The chief authority for the facts of Mrs. Tevis's life + is, of course, her autobiography; Annual Catalogues of Science Hill. + + +THE MAY QUEEN + + [From _Sixty Years in a School-Room_ (Cincinnati, 1878)] + +For many years we kept up the custom of crowning a "Rose Queen" in +May, and enjoying a holiday in the woods. Happily for the girls, I +greeted the return of the festival day with a gladness almost equal to +theirs, for I retained enough of the freshness of youth in my heart to +enable me to participate with zest in the joys of childhood. + +"Once upon a time," after a long severe Winter, followed by a Spring +of unusual beauty, it was determined to celebrate the day with great +rejoicings. The girls were wild with delight at the prospect of a +whole day's release from slates, books, and blackboards--a charming +episode in the drudgery of their everyday life. Ah, happy children! to +whom every glimpse of nature is beautiful, and every blade of grass a +marvel! Give them ever so small a bit of green meadow checkered with +sunshine and shade upon which to revel among buttercups and daisies, +and "little they'll reck" how the world goes on. + +There was but little opportunity for canvassing or intrigue in the +election of Queen. Fanny Henning was chosen by acclamation as best +fitted to grace the regal authority. Fanny possessed a mind and a +character as transparent as a clear brook. Her ingenuous face, her +self-forgetting and amiable bearing towards her companions made her the +loved and cherished of them all. She also held a distinguished place in +the estimation of her teachers for superior excellence, dutiful +affection, and modest deportment. Thus it was universally conceded that +"Fair-handed Spring" might well resign to Fanny her sovereignty for one +day over the brilliant treasures of garden, glade, and forest, awakened +into life and brightened into beauty by her magic wand. + +The rosy hours followed each other in quick succession until within a +few days of the anticipated time, when lo! the "queen elect" broke out +with measles. The whole school was filled with dismay, bitter tears of +disappointment were shed by some; others predicted that she would be +well enough to go through the ceremony. Fanny, uniting in their +hopeful aspirations, prepared her coronation speech and rehearsed it +to perfection, for, though confined to her room, she was not really +ill. On the eve of the appointed day, however, the doctor pronounced +her too feeble to endure the fatigue. What was to be done? The +trophies of many loyal hearts were ready to be laid at the feet of the +queen. Spirit hands seemed dispensing blessings, and guardian angels +extending their wings over these healthful, happy girls as they +diligently wrought sparkling wreaths and arranged beautiful bouquets. + +The banners were prepared, the white dresses were trimmed with +evergreen. The Seasons, the maids of honor, and all the officials were +in waiting, but "_Hamlet_" could not be left out of the play. One +modest little girl, after listening in silence to the suggestions of +the others, raised her eyes to my face and said hesitatingly: + +"Can't Emma Maxwell be queen in Fanny's place?" + +"Oh, no!" said another; "she could not possibly learn the speech in +time." + +"No, indeed!" exclaimed several voices at once, "that would be +impossible; but she might read it." + +"Yes, yes! let her read it; the queen's speeches are read in +Parliament!" + +"Will you accept the proposition?" said I, turning to Emma. + +"I think I can learn it," she replied, "and will try if you wish it." + +The coronation was to take place the next morning at ten o'clock. A +previous rehearsal would be impossible; but what Emma proudly +determined to do was generously accomplished. + +The evening star looked out bright and clear in the blue deep, +thrilling the hearts of these young girls with the prospect of a +pleasant morrow. + +Most of them were stirring before sunrise. "Is it clear?" "Are we +going?" And from every room issued the sound of cheerful voices; and +then such shouts, such hurrying and bathing and dressing as was seldom +known before. + +Ten o'clock came, and the yard, where the temporary throne was +erected, was soon filled with spectators and invited guests, mingling +with the children and participating in their pleasure. The proxy queen +bore her blushing honors meekly, going through all the coronation +ceremonies with a charming dignity. She stood Calypso-like among her +train of attendants in full view of the audience who listened in +breathless silence to her address. I watched her closely; she seemed +to plant her feet firmly, as if to still the beatings of her heart; no +gesture except a gentle motion of the right arm as she swayed her +scepter majestically around, her eyes steadily fixed upon some object +beyond, with which she seemed completely absorbed. Not a word was +misplaced, not a sentence omitted, of a speech long enough for a +Parliamentary harangue. No one prompted, nor did she once turn her +eyes toward the scroll she held in her left hand. Enthusiastic and +excessive were the rejoicings of her juvenile auditors. + +Fanny witnessed the whole ceremony through a convenient window which +framed for her a living picture of ineffable beauty, and on this clear +day, with only a few white Spring clouds floating over the bluest of +skies, it was a sight of earth that makes one understand heaven. + +The Seasons followed in quick succession, proffering homage to the +queen; then came the "rosy Hours" with their sweet-toned voices, and +the ceremony was completed by a few words from "Fashion and Modesty," +the latter gently pushing the former aside, and casting a veil over +the burning blushes of the queen. The address being finished, queen +and attendants walked in procession to a grove that skirted the town, +where beauty filled the eye, and singing birds warbled sweet music. +When tired of play, a more substantial entertainment was provided. +Group after group spread the white cloth on the soft green turf, and +surrounded the plentiful repast, gratefully acknowledging the Hand +that supplies our wants from day to day. He who called our attention +to the "lilies of the field," stamps a warrant of sacredness upon our +rejoicings, in all that he has made. + +There was something very remarkable in the quickness and facility with +which Emma Maxwell memorized the queen's speech. She was a girl of +more than ordinary vivacity, of a highly imaginative, impressionable +nature, and seemed to have the gift of bewitching all who knew her. +She occupied a commanding position in her class as a good reciter, but +I had not hitherto noticed any great facility in memorizing. I called +her the next day, and asked her to recite the piece to me alone. She +stared rather vacantly at me, and said: + +"I can not remember a sentence of it." + +"What! when you repeated it with so much facility yesterday! explain +yourself." + +"I do not know how it is," she replied, "that though I can learn with +the utmost precision, mechanically, whatever I choose, in a short +time, yet under such circumstances my memory has not the power of +retention. If my train of repetition had been interrupted for one +moment yesterday, I should have failed utterly." + +"What were you looking at so intently the whole time?" + +"I was looking at certain objects about the yard and house in +connection with which I had studied the speech the evening before." + +"Yes; but you certainly can repeat some portion of it to me?" + +"Not one sentence connectedly; it has all passed from my mind like a +shadow on the wall." + +Yet she was a girl of good judgment, read much, talked well, and +possessed in an eminent degree the indispensable requisite of a good +memory--power of attention. + + + + +ROBERT J. BRECKINRIDGE + + +Robert Jefferson Breckinridge, LL.D., one of Kentucky's most prolific +writers for the public prints, was born at Cabell's Dale, near +Lexington, Kentucky, March 8, 1800. He was the son of John +Breckinridge, President Jefferson's Attorney-General. He studied at +Princeton and Yale, and was graduated from Union College in 1819. +Breckinridge then read law and was admitted to the Lexington, +Kentucky, bar in 1823. He practiced law for eight years, during part +of which time he was a member of the Kentucky legislature. Realizing +that Kentucky would oppose the emancipation of the slaves, in which he +heartily believed, Breckinridge decided to quit the law and politics +for the church. He studied theology and became pastor of the Second +Presbyterian church in Baltimore, which pastorate he held for thirteen +years. In 1845 Dr. Breckinridge was elected president of Jefferson +College (now Washington and Jefferson College), at Washington, +Pennsylvania, but two years later he resigned the presidency of the +college in order to accept the pastorate of the First Presbyterian +church of Lexington, Kentucky. In 1848 Dr. Breckinridge was elected +superintendent of public instruction of Kentucky; and in 1853 he +became professor of theology in the Danville Theological Seminary, +which position he held until his death. He was chairman of the +Baltimore national convention of 1864 which nominated Abraham Lincoln +for the presidency. Dr. Breckinridge's writings include _Travels in +France, Germany_, etc. (Philadelphia, 1839); _Popery in the XIX. +Century in the United States_ (1841); _Memoranda of Foreign Travel_ +(Baltimore, 1845); _The Internal Evidence of Christianity_ (1852); +_The Knowledge of God Objectively Considered_ (New York, 1858); and +_The Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered_ (New York, 1859). These +two last named works, of enormous proportions, are Dr. Breckinridge's +greatest theological and literary productions. He also published +_Kentucky School Reports_ (1848-1853). While a resident of Baltimore +he was one of the editors of _The Literary and Religious Magazine_, +and of its successor, _The Spirit of the Nineteenth Century_, in both +of which publications he carried on many bitter and never-ending +discussions with the Roman Catholics concerning theological and +historical questions. He was also editor of _The Danville Quarterly +Review_ for several years. A complete collection of Dr. Breckinridge's +books, debates, articles, and pamphlets, upon slavery, temperance, +Popery, Universalism, Presbyterianism, education, agriculture, and +politics, would form a five-foot shelf of books. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1887, v. i). + + +SANCTIFICATION + + [From _The Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered_ (New York, + 1859)] + +The completeness of the Plan of Salvation seems to be absolute. The +adaptedness of all its parts to each other, and to their own special +end--and the adaptedness of the whole and of every part, to the great +end of all, the eradication of sin and misery; exhibits a subject, the +greatest, the most intricate, and the most remote of all in a manner so +precise and clear; that the sacred Scriptures, even if they had no grace +and no mercy to offer to us personally, might justly challenge the very +highest place as the most stupendous monument of sublime and successful +thought. What then ought we to think of them, when all this glorious +intelligence is merely tributary to our salvation? The end of this +infinite completeness, only to pour into our polluted and thoughtless +hearts, inexhaustible supplies of grace--that we may be extricated from +a condition utterly hopeless without that grace ... and be brought to a +condition unspeakably blessed to us and glorious to God? Yet this is the +overwhelming conclusion to which every just consideration of them +forces us to come; the conclusion to which the imperfect disclosure +which has now been attempted, of a single point in this divine system, +wholly compels us. In this deep conviction, therefore, and as the +conclusion of all that has now been advanced, I venture to define, that +Sanctification is a benefit of the Covenant of Redemption--being a work +of grace, on the part of the triune God, wherein the elect who have been +Effectually Called, Regenerated, Justified, and Adopted, are, through +the virtue of the death and resurrection of Christ, by the indwelling of +the Word and Spirit, through the use of the divine ordinances, and by +the power of God with them, enabled more and more to die unto sin, to be +renewed in the spirit of their mind, and to live unto righteousness, in +an increasing conformity to the image of God, to his great Glory, and +their growth in holiness. + + + + +CAROLINE L. HENTZ + + +Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz, novelist, was born at Lancaster, +Massachusetts, June 1, 1800. When twenty-four years of age she was +married to N. M. Hentz, a Frenchman, then associated with George +Bancroft in conducting the Round Hill School at Northampton, +Massachusetts. Two years after her marriage her husband was elected to +the chair of modern languages in the University of North Carolina, and +this position he held until 1830, when he removed to Covington, +Kentucky, where he and his wife conducted a private school. Covington +was the birthplace of Mrs. Hentz's first literary work. The directors +of the Arch Street theatre, Philadelphia, had offered a prize of five +hundred dollars for the best original tragedy founded on the conquest +of the Moors in Spain, and Mrs. Hentz submitted _De Lara, or, the +Moorish Bride_, which was awarded first place, but the prize was never +paid the author. _De Lara_ was later published and successfully +produced on the stage. This encouraged Mrs. Hentz to write another +tragedy, entitled _Lamorah, or, the Western Wild_, a tragedy of Indian +life, which was staged in Cincinnati and published at Columbus, +Georgia. Her _Constance of Werdenberg_ was written at Covington. After +two years at Covington, Mrs. Hentz crossed the Ohio river and opened a +school at Cincinnati. Her novel, _Lovell's Folly_, was written there. +In 1834 she removed to Alabama, and this State was her home for the +subsequent fourteen years. Her first widely successful novel, _Aunt +Patty's Scrap-Bag_ (Philadelphia, 1846) was followed by her generally +accepted masterpiece, _Linda, or, the Young Pilot of the Belle Creole_ +(1850). Now came in rapid succession her other works: _Rena, or, the +Snow Bird_ (1851); _Marcus Warland_ (1852); _Eoline_; _Wild Jack_; +_Helen and Arthur_; _Ugly Effie_; _The Planter's Northern Bride_ +(1854); _Love after Marriage_ (1854); _The Banished Son; Robert +Graham_ (1856); and _Ernest Lynwood_ (1856), her last book and by some +critics regarded as her best. Mrs. Hentz began her literary work in +Kentucky, as indicated above, and, though the claim of Kentucky is +rather slender upon her it is, nevertheless, legitimate. She died at +Marianna, Florida, February 11, 1856. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1888, v. iii); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, + Georgia, 1909, v. vi). + + +BESIDE THE LONG MOSS SPRING + + [From _Marcus Warland_ (1852)] + +Marcus sat beside the Long Moss Spring, the morning sun-beams glancing +through the broad leaves of the magnolia and the brilliant foliage of +the holly, and playing on his golden hair. He held in his hand a +fishing-rod, whose long line floated on the water; and though his eye +was fixed on the buoyant cork, there was no hope or excitement in its +gaze. His face was pale and wore a severe expression, very different +from the usual joyousness and thoughtlessness of childhood. Even when +the silvery trout and shining perch, lured by the bait, hung +quivering on the hook, and were thrown, fluttering like wounded birds +through the air, to fall panting, then pulseless, at his side, he +showed no consciousness of success, no elation at the number of his +scaly victims. Tears, even, large and slowly gathering tears, rolled +gradually and reluctantly down his fair oval cheeks; they were not +like the sudden, drenching shower, that leaves the air purer and the +sky bluer, but the drops that issue from the wounded bark formed of +the life-blood of the tree. + +Beautiful was the spot where the boy sat, and beautiful the vernal +morning that awakened Nature to the joy and the beauty of youth. The +fountain, over whose basin he was leaning, was one of those clear, +deep, pellucid springs, that gush up in the green wilds of southern +Georgia, forming a feature of such exquisite loveliness in the +landscape, that the traveler pauses on the margin, feeling as if he +had found one of those enchanted springs of which we read in fairy +land, whose waters are too bright, too pure, too serene for earth. + +The stone which formed the basin of the fountain was smooth and +calcareous, hollowed out by the friction of the waters, and gleaming +white and cold through their diaphanous drapery. In the centre of this +basin, where the spring gushed in all its depth and strength, it was +so dark it looked like an opaque body, impervious to the eye, whence +it flowed over the edge of its rocky receptacle in a full, rejoicing +current, sweeping over its mossy bed, and bearing its sounding tribute +to the Chattahoochee, "rolling rapidly." The mossy bed to which we +have alluded was not the verdant velvet that covers with a short, +curling nap the ancient rock and the gray old tree, but long, slender, +emerald-green plumes, waving under the water, and assuming through its +mirror a tinge of deep and irradiant blue. Nothing can be imagined +more rich and graceful than this carpet for the fountain's silvery +tread, and which seems to bend beneath it, as the light spray rustling +in the breeze. The golden water-lily gleamed up through the crystal, +and floated along the margin on its long and undulating stems. + + + + +JOHN P. DURBIN + + +John Price Durbin, Seventh President of Dickinson College, was born +near Paris, Kentucky, October 10, 1800. He was apprenticed to a +cabinet-maker in Paris, and the meager wages he received were invested +in books. In 1819 Durbin became a Methodist circuit-rider. He +afterwards studied at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, and was +graduated from Cincinnati College in 1825. In the fall of that year he +became professor of languages in Augusta College, Augusta, Kentucky, +and he occupied the chair until 1831, when he was elected chaplain of +the United States Senate. In the next year Dr. Durbin was elected +professor of natural sciences in Wesleyan University, Middletown, +Connecticut, He remained at Wesleyan but one year, when he was chosen +editor of the New York _Christian Advocate and Journal_. In 1834 +Editor Durbin became President Durbin of Dickinson College, Carlisle, +Pennsylvania. He is regarded as the greatest head the college has ever +known. During vacations Dr. Durbin traveled extensively in Europe and +the Orient, and these journeys are best preserved in his books. In the +1844 General Conference of the Methodist church he was in the thickest +of the great fight over the slavery question; and in the following +year he resigned as president of Dickinson, after more than ten years +of distinguished success in the management of the ancient college. He +now returned to the active pastorate, taking charge of the Union +Methodist church in Philadelphia. From 1850 to 1872 Dr. Durbin was +secretary of the Methodist Missionary Society, in the interest of +which he visited Europe in 1867. He raised many millions of dollars +for foreign missions while he was in charge of the society. He was the +founder of foreign missions in Bulgaria. Dr. Durbin was an eloquent +and persuasive preacher, an able administrator, and during the latter +years of his life he wielded a wonderful influence in the Methodist +church. He died at New York City, October 17, 1876. His works include +_Observations in Europe_ (New York, 1844, 2 vols.); _Observations in +Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Asia Minor_ (New York, 1845, 2 vols.); +and he edited the American edition of Wood's _Mosaic History of the +Creation_ (New York, 1831). Dr. Durbin was a rather prolific +contributor to religious and secular periodicals. His _Observations in +Europe_ is the best literary work he did. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1888, v. ii). + + +IMPRESSIONS OF LONDON + + [From _Observations in Europe_ (New York, 1844, v. ii)] + +The first impression of London is usually wonder at its _immensity_. I +received this impression in its full force, as the reader will have +already perceived, in coming up the Thames. Nor did it diminish in the +course of my rambles through the great metropolis, subsequently. When +the stranger first leaves the river, and plunges into the thronged +streets, he absolutely becomes dizzy in the whirl of busy life around +him. Men sweep by him in _masses_; at times the way seems wedged with +them: wagons, carts, omnibuses, hacks, and coaches block up the avenues, +and make it quite an enterprise to cross them. Every day my amazement +increased at the extent, the activity, the wealth of London. The +impression was totally different from that of Paris. The French capital +strikes you as the seat of human enjoyment. You find the art of life, so +far as mere physical good is concerned, in perfection there. No wish +need be ungratified. Your taste may be gratified with the finest music, +the most fascinating spectacles, the most splendid works of art in the +world. You may eat and drink when and where you please; in half an hour, +almost any delicacy that earth has produced or art invented is set +before you. You may spend days and weeks in visiting her museums, her +hospitals, her gardens, her cemeteries, her libraries, her palaces, and +yet remain unsatisfied. In London everything is different. Men are +active, but it is in pursuit of wealth. In general they do not seem to +enjoy life. The arts are cultivated to a small extent by a small class +of society; the mass seem hardly to know that arts exist. No splendid +collections are open, without fee or reward, to the public, or to you. +You can purchase gratification, but of a lower order than in Paris, and +at a higher price. Except a few _lions_--the Docks, the Tunnel, +Westminster Abbey, _&c._--nearly everything that the city has to show to +a stranger can be seen as you ride along the streets. When you leave +Paris you have just begun to enjoy it, and desire to return again; you +leave London convinced, indeed, of its vastness and wealth, but tired of +gazing at dingy buildings and thronged streets, and are satisfied +without another visit. Such, at least, were my own impressions. Apart +from private friendships and professional interests, I have no care to +see London again. + + + + +FORTUNATUS COSBY, Jr. + + +Fortunatus Cosby, Junior, poet and editor, the son of a distinguished +lawyer, was born near Louisville, Kentucky, May 2, 1801. He was +educated at Yale and Transylvania, then studied law, but, like so many +literary men have done, never practiced. Cosby was a passionate lover +of books, and most of his life was spent among his collection. He was +wealthy and well able to indulge his taste to any extreme. His +kinsman, President Thomas Jefferson, offered to make him secretary of +the legation at London, but he declined. Cosby was some years later +superintendent of the Philadelphia public schools, and a contributor +to _Graham's Magazine_, as well as to other high-class periodicals. In +1846 he was editor of the Louisville _Examiner_, the first Kentucky +paper devoted to emancipation of the slaves. In 1860 Cosby was +appointed consul to Geneva, and the next eight years of his life were +devoted to his diplomatic duties and to traveling. He returned to the +United States in 1868, and to his old home near Louisville. There +death found him in June, 1871. Several of his friends, which included +William Cullen Bryant, Rufus W. Griswold, and George D. Prentice, +often urged Cosby to collect his verse and bring it together in a +volume, but he was "too careless of his fame to do it;" and "many +waifs he from time to time contributed to the periodicals," are now +lost to the general public. He is, of course, well represented in all +of the anthologies of American poetry, but a collection of his +writings should be made. Cosby's best work is to be seen in his +_Fireside Fancies_, _Ode to the Mocking Bird_, _The Traveler in the +Desert_, and _A Dream of Long Ago_. He has often been pronounced the +best song writer this country has produced; and that he was a man of +fine culture, an ardent lover of books and Nature, and a maker of +charming and exquisite verse can be readily proved. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860); _Blades o' Bluegrass_, by + Fannie P. Dickey (Louisville, Kentucky, 1892). + + +FIRESIDE FANCIES + + [From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)] + + By the dim and fitful firelight + Musing all alone, + Memories of old companions + Dead, or strangers grown;-- + Books that we have read together, + Rambles in sweet summer weather, + Thoughts released from earthly tether-- + Fancy made my own. + + In my cushioned arm-chair sitting + Far into the night, + Sleep, with leaden wings extinguished + All the flickering light; + But, the thoughts that soothed me waking, + Care, and grief, and pain forsaking, + Still the self-same path were taking-- + Pilgrims, still in sight. + + Indistinct and shadowy phantoms + Of the sacred dead, + Absent faces bending fondly + O'er my drooping head, + In my dreams were woven quaintly, + Dim at first, but calm and saintly, + As the stars that glimmer faintly + From their misty bed. + + Presently a lustrous brightness + Eye could scarce behold, + Gave to my enchanted vision + Looks no longer cold, + Features that no clouds encumber, + Forms refreshed by sweetest slumber, + And, of all that blessed number, + Only one was old. + + Graceful were they as the willow + By the zephyr stirred! + Bright as childhood when expecting + An approving word! + Fair as when from earth they faded, + Ere the burnished brow was shaded, + Or, the hair with silver braided, + Or lament was heard. + + Roundabout in silence moving + Slowly to and fro-- + Life-like as I knew and loved them + In their spring-time glow;-- + Beaming with a loving luster, + Close, and closer still they cluster + Round my chair that radiant muster, + Just as long ago. + + Once, the aged, breathing comfort + O'er my fainting cheek, + Whispered words of precious meaning + Only she could speak; + Scarce could I my rapture smother, + For I knew it was my mother, + And to me there was no other + Saint-like and so meek! + + Then the pent-up fount of feeling + Stirred its inmost deep-- + Brimming o'er its frozen surface + From its guarded keep, + On my heart its drops descending, + And for one glad moment lending + Dreams of Joy's ecstatic blending, + Blessed my charmed sleep. + + Bright and brighter grew the vision + With each gathering tear, + Till the past was all before me + In its radiance clear; + And again we read at even-- + Hoped, beneath the summer heaven, + Hopes that had no bitter leaven, + No disturbing fear. + + All so real seemed each presence, + That one word I spoke-- + Only one of old endearment + That dead silence broke. + But the angels who were keeping + Stillest watch while I was sleeping, + Left me o'er the embers weeping-- + Fled when I awoke. + + But, as ivy clings the greenest + On abandoned walls; + And as echo lingers sweetest + In deserted halls:-- + Thus, the sunlight that we borrow + From the past to gild our sorrow, + On the dark and dreaded morrow + Like a blessing falls. + + + + +THOMAS F. MARSHALL + + +Thomas Francis Marshall, the famous Kentucky orator and advocate, was +born at Frankfort, Kentucky, June 7, 1801. He was the son of Dr. Louis +Marshall, a brother of the great chief justice, and sometime president +of Washington College (Washington and Lee University). "Tom" Marshall, +to give him the name by which he was known throughout the South and +West, was educated by private tutors, studied law under John J. +Crittenden, and began the practice at Versailles, Kentucky. From 1832 to +1836 he was a member of the Kentucky legislature, and his speeches in +that body, as well as in other places, brought him a great reputation as +a brilliant and witty orator. The habit of drink was fastening itself +upon him, however, and this retarded his progress in the world. Marshall +was elected to Congress from the old Ashland district in 1840, and in +that body he always bitterly opposed most measures proposed by Henry +Clay, whom he afterwards eloquently eulogized. In 1841 his distinguished +friend, Richard H. Menefee, the Kentucky orator, died, and Marshall +delivered his celebrated eulogy upon him. This address, given before the +Law Society of Transylvania University, was the greatest effort of his +life. It has been pronounced the finest speech of its character yet +made in America. Marshall served in the Mexican War with no great degree +of gallantry; and in 1850 he opposed the third Kentucky Constitution, +then in the making, through a paper which he edited and called the _Old +Guard_. "Tom" Marshall joined many temperance societies, and delivered +many temperance speeches, but he always violated his pledge and returned +to the old paths of drink. He was the great wit of his day and +generation in Kentucky, if not, indeed, in the whole country. His +stories are related to-day by persons who think them of recent origin. +Marshall was counsel in many noted trials in the South and West, and his +arguments to the jury were logical and eloquent. His speech in the +famous Matt. Ward trial is, perhaps, his master effort before a jury. In +1856 Marshall removed to Chicago, but he shortly afterwards returned to +Kentucky. In 1858-1859 he delivered lectures upon historical subjects in +various cities of the United States. The Civil War failed to interest +him at all, but he was broken in health at the time, and preparing +himself for the long journey which was fast pressing upon him. "Tom" +Marshall died near Versailles, Kentucky, September 22, 1864. To-day he +sleeps amid a clump of trees in a Blue Grass meadow near the little town +of his triumphs and of his failures--Versailles. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Speeches and Writings of Thomas F. Marshall_, + edited by W. L. Barre (Cincinnati, 1858); _Thomas F. Marshall_, by + Charles Fennell (_The Green Bag_, Boston, July, 1907). + + +TEMPERANCE: AN ADDRESS + + [From _Speeches and Writings of Hon. Thomas F. Marshall_, edited + by W. L. Barre (Cincinnati, 1858)] + +Mr. President, we of the "Total Abstinence and Vigilance Society," in +our meetings at the other end of the city [Washington] are so much in +the habit of "telling experiences," that I myself have somewhat fallen +into it, and am guilty occasionally of the egotism of making some small +confessions (as small as I can possibly make them). Mine, then, sir, was +a different case. I had earned a most unenviable notoriety by excesses +which, though bad enough, did not half reach the reputation they won for +me. I never was an habitual drunkard. I was one of your spreeing gentry. +My sprees, however, began to crowd each other and my best friends feared +that they would soon run together. Perhaps my long intervals of entire +abstinence--perhaps something peculiar in my form, constitution, or +complexion--may have prevented the physical indications, so usual, of +that terrible disease, which, till temperance societies arose, was +deemed incurable and resistless. Perhaps I had nourished the vanity to +believe that nature had endowed me with a versatility which enabled me +to throw down and take up at pleasure any pursuit, and I chose to sport +with the gift. If so, I was brought to the very verge of a fearful +punishment. Physicians tell us that intemperance at last becomes, of +itself, not a habit voluntarily indulged, but a disease which its victim +cannot resist. I had not become fully the subject of that fiendish +thirst, that horrible yearning after the distillation "from the alembick +of hell," which is said to scorch in the throat, and consume the vitals +of the confirmed drunkard, with fires kindled for eternity. I did become +alarmed, and for the first time, no matter from what cause, lest the +demon's fangs were fastening upon me, and I was approaching that line +which separates the man who frolics, and can quit, from the lost +inebriate, whose appetite is disease, and whose will is dead. I joined +the society on my own account, and felt that I must encounter the title +of "reformed drunkard," annoying enough to me, I assure you. I judged, +from the cruel publicity given through the press to my frolics, what I +had to bear and brave. But I did brave it all; and I would have dared +anything to break the chain which I at last discovered was riveting my +soul, to unclasp the folds of that serpent-habit whose full embrace is +death. Letters from people I never had heard of, newspaper paragraphs +from Boston to New Orleans were mailed, and are still mailing to me, by +which I am very distinctly, and in the most friendly and agreeable +manner, apprised that I enjoyed all over the delectable reputation of a +sot, with one foot in the grave, and understanding almost totally +overthrown. I doubt not, sir, that the societies who have invited me to +address them at different places in the Union, will expect to find me +with an unhealed carbuncle on my nose, and my body of the graceful and +manly shape and proportion of a demijohn. I have dared all these +annoyances, all this celebrity. I have not shrunk from being a text for +temperance preachers, and a case for the outpouring of the sympathies of +people who have more philanthropy than politeness, more temperance than +taste. I signed the pledge on my own account, sir, and my heart leaped +to find that I was free. The chain has fallen from my freeborn limbs; +not a link or fragment remains to tell I ever wore the badge of +servitude. + + + + +JEFFERSON J. POLK + + +Jefferson J. Polk, an eccentric clergyman, physician, and writer, was +born near Georgetown, Kentucky, March 10, 1802. He spent his young +manhood as a printer on the _Georgetown Patriot_, and the _Kentucky +Gazette_. In 1822 Polk joined the Lexington Temperance Society, and he +continued steadfast in the cause until his death. He subsequently +united with the Methodist church of Lexington, and married; but he +continued to work as a journeyman-printer until 1826, when he removed +to Danville, Kentucky, where he purchased and became editor of _The +Olive Branch_, a weekly newspaper. This he conducted for several +years, when he disposed of it in order to become an agent for the +American Colonization Society. Polk held that emancipation with +colonization in Liberia or elsewhere was the only proper and just +solution of the slavery question. The awful Asiatic cholera reached +Danville in 1833--as it did nearly a dozen other Kentucky towns--and +Polk played his part in the battle which was waged against it. A short +time later he became a Methodist circuit-rider, but, in 1839, he went +to Lexington to study medicine at Transylvania Medical School. In the +following year Dr. Polk removed to Perryville, Kentucky, some miles +from Danville, and this was his future home. Here he practiced +medicine and preached the Gospel for the next twenty years. In 1860 he +supported John Bell of Tennessee for president, but, when Lincoln was +elected, he became a strong Union man. The battle of Perryville +(October 8, 1862), the greatest battle ever fought upon Kentucky soil, +was waged before the good doctor's very door. He converted his house +into a hospital, and himself acted as surgeon of a field hospital. +After the war he was postmaster of Perryville and claim agent for +Union soldiers. At the age of sixty-five years, this eccentric old man +published one of the literary curiosities of Kentucky literature, yet +withal a work of real interest and much first-hand information. The +little volume was entitled _Autobiography of Dr. J. J. Polk, to which +is added his occasional writings and biographies of worthy men and +women of Boyle County, Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1867). From the +frontispiece portrait the author looks fiercely out at the reader, a +real son of thunder. Besides the autobiography of Dr. Polk the volume +contains sketches of men, women, and places, fables, proverbs, +sermons, woman's rights, a ghost story, "love powders," reflections of +an old man, biographies of a group of the doctor's parishioners--all +crowded into the 254 pages of this book. Dr. Polk died at Perryville, +Kentucky, May 23, 1881. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. The chief authority for the facts of Dr. Polk's life + is, of course, his _Autobiography_; _History of Kentucky_, by R. + H. Collins (Covington, Kentucky, 1882). + + +THE BATTLE OF THE BOARDS + + [From _Autobiography of Dr. J. J. Polk_ (Louisville, Kentucky, + 1867)] + +In the early settlement of Kentucky, when the Indians still roved +through our dense forests, plundering and murdering the white +inhabitants, three men left Harrod's Station to search for their +horses that had strayed off. They pursued their trail through the rich +pea-vine and cane, that everywhere abounded, for many miles. +Frequently on their route they saw signs that a party of Indians were +in their vicinity, hence they took every step cautiously. Thus they +traveled all day. Toward night they were many miles from home, but +they continued their search until darkness and a cold rain that began +to fall drove them to take shelter in an old deserted log cabin, +thickly surrounded by cane and matted over with grape-vines. After +they had gained this pleasant retreat they held a consultation, and +agreed not to strike a fire, as the Indians, if any in the +neighborhood, knew the location of the cabin, and, like themselves, +might take shelter in it, and murder or expel the white intruders. +Finally, the three now in possession, concluded to ascend into the +loft of the cabin, the floor of which was clap-boards, resting upon +round poles. In their novel position they lay down quietly side by +side, each man holding his trusty rifle in his arms. Thus arranged, +they awaited the results of the night. + +They had not been in their perilous position long when six well-armed +Indians entered the cabin, placed their guns and other implements of +warfare in one corner of the house, struck a light, and began to make +the usual demonstrations of joy on such occasions. One of our heroes +wished to know the number of the Indians--he was the middle man of the +three, and was lying on his back--and, as hilarity and mirth "grew +thick and fast" among the Indians, he attempted to turn over and get a +peep at things below. His comrades caught him on each side to keep him +from turning over, and, in the struggle, one of the poles broke, and +with a tremendous crash the clap-boards and the three men fell in the +midst of the Indians, who with a loud yell of terror fled from the +house, leaving their guns, and never returned. + +The three men who had thus made a miraculous escape from the savage +foe, remained all night in quiet possession of the cabin, and in the +morning returned to the station with their trophies. Whenever the +three heroes met in after life they laughed over their strange +deliverance, and what they called "The Battle of the Boards." + + + + +GEORGE D. PRENTICE + + +George Dennison Prentice, poet, editor, wit, and founder of the +_Journal School of Female Poets_, was born at Preston, Connecticut, +December 18, 1802. In the fall of 1820 Prentice entered the Sophomore +class of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, where one of his +instructors was Horace Mann, and among his classmates was Samuel G. +Howe. At college he was famous for his prodigious memory. Prentice was +graduated from Brown in 1823, after which he taught school for some +time. He next turned to the law, but this he also abandoned to enter +upon his life work--journalism. In 1827 he became editor of a paper in +New London, Connecticut, but in the following year he went to Hartford +to take charge of the _New England Review_, which "was the Louisville +_Journal_, born in Connecticut." In 1830 the Connecticut Whigs +requested Prentice to journey to Kentucky and prepare a campaign life +of Henry Clay. He finally decided to do this, naming John Greenleaf +Whittier, the good Quaker poet, as his successor in the editorial +chair of _The Review_, and setting out at once upon his long +pilgrimage to Lexington. He dashed off his biography of the statesman +in a few months, and it greatly pleased the Whigs of his State, but +Prentice had decided to remain in Kentucky. He went to Louisville, and +on November 24, 1830, the first issue of the _Louisville Journal_ +appeared, and George D. Prentice had at last come into his very own. +His pungent paragraphs made the "Yankee schoolmaster" feared by +editors in the remotest corners of the country, but more especially by +Shadrach Penn, editor of the _Louisville Advertiser_, the Democratic +organ, as the _Journal_ was the Whig organ. After a constant warfare +of more than ten years, poor Penn capitulated, and removed to +Missouri. Prentice found another foe worthy of his steel in John H. +Harney, editor of the Louisville _Daily Democrat_, but the battle of +the wits between them was not as keen as it was between him and Penn. +Prentice survived both editors and wrote exquisite eulogies upon them! +He also had many personal encounters, which his biographer, Mr. John +James Piatt, the Ohio poet, declines to dignify with the term of +"duel." His pistol "brush" with Col Reuben T. Durrett, the Kentucky +historical writer and collector, was, perhaps, his most serious +affair. And the colonel lived to write a fine tribute to him, which +was turning the tables upon him just a bit! Prentice's home in +Louisville was the center of the city's literary life for many years. +His wife was a charming and cultured woman, in every way fitted to +assist him. A volume of his witty paragraphs, called by the +publishers, _Prenticeana_ (New York, 1859), attracted attention in +London and Paris, and in all parts of the United States. Next to Whig +politics, the _Journal_ was the literary newspaper of the country. All +Western and Southern poets were welcomed to its columns, particularly +were female poets "featured," and upon them all Prentice poured out +indiscriminate praise, which may or may not have been good for them or +for the public. At any rate, he never failed to send a kindly letter +to each new "discovery," in which their work already submitted was +extravagantly valued, and in which they were urged to flood the office +with more of the same kind. His praise of Amelia B. Welby, the +sentimental singer of the long ago, seems indefensible to-day. As a +poet himself Prentice was a master of blank verse forms. Mr. Piatt put +him next to Bryant among American poets in the handling of this +difficult measure. _The Closing Year_, written in 1835, is undoubtedly +his finest poem; and _At My Mother's Grave_ is usually set beside it. +Although his sons, wife, and most of his friends sympathized with the +South in the war of Sections, Prentice was always an ardent advocate +of the Union cause. He died near Louisville, on the banks of the Ohio +river, January 22, 1870. Henry Watterson delivered an eulogy upon him, +and snugly adjusted his mantle about his own shoulders. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poems of George D. Prentice_, edited by John J. + Piatt (Cincinnati, 1878); _The Pioneer Press of Kentucky_, by W. + H. Perrin (Louisville, 1888). + + +THE CLOSING YEAR + + [From _The Poems of George D. Prentice, edited with a Biographical + Sketch_, by John J. Piatt (Cincinnati, 1878, 4th Edition)] + + 'Tis midnight's holy hour--and silence now + Is brooding, like a gentle spirit, o'er + The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds + The bell's deep notes are swelling. 'Tis the knell + Of the departed Year. + + No funeral train + Is sweeping past; yet on the stream and wood, + With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest, + Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred, + As by a mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud, + That floats so still and placidly through heaven, + The spirits of the seasons seem to stand-- + Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form, + And Winter with his aged locks--and breathe + In mournful cadences, that come abroad + Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail, + A melancholy dirge o'er the dead Year, + Gone from the earth forever. + + 'Tis a time + For memory and for tears. Within the deep, + Still chambers of the heart, a specter dim, + Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time, + Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold + And solemn finger to the beautiful + And holy visions that have passed away + And left no shadow of their loveliness + On the dead waste of life. That specter lifts + The coffin-lid of hope, and joy, and love, + And, bending mournfully above the pale + Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers + O'er what has passed to nothingness. + + The Year + Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng + Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow, + Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course, + It waved its scepter o'er the beautiful, + And they are not. It laid its pallid hand + Upon the strong man, and the haughty form + Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim. + It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged + The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail + Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song + And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er + The battle-plain, where sword and spear and shield + Flashed in the light of midday--and the strength + Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass, + Green from the soil of carnage, waves above + The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came + And faded like a wreath of mist at eve; + Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air, + It heralded its millions to their home + In the dim land of dreams. + + Remorseless Time!-- + Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe!--what power + Can stay him in his silent course, or melt + His iron heart to pity? On, still on + He presses, and forever. The proud bird, + The condor of the Andes, that can soar + Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave + The fury of the northern hurricane + And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home, + Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks down + To rest upon his mountain-crag--but Time + Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness, + And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind + His rushing pinion. Revolutions sweep + O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast + Of dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink, + Like bubbles on the water; fiery isles + Spring, blazing, from the ocean, and go back + To their mysterious caverns; mountains rear + To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow + Their tall heads to the plain; new empires rise, + Gathering the strength of hoary centuries, + And rush down like the Alpine avalanche, + Startling the nations; and the very stars, + Yon bright and burning blazonry of God, + Glitter awhile in their eternal depths, + And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train, + Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away, + To darkle in the trackless void: yet Time, + Time the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career, + Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not + Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path, + To sit and muse, like other conquerors, + Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought. + + +ON REVISITING BROWN UNIVERSITY + + [From the same] + + It is the noon of night. On this calm spot, + Where passed my boyhood's years, I sit me down + To wander through the dim world of the Past. + + The Past! the silent Past! pale Memory kneels + Beside her shadowy urn, and with a deep + And voiceless sorrow weeps above the grave + Of beautiful affections. Her lone harp + Lies broken at her feet, and as the wind + Goes o'er its moldering chords, a dirge-like sound + Rises upon the air, and all again + Is an unbreathing silence. + + Oh, the Past! + Its spirit as a mournful presence lives + In every ray that gilds those ancient spires, + And like a low and melancholy wind + Comes o'er yon distant wood, and faintly breathes + Upon my fevered spirit. Here I roved + Ere I had fancied aught of life beyond + The poet's twilight imaging. Those years + Come o'er me like the breath of fading flowers, + And tones I loved fall on my heart as dew + Upon the withered rose-leaf. They were years + When the rich sunlight blossomed in the air, + And fancy, like a blessed rainbow, spanned + The waves of Time, and joyous thoughts went off + Upon its beautiful unpillared arch + To revel there in cloud, and sun, and sky. + + Within yon silent domes, how many hearts + Are beating high with glorious dreams. 'Tis well; + The rosy sunlight of the morn should not + Be darkened by the portents of the storm + That may not burst till eve. Those youthful ones + Whose thoughts are woven of the hues of heaven, + May see their visions fading tint by tint, + Till naught is left upon the darkened air + Save the gray winter cloud; the brilliant star + That glitters now upon their happy lives + May redden to a scorching flame and burn + Their every hope to dust; yet why should thoughts + Of coming sorrows cloud their hearts' bright depths + With an untimely shade? Dream on--dream on, + Ye thoughtless ones--dream on while yet ye may! + When life is but a shadow, tear, and sigh, + Ye will turn back to linger round these hours + Like stricken pilgrims, and their music sweet + Will be a dear though melancholy tone + In Memory's ear, sounding forever more. + + +PRENTICE PARAGRAPHS + + [From _Prenticeana_ (New York, 1859)] + +James Ray and John Parr have started a locofoco paper in Maine, called +the _Democrat_. Parr, in all that pertains to decency, is below zero; +and Ray is below Parr. + +The editor of the ---- speaks of his "lying curled up in bed these +cold mornings." This verifies what we said of him some time ago--"he +lies like a dog." + +A young widow has established a pistol gallery in New Orleans. Her +qualifications as a teacher of the art of duelling are of course +undoubted; she has killed her man. + +Wild rye and wild wheat grow in some regions spontaneously. We believe +that wild oats are always sown. + +"What would you do, madam, if you were a gentleman?" "Sir, what would +you do if you were one?" + +Whatever Midas touched was turned into gold; in these days, touch a +man with gold and he'll turn into anything. + + + + +ROBERT M. BIRD + + +Robert Montgomery Bird, creator of _Nick of the Woods_, was born at +Newcastle, Delaware, in 1803. He early abandoned the practice of +medicine in Philadelphia in order to devote his entire attention to +literature. His first works were three tragedies, entitled _The +Gladiator_, _Oraloosa_, and _The Broker of Bogota_, the first of which +was very popular on the stage. In 1834 Dr. Bird published his first +novel, _Calavar_, a romance of Mexico that was highly praised by William +H. Prescott. In the following year _The Infidel_, sequel to _Calavar_, +appeared. _The Hawks_ _of Hawk Hollow_, and _Sheppard Lee_ followed +fast upon the heels of _The Infidel_. Then came _Nick of the Woods, or +the Jibbenainosay_ (Philadelphia, 1837, 2 vols.), the author's +masterpiece. The background of this fine old romance was set against the +Kentucky of 1782. Dr. Bird's Kentucky pioneers and Indians are drawn to +the life, the silly sentimentalism of Cooper and Chateaubriand +concerning the Indian character was avoided and indirectly proved +untrue. _Nick of the Woods_ was dramatized and produced upon the stage +with great success. A collection of Dr. Bird's periodical papers was +made, in 1838, and published under the title of _Peter Pilgrim, or a +Rambler's Recollections_. This work included the first adequate +description of Mammoth Cave, in Edmonson county, Kentucky. The author +was one of the cave's earliest explorers, and his account of it heralded +its wonders to the world in a manner that had never been done before. +Just how long Dr. Bird remained in Kentucky is not known, as no +comprehensive biography of him has been issued, but he must have been in +this State for several years prior to the publication of _Nick of the +Woods_, and _Peter Pilgrim_. His last novel was _Robin Day_ (1839). +After the publication of this tale, Dr. Bird became a Delaware farmer. +In 1847 he returned to Philadelphia and became joint editor of the +_North American Gazette_. He died at Philadelphia, January 22, 1854, of +brain fever. Morton McMichael, with whom he was associated in conducting +the _Gazette_, wrote an eloquent tribute to his memory. Dr. Bird's poem, +_The Beech Tree_, is remembered today by many readers. But it is as the +creator of _Nick of the Woods_, a new edition of which appeared in 1905, +that his fame is firmly fixed. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Prose Writers of America_, by R. W. Griswold + (Philadelphia, 1847); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American + Biography_ (New York, 1888, v. i). + + +NICK OF THE WOODS + + [From _Nick of the Woods_ (New York, 1853, revised edition)] + +"What's the matter, Tom Bruce?" said the father, eyeing him with +surprise. + +"Matter enough," responded the young giant, with a grin of mingled awe +and delight; "the Jibbenainosay is up again!" + +"Whar?" cried the senior, eagerly,--"not in our limits?" + +"No, by Jehosaphat!" replied Tom; "but nigh enough to be +neighborly,--on the north bank of Kentuck, whar he has left his mark +right in the middle of the road, as fresh as though it war but the +work of the morning!" + +"And a clear mark, Tom?--no mistake in it?" + +"Right to an iota!" said the young man;--"a reggelar cross on the +breast, and a good tomahawk dig right through the skull; and a +long-legg'd fellow, too, that looked as though he might have fou't old +Sattan himself!" + +"It's the Jibbenainosay, sure enough; and so good luck to him!" cried +the commander: "thar's a harricane coming!" + +"Who is the Jibbenainosay?" demanded Forrester. + +"Who?" cried Tom Bruce: "Why, Nick,--Nick of the Woods." + +"And who, if you please, is Nick of the Woods?" + +"Thar," replied the junior, with another grin, "thar, stranger, you're +too hard for me. Some think one thing, and some another; but thar's +many reckon he's the devil." + +"And his mark, that you were talking of in such mysterious +terms,--what is that?" + +"Why, a dead Injun, to be sure, with Nick's mark on him,--a knife-cut, +or a brace of 'em, over the ribs in the shape of a cross. That's the +way the Jibbenainosay marks all the meat of his killing. It has been a +whole year now since we h'ard of him." + +"Captain," said the elder Bruce, "you don't seem to understand the +affa'r altogether; but if you were to ask Tom about the Jibbenainosay +till doomsday, he could tell you no more than he has told already. You +must know, thar's a creatur' of some sort or other that ranges the +woods round about our station h'yar, keeping a sort of guard over us +like, and killing all the brute Injuns that ar' onlucky enough to come +in his way, besides scalping them and marking them with his mark. The +Injuns call him _Jibbenainosay_, or a word of that natur', which them +that know more about the Injun gabble that I do, say means the +_Spirit-that-walks_; and if we can believe any such lying devils as +Injuns (which I am loath to do, for the truth ar'nt in 'em), he is +neither man nor beast, but a great ghost or devil that knife cannot +harm nor bullet touch; and they have always had an idea that our fort +h'yar in partickelar, and the country round about, war under his +protection--many thanks to him, whether he be a devil or not; for that +war the reason the savages so soon left off a worrying of us." + +"Is it possible," said Roland, "that any one can believe such an +absurd story?" + +"Why not?" said Bruce, stoutly. "Thar's the Injuns themselves, Shawnees, +Hurons, Delawares, and all,--but partickelarly the Shawnees, for he +beats all creation a-killing of Shawnees,--that believe in him, and hold +him in such eternal dread, that thar's scarce a brute of 'em has come +within ten miles of the station h'yar this three y'ar: because as how, +he haunts about our woods h'yar in partickelar, and kills 'em +wheresomever he catches 'em,--especially the Shawnees, as I said afore, +against which the creatur' has a most butchering spite; and there's them +among the other tribes that call him _Shawneewannaween_, or the Howl of +the Shawnees, because of his keeping them ever a howling. And thar's his +marks, captain,--what do you make of _that_? When you find an Injun +lying scalped and tomahawked, it stands to reason thar war something to +kill him." + +"Ay, truly," said Forrester; "but I think you have human beings enough +to give the credit to, without referring it to a supernatural one." + +"Strannger," said Big Tom Bruce the younger, with a sagacious nod, "when +you kill an Injun yourself, I reckon,--meaning no offense--you will be +willing to take all the honor that can come of it, without leaving it to +be scrambled after by others. Thar's no man 'arns a scalp in Kentucky, +without taking great pains to show it to his neighbors." + +"And besides, captain," said the father, very gravely, "thar are men +among us who have seen the creatur'!" + +"_That_," said Roland, who perceived his new friends were not well +pleased with his incredulity, "is an argument I can resist no longer." + + + + +JOHN A. McCLUNG + + +John Alexander McClung, Kentucky's romantic historian and novelist, was +born near the ancient town of Washington, Kentucky, September 25, 1804. +He was educated at the Buck Pond Academy of his uncle, Dr. Louis +Marshall, near Versailles, Kentucky. Having united with the Presbyterian +church when he was sixteen years old, McClung entered Princeton +Theological Seminary, in 1822, to fit himself for the ministry. He +accepted his first pastorate in 1828, but, as his religious views were +undergoing a profound change, he withdrew from the church and devoted +himself to literature. His first work was a novel, called _Camden_ +(Philadelphia, 1830). This was a story of the South during the +Revolutionary War. His _Sketches of Western Adventure_ (Maysville, +Kentucky, 1832), though almost as fictitious as _Camden_, came to be +regarded as history, and it is upon this work that McClung's reputation +rests. In a general way the _Sketches_ are "of the most interesting +incidents connected with the settlement of the West from 1755 to 1794." +Many of them are most certainly figments of the author's imagination, +yet they have come to be regarded as literal truth and history. His +story of the women at Bryant's Station, who carried water for the +defense of the fort while it was besieged by ambushed Indians under +Simon Girty, in 1782, is his _piece de resistance_. John Filson, +Alexander Fitzroy, Gilbert Imlay, Harry Toulmin, William Littell, +Rafinesque, Marshall, and Butler, the Kentucky historians that published +their works prior to McClung's, are silent concerning the tripping of +the women to the spring for water while the Indians lay upon the banks +of Elkhorn with rifles cocked and ready. All Indians have been +scalp-hunters, regardless of whatever else they have been, and a woman's +scalp dangling from their sticks afforded them as much pleasure as a +man's. When the Collinses, both father and son, reached this romance +they merely reproduced it "as interesting," allowing it to pass without +further comment of any kind. McClung blended romance and history as +charmingly as did Judge James Hall, of Cincinnati, whom Mann Butler took +to task. The climax of this tale came in the erection of a memorial wall +encircling a spring which sprang out of the ground some years prior to +the Civil War! McClung began the practice of law in 1835, but in 1849 he +returned to the ministry. He subsequently held pastorates at Cincinnati +and Indianapolis, but finally settled at Maysville, Kentucky. He +declined the presidency of Hanover College, Indiana, in 1856. On August +16, 1859, McClung was drowned in the Niagara river, his body being +carried over the falls, but it was later recovered and returned to +Kentucky for interment. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by Z. F. Smith (Louisville, + Kentucky, 1892); _Kentucky in the Nation's History_, by R. M. + McElroy (New York, 1909). + + +THE WOMEN OF BRYANT'S STATION + + [From _Sketches of Western Adventure_ (Cincinnati, 1838)] + +All ran hastily to the picketing, and beheld a small party of Indians, +exposed to open view, firing, yelling, and making the most furious +gestures. The appearance was so singular, and so different from their +usual manner of fighting, that some of the more wary and experienced of +the garrison instantly pronounced it a decoy party, and restrained the +young men from sallying out and attacking them, as some of them were +strongly disposed to do. The opposite side of the fort was instantly +manned, and several breaches in the picketing rapidly repaired. Their +greatest distress arose from the prospect of suffering for water. The +more experienced of the garrison felt satisfied that a powerful party +was in ambuscade near the spring, but at the same time they supposed +that the Indians would not unmask themselves, until the firing upon the +opposite side of the fort was returned with such warmth, as to induce +the belief that the feint had succeeded. + +Acting upon this impression, and yielding to the urgent necessity of +the case, they summoned all the women, without exception, and +explaining to them the circumstances in which they were placed, and +the improbability that any injury would be offered them, until the +firing had been returned from the opposite side of the fort, they +urged them to go in a body to the spring, and each bring up a bucket +full of water. Some of the ladies, as was natural, had no relish for +the undertaking, and asked why the men could not bring water as well +as themselves, observing that _they_ were not bullet-proof, and that +the Indians made no distinction between male and female scalps! + +To this it was answered, that women were in the habit of bringing +water every morning to the fort, and that if the Indians saw them +engaged as usual, it would induce them to believe that their ambuscade +was undiscovered, and that they would not unmask themselves for the +sake of firing at a few women, when they hoped, by remaining concealed +a few moments longer, to obtain complete possession of the fort. That +if men should go down to the spring, the Indians would immediately +suspect that something was wrong, would despair of succeeding by +ambuscade, and would instantly rush upon them, follow them into the +fort, or shoot them down at the spring. The decision was soon over. + +A few of the boldest declared their readiness to brave the danger, and +the younger and more timid rallying in the rear of these veterans, +they all marched down in a body to the spring, within point blank shot +of more than five hundred Indian warriors! Some of the girls could not +help betraying symptoms of terror, but the married women, in general, +moved with a steadiness and composure, which completely deceived the +Indians. Not a shot was fired. The party were permitted to fill their +buckets, one after another, without interruption, and although their +steps became quicker and quicker, on their return, and when near the +gate of the fort, degenerated into a rather unmilitary celerity, +attended with some little crowding in passing the gate, yet not more +than one-fifth of the water was spilled, and the eyes of the youngest +had not dilated to more than double their ordinary size. + + + + +JAMES O. PATTIE + + +James Ohio Pattie, an early Western traveler, was born near +Brooksville, Kentucky, in 1804. His father, Sylvester Pattie +(1782-1828), emigrated to Missouri in 1812, and settled at St. +Charles. He served in the War of 1812, at the conclusion of which he +built a saw-mill on the Gasconade river, sending down pine lumber in +rafts to St. Louis. Several years later his wife died, leaving nine +young children, of whom James O. Pattie was the eldest. In 1824 +Sylvester Pattie became dissatisfied with his lumber business and +decided to dispose of it and undertake an expedition into New Mexico, +which was one of the first from this country into that territory. The +route pursued by his party was quite new. James O. Pattie was at +school, but he prevailed upon his father to permit him to accompany +the expedition. It remained for him to write a most interesting +account of their remarkable journey, in which Indians who had never +seen white men before were encountered, his own capture described, +together with the sufferings and death of his father in New Mexico. On +his return to the United States Pattie passed through Cincinnati, +where he met Timothy Flint, one of the pioneers of Western letters, +who edited his journal under the title of _The Personal Narrative of +James O. Pattie, of Kentucky, during an Expedition from St. Louis, +through the Vast Regions between that Place and the Pacific Ocean, and +thence Back through the City of Mexico to Vera Cruz, during +Journeyings of Six Years; in which_ _he and his Father, who +accompanied him, suffered Unheard of Hardships and Dangers, and +Various Conflicts with the Indians, and were made Captives, in which +Captivity his Father Died; together with a description of the Country +and the Various Nations through which they Passed_ (Cincinnati, 1831). +"One sees in [Pattie's] pages the beginnings of the drama to be fought +out in the Mexican War." The date and place of his death are unknown. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1888, v. iv); Pattie's _Narrative_ has been carefully + re-edited with notes and introduction by Reuben Gold Thwaites, and + published in his famous _Early Western Travels Series_ (Cleveland, + 1905, v. xviii). + + +THE SANTA FE COUNTRY + + [From _The Personal Narrative of James O. Pattie, of Kentucky_ + (Cincinnati, 1831)] + +We set off for Santa Fe on the 1st of November [1824]. Our course for +the first day led us over broken ground. We passed the night in a +small town, called Callacia, built on a small stream, that empties +into the del Norte. The country around this place presents but a small +portion of level surface. + +The next day our path lay over a point of the mountain. We were the +whole day crossing. We killed a grey bear, that was exceedingly fat. +It had fattened on a nut of the shape and size of a bean, which grows +on a tree resembling the pine, called by the Spanish, _pinion_. We +took a great part of the meat with us. We passed the night again in a +town called Albukerque. + +The following day we passed St. Thomas, a town situated on the bank of +the del Norte, which is here a deep and muddy stream, with bottoms +from five to six miles wide on both sides. These bottoms sustain +numerous herds of cattle. The small huts of the shepherds, who attend +to them, were visible here and there. We reached another town called +Elgidonis, and stopped for the night. We kept guard around our horses +all night, but in the morning four of our mules were gone. We hunted +for them until ten o'clock, when two Spaniards came, and asked us +what we would give them if they would find our mules? We told them to +bring the mules, and we would pay them a dollar. They set off, two of +our men following them without their knowledge and went into a +thicket, where they had tied the mules, and returned with them to us. +As may be supposed, we gave them both a good whipping. It seemed at +first that the whole town would rise against us in consequence. But +when we related the circumstances fairly to the people, the officer +corresponding to our justice of the peace, said, we had done perfectly +right, and had the men put in the stocks. + +We recommenced our journey, and passed a mission of Indians under the +control of an old priest. After crossing a point of the mountain, we +reached Santa Fe, on the 5th. This town contains between four and five +thousand inhabitants. It is situated on a large plain. A handsome +stream runs through it, adding life and beauty to a scene striking and +agreeable from the union of amenity and cultivation around, with the +distant view of the snow clad mountains. It is pleasant to walk on the +flat roofs of the houses in the evening, and look on the town and +plain spread below. The houses are low, with flat roofs as I have +mentioned. The churches are differently constructed from the other +buildings and make a beautiful show. They have a great number of large +bells, which, when disturbed, make a noise, that would almost seem +sufficient to awaken the dead. + +We asked the governor for permission to trap beaver in the river Helay. +His reply was that, he did not know if he was allowed by the law to do +so; but if upon examination it lay in his power, he would inform us on +the morrow, if we would come to his office at 9 o'clock in the morning. +According to this request, we went to the place appointed, the +succeeding day, which was the 9th of November. We were told by the +governor, that he had found nothing that would justify him in giving us +the legal permission we desired. We then proposed to him to give us +liberty to trap upon the conditions that we paid him five per cent on +the beaver we might catch. He said he would consider this proposition, +and give us an answer the next day at the same hour. The thoughts of our +hearts were not at all favorable to this person, as we left him. + + + + +WILLIAM F. MARVIN + + +William F. Marvin, "the latter-day drunken poet of Danville," was born +at Leicestershire, England, in 1804. He emigrated to America when a +young man, and made his home in the little town of Danville, Kentucky. +Marvin was a shoemaker by trade, but verse-making and bacchanalian +nights were his heart's delight and perfect pleasures. He was a +well-known character in Danville and the surrounding country, and many +are the old wives' tales they tell on the old poet to this day. On one +occasion, while in his cups, of course, he attempted suicide, using +his shoe knife on his throat, but he was finally persuaded that a shoe +knife could be put to far better purposes. Marvin served in the +Mexican War, and on his return home, he published his first and only +book of verse, _The Battle of Monterey and Other Poems_ (Danville, +Kentucky, 1851). The title-poem, _The Battle of Monterey_, is a rather +lengthy metrical romance of some forty or more pages; but the "other +poems," called also "miscellaneous poems," extend the book to its 219 +pages. A few of these are worthy of preservation, especially the +shorter lyrics. Marvin's book is now extremely rare. The writer has +located not more than six copies, though a large edition was printed +by the poet's publisher, Captain A. S. McGrorty, who is still in the +land of the living. During the closing years of his life Marvin +contributed occasional poems to the old _Kentucky Advocate_, the +Danville newspaper, his last poem having appeared in that paper, +called _The Beauty, Breadth, and Depth of Love_. William F. Marvin +died at Danville, Kentucky, July 12, 1879, and was buried in the +cemetery of the town. To-day his grave may be identified, but it is +unmarked by a monument. His verse certainly shows decided improvement +over the rhymes of Thomas Johnson, but both of them were imperfect +forerunners of that celebrated poet and distinguished soldier, who was +born at Danville about the time Marvin reached there and set up his +shop on Main street--Theodore O'Hara, the highest poetic note in the +literature of old Kentucky. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Kentucky Advocate_ (Danville, July 14, 1879); + letters from G. W. Doneghy, the Danville poet of to-day, author of + _The Old Hanging Fork, and Other Poems_ (Franklin, Ohio, 1897), to + the writer. + + +EPIGRAM + + [From _The Battle of Monterey and Other Poems_ (Danville, + Kentucky, 1851)] + + A bee, while hovering round a lip, + Where wit and beauty hung, + Mistook its bloom, and flew to sip, + But ah, the bee got stung. + + +THE FIRST ROSES OF SPRING + + [From the same] + + Ye are come my sad heart to beguile, + In the blush of your beautiful hue; + The fairest and welcomest flowers that smile, + Within the wide arch of the blue. + + From Araby odors ye bring, + And ye steal the warm tints from the sky, + And scatter your pearly bright beauties in spring, + As if nature ne'er meant you to die. + + The soft crimson blush of each lip, + 'Mong the green leaves and buds that abound + Seems pouting in richness, and parted to sip + The dew that is falling around. + + Ye bow to the breath of the Morn, + And cover his wings with perfume; + And woo the gay bee in the earliest dawn, + To rest on your bosoms of bloom. + + Ye have brought back the passion of love, + For a moment to warm my lone breast, + And pointed to undying roses above, + That smile through eternity's rest. + + +SONG + + [From the same] + + +AIR--_Here's a health to One I love dear_. + + Here's a bumper brimful for our friends, + And a frown and a fig for our foes; + And may he who stoops meanly to gain his own ends, + Never know the sweets of repose. + + Though folly and ignorance join, + To blight the young buds of our fame, + Their slander a moment may injure the vine, + But its fruits will be blushing the same. + + Then here is a bumper to truth, + May its banners wave wide as the world, + And a fig for the mortal in age or in youth + Who has not its banner unfurl'd. + + + + +ELISHA BARTLETT + + +Dr. Elisha Bartlett, physician, poet, and politician, was born at +Smithfield, Rhode Island, in 1805. He was graduated in medicine from +Brown University in 1826, and later practiced at Lowell, +Massachusetts, of which city he was the first mayor. Dr. Bartlett +lectured at Dartmouth College in 1839; and two years later he became +professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine in the medical school +of Transylvania University, Lexington, Kentucky. He left Transylvania +in 1844, for the University of Maryland, but he returned to Lexington +two years later, occupying his former chair in the medical school. In +1849 Dr. Bartlett left Transylvania and went to Louisville, where he +delivered medical lectures for a year. From 1851 until his death he +was professor of materia medica and medical jurisprudence in the +College of Physicians and Surgeons of New York City. Dr. Bartlett died +at his birthplace, Smithfield, Rhode Island, July 18, 1855, one of the +most widely known of American physicians, and also well known and +highly regarded by medical men in Europe. His medical works are: +_Essay on the Philosophy of Medical Science_ (Philadelphia, 1844); +_Inquiry into the Degree of Certainty in Medicine_ (1848); _A +Discourse on the Life and Labours of Dr. Wells, the Discoverer of the +Philosophy of Dew_ (1849); _The Fevers of the United States_ (1850); +_Discourse on the Times, Character, and Works of Hippocrates_ (1852). +These are his medical works, but it is upon his small volume of poems, +_Simple Settings, in Verse, for Six Portraits and Pictures, from Mr. +Dickens's Gallery_ (Boston, 1855), that he is entitled to his place in +this work. Of this little book of but eighty pages, his friend, Dr. +Oliver Wendell Holmes, wrote: "Yet few suspected him of giving +utterance in rhythmical shape to his thoughts or feelings. It was only +when his failing limbs could bear him no longer, as conscious +existence slowly retreated from his palsied nerves, that he revealed +himself freely in truest and tenderest form of expression. We knew he +was dying by slow degrees, and we heard from him from time to time, or +saw him always serene and always hopeful while hope could have a place +in his earthly future.... When to the friends he loved there came, as +a farewell gift, ... a little book with a few songs in it--songs with +his whole warm heart in them--they knew that his hour was come, and +their tears fell fast as they read the loving thoughts that he had +clothed in words of beauty and melody. Among the memorials of +departed friendships, we treasure the little book of 'songs' ... his +last present, as it was his last production." + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. i); _History of the Medical Department of + Transylvania University_, by Dr. Robert Peter (Louisville, + Kentucky, 1905). + + +JOHN BROWDIE OF NICHOLAS NICKLEBY + + [From _Simple Settings, in Verse, for Six Portraits and Pictures, + from Mr. Dickens's Gallery_ (Boston, 1854)] + + 'Twas worth a crown, John Browdie, to hear you ringing out, + O'er hedge and hill and roadside, that loud, hilarious shout; + And how the echoes caught it up and flung it all about. + + 'Twas worth another, John, to see that broad and glorious grin, + That stretched your wide mouth wider still, and wrinkled round your + chin. + And showed how true the heart was that glowed and beat within. + + Yes! Nick has beaten the _measther_,--'twas a sight beneath the + sun! + And I only wish, John Browdie, when that good deed was done, + That you and I had both been there to help along the fun. + + Be sure he let him have it well;--his trusty arm was nerved + With hoarded wrongs and righteous hate,--so it slackened not nor + swerved, + Until the old curmudgeon got the thrashing he deserved. + + The guinea, John, you gave the lad, is charmed forevermore; + It shall fill your home with blessings; it shall add unto your + store; + Be light upon your pathway, and sunshine on your floor. + + These are the treasures, too, laid up forever in the sky, + Kind words to solace aching hearts, and make wet eyelids dry, + And kindly deeds in silence done with no one standing by. + + And when you tell the story, John, to her, your joy and pride-- + The miller's bonny daughter, so soon to be your bride-- + She shall love you more than ever, and cling closer to your side. + + Content and health be in your house! and may you live to see + Full many a little Browdie, John, climb up your sturdy knee; + The mother's hope, the father's stay and comfort long to be. + + These are thy crown, O England; thy glory, grace, and might!-- + Who work the work of honest hands, from early morn till night, + And worship God by serving man, and doing what is right. + + All honor, then, to them! let dukes and duchesses give room! + The men who by the anvil strike, and ply the busy loom; + And scatter plenty through the land, and make the desert bloom. + + + + +SAMUEL D. GROSS + +Dr. Samuel David Gross, the distinguished American surgeon and author, +was born near Easton, Pennsylvania, July 8, 1805. He was graduated +from the Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, in the class of +1828, and he at once entered upon the active practice of his +profession in Philadelphia. In 1833 Dr. Gross accepted a professorship +in the Ohio Medical College of Cincinnati, which position he held +until 1840, when he became professor of surgery in the University of +Louisville. The subsequent sixteen years of Dr. Gross's life were +spent upon Kentucky soil. His _Report on Kentucky Surgery_ +(Louisville, 1851) contained the first biography of Dr. Ephraim +McDowell, the Kentucky surgeon, who performed the first operation for +the removal of the ovaries done in the world. That Dr. McDowell had +actually accomplished this wonderful feat at Danville, in 1809, was +Dr. Gross's contention, and that he was able to prove it beyond all +doubt, and place the Danville doctor before the world as the father +of ovariotomy, proves the power of his paper. Dr. Gross was the +founder of the Louisville _Medical Review_, but he had conducted it +but a short time when he accepted the chair of surgery in the +Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia. This position he occupied +until about two years prior to his death. Dr. Gross enjoyed an +international reputation as a surgeon. Oxford and Cambridge conferred +degrees upon him in recognition of his distinguished contributions to +medical science. As an original demonstrator he was well known. He was +among the first to urge the claims of preventive medicine; and his +demonstrations upon rabbits, with a view to throwing additional light +on manual strangulation, are familiar to students of medicine and +medical history. His works include: _Elements of Pathological Anatomy_ +(1839); _Foreign Bodies in the Air-Passages_ (1854); _Report on the +Causes which Retard the Progress of American Medical Literature_ +(1856); _System of Surgery_ (1859); _Manual of Military Surgery_ +(1861), Japanese translation (Tokio, 1874); and his best known work of +a literary value, _John Hunter and His Pupils_ (1881). In 1875 he +published two lectures, entitled _The History of American Medical +Literature_; and, in the following year, with several other writers, +he issued _A Century of American Medicine_. Dr. Gross was always +greatly interested in the history of medicine and surgery. He died at +Philadelphia, May 6, 1884. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. His _Autobiography_ (Philadelphia, 1887, two vols.), + was edited by his sons, one of whom, A. Haller Gross, was born in + Kentucky; Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. iii). + + +KENTUCKY + + [From _Autobiography of Samuel D. Gross, M. D._ (Philadelphia, + 1887, v. i.)] + +It was pleasant to dwell in the land of Boone, of Clay, and of +Crittenden; to behold its fertile fields, its majestic forests, and +its beautiful streams; and to associate with its refined, cultivated, +generous-hearted, and chivalric people. It was there that I had hoped +to spend the remainder of my days upon objects calculated to promote +the honor and welfare of its noble profession, and finally to mingle +my dust with the dust and ashes of the sons and daughters of Kentucky. +But destiny has decreed otherwise. A change has come over my life. I +stand this evening in the presence of a new people, a stranger in a +strange place, and a candidate for new favors. + + +THE DEATH OF HENRY CLAY + + [From the same] + +The admirers of Mr. Clay cannot but regret the motives which induced +him to spend his last days at Washington. It was a pitiful ambition +which prompted him to forsake his family and his old friends to die at +the capital of the country in order that he might have the _eclat_ of +a public funeral. Broken down in health and spirits when he left his +old home, unable to travel except by slow stages, he knew perfectly +well that his days were numbered, and that he could never again see +Kentucky. How much more dignified would it have been if he had +breathed out his once precious life in the bosom of his family and in +the arms of the woman who for upwards of half a century had watched +over his interests, reared his children with a fond mother's care, +loved him with a true woman's love, and followed him, wherever he was, +with her prayers and her blessings! + + + + +THOMAS H. CHIVERS + + +Dr. Thomas Holley Chivers, the eccentric Southern poet, and maker of +most unusual verse forms, was born near Washington, Georgia, December +12, 1807. He was instructed in the classics by his mother, and, choosing +medicine as his vocation, he went to Lexington, Kentucky--most probably +making the long journey on horse-back--and entered the medical school of +Transylvania University. Chivers matriculated in November, 1828, and +took up his abode at the old Phoenix Hotel, as his father was wealthy +and liberal with him. He took one ticket and made it during his first +year. The college records show that he returned for the fall session of +1829, and that, during his second year, he took two tickets, graduating +on March 17, 1830. The thesis he submitted for his degree of Doctor of +Medicine was _Remittent and Intermittent Bilious Fever_. Kentucky was +the birthplace of the first poems Chivers wrote, and, very probably, the +birthplace of his first book, _Conrad and Eudora, or The Death of +Alonzo_ (Philadelphia, 1834). This little drama, intended for the study, +was set in Kentucky, and founded upon the Beauchamp-Sharp murder of +1825, which was still the chief topic of conversation in the State when +the poet reached Lexington in 1828. Chivers's second book of poems, +called _Nacoochee_ (New York, 1837), contained two poems written while a +student of Transylvania, entitled _To a China Tree_, and _Georgia +Waters_. A short time after the publication of this book Chivers and +Edgar Allan Poe became acquainted; and the remainder of their lives they +were denouncing and fighting each other. It all came about by Chivers +claiming his _Allegra Florence in Heaven_, published in _The Lost +Pleiad_ (New York, 1845), as the original of _The Raven_. Of course, the +world and the critics have smiled at this claim and let it pass. After +Poe's death Chivers claimed practically everything the Virginian did to +be a plagiarism of some of his own poems. His most famous work was +_Eonchs of Ruby_ (New York, 1851). This was followed by _Virginalia_ +(Philadelphia, 1853); _Memoralia_ (Philadelphia, 1853); _Atlanta_ +(Macon, Ga., 1853); _Birth-Day Song of Liberty_ (Atlanta, Ga., 1856); +and _The Sons of Usna_ (Philadelphia, 1858). Bayard Taylor, in his +famous _Echo Club_, mentioned _Facets of Diamond_ as one of the poet's +publications, but a copy of it has not yet been unearthed. Dr. Chivers +died at Decatur, Georgia, December 19, 1858. No more pathetic figure has +appeared in American letters than Chivers. Had he been content to write +his poetry independently of Poe or any one else, he would have left his +name clearer. He was a wonderful manipulator of verse-forms, but he was +not what Poe was--a world-genius. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _In the Poe Circle_, by Joel Benton (New York, + 1899); _The Poe-Chivers Papers_, by G. E. Woodberry (_Century + Magazine_, Jan., Feb., 1903); _Representative Southern Poets_, by + C. W. Hubner (New York, 1906); _Library of Southern Literature_ + (Atlanta, Georgia, 1909, v. ii). + + +THE DEATH OF ALONZO + + [From _Conrad and Eudora_ (Philadelphia, 1834)] + +_Act III. Scene IV. Frankfort. Time, midnight._ Conrad _enters from +the tavern, walks the street, dressed in dark clothes, with a masque +on his face, and, with difficulty, finds_ Alonzo's _house_. + + _Conrad._ This is the place,--and I must change my name. + + (_Goes to the door and knocks. Puts his hand in his bosom. + A female voice is heard within--the wife of_ Alonzo.) + + _Angeline._ I would not venture out this time o' night. + + (_Conrad knocks_.) + + _Alonzo._ Who's there? + + _Conrad._ A friend. + + _Angeline_ (_within_). I would not venture out, my love! + + _Alonzo._ Why, Angeline!--thy fears are woman's, love. + + (_Knocks again._) + + _Alonzo._ Who is that?--speak out! + + _Conrad._ Darby--'tis thy friend! + He has some business with thee--'tis of weight! + Has sign'd a bond, and thou must seal the deed! + + _Alonzo._ What does he say? + + _Angeline._ Indeed I do not know--you'd better see. + + (_Knocks again and looks round._) + + _Alonzo._ Who can this be--so late at night? + + (_Opens the door and steps back._) + + _Conrad._ Behold! (_Throws off his masque and takes him by the + throat._) + Look in my face, and call my name! + + _Alonzo._ Conrad!--Conrad! do not kill me, have mercy! + + _Conrad._ Where is my wife? Now, villain! die!--die!--die! + + (_Stabs him._) + + Now, pray! if thou canst pray, now pray--now die! + Now, drink the wormwood which Eudora drank. + + (_Stamps him._ Alonzo _dies_.) + + (Conrad _rushes out and is seen no more_. Angeline, Alonzo's + _wife, runs in the room, screams, and falls upon his breast_.) + + _Angeline._ 'Tis he--'tis he--Conrad has kill'd Alonzo! + Oh! my husband! my husband! thou art dead! + 'Tis he--'tis he--the wretch has kill'd Alonzo! + + (_The doctor_, Alonzo's _brother, rushes in, crying "Murder!--murder!" + Watchmen and citizens rush in, crying + "Murder! murder!_ Alonzo's _dead_! Alonzo's _dead_!") + + _Citizens._ Who, under God's heaven, could have done this deed? + + _Angeline._ 'Tis he--'tis he! Conrad has kill'd Alonzo! + + _Watchmen._ Who did it? Speak! speak! Conrad kill'd Alonzo? + + _Angeline._ Conrad--'twas Conrad, kill'd my husband! Dead! + Oh! death--death--death! What will become of me? + + _Doctor._ Did you see his face? My God! I know 'twas he! + + _Angeline._ I saw his face--I heard his voice--he's gone! + + (Angeline _feels his pulse, while the rest look round_.) + + Oh! my husband!--my husband!--death, death! + Speak, Alonzo! speak to Angeline--death! + Oh! speak one word, and tell me who it was! + + (_Kisses him._) + + No pulse--my husband's dead! He's gone!--he's gone! + + (_Faints away on his breast. The watchmen and citizens take her + into an adjoining room, bearing her husband with her--asking, + "Who could have kill'd him? Speak_, Angeline--_speak_!") + + _Curtain falls. End of Act III._ + + +GEORGIA WATERS + + [From _Nacoochee_ (New York, 1837)] + + On thy waters, thy sweet valley waters, + Oh! Georgia! how happy were we! + When thy daughters, thy sweet-smiling daughters, + Once gathered sweet-william for me. + Oh! thy wildwood, thy dark shady wildwood + Had many bright visions for me; + For my childhood, my bright rosy childhood + Was cradled, dear Georgia! in thee! + + On thy mountains, thy green purple mountains, + The seasons are waiting on thee; + And thy fountains, thy clear crystal fountains + Are making sweet music for me. + Oh! thy waters, thy sweet valley waters + Are dearer than any to me; + For thy daughters, thy sweet-smiling daughters, + Oh! Georgia! give beauty to thee. + +Transylvania University, 1830. + + + + +JEFFERSON DAVIS + + +Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederacy, was +born in Christian, now Todd, county, Kentucky, June 3, 1808. During his +infancy his family removed first to Louisiana and afterwards to +Mississippi, locating near the village of Woodville. When but seven +years old he was mounted on a pony and, with a company of travelers, +rode back to Kentucky. He entered St. Thomas College, a Roman Catholic +institution, near Springfield, Kentucky. This tiny, obscure "college" +was presided over by Dominicans, and Davis was the only Protestant boy +in it. He spent two years at St. Thomas, when he returned home to be +fitted for college. In October, 1821, when in his fourteenth year, +Jefferson Davis arrived in Lexington, Kentucky, and matriculated in the +academic department of Transylvania University. Horace Holley, +surrounded with his famous faculty, was in charge of the University +during Davis's student days. His favorite professor was Robert H. +Bishop, afterwards president of Miami University, Oxford, Ohio; and his +fellow students included David Rice Atchison, George Wallace Jones, +Gustavus A. Henry, and Belvard J. Peters, all subsequently in Congress +or on the bench. When Davis was in the United States Senate he found +five other Transylvania men in the same body. He made his home with old +Joseph Ficklin, the Lexington postmaster, and three of the happiest +years of his life were spent in the "Athens of the West." He left +Transylvania at the end of his junior year in order to enter West Point, +from which he was graduated in 1828. As Lieutenant Davis he was in +Kentucky during the cholera-year of 1833, and he did all in his power to +bury the dead and watch the dying. Near Louisville, on June 17, 1835, +Davis was married to Miss Sarah Knox Taylor, second daughter of +President Taylor, but within the year the fair young girl died. Davis +was in the lower House of Congress, in 1845, as a Democrat; but in the +following year he enlisted for service in the Mexican War, through which +he served with great credit to himself and to his country. From 1847 to +1851 he was United States Senator from Mississippi; and from 1853 to +1857 he was Secretary of War in President Pierce's cabinet. Davis was +immediately returned to the Senate, where he continued until January 21, +1861, when he bade the Senators farewell in a speech that has made him +famous as an orator. Four weeks later he was inaugurated as provisional +president of the Confederate States. On February 22, 1862, he was +elected permanent president, and settled himself in the capitol at +Richmond, Virginia. President Davis was arrested near Irwinville, +Georgia, May 10, 1865, and for the next two years he was a prisoner in +Fortress Monroe. He died at New Orleans, December 6, 1889, but in 1893 +his body was removed to Richmond. As an author Davis's fame must rest on +his _The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government_ (New York, 1881, +two vols.). + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Jefferson Davis: A Memoir by his wife_, Mrs. V. + Jefferson Davis (New York 1890, two vols.); _Belford's Magazine_ + (Jan., 1890); _Southern Statesmen of the Old Regime_, by W. P. + Trent (New York, 1897); _Jefferson Davis_, by W. E. Dodd + (Philadelphia, 1907); _Statesmen of the Old South_, by W. E. Dodd + (New York, 1911). Prof. W. L. Fleming, of Louisiana State + University is now preparing what will be the most comprehensive + and, perhaps, the definitive biography of Davis. + + +FROM FAREWELL SPEECH IN UNITED STATES SENATE ON JANUARY 21, 1861 + + [From _The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government_ (New York, + 1881, v. i.)] + +It has been a conviction of pressing necessity, it has been a belief +that we are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our +fathers bequeathed to us, which has brought Mississippi to her present +decision. She has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created +free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack upon her social +institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been +invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races. That +Declaration of Independence is to be construed by the circumstances +and purposes for which it was made. The communities were declaring +their independence; the people of those communities were asserting +that no man was born--to use the language of Mr. Jefferson--booted and +spurred, to ride over the rest of mankind; that men were created +equal--meaning the men of the political community; that there was no +divine right to rule; that no man inherited the right to govern; that +there were no classes by which power and place descended to families; +but that all stations were equally within the grasp of each member of +the body politic. These were the great principles they announced; +these were the purposes for which they made their declaration; these +were the ends to which their enunciation was directed. They have no +reference to the slave; else, how happened it that among the items of +arraignment against George III was that he endeavored to do just what +the North has been endeavoring of late to do--to stir up insurrection +among our slaves? Had the Declaration announced that the negroes were +free and equal, how was the Prince to be arraigned for raising up +insurrection among them? And how was this to be enumerated among the +high crimes which caused the colonies to sever their connection with +the mother country? When our Constitution was formed, the same idea +was rendered more palpable; for there we find provision made for that +very class of persons as property; they were not put upon the footing +of equality with white men--not even upon that of paupers and +convicts; but, so far as representation was concerned, were +discriminated against as a lower caste, only to be represented in the +numerical proportion of three fifths. + +Then, Senators, we recur to the compact which binds us together; we +recur to the principles upon which our Government was founded; and +when you deny them, and when you deny to us the right to withdraw from +a Government which, thus perverted, threatens to be destructive of our +rights, we but tread in the path of our fathers when we proclaim our +independence and take the hazard. This is done, not in hostility to +others, not to injure any section of the country, not even for our own +pecuniary benefit; but from the high and solemn motive of defending +and protecting the rights we inherited, and which it is our sacred +duty to transmit unshorn to our children. + +I find in myself, perhaps, a type of the general feeling of my +constituents towards yours. I am sure I feel no hostility towards you, +Senators from the North. I am sure there is not one of you, whatever +sharp discussion there may have been between us, to whom I cannot now +say, in the presence of my God, I wish you well; and such, I am sure, +is the feeling of the people whom I represent towards those whom you +represent. I, therefore, feel that I but express their desire when I +say I hope, and they hope, for peaceable relations with you, though +we must part. They may be mutually beneficial to us in the future, as +they have been in the past, if you so will it. The reverse may bring +disaster on every portion of the country; and, if you will have it +thus, we will invoke the God of our fathers, who delivered them from +the power of the lion, to protect us from the ravages of the bear; and +thus, putting our trust in God and in our own firm hearts and strong +arms, we will vindicate the right as best we may. + +In the course of my service here, associated at different times with a +great variety of Senators, I see now around me some with whom I have +served long; there have been points of collision; but, whatever of +offense there has been to me, I leave here. I carry with me no hostile +remembrance. Whatever offense I have given which has not been redressed, +or for which satisfaction has not been demanded, I have, Senators, in +this hour of our parting, to offer you my apology for any pain which, in +heat of discussion, I have inflicted. I go hence unencumbered of the +remembrance of any injury received, and having discharged the duty of +making the only reparation in my power for any injury offered. + +Mr. President and Senators, having made the announcement which the +occasion seemed to me to require, it only remains for me to bid you a +final adieu. + + + + +WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER + + +William Davis Gallagher, poet and critic, was born at Philadelphia, +August 21, 1808. When he was but eight years old he removed to +Cincinnati with his mother, a widow. In 1821 he was apprenticed to a +Cincinnati printer. At the age of twenty years Gallagher journeyed +through Kentucky and Mississippi, and his letters concerning the +country and the people won him his first fame as a writer. In 1831 he +became editor of the Cincinnati _Mirrow_, the fifth or sixth literary +journal published in the West. Three years later Thomas H. Shreve +joined Gallagher in editing the paper. Like all Western magazines, +the _Mirrow's_ high hopes were utterly dashed upon the old rocks of +failure from one cause or another. In 1835 Gallagher published _Erato +No. I._, and _Erato No. II._, which were two small pamphlets of poems. +_Erato No. III._ was published at Louisville, two years later. The +chief poem in this was upon a Kentucky subject. Gallagher's anthology +of Western verse, without biographical or critical notes, entitled +_The Poetical Literature of the West_ (Cincinnati, 1841), the first +work in that field, was well done, and it strengthened his claim as a +critic. In 1854 he became one of the editors of the _Louisville +Courier_; but he shortly afterwards purchased a farm near Pewee +Valley, Kentucky, some twelve miles from Louisville, and as a Kentucky +farmer he spent the final forty years of his life. He took keen +interest in agricultural pursuits, but he made nothing more than a +meager living out of his farm. His essay on _Fruit Culture in the Ohio +Valley_ attracted the attention of persons interested in that subject. +As a poet Gallagher submits his claim upon a rather long pastoral +poem, entitled _Miami Woods_. This work was begun in 1839, and +finished seventeen years later. This gives the title of his book of +poems, _Miami Woods, A Golden Wedding, and Other Poems_ (Cincinnati, +1881). _A Golden Wedding_ is not an overly skillful production, and +the poet is best seen in his shorter lyrics. Perhaps _The Mothers of +the West_, which appeared in the _Erato No. III._, is the best thing +he did, and the one poem that will keep his fame green. Gallagher +began his literary career with great promise, and he pursued it +diligently for some years, but when he should have been doing his +finest work, he was winning some prize from an agricultural journal +for the best essay on _Fruit Culture in the Ohio Valley_! He failed to +follow the gleam. William D. Gallagher died at "Fern Rock Cottage," +Pewee Valley, Kentucky, June 27, 1894. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. Coggeshall + (Columbus, Ohio, 1860); _Blades o' Bluegrass_, by Fannie P. Dickey + (Louisville, 1892). + + +THE MOTHERS OF THE WEST + + [From _Miami Woods, A Golden Wedding, and Other Poems_ + (Cincinnati, 1881)] + + The mothers of our Forest-Land! + Stout-hearted dames were they; + With nerve to wield the battle-brand, + And join the border fray. + Our rough land had no braver + In its days of blood and strife-- + Aye ready for severest toil, + Aye free to peril life. + + The mothers of our Forest-Land! + On old Kentucky's soil, + How shared they, with each dauntless band, + War's tempest, and life's toil! + They shrank not from the foeman, + They quail'd not in the fight, + But cheer'd their husbands through the day, + And soothed them through the night. + + The mothers of our Forest-Land! + _Their_ bosoms pillow'd Men; + And proud were they by such to stand + In hammock, fort, or glen; + To load the sure old rifle-- + To run the leaden ball-- + To watch a battling husband's place, + And fill it should he fall. + + The mothers of our Forest-Land! + Such were their daily deeds: + Their monument--where does it stand? + Their epitaph--who reads? + No braver dames had Sparta-- + No nobler matrons Rome-- + Yet who or lauds or honors them, + Ev'n in their own green home? + + The mothers of our Forest-Land! + They sleep in unknown graves; + And had they borne and nursed a band + Of ingrates, or of slaves, + They had not been more neglected! + But their graves shall yet be found, + And their monuments dot here and there + "The Dark and Bloody Ground!" + + + + +THOMAS H. SHREVE + + +Thomas H. Shreve, poet and journalist, was born at Alexandria, +Virginia, in 1808. In early life he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, +and entered mercantile pursuits. In 1834 Shreve became a Cincinnati +editor; but four years later he returned to Louisville to again engage +in business. Throughout his business career, Shreve was a constant +contributor of poems and prose sketches to the best magazines. He +finally abandoned business for literature, and he at once became +associate editor of the _Louisville Journal_. He was not a rugged +journalist of the Prentice type, but a cultured and chaste essayist +who should have written from his study window, rather than from such a +seething hothouse of sarcasm and invective as Prentice maintained. He +was a mild-mannered man, a Quaker, who spent his last months on earth +in crossing swords with Thomas Babington Macaulay concerning the +character of William Penn. In 1851 Shreve's _Drayton, an American +Tale_, was issued by the Harpers at New York. This work won the author +much praise in the East as well as in the West, and it started him +upon an honorable career, which was soon cut short by disease. Thomas +H. Shreve died at Louisville, December 23, 1853. Prentice penned a +splendid tribute to the memory of his dead friend and associate; and +some years later a collection of his verse was made as a fitting +memorial of his blameless life and literary labors. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860); _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. + Collins (Covington, Kentucky, 1882); _The Shreve Family_, by L. P. + Allen (Greenfield, Illinois). + + +I HAVE NO WIFE + + [From _The Knickerbocker Magazine_ (August, 1838)] + + I have no wife--and I can go + Just where I please, and feel as free + As crazy winds which choose to blow + Round mountain-tops their melody. + On those who have Love's race to run, + Hope, like a seraph, smiles most sweet-- + But they who Hymen's goal have won, + Sometimes, 'tis said, find Hope a cheat. + + I have no wife--young girls are fair-- + But how it is, I cannot tell, + No sooner are they wed, than their + Enchantments give them the farewell. + The girls, oh, bless them! make us yearn + To risk all odds and take a wife-- + To cling to one, and not to turn + Ten thousand in the dance of life. + + I have no wife:--Who'd have his nose + Forever tied to one lone flower, + E'en if that flower should be a rose, + Plucked with light hand from fairy bower? + Oh! better far the bright bouquet + Of flowers of every hue and clime; + By turns to charm the sense away, + And fill the heart with dreams sublime. + + I have no wife:--I now can change + From grave to joy, from light to sad + Unfettered, in my freedom range + And fret awhile, and, then, be glad. + I now can heed a Siren's tongue, + And feel that eyes glance not in vain-- + Make love apace, and, being flung, + Get up and try my luck again. + + I have no wife to pull my hair + If it should chance entangled be-- + I'm like the lion in his lair, + Who flings his mane about him free. + If 'tis my fancy, I can wear + My boots unblessed by blacking paste, + Cling to my coat till it's threadbare, + Without a lecture on bad taste. + + I have no wife, and I can dream + Of girls who're worth their weight in gold; + Can bask my heart in Love's broad beam, + And dance to think it's yet unsold. + Or I can look upon a brow + Which mind and beauty both enhance, + Go to the shrine, and make my bow, + And thank the Fates I have a chance. + + I have no wife, and, like a wave, + Can float away to any land, + Curl up and kiss, or gently lave + The sweetest flowers that are at hand. + A Pilgrim, I can bend before + The shrine which heart and mind approve;-- + Or, Persian like, I can adore + Each star that gems the heaven of love. + + I have no wife--in heaven, they say, + Such things as weddings are not known-- + Unyoked the blissful spirits stray + O'er fields where care no shade has thrown. + Then why not have a heaven below, + And let fair Hymen hence be sent? + It would be fine--but as things go, + _Unwedded, folks won't be content_! + + + + +ORMSBY M. MITCHEL + + +Ormsby MacKnight Mitchel, the celebrated American astronomer and author, +was born near Morganfield, Kentucky, August 28, 1809. He graduated from +West Point in the famous class of 1829 which included Robert E. Lee and +Joseph E. Johnston, Mitchel was professor of mathematics at West Point +for two years; but he later studied law and practiced at Cincinnati for +a year. In 1834 he was elected professor of mathematics and astronomy in +Cincinnati College. By his own efforts he raised sufficient funds with +which to establish an astronomical observatory in Cincinnati, in +1845--now the Mitchel Observatory--the first of the larger observatories +in this country. In 1860 Professor Mitchel was chosen as director of the +Dudley observatory at Albany, New York, and there he remained for two +years. The Civil War coming on, he entered the Union army, and rose to +the rank of general. General Mitchel was placed in command of the +"Department of the South," but before the war was well under way, +almost, he contracted yellow fever and died at Beaufort, South Carolina, +October 30, 1862. General Mitchel was the most distinguished astronomer +ever born on Kentucky soil; and in the army the men knew him as "Old +Stars." He was a popular lecturer, but it is as an author that his great +reputation rests. His books are: _The Planetary and Stellar Worlds_ (New +York, 1848); _The Orbs of Heaven_ (1851); _A Concise Elementary Treatise +of the Sun, Planets, Satellites, and Comets_ (1860); and _The Astronomy +of the Bible_ (New York, 1863). From 1846 to 1848 General Mitchel +published an astronomical journal, called _The Sidereal Messenger_. +Harvard and Hamilton Colleges conferred honorary degrees upon him; and +he was a member of many scientific societies in the United States and +Europe. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Ormsby MacKnight Mitchel, Astronomer and General_, + by his son, F. A. Mitchel; biographical sketch in _The Astronomy + of the Bible_ (New York, 1863); _Old Stars_, by P. C. Headley + (Boston, 1864). + + +ASTRONOMICAL EVIDENCES OF GOD + + [From _The Astronomy of the Bible_ (New York, 1863)] + +If we extend our researches beyond the limits of the solar system, and, +passing across the mighty gulf which separates us from the starry +heavens, inspect minutely the organizations which are there displayed, +we find the dominion of these same laws extending to these remote +regions, and holding an imperious sway over revolving suns. Thus we +perceive, that in one most important particular, the objects which +compose the mighty universe are obviously alike, and seem to have sprung +from a common origin. We are, moreover, compelled to admit a sun in +every visible star; and if a sun, then attendant planets; and if +revolving planets, then, likewise, some scheme of sentient existence, +possibly remotely analogous to that which is displayed with such +wonderful minuteness in our globe. Thus if the being of a God can be +argued from the admirable adaptations which surround man in this nether +world, every star that glitters in the vast concave of heaven +proclaims, with equal power, this mighty truth. If we rise still higher, +and from the contemplation of individual stars, examine their +distribution, their clusterings, their aggregations into immense +systems, the fact of their mutual influences, their restless and eternal +activity, their amazing periods of revolution, their countless millions, +and their ever-during organizations, the mind, whelmed with the display +of grandeur, exclaims involuntarily, "This is the empire of a God!" + +And now, how is the knowledge of this vast surrounding universe revealed +to the mind of man? Here is, perhaps, the crowning wonder. Through the +agency of light, a subtle, intangible, imponderable something, +originating, apparently, in the stars and suns, darting with incredible +velocity from one quarter of the universe to the other, whether in +absolute particles of matter shot off from luminous bodies, or by traces +of an ethereal fluid, who shall tell? This incomprehensible fluid falls +upon an instrument of most insignificant dimensions, yet of most +wonderful construction, the human eye, and, lo! to the mind what wonders +start into being. Pictures of the most extravagant beauty cover the +earth; clouds dipped in the hues of heaven fill the atmosphere; the sun, +the moon, the planets, come up from out of the depths of space, and far +more amazing still, the distant orbs of heaven, in their relative +magnitudes, distances and motions, are revealed to the bewildered mind. +We have only to proceed one step further, and bringing to the aid of the +human eye, the auxiliary power of the optic glass, the mind is brought +into physical association with objects which inhabit the confines of +penetrable space. We take cognizance of objects so remote, that even the +flashing element of light itself, by which they are revealed, flies on +its errand ten times ten thousand years to accomplish its stupendous +journey. + +Strike the human eye from existence, and at a single blow, the sun is +blotted out, the planets fade, the heavens are covered with the +blackness of darkness, the vast universe shrinks to a narrow compass +bounded by the sense of touch alone. + +Such, then, is the organization of the universe, and such the means by +which we are permitted to take cognizance of its existence and +phenomena. If the feeble mind of man has achieved victories in the +natural world--if his puny structures, which have survived the +attacks of a few thousand years, proclaim the superiority of the +intelligence of his mind to insensate matter--if the contemplation of +the works of art and the triumphs of human genius, swells us into +admiration at the power of this invisible spirit that dwells in mortal +form,--what shall be the emotions excited, the ideas inspired, by the +contemplation of the boundless universe of God? + + + + +ALBERT T. BLEDSOE + + +Albert Taylor Bledsoe, controversialist, was born at Frankfort, +Kentucky, November 9, 1809, the son of a journalist. He was appointed +from Kentucky to West Point and was graduated in 1830, after which he +served in the army in Indian territory until the last day of August, +1832, when he resigned to enter upon the study of law. A year later +Bledsoe abandoned law to become a tutor in Kenyon College, Ohio, where +he later studied theology and was ordained a clergyman in the +Protestant Episcopal church. He was connected with various Ohio +churches from 1835 to 1838, but in the latter year he quit the +ministry to resume his legal studies and he removed to Springfield, +Illinois, where he formed a partnership with the afterwards celebrated +statesman and soldier, Colonel Edward D. Baker. Abraham Lincoln and +Stephen A. Douglas were practicing law in Springfield at this time, +and Bledsoe knew both of them intimately; but because of his +subsequent connection with the Southern Confederacy none of the +biographies of these men mention him. For the following ten years +Bledsoe practiced his profession at Springfield and Washington, D. C. +His first book, _An Examination of Edwards's Inquiry into the Freedom +of the Will_ (Philadelphia, 1845), showed that his interest in +theological subjects had not waned. In 1848 Bledsoe was elected +professor of mathematics in the University of Mississippi, which +position he held for the ensuing six years. His next volume, _A +Theodicy, or Vindication of the Divine Glory_ (New York, 1853), gave +him a place among theologians. In 1854 Dr. Bledsoe was elected to the +chair of mathematics in the University of Virginia, and this he +occupied until 1861. While at the University he published _An Essay on +Liberty and Slavery_ (Philadelphia, 1856), which anticipated his +subsequent action of entering the Confederate army, which he did in +1861, and he was commissioned as a colonel. Dr. Bledsoe was speedily +made assistant secretary of war, but this work proved most +uncongenial, and he gladly accepted the joint invitation of Davis and +Lee to run the blockade, in 1863, and go to England to gather +materials for a constitutional argument on the right of secession. He +spent three years in London and upon his return to the United States, +in February, 1866, he brought his vast researches together in his best +known work, _Is Davis a Traitor? or was Secession a Constitutional +Right Previous to the War of 1861?_ (Baltimore, 1866). Dr. Bledsoe now +took up his residence at Baltimore, and some months later he became +editor of a quarterly periodical, _The Southern Review_, which he +conducted for the final years of his life. In 1868 he added the +principalship of a Baltimore school to his burdens; and in the same +year his last volume appeared, _The Philosophy of Mathematics_ +(Philadelphia, 1868). In 1871 Dr. Bledsoe was ordained a minister in +the Methodist church, and his _Review_ became the recognized organ of +his church. He died at Alexandria, Virginia, December 8, 1877. Dr. +Bledsoe was always a student and scholar, but he was essentially a +controversialist, often bitter in his statements, but time has +mellowed much of this, and he now stands forth as a very remarkable +man. Consider him from a dozen angles, and one will not find his like +in the whole range of American history. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. i); _Library of Southern Literature_, sketch by his + daughter, Mrs. Sophie Herrick (Atlanta, 1909, v. i). + + +SEVEN CRISES CAUSED THE CIVIL WAR + + [From _The Southern Review_ (Baltimore, April, 1867)] + +This history consists of seven great crises. The first of these +convulsed the Union, and threatened its dissolution before the new +Constitution was formed, or conceived. For how little soever its +history may be known, the North and the South, like Jacob and Esau, +struggled together, and that, too, with almost fatal desperation, in +the womb of the old Union. Slavery had nothing at all to do with that +struggle between the North and the South, the _dramatis personae_ in +the tragedy of 1861. It was solely and simply a contest for power. + +The second crisis was the formation and adoption of the new +Constitution. Much has been said about that event, as the most +wonderful revolution in the history of the world; because the +government of a great people was then radically changed by purely +peaceable means, and without shedding a drop of blood. But if that was +a bloodless revolution in itself, no one, who has maturely considered +it in all its bearings, can deny that it was, in the end, the occasion +of the most sanguinary strife in the annals of a fallen world. + +The revolution of 1801, by which the radical notions and doctrines of +the infidel philosophers of the eighteenth century gained the +ascendency in this country, never more to abate in their onward march, +constituted the third great crisis in the political history of the +United States. In passing through this crisis, the Republic of 1787 +became in practice the Democracy of the following generation; and, +finally, the rabid radicalism of 1861. It was then that the +democratic, or predominant, element in the Republic, began to swallow +up the others, and so became the most odious of all the forms of +absolute power or despotism. It was then that the reign of "King +Demos," the unchecked and the unlimited power of mere numbers, was +inaugurated, and his throne established on the ruins of American +freedom. But, while history will show this, it will also administer +the consoling reflection, that American freedom was doomed, from the +first, by the operation of other causes, and that the revolution of +1801 only precipitated its fall. If so, then the sooner its fall the +better for the world; as in that case its destruction would involve a +smaller portion of the human family in its ruins. + +The desperate struggle of 1820-21, between the North and the South, +relative to the admission of Missouri into the Union; the equally +fierce contest respecting the Tariff in 1832-33; the Mexican War, and +the acquisition of vast territory, by the dismemberment of a foreign +empire, which led to the most violent and angry of all the quarrels +between the two sections; constitute the fourth, fifth and sixth +crises in the stormy history of the United Sections. The seventh and +last great crisis, grew out of the repeal of the Missouri Compromise +of 1820, the rise of the Republican party, as it is called; and +consisted in the secession of the Southern States, and the war of +coercion. Each of these seven crises had, of course, its prelude and +its sequel, without which it cannot be comprehended, or seen how it +followed the preceding, and how it led to the succeeding crises in the +chain of events. Now some of these crises are most imperfectly +understood by the public, and, in some respects, most perfectly +misunderstood, such as the first two for example; others, and +especially the fourth, or the great Compromise of 1820, are overlaid +with a mass of lying traditions such as the world has seldom seen; +traditions invented by politicians, and industriously propagated by +the press and the pulpit. If these traditions were cleared away, and +the facts which lie beneath them in the silent records of the country +brought to view, the revelation would be sufficient to teach both +sections of the Union the profoundest lessons of humiliation and +sorrow. If patiently and properly studied, the history of the United +States is, perhaps, fraught with as many valuable lessons for the +warning and instruction of mankind, as that of any other age or nation +since the fall of Rome, since the Flood, or since the fall of man. + + + + +RICHARD H. MENEFEE + + +Richard Hickman Menefee, who with Henry Clay and Thomas F. Marshall +form the great triumvirate of early Kentucky orators, was born at +Owingsville, Kentucky, December 4, 1809. He was educated at +Transylvania University, and graduated from the law school of that +institution in 1832. He practiced his profession at Mt. Sterling, +Kentucky, for several years, when, in 1836, he was elected to the +Kentucky legislature. In the legislature he won a wide reputation as +an orator, and rapidly became known as the most gifted man of his age +in Kentucky. In the summer of 1837 Menefee made the race for Congress +and, after an exciting campaign, it was found that he had defeated his +opponent, Judge Richard French. In the lower House of Congress Menefee +and Sargeant S. Prentiss of Mississippi were the two young men that +compelled the country's attention and admiration as orators. In 1838 +William J. Graves, a Kentucky member of the House, killed Jonathan +Cilley, representative from a Maine district, and the friend of +Nathaniel Hawthorne, in a duel near Washington City. Menefee was one +of Graves's seconds. This affair of honor was so bitterly condemned on +all sides that Congress was compelled to enact the anti-duelling law. +In July, 1838, the people of Boston tendered Daniel Webster a great +home-coming banquet, in Faneuil Hall, and Menefee responded very +eloquently to a toast to Kentucky. One more session of Congress and he +returned to Kentucky, entering upon the practice of law at Lexington, +where cases pressed fast upon him. He met Henry Clay in the great +Rogers will case of 1840, and Clay got the jury's verdict. Cassius M. +Clay placed Menefee in nomination for the United States Senate in the +Kentucky legislature of 1841, but his ill-health made his election a +hazardous action. A short time before his death he drew up the mature +reflections of his life, in the form of a diary, and this, only +recently published, has added to his fame. Menefee died at Lexington, +Kentucky, February 20, 1841. Thomas P. Marshall pronounced an eulogy +upon him which has taken its rightful place among the masterpieces of +American oratory; and in 1869 a Kentucky county was carved out of +several other counties and named in his honor. While he was not a +constructive statesman, Menefee's fame as an orator seems to grow +greater with the passing of the years. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Speeches and Writings of Thomas F. Marshall_, by W. + L. Barre (Cincinnati, 1858); _Richard Hickman Menefee_, by John + Wilson Townsend (New York, 1907). + + +KENTUCKY: A TOAST + + [From _Richard Hickman Menefee_, by John Wilson Townsend (New + York, 1907)] + +MR. CHAIRMAN: + +I cannot remain silent under the sentiment which has just been announced +and so enthusiastically received. That sentiment relates not to myself +but to Kentucky--dearer to me than self. Of Kentucky I have nothing to +say. There she is. In her history, from the period when first penetrated +by the white man as the _dark and bloody ground_, down to the present, +she speaks. The character to which that history entitles her is before +the world. She is proud of it. She is proud of the past; she is proud of +the present. And her pride is patriotic and just. As one of her sons, I +ask to express in her name, the acknowledgments due to the complimentary +notice you have taken of her, a notice not the less complimentary from +its association with the name of Massachusetts. + +There is much in the character and history of Massachusetts which should +bind her in the strongest bonds to Kentucky. Your sentiment places them +together: just where they ought to be. Kentucky is willing to occupy the +place you have assigned her. Without respect now to subordinate +differences in past events, both States stand knit together by the +highest and strongest motives by which States can be impelled. I mean +the motive and purpose common to each of maintaining and upholding, in +every extremity and to the very last, the Union of these States and the +Constitution. Massachusetts has proclaimed over and over again her +resolution not to survive them. Nor will Kentucky survive them. She has +embarked her whole destiny--all she has and all she hopes for--in the +Union and the Constitution. Let come what may of public calamity, of +faction, of sectional seduction or intimidation, or evil in any form the +most dreadful to man, Kentucky, like Massachusetts, regards the +overthrow of the Union as more frightful than all. Kentucky acknowledges +no justification for a disruption of the Union that is not a +justification for revolution itself. In that Union, and under that +Constitution, Kentucky means to stand or fall. Kentucky stands by the +Union in her living efforts; she means to hold fast to it in her +expiring groans. With Massachusetts she means to perish, if perish she +must, with hands clenched, in death, upon the Union. + + * * * * * + +If the occasion allowed it, I should like to say something of old +Massachusetts. I should like to rekindle my own patriotism at her +altars. Here--on this very spot--in this very hall--the sacred flame +of revolutionary liberty first ascended. Here it has ever ascended. It +has never been smothered--never dimmed. Perpetual--clear--holy! Behold +its inspirations here in your midst! Where are the doctrines of the +Union and the Constitution so incessantly inculcated as here? Where +are those doctrines so enthusiastically adopted as here? The +principles of the Union and the Constitution--for us another name for +the principles of liberty which cannot survive their overthrow--will, +in after ages, trace with delight their lineage through you. The blood +of freedom is here pure. To be allied to it is to be ennobled. +_Massachusetts!_ Which of her multitude of virtues shall I commend? +How can I discriminate? I will not attempt it. I take her as she is +and all together--I give--_Old Massachusetts!_ God bless her! + + + + +GEORGE W. CUTTER + + +George Washington Cutter, one of Kentucky's finest poets, was born in +Massachusetts about 1809, but he early came to Covington, Kentucky, and +entered upon the practice of his profession, the law. He commanded a +company of Kentuckians in the Mexican War with great honor to himself +and to them. He had been a constant contributor of verse to the +periodicals of his time, but he did not publish his first book until +after the war with Mexico. _Buena Vista and Other Poems_ (Cincinnati, +1848) was his first collection, and it contained a preface signed from +Covington, Kentucky, December, 1847. From this it will be seen that +Cutter returned to Kentucky after the war, and that he was living in +this State at the time of his book's appearance. Tradition has said that +he wrote the title-poem, _Buena Vista_, a spirited war ballad, on the +field of action immediately after the battle. His little volume +contained thirty-seven poems, including _The Song of Steam_, which has +been singled out by critics as his masterpiece, an ode to Henry Clay, +his political idol, and his fine descriptive poem, _The Creation of +Woman_. This, to the present writer, is the most exquisite thing Cutter +did in verse. It is highly and consistently poetical, and it should be +better appreciated than it has been. Cutter was married to Mrs. Frances +Ann Drake, a famous Kentucky actress, but they were not happy and a +separation by mutual agreement subsequently followed. Mrs. Cutter was +the widow of Alexander Drake, of the well-known family of that name, and +after parting with the poet she resumed her first husband's name, +returned to the stage, and managed theatres in Kentucky and Ohio until +her death in Oldham county, Kentucky, September 1, 1875. Cutter later +removed to Indiana and was a member of the State legislature, after +which service he removed to Washington City to accept a government +position. In Washington Cutter continued his poetical output, life in +the capital turning his attention to patriotic subjects. _Poems, +National and Patriotic_ (Philadelphia, 1857) proved the author to be, +for the critics of his time, "the most intensely patriotic poet we +have." This volume contained sixty-nine of what he regarded as his best +poems. _The Song of Steam and Other Poems_ also appeared in this same +year of 1857, and it contained one of the poet's finest efforts, _The +Song of the Lightning_. Cutter died at Washington, D. C., December 24, +1865. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, 1860); Adams's _Dictionary of American + Authors_ (Boston, 1905). + + +THE SONG OF STEAM + + [From _Buena Vista and Other Poems_ (Cincinnati, 1848)] + + Harness me down with your iron bands, + Be sure of your curb and rein; + For I scorn the power of your puny hands + As the tempest scorns a chain. + How I laughed as I lay concealed from sight, + For many a countless hour, + At the childish boast of human might, + And the pride of human power. + + When I saw an army upon the land, + A navy upon the seas, + Creeping along, a snail-like band, + Or waiting the wayward breeze; + When I marked the peasant faintly reel + With the toil which he daily bore, + As he feebly turned the tardy wheel, + Or tugged at the weary oar;-- + + When I measured the panting courser's speed, + The flight of the courier dove-- + As they bore the law a king decreed, + Or the lines of impatient love-- + I could not but think how the world would feel, + As these were outstripp'd afar, + When I should be bound to the rushing keel, + Or chained to the flying car. + + Ha! ha! ha! they found me at last, + They invited me forth at length, + And I rushed to my throne with a thunder-blast, + And I laughed in my iron strength. + Oh! then ye saw a wondrous change + On the earth and the ocean wide, + Where now my fiery armies range, + Nor wait for wind or tide. + + Hurrah! hurrah! the waters o'er, + The mountain's steep decline, + Time--space--have yielded to my power-- + The world! the world is mine! + The rivers, the sun hath earliest blest, + Or those where his beams decline; + The giant streams of the queenly west, + Or the orient floods divine: + + The ocean pales where'er I sweep, + To hear my strength rejoice, + And the monsters of the briny deep + Cower, trembling, at my voice. + I carry the wealth and the lord of earth, + The thoughts of his god-like mind, + The wind lags after my flying forth, + The lightning is left behind. + + In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine, + My tireless arm doth play, + Where the rocks never saw the sun decline, + Or the dawn of the glorious day. + I bring earth's glittering jewels up + From the hidden cave below, + And I make the fountain's granite cup + With a crystal gush o'erflow. + + I blow the bellows, I forge the steel, + In all the shops of trade; + I hammer the ore and turn the wheel, + Where my arms of strength are made; + I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint; + I carry, I spin, I weave; + And all my doings I put into print, + On every Saturday eve. + + I've no muscle to weary, no breast to decay, + No bones to be "laid on the shelf," + And soon I intend you may "go and play," + While I manage this world myself. + But harness me down with your iron bands, + Be sure of your curb and rein; + For I scorn the strength of your puny hands, + As the tempest scorns a chain. + + + + +MARY P. SHINDLER + + +Mrs. Mary Palmer Shindler, poet and novelist, was born at Beaufort, +South Carolina, February 15, 1810. She was the daughter of Dr. +Benjamin M. Palmer, the celebrated Presbyterian preacher of New +Orleans. She was educated in Charleston by the daughter of Dr. David +Ramsey, the early historian of South Carolina. Her education was +completed in the schools of Connecticut and New Jersey. In 1835 Miss +Palmer was married to Charles E. Dana of New York; and in 1848 to Rev. +Robert D. Shindler, an Episcopal clergyman. Two years after this +marriage they removed to Maryland, and then to Shelbyville, Kentucky, +where Dr. Shindler held a professorship in Shelby College. Shelbyville +was Mrs. Shindler's home henceforth, save for short sojourns in other +states, and in that town she died about 1880. She was the author of +_The Southern Harp_ (1840); _The Northern Harp_ (1841); _The Parted +Family and Other Poems_ (1842); _The Temperance Lyre_ (1842); _Charles +Morton, or the Young Patriot_ (1843); _The Young Sailor_ (1844); +_Forecastle Tour_ (1844); and, _Letters to Relatives and Friends on +the Trinity_ (1845). Several of Mrs. Shindler's lyrics are well known. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1888, v. v); _The Writers of South Carolina_, by George A. + Wauchope (Columbia, South Carolina, 1910). + + +THE FADED FLOWER + + [From _The Parted Family and Other Poems_ (1842)] + + I have seen a fragrant flower + All impearled with morning dew; + I have plucked it from the bower, + Where in loveliness it grew. + Oh, 'twas sweet, when gayly vying + With the garden's richest bloom; + But when faded, withered, dying, + Sweeter far its choice perfume. + + So the heart, when crushed by sorrow, + Sends its richest streams abroad, + While it learns sweet balm to borrow + From the uplifted hand of God. + Not in its sunny days of gladness + Will the heart be fixed on Heaven; + When 'tis wounded, clothed in sadness, + Oft its richest love is given. + + + + +MARTIN J. SPALDING + + +Martin John Spalding, seventh archbishop of Baltimore, was born near +Lebanon, Kentucky, May 23, 1810. His forebears were Maryland Catholics +who had emigrated to Kentucky. He was graduated from St. Mary's +College when but sixteen years of age. Spalding then spent four years +at St. Joseph's College, Bardstown, Kentucky, and the same number of +years in Rome, at the conclusion of which he is said to have made a +seven hours' defense in Latin of 256 theological propositions. This +exhibition won him a doctor's diploma, and his ordination as a priest. +From 1834 to 1843 Dr. Spalding was president of St. Joseph's College +in Bardstown. And from 1843 to 1848 he was in charge of the cathedral +at Louisville. In 1848 he was consecrated Bishop of Lengone; and two +years later Bishop of Louisville. Bishop Spalding served in this +capacity until 1864 when, in the presence of four thousand people, he +was installed as the seventh archbishop of Baltimore. This high office +he held until his death, which occurred at Baltimore, February 7, +1872. Bishop Spalding was the greatest Roman Catholic reviewer and +historian Kentucky has produced. He was one of the editors of the +_Catholic Magazine_, and the author of the excellent _Sketches of the +Early Catholic Missions in Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1846); _The Life, +Times, and Character of the Rt. Rev. B. J. Flaget_ (Louisville, 1852). +He also published _Lectures on the General Evidences of Christianity_ +(1844); _Review of D'Aubigne's History of the Reformation_ (Baltimore, +1847); _History of the Protestant Reformation_ (1860); and a +posthumous volume, _Miscellanea_ (1885). There is also a uniform five +volume edition of his works, which is fortunate, as his books, +especially the _Sketches_, and _Flaget_, are exceedingly scarce. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life of Archbishop Spalding_, by his nephew, John + L. Spalding (New York, 1872); Adams's _Dictionary of American + Authors_ (Boston, 1905). + + +A BISHOP'S ARRIVAL + + [From _Sketches of the Life, Times, and Character of the Rt. Rev. + Benedict Joseph Flaget_ (Louisville, Kentucky, 1852)] + +Bishop Dubourg had sailed from Bordeaux on the 1st of July, 1817; and +he had landed at Annapolis on the 4th of September. His _suite_ +consisted of five priests--of whom the present Archbishop of New +Orleans was one--and twenty-six young men, some of whom were +candidates for the ministry, and others were destined to become lay +brothers to assist the missionaries in temporal affairs. Several of +these youths were from Belgium; and among them was the V. Rev. D. A. +Deparcq, of our Diocese. A portion of the company started directly for +Baltimore with Bishop Dubourg; the rest, with the Rev. M. Blanc at +their head, remained at Annapolis, where they were entertained with +princely hospitality in the mansion of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, +until the end of October. + +Preparations were in the meantime made for crossing the mountains. The +stage then ran westward only once a week; and no less than three weeks +were consumed in transporting the missionary band to Pittsburgh. The +Bishop and M. Blanc were in the last division; but after remaining in +the stage for two days, during which time it had repeatedly upset, +endangering their lives, they finally abandoned it altogether, and +performed the remainder of the journey for five days on foot. About +the middle of November, the missionary company embarked on a flatboat; +and they reached Louisville on the last day of the month. Here they +found the Rev. MM. Chabrat and Shaeffer, who had been sent on by +Bishop Flaget to welcome them to Kentucky. Accompanied by them and by +the Rev. M. Blanc, Bishop Dubourg started immediately for St. +Thomas's, where he arrived in the evening of December 2d. + +Bishop Flaget was rejoiced to meet his old friend. "I recognized him +instantly," says he; "see! on meeting me, he has the humility to +dismount, in order to present me the most affectionate salute that ever +was given." Many and long were the "happy conversations" which he held +with his former associate, and now distinguished guest. Bishop Dubourg +officiated pontifically, and preached an admirable sermon in the church +of St. Thomas,--the only cathedral which the Bishop as yet possessed. + +On the 12th of December, the two prelates, accompanied by Father +Badin, set out for St. Louis, by the way of Louisville. Here Bishop +Dubourg preached in the chapel erected by M. Badin. On the 18th they +embarked on the steamboat Piqua, and on the 20th reached the mouth of +the Ohio, where they were detained five days by the ice. Their time +was passed chiefly in religious exercises and pious conversations. + +The following description of the Piqua and its passengers, from the +pen of Bishop Flaget, may not be uninteresting to us at the present +day, when steamboat building and navigation have so greatly changed +for the better: + +"Nothing could be more original than the medley of persons on board this +boat. We have a band of seven or eight comedians, a family of seven or +eight Jews, and a company of clergymen composed of a tonsured cleric, a +priest, and two Bishops; besides others, both white and black. Thus more +than thirty persons are lodged in an apartment (cabin), twenty feet by +twelve, which is again divided into two parts. This boat comprises the +old and the new testament. It might serve successively for a synagogue, +a cathedral, a theatre, an hospital, a parlor, a dining room, and a +sleeping apartment. It is, in fact, a veritable _Noah's ark_, in which +there are both clean and unclean animals;--and what is more +astonishing,--peace and harmony reign here." + +They were still at the mouth of the Ohio on the morning of Christmas +day. Not being able to say three Masses, they determined to make three +meditations. At the conclusion of the second, the redoubtable Piqua +resumed her course towards St. Louis. The Bishops and clergy made a +kind of retreat on their Noah's ark. On the evening of Christmas day, +the boat stopped near the farm of the widow Fenwick, a good Catholic, +whom they were happy to visit. M. Badin continued his journey by land +from this point, in order to be able to visit on the way many of his +old friends, Catholic emigrants from Kentucky. + +The Bishops returned to the boat, where they found the comedians +performing a play,--that is, engaged in a general fight among +themselves,--until they were separated by the captain. At midnight, on +the 30th, they arrived at St. Genevieve; and early next morning they +sent a messenger to announce their coming to M. De Andreis. + +Two hours afterwards, "about thirty of the principal inhabitants came, +with several young men on horseback and a carriage, to escort the +Bishops into the town. We went to the presbytery to put on our +pontifical robes: twenty-four choir-children with the cross at their +head, and four citizens bearing a canopy, conducted us to the church, +where after the installation of Bishop Dubourg, on a throne specially +prepared for the purpose, we sang the _Te Deum_. The whole day was +spent in receiving visits." + +On the first day of the year 1818, Bishop Dubourg celebrated +Pontifical Mass at St. Genevieve. The journey was then continued to +Prairie du Rocher and Cahokias to St. Louis, where the prelates +arrived on the 5th. They were received with great pomp, in the best +French style; and Bishop Dubourg was no sooner known than he was +universally esteemed and beloved. He professed himself much pleased +with the dispositions and sentiments of his new flock,--so different +from what he had been led to expect. + +Bishop Flaget having now completed his mission, preached his farewell +sermon to the Catholics of St. Louis on the feast of the Epiphany; and +on the next day he turned his face homeward. He and M. Badin performed +the journey on horseback, by the way of Kaskaskia and Vincennes. They +were detained three days at the former place, not being able to cross +the river in consequence of the running ice; and in traversing Illinois +they passed three successive nights in the open air of the prairies. +They reached Vincennes on the 27th of January; and after remaining here +two weeks, attending to missionary duties, they continued their journey. + +On the 21st of February, the Bishop found himself once more at his +retired and pleasant home in the seminary of St. Thomas. + + + + +JOHN W. AUDUBON + + +John Woodhouse Audubon, son of the great Audubon, was born at +Henderson, Kentucky, November 30, 1812. At the time of his birth his +father was ekeing out an existence in Henderson, with saw-mills and +lumber ventures of various kinds, all of which finally failed. The +nomadic life of the ornithologist was early forced upon his son. Their +wanderings were chiefly confined to the country south of the Ohio +river, and Louisiana. John Woodhouse Audubon was instructed by his +mother in the useful field of learning; but from his father he learned +to delineate birds and mammals, though it was the family's desire that +he should become a portrait painter. He and his brother, Victor, who +was three years his elder, were sent to school together, but, in 1826, +they were separated, Victor becoming a clerk at Louisville, Kentucky, +and John remaining in Louisiana with his mother, who was then +conducting a school, while the father went to Europe to solicit +subscriptions for his forthcoming _Birds of America_. John W. Audubon +was at this time engaged in drawing from Nature, and in playing the +violin, to which he was devoted throughout life. He was a clerk for a +short time on a Mississippi river steamboat, but any kind of routine +was distasteful to him, his whole life being absorbed in the study of +birds and mammals. He accompanied his father on one of his European +trips, and in England and Scotland he copied many of the masterpieces +of the great painters. In 1863 the collection of new species demanded +that father and son should go as far South as the Gulf of Mexico; and +while passing through Charleston, South Carolina, the son met Maria +Bachman, whom he married the following year. In 1840 the Audubon house +near New York City was built, and there John W. Audubon spent the +remaining years of his life. In 1849 he joined a California company to +go to the gold fields, but he went not for gold but for new birds and +mammals. He returned in the following year, and in 1851, his famous +father died. The brothers were then occupied with the publication of +_The Quadrupeds_, and the octavo edition of _The Birds of America_. In +the summer of 1860 Victor Audubon died; and on February 21, 1862, his +brother followed him into the silent country. John Woodhouse Audubon's +forty-nine years were spent in collaborating with his father and +brother, but his independent fame is founded upon the manuscript +record of his 1849 journey from New York to California. This most +interesting manuscript was edited by his daughter, Miss Maria R. +Audubon, of Salem, New York, and published as _Audubon's Western +Journal: 1849-1850_ (Cleveland, Ohio, 1906). A more charming book of +travels, of Nature in many forms, would be difficult to name. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. The several lives of the great Audubon contain much + material for a study of his son. His daughter made an excellent + sketch of him for her edition of his _Western Journal: 1849-1850_ + (Cleveland, 1906). + + +LOS ANGELES[8] + + [From Audubon's _Western Journal, 1849-1850_ (Cleveland, 1906)] + +This "city of the angels" is anything else, unless the angels are +fallen ones. An antiquated, dilapidated air pervades all, but +Americans are pouring in, and in a few years will make a beautiful +place of it. It is well watered by a pretty little river, led off in +irrigating ditches like those at San Antonio de Bexar. The whole town +is surrounded to the south with very luxuriant vines, and the grapes +are quite delightful; we parted from them with great regret, as fruit +is such a luxury with us. Many of the men took bushels, and only paid +small sums for them. + + +TULARE VALLEY + + [From the same] + +One more day brought us to this great valley, and the view from the +last hill looking to northwest was quite grand, stretching on one hand +until lost in distance, and on the other the snowy mountains on the +east of the Tulare valley. Here, for the first time, I saw the Lewis +woodpecker, and Steller's jay in this country. I have seen many +California vultures and a new hawk, with a white tail and red +shoulders. During the dry season this great plain may be travelled on, +but now numerous ponds and lakes exist, and the ground is in places, +for miles, too boggy to ride over, so we were forced to skirt the +hills. This compelled us sometimes to take three days when two should +have been ample. Our journeys now are not more than twenty miles a +day, and our nights are so penetrating and cold, that four blankets +are not too many. + + +CHRISTMAS IN 'FRISCO IN 1849 + + [From the same] + +Christmas Day! Happy Christmas! Merry Christmas! Not that here, to me +at any rate, in this pandemonium of a city. Not a _lady_ to be seen, +and the women, poor things, sad and silent, except when drunk or +excited. The place full of gamblers, hundreds of them, and men of the +lowest types, more blasphemous, and with less regard for God and his +commands than all I have ever seen on the Mississippi, [in] New +Orleans or Texas, which give us the same class to some extent, it is +true; but instead of a few dozen, or a hundred, gaming at a time, here +there are thousands, and one house alone pays one hundred and fifty +thousand dollars per annum for the rent of the "Monte" tables. + +Sunday makes no difference, certainly not Christmas, except for a +little more drunkenness, and a little extra effort on the part of the +hotel keepers to take in more money. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[8] Copyright, 1905, by the Arthur H. Clark Company. + + + + +ADRIEN E. ROUQUETTE + + +Adrien Emmanuel Rouquette, Louisiana's most distinguished poet, was +born at New Orleans, February 13, 1813, the scion of an old and +honorable Creole family, and the brother of Francois Dominique +Rouquette (1810-1890), who was also a poet of much merit. From his +boyhood he had a great fancy for the American Indian, and among them +he spent many of his early years. His academic training was begun at +Transylvania University of Lexington, Kentucky, but as the old +matriculation books have disappeared, it now seems quite impossible to +definitely fix his period of residence. From Lexington Rouquette +journeyed to Paris, France, where he studied at the Royal College and +at Nantes and Remnes. He was graduated from Remnes, March 26, 1833, +and at once returned to New Orleans. He had, however, developed into +such an unconventional fellow his family decided that a law course in +Paris was what he needed, so back to the capital of the French he +went. He soon abandoned the law and again returned to New Orleans, +where he took up his abode among the Indians. In 1841 Rouquette +published his first and best book of poems, written wholly in French, +entitled _Les Savanes_ (Paris and New Orleans). Nearly all of the +poems were upon Louisiana subjects, save the finest one, _Souvenir de +Kentucky_, an exquisite memorial of his Kentucky days, written in +1838. As he was partly educated in Kentucky and in praise of Kentucky +wrote his masterpiece, this State has a double claim upon him which, +though secondary to that of Louisiana, is none the less legitimate. In +1842 the poet began his studies for the priesthood, and three years +later he was ordained and attached to the Catholic cathedral at New +Orleans. His subsequent works include _Discours prononce a la +Cathedral de Saint Louis_ (New Orleans, 1846); _Wild Flowers_ (New +Orleans, 1848); _La Thebaide en Amerique_ (New Orleans, 1852); +_L'Antoniade_ (New Orleans, 1860), a long poem in which a solitary +life is extolled; _Poemes patriotiques_ (New Orleans, 1860); _St. +Catherine Tegehkwitha_ (New Orleans, 1873); and, _La Nouvelle Atala_ +(New Orleans, 1879). In 1859 the Abbe Rouquette established a mission +for the Choctaw Indians on the Bayou Lacombe, to which work he gave +the larger part of his life. Rouquette also turned into French the +poems of Estelle Anna Lewis (1824-1880), the Baltimore woman whom Poe +admired; and he edited _Selections from the Poets of all Countries_. +The three great Louisiana writers, Rouquette, the poet, Fortier, the +critic, and Gayarre, the historian, published pamphlets condemnatory +of Mr. George W. Cable's conceptions of Creole life and history as set +forth in his many books. The Abbe sent his out anonymously, entitled +_Critical Dialogue between Aboo and Caboo on a New Book, or a +Grandissime Ascension_, edited by E. Junius (Great Publishing House of +Sam Slick Allspice, 12 Veracity street, Mingo City, 1880). From the +Creole standpoint _The Grandissimes_ most probably deserved to be +satirized, but not in the cheap and easy manner of this little +pamphlet. It was a very unhappy swan-song of senility for the Abbe +Rouquette. He died at New Orleans, July 15, 1887, lamented by his city +and state. Sainte-Beuve, though recognizing the influence of +Chateaubriand in Rouquette's work, praised him highly, as did many of +the other famous French critics of his day and generation. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Cyclopaedia of American Literature_, by E. A. and + G. L. Duyckinck (New York, 1856); _Louisiana Studies_, by Alcee + Fortier (New Orleans, 1894); _Literature of the Louisiana + Territory_, by A. N. DeMenil (St. Louis, 1904). + + +SOUVENIR DE KENTUCKY + + [From _Les Savanes, Poesies Americaines_ (Paris, 1841)] + +Kentucky, the bloody land! + + * * * * * + +Le Seigneur dit a Osee: "Apres cela, neanmoins, je l'attirerai +doucement a moi, je l'amenerai dans la solitude, et je lui parlerai au +coeur."--(_La Bible_ Osee). + + Enfant, je dis un soir: Adieu, ma bonne mere! + Et je quittai gaiment sa maison et sa terre, + Enfant, dans mon exil, une lettre, un matin, + (O Louise!) m'apprit que j'etais orphelin! + Enfant, je vis les bois du Kentucky sauvage, + Et l'homme se souvient des bois de son jeune age! + Ah! dans le Kentucky les arbres sont bien beaux: + C'est la _terre de sang_, aux indiens tombeaux, + Terre aux belles forets, aux seculaires chenes, + Aux bois suivis de bois, aux magnifiques scenes; + Imposant cimetiere, ou dorment en repos + Tant de _rouges-tribus_ et tant de _blanches-peaux_; + Ou l'ombre du vieux Boon, immobile genie, + Semble ecouter, la nuit, l'eternelle harmonie, + Le murmure eternel des immenses deserts, + Ces mille bruits confus, ces mille bruits divers, + Cet orgue des forets, cet orchestre sublime, + O Dieu! que seul tu fis, que seul ton souffle anime! + Quand au vaste clavier pese un seul de tes doigts, + Soudain, roulent dans l'air mille flots a la fois: + Soudain, au fond des bois, sonores basiliques, + Bourdonne un ocean de sauvages musiques; + Et l'homme, a tous ces sons de l'orgue universel, + L'homme tombe a genoux, en regardant le ciel! + Il tombe, il croit, il prie; et, chretien sans etude, + Il retrouve, etonne, Dieu dans la solitude! + +A portion of this famous poem was translated by a writer in _The +Southern Quarterly Review_ (July, 1854). + + Here, with its Indian tombs, the Bloody Land + Spreads out:--majestic forests, secular oaks, + Woods stretching into woods; a witching realm, + Yet haunted with dread shadows;--a vast grave, + Where, laid together in the sleep of death, + Rest myriads of the red men and the pale. + Here, the stern forest genius, veteran Boon, + Still harbors: still he hearkens, as of yore, + To never ceasing harmonies, that blend, + At night, the murmurs of a thousand sounds, + That rise and swell capricious, change yet rise, + Borne from far wastes immense, whose mingling strains-- + The forest organ's tones, the sylvan choir-- + Thy breath alone, O God! can'st animate, + Making it fruitful in the matchless space! + Thy mighty fingers pressing on its keys, + How suddenly the billowy tones roll up + From the great temples of the solemn depths, + Resounding through the immensity of wood + To the grand gushing harmonies, that speak + For thee, alone, O Father. As we hear + The unanimous concert of this mighty chaunt, + We bow before thee; eyes uplift to Heaven, + We pray thee, and believe. A Christian sense + Informs us, though untaught in Christian books + Awed into worship, as we learn to know + That thou, O God, art in the solitude! + + + + +EMILY V. MASON + + +Miss Emily Virginia Mason, biographer and anthologist, was born at +Lexington, Kentucky, October 15, 1815, the sister of Stevens Thompson +Mason, first governor of Michigan. She was educated in Kentucky schools +and in a female seminary at Troy, New York. From 1845 until 1861 Miss +Mason lived in Fairfax county, Virginia, but when the Civil War began +she left her home and volunteered in the Confederate States hospital +service; and she was matron successively of hospitals in the Virginia +towns of Greenbrier, White Sulphur Springs, Charlottesville, Lynchburg, +and Richmond. Miss Mason won a wide reputation in this work, becoming +one of the best loved of Southern women. Almost immediately after the +war her first literary work was published, an anthology of _The Southern +Poems of the War_ (Baltimore, 1867) which was one of the first +collection issued of verse which owed its origin to the war. Her second +book was what she always said was the first life of Lee, though John +Esten Cooke's account of the great soldier appeared about the same +time, entitled _A Popular Life of General Robert Edward Lee_ (Baltimore, +1871). This was followed by her edition of _The Journal of a Young Lady +of Virginia in 1798_ (1871), which enjoyed wide popularity among +Virginians of her generation. Miss Mason went to Paris, France, about +1870, and for the following fifteen years she was associate principal of +an American school for young women. Upon her return to this country she +established herself in an attractive old Southern home at Georgetown, D. +C., in which she spent the remainder of her life. Miss Mason's last +literary work was _Memories of a Hospital Matron_, which appeared in +_The Atlantic Monthly_ for September and October of 1902. She was an +able writer and a most remarkable woman in many respects. Miss Mason +died at Georgetown, D. C., February 16, 1909, at the great age of +ninety-four years. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Southern Writers_, by W. P. Trent (New York, 1905); + _The Washington Post_ (February 17, 1909). + + +THE DEATH OF LEE + + [From _A Popular Life of General Robert E. Lee_ (Baltimore, 1871)] + +On the evening of this day, 28th of September [1870] after a morning +of great fatigue, he attended the vestry meeting referred to, returned +home, and seated at the tea-table, opened his lips to give thanks to +God. + +The family looked up to see the parted lips, but heard no sound. With +that last thanksgiving his great heart broke. + +For many days his weeping friends hung over him, hoping for a return +of health and reason, but in vain. He murmured of battles and sieges; +of guarded tents and fields just won. Among his last words were: +"Strike my tent! Send for Hill!" Remarkably coincident with those of +his great lieutenant, Jackson, whose words were: "Let A. P. Hill +prepare for action! March the infantry rapidly to the front! Let us +cross the river and rest under the shade of the trees." + +At 9 o'clock on the morning of the 12th of October, the great soldier +breathed his last. + +The following day his body was borne to the college-chapel, escorted +by a guard of honor composed of Confederate soldiers. Next the hearse +was led General Lee's favorite horse "Traveller," who had borne him in +so many battles. The Trustees and Faculty of the college, the cadets +of the Military Institute, and the citizens, followed in procession. + +Above the chapel floated the flag of Virginia, draped in mourning. + +Through this and the succeeding day, the body, covered with flowers, +lay in state, visited by thousands who came to look for the last time +upon his noble features. + +On the 15th, the last said rites were rendered, amid the tolling of the +bells, the sound of martial music, and the thundering of artillery. + +The students, officers and soldiers of the Confederate army, and about +a thousand persons, assembled at the chapel. A military escort, with +the officers of General Lee's staff, were in the front. The hearse +followed, with the faithful "Traveller" close behind it. Next came a +committee of the Virginia Legislature, with citizens from all parts of +the State. Passing the Military Institute, the cadets made the +military salute as the body appeared, then joined the procession, and +escorted it back to the chapel. + +It had been the request of General Lee that no funeral oration should +be pronounced over his remains. His old and long-tried friend, the +Rev. Wm. N. Pendleton, simply read the burial services of the +Episcopal Church, after which was lowered into a tomb beneath the +chapel all that was mortal of Robert E. Lee. + + + + +EDMUND FLAGG + + +Edmund Flagg, traveler, journalist, and poet, was born at Wiscasset, +Maine, November 24, 1815. Immediately upon his graduation from Bowdoin +College, in 1835, he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, and became a +teacher. His letters written to the _Louisville Journal_ while +traveling in the states of the Middle West, were afterwards collected, +revised, and published anonymously, entitled _The Far West, or a Tour +beyond the Mountains_ (New York, 1838, two vols.). This work has been +edited by Dr. Reuben Gold Thwaites and published as volumes 26 and 27 +of _Early Western Travels_ (Cleveland, 1906). In 1839 Flagg became +associate editor of the Louisville _Literary News-Letter_, of which +George D. Prentice was editor. All of his poems of merit were +published in the _Journal_, and _News-Letter_. Flagg contributed both +prose and verse to the Louisville papers for nearly thirty-five years. +Ill-health compelled him to abandon journalism for law, and at +Vicksburg, Mississippi, he formed a partnership with the celebrated +Sargent Smith Prentiss. Two years later he became editor of the +_Gazette_ at Marietta, Ohio. Flagg's first two novels were issued +about this time, entitled _Carrero_ (New York, 1842), and _Francois of +Valois_ (New York, 1842). He was next editor of a publication at St. +Louis; and in 1849 he was secretary of the American legation at +Berlin. In 1850-1851 he was United States consul at Venice. He +afterwards returned to St. Louis and to journalism. Two of his plays, +_Blanche of Artois_, and _The Howard Queen_, were well received at +Louisville, Cincinnati, and several other cities. In 1853 Flagg's +_Venice, the City of the Sea_, appeared, and it won him a wide +reputation. _North Italy since 1849_, issued some years later, resumed +the story of Venice where his first work had left off, and brought it +down to date. Flagg was afterwards connected with the State department +in Washington, and under an order from Congress he prepared his +famous _Report on the Commercial Relations of the United States with +all Foreign Nations_ (Washington, 1856-1857, four vols.). His final +work was a novel, _De Molai, the Last of the Military Templars_ +(1888). Edmund Flagg died at Salem, Virginia, in 1890. He is most +certainly a Kentucky poet, journalist, and traveler, but his fame as a +dramatist, historian, and novelist belongs wholly to other states. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Literature of the Louisiana Territory_, by A. N. + DeMenil (St. Louis, 1904); Adams's _Dictionary of American + Authors_ (Boston, 1905). + + +THE ANCIENT MOUNDS OF THE WEST + + [From _The Louisville Literary News-Letter_] + +Ages since--long ere the first son of the Old World had pressed the +fresh soil of the New--long before the bright region beyond the blue +waves had become the object of the philosopher's reverie by day, and +the enthusiast's vision by night--in the deep stillness and solitude +of an unpeopled land, these vast mausoleums rose as they now rise, in +lonely grandeur from the plain and looked down even as now they look, +upon the giant floods rolling their dark waters at their base, +hurrying past them to the deep. So has it been with the massive tombs +of Egypt, amid the sands and barrenness of the desert. For ages untold +have the gloomy pyramids been reflected by the inundations of the +Nile; an hundred generations, they tell us, have arisen from the +cradle, and reposed beneath their shadows, and like autumn leaves have +dropped into the grave; but, from the midnight of bygone centuries, +comes forth no darting spirit to claim these kingly sepulchres as his +own! And shall the dusky piles, on the plains of distant Egypt affect +so deeply our reverence for the departed, and these mighty monuments, +reposing in dark sublimity upon our own magnificent prairies, vailed +in mystery more inscrutable than they, call forth no solitary throb? +Is there no hallowing interest associated with these aged +relics--these tombs, and temples, and towers' of another race, to +elicit emotion? Are they indeed to us no more than the dull clods we +tread upon? Why then does the wanderer from the far land gaze upon +them with wonder and veneration? Why linger fondly around them, and +meditate upon the power which reared them, and is departed? Why does +the poet, the man of genius and fancy, or the philosopher of mind and +nature, seat himself at their base, and with strange and undefined +emotions, pause and ponder, amid the loneliness that slumbers around? +And surely, if the far traveler, as he wanders through this Western +Valley, may linger around these aged piles, and meditate upon a power +departed--a race obliterated--an influence swept from the earth +forever--and dwell with melancholy emotions upon the destiny of man, +is it not meet, that those into whose keeping they seem by Providence +consigned, should regard them with interest and emotion?--that they +should gather up and preserve every incident relevant to their origin, +design, or history, which may be attained, and avail themselves of +every measure, which may give to them perpetuity, and hand them down, +undisturbed in form or character, to other generations? + +That these venerable piles are of the workmanship of man's hand, no +one, who with unprejudiced opinion has examined them, can doubt. But +with such an admission, what is the cloud of reflections, which throng +and startle the mind? What a series of unanswerable inquiries succeed! +When were these enormous earth heaps reared up from the plain? By what +race of beings was the vast undertaking accomplished? What was their +purpose?--what changes in their form and magnitude have taken +place?--what vicissitudes and revolutions have, in the lapse of +centuries, rolled like successive waves over the plains at their base? +As we reflect, we anxiously look around us for some tradition--some +time-stained chronicle--some age-worn record--even the faintest and +most unsatisfactory legend, upon which to repose our credulity, and +relieve the inquiring solicitude of the mind. But our research is +hopeless. The present race of Aborigines can tell nothing of these +tumuli. To them as to us they are vailed in mystery. Ages since--long +ere the white-face came--while this fair land was yet the home of his +fathers--the simple Indian stood before the venerable earth-heap, and +gazed, and wondered, and turned away. + + + + +CATHERINE A. WARFIELD + + +Mrs. Catherine Ann Warfield, poet and novelist, was born at Natchez, +Mississippi, June 6, 1816, the daughter of Nathaniel H. Ware. She was +educated at Philadelphia with her sister, Eleanor P. Ware Lee +(1820-1849), with whom she afterwards collaborated in her first two +volumes. Catherine Ware was married at Cincinnati, in 1833, to Robert +Elisha Warfield, of Lexington, Kentucky, and Kentucky was her home +henceforth. _The Wife of Leon, and Other Poems, by Two Sisters of the +West_ (New York, 1844), and _The Indian Chamber, and Other Poems_ (New +York, 1846) were the works of the sisters. In 1857 Mrs. Warfield +removed from Lexington to Pewee Valley, Kentucky, near Louisville, and +some three years later her masterpiece appeared, entitled _The +Household of Bouverie_ (New York, 1860, two vols.). This work brought +her into wide notice. During the Civil War Mrs. Warfield wrote some of +the most spirited lyrics which that mighty conflict called forth. +After the war she turned again to prose fiction, producing the +following books: _The Romance of the Green Seal_ (1867); _Miriam +Monfort_ (1873); _A Double Wedding_ (1875); _Hester Howard's +Temptation_ (1875); _Lady Ernestine_ (1876); _Miriam's Memoirs_ +(1876); _Sea and Shore_ (1876); _Ferne Fleming_ (1877); and her last +novel, _The Cardinal's Daughter_ (1877). Mrs. Warfield died at Pewee +Valley, Kentucky, May 21, 1877, at the time of her greatest +popularity. Of her books _The Household of Bouverie_ is the only one +that is generally known to-day, and is, perhaps, the only one that is +at all readable and interesting. Mrs. Warfield was an early edition of +"The Duchess" and Mary Jane Holmes, though she did write fine war +lyrics and one good story, which is just a bit better than either of +the other two women did. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Women of the South Distinguished in Literature_, by + Mary Forrest (New York, 1861); _Library of Southern Literature_ + (Atlanta, 1910, v. xii). + + +CAMILLA BOUVERIE'S DIARY + + [From _The Household of Bouverie_ (New York, 1860, v. ii)] + +Another queer scene with little Paul, whose quaint ways divert and +mystify me all the time. During Mr. Bouverie's absence of a week, I +have nothing else to amuse me nor to write about. He has called me +familiarly "Camilla" until now; but fearing that Mr. Bouverie might +not like the appellation, or rather that it might make me appear too +childish in his sight, I said to him recently: + +"Paul, you are a little fellow, and I am your guardian's wife. Don't +you think it would sound better if you were to add a handle to my +name, as common folks say? Call me 'Cousin Camilla' or 'Aunt Camilla,' +whichever you prefer; which shall it be, Quintil?" + +"Neither," he replied, manfully, "for you are neither of those things +to me, and I do not like to tell stories; but I will call you 'madam,' +if you choose, as you are a 'madam;'" and something like a sneer +wreathed his childish lips. + +"A foolish little madam, you think, Paul!" I rejoined, half in pique, +half in playfulness. + +"Why that is the very name for you," he said, brightening with the +thought. "'Little Madam!' I will call you so; but I will not put in +the foolish," he added, gravely, "for, perhaps, you will change after +a while and grow wiser." + +He spoke very seriously, sorrowfully almost, and I was quite provoked +for a moment to be set down in this fashion, by such a mere babe and +suckling. I was glad of the opportunity presented to me of snubbing +him by noticing a streak of molasses on his cheek. + +"Go wash your face, Paul," I said, "it is dirty!" + +He walked gravely to the glass and surveyed the stain. "Looking +glasses are useful things, after all," he said; "they tell the +truth--see 'Little Madam,' how you are mistaken! my face is not dirty, +only soiled; food is not dirt--if it were, we should all starve." + +He turned and smiled at me in his peculiar way, half mocking, half +affectionate. + +"Yet, as you bid me," he added, "I will wash it off; but isn't it a +pity to waste what would keep a bee alive a whole day!" + +Is this brat a humorist? + +He has brought out of his funny little trunk the oddest present for +me! It is a Medusa's head admirably carved in alabaster, and was +broken from the side of a vase by accident, and given to him by a +lady, at whose house he made a visit with Mr. Bouverie. + +He considers it a priceless treasure. There is a vague horror to me in +the face that is almost insupportable. The snaky hair, the sightless, +glaring eyes, are so mysteriously dreadful. He says it will answer for +a paper weight. No, Paul, I will lay it away out of sight forever. + + +A PLEDGE TO LEE + +(Written for a Kentucky Company) + + [From _Southern Poems of the War_, edited by Emily V. Mason + (Baltimore, 1867)] + + We pledge thee, Lee! + In water or wine, + In blood or in brine, + What matter the sign? + Whether brilliantly glowing, + Or darkly overflowing, + So the cup is divine + That we fill to thee! + Vanquished--victorious, + Gloomy or glorious, + Fainting and bleeding, + Advancing, receding, + Lingering or leading, + Captive or free; + With swords raised on high, + With hearts nerved to die, + Or to grasp victory; + Hand to hand--knee to knee, + With a wild three times three + We pledge thee, Lee! + + We pledge thee, chief: + In the name of our nation, + Her wide devastation, + Her sore desolation, + Her grandeur and grief! + Where'er thou warrest + When our need is the sorest, + Or in Fortress or forest, + Bidest thy time; + Thou--Heaven elected, + Thou--Angel-protected, + Thou--Brother selected, + What e'er thy fate be, + Our trust is in thee, + And our faith is sublime. + With swords raised on high, + With hearts nerved to die, + Or to grasp victory; + Hand to hand--knee to knee, + With a wild three times three, + We pledge thee, Lee! + + + + +J. ROSS BROWNE + + +John Ross Browne, humorist and traveler, was born in Ireland, in 1817, +but when an infant his father came to America and settled at +Louisville, Kentucky. Browne was educated in the Louisville schools, +and studied medicine for a time under several well-known physicians. +When eighteen years old he went to New Orleans; and this journey +kindled his passion for travel that ended only with his death. Browne +took the whole world for his home. He first went almost around the +globe on a whaling vessel, and on his return to this country, he +published his first book, called _Etchings of a Whaling Cruise_ (New +York, 1846). Browne was private secretary for Robert J. Walker, +Secretary of the Treasury, for a time, but, in 1849, he went to +California as a government commissioner; and in 1851 he went to Europe +as a newspaper correspondent. A tour of Palestine is described in +Browne's most famous book, _Yusef, or the Journey of the Frangi_ (New +York, 1853). He shortly afterwards returned to the United States and +became an inspector of customs on the Pacific coast; but the year of +1861 found him again in Europe, residing at Frankfort-on-the-Main. +Browne's next work was _Crusoe's Island_ (New York, 1864). His +family's residence in Germany resulted in the author publishing _An +American Family in Germany_ (New York, 1866), one of his most +delightful volumes. Browne's travels in northern Europe are described +in _The Land of Thor_ (New York, 1867). He now returned to America and +made his home in California. He investigated the mineral resources of +the country west of the Rocky Mountains, and his report was issued as +_Resources of the Pacific Slope_ (1869). _Adventures in the Apache +Country_ (1869), was his last book. Browne was appointed United States +Minister to China on March 11, 1868, but he was recalled sixteen +months later. He died at Oakland, California, December 9, 1875. Most +of his volumes are very cleverly illustrated with his own comical +sketches of characters and scenes. That J. Ross Browne was a man of +very considerable ability in several directions admits of no argument. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1887, v. i); _National Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1900, v. viii). + + +LAPDOGS IN GERMANY + + [From _An American Family in Germany_ (New York, 1866)] + +One of the most remarkable sights is the dog-fancier--a strapping +six-foot dandy, leading after him, with silken strings, a whole brood +of nasty little poodles. This fellow is a type of the class; you meet +them everywhere at every Continental city. There are thousands of them +in Frankfort, men strangely infatuated on the subject of little dogs. +Now pardon me if I devote some serious reflections to this extraordinary +and unreasonable propensity, which, I fear, is rapidly taking root in +the hearts of the American people, especially the female portion of our +population. In men it is often excusable; they may be driven to it by +unrequited affection. I never see a fine-looking fellow leading a gang +of little poodle-dogs after him, that I don't imagine he has had some +dreadful experience in the line of true love; but with the opposite sex +the case is quite different. "If women have one weakness more marked +than another," says Mrs. Beecher Stowe, in a very eloquent passage of +the "Minister's Wooing," "it is toward veneration. They are born +worshippers--makers of silver shrines for some divinity or other, which, +of course, they always think fell straight down from heaven." And, in +illustration of this very just remark, she refers to instances where +celebrated preachers and divines have stood like the image that +Nebuchadnezzar the king set up, "and all womankind, coquettes and flirts +not excepted, have been ready to fall down and worship, even before the +sound of cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, and so forth," where the most +gifted and accomplished of the sex "have turned away from the flattery +of admirers, to prostrate themselves at the feet of a genuine hero, who +never moved them except by heroic deeds and the rhetoric of a noble +life"--a most striking and beautiful trait in woman's character to which +all homage should be rendered. She clingeth unto man, even as the ivy +clingeth unto the oak. But does anybody pretend to tell me that man is +always the lucky recipient of this devotion? Alas, no! Not always for +him is it that women are burdened with this load of "fealty, faith, and +reverence more than they know what to do with;" not always for him is it +that "They stand like a hedge of sweet peas, throwing out fluttering +tendrils everywhere for something high and strong to climb by." Alas! +man is but a cipher among the objects of woman's heroic devotion. I have +a lady in my eye who from early youth has bestowed the tenderest +affections of her heart upon poll-parrots; another, who for years has +wept over the woes of a little chicken; who would abandon her midnight +slumber to minister to the afflictions of a lame turkey, and insensible +to the appeals of her lover, only relax in her severity when moved by +the plaintive mewing of a cat; another, who, in the bosom of her family, +and tenderly adored by her husband, has long since yielded to the +fascinating allurement of a sewing-machine, and wrapped around its +cogwheels, cotton spools, and hammering needles the poetry of a romantic +attachment; and, lastly, the particular case in point, at which I marvel +most of all, three most bewitching young ladies, of acknowledged beauty, +who are hopelessly and irrevocably gone in love with--what do you think? +Not a man, erect and noble, with the brow of Jove and eye of Mars; not +even a horse, the paragon of beautiful and intelligent animals, or a +lion, the king of the forest; but a miserable, dirty, nasty, little +lapdog; a snappish, foul-eyed inodorous, sneaking little brute, which +even the very cats hold in contempt! And yet they love it; at least they +say so, and I have no reason to dispute their word. Have I not heard +them, morning, noon, and night, protest their devotion to the dear +little Fidel--the precious, beautiful little Fidel--the adorable love of +a little Fidel! Oh, it is enough to make the angels weep to see the +grace and fondness with which this horrid little wretch is caught up in +those tender white arms, and hugged to those virgin bosoms and kissed by +those pouting and honeyed lips! Faugh! It drives me mad. What is the use +of wasting so much sweetness when there are thousands of good, honest +fellows actually pining away from unrequited affection? brave sons of +toil, ready at a moment's notice to be caressed by these sweet-pea +vines, who are throwing out their fluttering tendrils for something high +and strong to cling to. I leave it to any honest miner, if it is not +provoking to the last degree to see the noblest capacity of woman's +nature thus cruelly and wastefully perverted--the choicest affections +devoted to a miserable, disgusting, and unsympathizing little +monster--the very honey of their lips lavished on that foul and mucous +nose, which, if it knows anything, must know some thing not fit to be +mentioned to polite ears. Heaven! how often have I longed to have a good +fair kick at one of these pampered little brutes. Only think of the care +taken of them, while widows and orphans are shivering in the cold and +perishing of hunger. The choicest pieces of meat cut up for them, +potatoes and gravy mixed, delicate morsels of bread; the savory mess put +before them by delicate hands, and swallowed into their delicate +stomachs, and too often rejected by those delicate organs, to the +detriment of the carpet. And then, when this delectable subject of +woman's adoration is rubbed, and scrubbed, and pitied, and physicked, +and thoroughly combed out from head to foot, with every love-lock of his +glossy hair filtered of its fleas, how tenderly he is laid upon the bed +or clasped in the embraces of beauty! Shade of Cupid! what a happy thing +it is to be a lapdog! Well might the immortal Bard of Avon prefer to be +a dog that bayed the moon rather than an indifferent poet. For my part, +I'd sooner be wrapped in the arms of beauty than be King of the Cannibal +Islands. That strange infatuation of feminine instinct which lends to +the head-dress, at an approaching bridal, a degree of importance to +which the expected groom can never aspire; which sees the destinies of +the whole matrimonial career centred in the fringe of a nightgown; which +seeks advice and consolation in the pattern of a reception-dress; which +would shrink from the fearful sacrifice of liberty but for the magic +power of new bonnets, new gloves, and embroidered handkerchiefs--that we +can all understand; these are woman's coy devices to tantalize mankind; +these are the probationary tortures inflicted upon him through mere +wantonness and love of mischief. But when the richest treasures of her +affection, the most divine essence of her being, the Promethean spark +warm from her virgin heart, for which worlds are lost and won--when +these are cast away upon a nauseous little lapdog, ye gods! what can +poor mortals do but abandon their humanity! It is shocking to think of +such competition, but how can we help it if young ladies give themselves +up to dog worship? I sincerely trust this Continental fashion may never +take root in California. Should it do so, farewell all hope for the +honest sons of toil; it will then be the greatest of good fortunes to be +born a lapdog! + + + + +ROB MORRIS + + +Robert Morris, who is generally bracketed with Albert Pike as the most +distinguished writer and craftsman American Masonry has produced, was +born near Boston, Massachusetts, August 31, 1818. He was made a Mason +in Mississippi, in 1846, and this was the beginning of a Masonic +career almost without parallel in the history of the fraternity. +Morris, of course, received all of the higher degrees in Masonry, but +the most momentous thing he did as a craftsman was to establish the +Order of the Eastern Star in 1850--the year he became a Kentuckian. In +September, 1854, while living in southern Kentucky, Morris wrote his +most celebrated poem, entitled _The Level and the Square_, which was +first published in his magazine, _The American Freemason_, of +Louisville, Kentucky. Rudyard Kipling lifted a line from it for his +equally famous poem, _The Mother Lodge_. Although Morris revised his +lines many times, the original version is far and away the finest. In +1858 he was elected Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Kentucky; and +two years later he removed his residence to La Grange, Kentucky, the +little town with which his fame is intertwined. Morris wrote several +well-known religious songs, _Sweet Galilee_, being the best of them. +He was the author of many books upon Masonry, his _Lights and Shadows +of Freemasonry_ (Louisville, 1852), being the first work in Masonic +belles-lettres. This was followed by his _History of the Morgan +Affair_ (New York, 1852); _Life in the Triangle_ (1853); _The Two +Saints John_ (1854); _Code of Masonic Law_ (Louisville, 1855), the +pioneer work on Masonic jurisprudence; _Masonic Book of American +Adoptive Rights_ (1855); _History of Freemasonry in Kentucky_ +(Frankfort, 1859), his most important historical work; _Synopsis of +Masonic Laws_ (1859); _Tales of Masonic Life_ (1860); _Masonic Odes +and Poems_ (New York, 1864); _Biography of Eli Bruce_ (1867); +_Dictionary of Freemasonry_ (1872); _Manual of the Queen of the South_ +(1876); _Knights Templar's Trumpet_ (1880); _Freemasonry in the Holy +Land_ (New York, 1882), an excellent work; _The Poetry of Freemasonry_ +(New York, 1884), upon the publication of which, the author was +invited to New York City and crowned "The Poet Laureate of +Freemasonry," December 17, 1884; and, _Magnum Opus_ (1886). Morris was +one of the foremost numismatics of his day and generation in America, +his works on this science being _The Twelve Caesars_, and _Numismatic +Pilot_. He was also the author of several works designed especially +for the officers of a Masonic lodge; and he edited in thirty volumes +_The Universal Masonic Library_, besides editing from time to time +four Masonic magazines. Rob Morris, to give him the name by which he +is best known, died at La Grange, Kentucky, July 31, 1888. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); _Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1888, v. iv). + + +THE LEVEL AND THE SQUARE + + [From _The American Freemason_ (Louisville, Kentucky, September + 15, 1854)] + + We meet upon the Level and we part upon the Square: + What words of precious meaning those words Masonic are! + Come let us contemplate them, they are worthy of our thought-- + With the highest and the lowest, and the rarest they are fraught. + + We meet upon the Level, though from every station come-- + The King from out his palace and the poor man from his home; + For the one must leave his diadem without the Mason's door, + And the other finds his true respect upon the checkered floor. + + We part upon the Square for the world must have its due; + We mingle with its multitude, a cold, unfriendly crew; + But the influence of our gatherings in memory is green, + And we long, upon the Level, to renew the happy scene. + + There's a world where all are equal--we are hurrying towards it + fast-- + We shall meet upon the Level there when the gates of death are + passed; + We shall stand before the Orient, and our Master will be there + To try the blocks we offer His unerring square. + + We shall meet upon the Level there, but never thence depart: + There's a mansion--'tis all ready for each zealous, faithful + heart:-- + There's a Mansion and a welcome, and a multitude is there, + Who have met upon the Level and been tried upon the Square. + + Let us meet upon the Level, then, while laboring patient here-- + Let us meet and let us labor tho' the labor seem severe; + Already in the western sky the signs bid us prepare, + To gather up our working tools and part upon the square. + + Hands around, ye faithful Ghiblimites, the bright, fraternal + chain, + We part upon the Square below to meet in heaven again;-- + Oh, what words of precious meaning those words Masonic are-- + We meet upon the Level and we part upon the Square. + + + + +AMELIA B. WELBY + + +Mrs. Amelia B. Welby, Kentucky's most famous female poet of the +mid-century, was born at St. Michael's, Maryland, February 3, 1819. +When she was fifteen years old her family removed to Louisville, +Kentucky, the city of her fame. In 1837, George D. Prentice, with his +wonderful nose for finding female verse-makers, added Amelia to his +already long and ever-increasing list. He printed her first poem in +his _Journal_, and crowned her as the finest branch of his poetical +tree. His declaration that she possessed the divine afflatus meant +nothing, as he had said the same thing about many another sentimental +single lady, pining upon the peaks of poesy. But Edgar Allan Poe and +Rufus W. Griswold soon separated her from the versifiers and placed +her among the poets, and thus her fame has come down to us with +fragrance. In June, 1838, Amelia was married to George Welby, a +Louisville merchant, who also held her to be a poet born in the +purple. Mrs. Welby's verse became well-known and greatly admired in +many parts of the country, and, in response to numerous requests for a +volume of her work, she collected her _Journal_ verse and published it +under the title of _Poems by Amelia_ (Boston, 1845). A second edition +was published the following year, and by 1860 the volume was said to +be in its seventeenth edition! Robert W. Weir's illustrated edition of +her poems was issued in 1850, and this is the most desirable form in +which her work has been preserved. These various editions will at once +convey some idea of her great popularity. With Poe, Prentice, and +Griswold singing her praises, and the public purchasing her poems as +rapidly as they could be made into books, Amelia's fame seemed secure. +To-day, however, no one has read any of her verse save _The Rainbow_, +which has been set down as her best poem, and she has become +essentially an historical personage, the keepsake of Kentucky letters. +While the greater number of her poems are quite unreadable, her elegy +for Miss Laura M. Thurston, a sister versifier, is well done and her +finest piece of work. Mrs. Welby died at Louisville, May 3, 1852, when +but thirty-three years of age. Had she lived longer, and the poetic +appreciation of the American people suffered no change, the heights to +which she would have attained can be but vaguely guessed at. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Female Poets of America_, by R. W. Griswold + (Philadelphia, 1856); _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, 1860). + + +THE RAINBOW + + [From _Poems by Amelia_ (Boston, 1845)] + + I sometimes have thoughts, in my loneliest hours, + That lie on my heart like the dew on the flowers, + Of a ramble I took one bright afternoon + When my heart was as light as a blossom in June; + The green earth was moist with the late fallen showers, + The breeze fluttered down and blew open the flowers, + While a single white cloud, to its haven of rest + On the white-wing of peace, floated off in the west. + + As I threw back my tresses to catch the cool breeze, + That scattered the rain-drops and dimpled the seas, + Far up the blue sky a fair rainbow unrolled + Its soft-tinted pinions of purple and gold. + 'Twas born in a moment, yet, quick as its birth + It had stretched to the uttermost ends of the earth, + And, fair, as an angel, it floated as free, + With a wing on the earth and a wing on the sea. + + How calm was the ocean! how gentle its swell! + Like a woman's soft bosom it rose and it fell; + While its light sparkling waves, stealing laughingly o'er, + When they saw the fair rainbow, knelt down on the shore. + No sweet hymn ascended, no murmur of prayer, + Yet I felt that the spirit of worship was there, + And bent my young head, in devotion and love, + 'Neath the form of the angel, that floated above. + + How wide was the sweep of its beautiful wings! + How boundless its circle! how radiant its rings! + If I looked on the sky, 'twas suspended in air; + If I looked on the ocean, the rainbow was there; + Thus forming a girdle, as brilliant and whole + As the thoughts of the rainbow, that circled my soul. + Like the wing of the Deity, calmly unfurled, + It bent from the cloud and encircled the world. + + There are moments, I think, when the spirit receives + Whole volumes of thought on its unwritten leaves, + When the folds of the heart in a moment unclose + Like the innermost leaves from the heart of a rose. + And thus, when the rainbow had passed from the sky, + The thoughts it awoke were too deep to pass by; + It left my full soul, like the wing of a dove, + All fluttering with pleasure, and fluttering with love. + + I know that each moment of rapture or pain + But shortens the links in life's mystical chain; + I know that my form, like that bow from the wave, + Must pass from the earth, and lie cold in the grave; + Yet O! when death's shadows my bosom encloud, + When I shrink at the thought of the coffin and shroud, + May Hope, like the rainbow, my spirit enfold + In her beautiful pinions of purple and gold. + + +ON THE DEATH OF A SISTER POET + + [From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)] + + She has passed, like a bird, from the minstrel throng, + She has gone to the land where the lovely belong! + Her place is hush'd by her lover's side, + Yet his heart is full of his fair young bride; + The hopes of his spirit are crushed and bowed + As he thinks of his love in her long white shroud; + For the fragrant sighs of her perfumed breath + Were kissed from her lips by his rival--Death. + + Cold is her bosom, her thin white arms + All mutely crossed o'er its icy charms, + As she lies, like a statue of Grecian art, + With a marbled brow and a cold hushed heart; + Her locks are bright, but their gloss is hid; + Her eye is sunken 'neath its waxen lid: + And thus she lies in her narrow hall-- + Our fair young minstrel--the loved of all. + + Light as a bird's were her springing feet, + Her heart as joyous, her song as sweet; + Yet never again shall that heart be stirred + With its glad wild songs like a singing bird: + Ne'er again shall the strains be sung, + That in sweetness dropped from her silver tongue; + The music is o'er, and Death's cold dart + Hath broken the spell of that free, glad heart. + + Often at eve, when the breeze is still, + And the moon floats up by the distant hill, + As I wander alone 'mid the summer bowers, + And wreathe my locks with the sweet wild flowers, + I will think of the time when she lingered there, + With her mild blue eyes and her long fair hair; + I will treasure her name in my bosom-core; + But my heart is sad--I can sing no more. + + + + +CHARLES W. WEBBER + + +Charles Wilkins Webber, the foremost Kentucky writer of prose fiction +and adventure of the old school, was born at Russellville, Kentucky, +May 29, 1819, the son of Dr. Augustine Webber, a noted Kentucky +physician. In 1838 young Webber went to Texas where he was with the +Rangers for several years. He later returned to Kentucky and studied +medicine at Transylvania University, Lexington, which he soon +abandoned for a brief course at Princeton Theological Seminary, with +the idea of entering the Presbyterian ministry. A short time +afterwards, however, he settled at New York as a literary man. Webber +was connected with several newspapers and periodicals, being associate +editor of _The Whig Review_ for about two years. His first book, +called _Old Hicks, the Guide_ (New York, 1848) was followed by _The +Gold Mines of the_ _Gila_ (New York, 1849, two vols.). In 1849 Webber +organized an expedition to the Colorado country, but it utterly +failed. Several of his other books were now published: _The +Hunter-Naturalist_ (Philadelphia, 1851); _Tales of the Southern +Border_ (1852; 1853); _Texas Virago_ (1852); _Wild Girl of Nebraska_ +(1852); _Spiritual Vampirism_ (Philadelphia, 1853); _Jack Long, or the +Shot in the Eye_ (London, 1853), his masterpiece; _Adventures with +Texas Rifle Rangers_ (London, 1853); _Wild Scenes in the Forest and +Prairie_ (London, 1854); and his last book, _History of Mystery_ +(Philadelphia, 1855). In 1855 Webber joined William Walker's +expedition to Central America, and in the battle of Rivas, he was +mortally wounded. He died at Nicaragua, April 11, 1856, in the +thirty-seventh year of his age. Webber's career is almost as +interesting as his stories. In fact, he put so much of his life into +his works that all of them may be said to be largely autobiographical. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Cyclopaedia of American Literature_, by E. A. and + G. L. Duyckinck (New York, 1856); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of + American Biography_ (New York, 1888, v. vi). + + +TROUTING ON JESSUP'S RIVER + + [From _Wild Scenes in the Forest and Prairie, or the Romance of + Natural History_ (London, 1854)] + +"The Bridge" at Jessup's River is well known to sportsmen; and to this +point we made our first flyfishing expedition. The eyes of Piscator +glistened at the thought, and early was he busied with hasty fingers +through an hour of ardent preparation amongst his varied and +complicated tackle. Now was his time for triumph. In all the ruder +sports in which we had heretofore been engaged, I, assisted by mere +chance, had been most successful; but now the infallible certainty of +skill and science were to be demonstrated in himself, and the +orthodoxy of flies vindicated to my unsophisticated sense. + +The simple preparations were early completed; the cooking apparatus, +which was primitive enough to suit the taste of an ascetic, consisted +in a single frying-pan. The blankets, with the guns, ammunition, rods, +etc., were all disposed in the wagon of our host, which stood ready at +the door. It was a rough affair, with stiff wooden springs, like all +those of the country, and suited to the mountainous roads they are +intended to traverse, rather than for civilized ideas of comfort. We, +however, bounded into the low-backed seat; and if it had been +cushioned to suit royalty, we could not have been more secure than we +were of such comfort as a backwood sportsman looks for. We soon found +ourselves rumbling, pitching, and jolting, over a road even worse than +that which brought us first to the lake. It seemed to me that nothing +but the surprising docility of the ponies which drew us, could have +saved us, strong wagon and all, from being jolted to atoms. I soon got +tired of this, and sprang out with my gun, determined to foot it +ahead, in the hope of seeing a partridge or red squirrel. + +We arrived at the "bridge" about the middle of the afternoon. There we +found an old field called Wilcox's clearing, and, like all places I +had seen in this fine grazing region, it was still well sodded down in +blue grass and clover. Our luggage having been deposited in the +shantee, consisting almost entirely of boards torn from the old house, +which were leaned against the sides of two forks placed a few feet +apart, we set off at once for the falls, a short distance above. This +was merely an initial trial, to obtain enough for dinner, and find the +prognostics of the next day's sport in feeling the manner of the fish. + +At the falls the river is only about fifteen feet wide, though its +average width is from twenty-five to thirty. The water tumbles over a +ledge of about ten feet, at the bottom of which is a fine hole, while +on the surface sheets of foam are whirled round and round upon the +tormented eddies, for the stream has considerable volume and power. + +We stepped cautiously along the ledge, Piscator ahead, and holding his +flies ready for a cast, which was most artistically made, not without +a glance of triumph at me, then preparing to do the same with the +humble angle-worm. The "flies" fall--I see the glance of half a dozen +golden sides darting at them; but by this time my own cast is made, +and I am fully occupied with the struggles of a fine trout. + +My companion's success was again far short of mine, and seeing him +looking at my trout lying beside me, I said: "Try the worms, good +Piscator--here they are. This is not the right time of day for them to +take the flies in this river, I judge." + +Improving the door of escape thus opened to him, he took off the flies +and used worms with immediate and brilliant success, which brought +back the smile to his face; and he would now and then as calmly brush +away the distracting swarm of flies from his face, as if they had been +mere innocent motes. But later that evening came a temporary triumph +for Piscator. The hole at the falls was soon exhausted, and we moved +down to glean the ripples. It was nearly sunset, and here the +pertinacious Piscator determined to try the flies again. He cast with +three, and instantly struck two half-pound trout, which, after a +spirited play, he safely landed. Rarely have I seen a prouder look of +triumph than that which glowed on his face as he bade me "look there!" +when he landed them. + +"Very fine, Piscator--a capital feat! but I fear it was an accident. +You will not get any more that way." + +"We shall see, sir," said he, and commenced whipping the water again, +but to no avail, while I continued throwing them out with great +rapidity. + +I abstained from watching him, for I had no desire to spoil his evening +sport by taunting him to continue his experiment. I soon observed him +throwing out the fish with great spirit again. I merely shouted to him +across the stream--"the angle-worm once more, Piscator?" + +"Yes!" with a laugh. + +As the sun went down the black gnats began to make themselves felt in +their smarting myriads, and we forthwith beat a hasty retreat to the +shantee. + +We had taken about ten pounds of trout; and the first procedure, after +reaching the camp, was to build a "smudge," or smoke-fire, to drive away +these abominable gnats, which fortunately take flight with the first +whiff of smoke, and the next was to prepare the fish for dinner, though +not till all had been carefully dressed by the guide, and placed in the +cold current of the little spring near, that they might keep sound. Now +came the rousing fire, and soon some splendid trout were piled upon +dishes of fresh pealed elm bark before us. They were very skillfully +cooked, and no epicure ever enjoyed a feast more thoroughly than we did +our well-flavored and delicious trout, in that rude shantee. + +The feast being over, then to recline back upon the fresh couch of +soft spruce boughs, and, with a cigar in mouth, watch the gathering +night-shades brooding lower and more low upon the thick wild forest in +front, far into the depths of which the leaping flames of our +crackling fire go, darting now and then with a revealing tongue of +quick light, and listening to the owl make hoarse answer to the wolf +afar off--to think of wild passages in a life of adventure years ago +amidst surroundings such as this; with the additional spice of peril +from savages and treacherous foes, and then, as the hushed life +subsides into a stiller mood, see the faces of loved ones come to you +through the darkness, with a smile from out your distant home, and +while it sinks sweetly on your heart, subside into happy and +dream-peopled slumber! "This is bliss!" the bliss of the shantee to +the wearied sportsman! a bliss unattainable by the toiler, and still +more by the lounger of the city. + +We were on foot with the sun next morning, and after another feast, +which we appreciated with unpalled appetites, we set off for some deep +spring holes nearly a mile above the falls. The morning set cloudy, +and rain fell piteously for several hours. But if this change +detracted from our sport, it at least served to give zest to the +evening's shelter and repose. + +I never felt more delightfully than I did when I sat down to a fine +dinner that evening in the old tavern, and very much of this pleasurable +feeling of entire comfort I attributed to the prompt use of the cold +bath, on reaching our temporary home, wet, weary, and shivering with +cold. This, with a change of clothes, restored me to a healthy glow of +warmth, ready to enjoy whatever our host might provide. + + + + +DR. L. J. FRAZEE + + +Dr. Lewis Jacob Frazee, author of a little volume of travels of +considerable charm, was born at Germantown, Kentucky, August 23, 1819. +He was prepared for college at the Maysville Academy, celebrated as +the school at which young U. S. Grant spent one year. He was graduated +from Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky, in the class of 1837; +and four years later he graduated in the medical department of the +University of Louisville. On April 9, 1844, Dr. Frazee left Maysville, +Kentucky, for a long sojourn in Europe, spending most of his time in +Paris studying subjects then untaught in this country. He also visited +England and the continent before returning home. These travels Dr. +Frazee related in a book of nearly three hundred pages, entitled _The +Medical Student in Europe_ (Maysville, Kentucky, 1849), which is now +an exceedingly rare work. The style is natural and clear and exhibits +genuine literary flavor. He settled at Louisville in 1851. His only +other publication was _The Mineral Waters of Kentucky_ (Louisville, +1872), a brochure. Dr. Frazee took a keen interest in the Filson Club +of Louisville, and one of his finest papers was read before that +organization: _An Analysis of the Personal Narrative of James O. +Pattie_. He was sometime professor in the medical school of the +University of Louisville, and in the Kentucky School of Medicine; and +he edited _The Transylvania Medical Journal_ for several years. Old +age found the good doctor surrendering his practice and professorships +to establish the Louisville Dental Depot, designed to furnish the +local dentists with supplies. He died at Louisville, Kentucky, August +12, 1905, eleven days before his eighty-sixth birthday. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Courier-Journal_ (Louisville, Kentucky, August + 13, 1905); letters from Dr. Thos. E. Pickett, the Maysville + historian, to the present writer. + + +HAVRE + + [From _The Medical Student in Europe_ (Maysville, Kentucky, 1849)] + +Havre is a place of about 25,000 inhabitants, has fine docks, which +are accessible in high tide, and a considerable amount of shipping. +Many of the streets are narrow and crooked, with narrow sidewalks and +in many cases none at all. The houses are stuccoed, and generally +present rather a sombre aspect. Three-fourths of the women we saw in +Havre wore no bonnets, but simply a cap. Some of them were mounted +upon donkeys, with a large market basket swung down each side of the +animal; these of course were the peasants. My attention was attracted +by the large sumpter horses here, which draw singly from eight to ten +bales of cotton, apparently with considerable ease. + +On the day after we arrived at Havre we ascended the hill which rises +at one extremity of the city. The various little winding pathways up +the hill, have on each side massive stone walls, with now and then a +gateway leading to a private residence almost buried in a thicket of +shrubbery and flowers. Upon the hill are situated some most delightful +and elegant mansions, with grounds beautifully ornamented with shade +trees, shrubbery, flowers and handsome walks. These salubrious +retreats have a double charm when compared with the thronged, narrow, +and noisy streets of the city below. Beyond these _Villas_ were fields +of grass and grain undivided by fences, with here and there a farm +house surrounded by a clump of trees. + +In Havre we found delightful cherries and strawberries, as well as a +variety of vegetables; the oysters and fish here though in abundance +are of rather an inferior quality, the oysters are very small and of a +decided copperish taste. At breakfast, which we took at any hour in +the morning that we thought proper, we ordered such articles as suited +our fancy, generally however a cup of coffee, a beef steak, eggs, an +omelet or something of this sort. We dined about five in the evening +upon soups, a variety of meats and vegetables, well prepared, and a +dessert of strawberries and other fruits, nuts, etc. The meats and +vegetables were not placed upon the table, but each dish was passed +around separately--the table being cleared and clean plates placed +for each course. We were compelled to eat slowly or wait for some +time upon others. + +This would not suit one of our western men who is for doing everything +in a minute, but the plan certainly has its advantages--one, of +promoting digestion by giving time for the mastication of the food, and +another, of no small moment for an epicure, that of having things fresh +from the oven. My own objection to the plan was, that I never knew how +much of an article to eat, as I did not know what would next be +introduced. Such an objection fails, of course, in many of the hotels +where the bill of fare is stereotyped, and where with more precision +than an almanac-maker you can foretell every change that will take place +during the ensuing year. Our table was well supplied with wine, which is +used as regularly at dinner as milk by our Kentucky farmers. When our +bill was made out, each item was charged separately, so much for +breakfast, mentioning what it consisted of--so much for dinner--so much +per day for a room, so much for each candle we used, and so on. A French +landlord in making out your bill goes decidedly into minutiae. + + + + +THEODORE O'HARA + + +Theodore O'Hara, author of the greatest martial elegy in American +literature, was born at Danville, Kentucky, February 11, 1820. He was +the son of Kane O'Hara, an Irish political exile, and a noted educator +in his day and generation. O'Hara's boyhood days were spent at +Danville, but his family settled at Frankfort when he was a young man. +He was fitted for college by his father, and his preparation was so +far advanced that he was enabled to join the senior class of St. +Joseph's College, a Roman Catholic institution at Bardstown, Kentucky. +Upon his graduation O'Hara was offered the chair of Greek, but he +declined it in order to study law. In 1845 he held a position in the +United States Treasury department at Washington; and a few years +later he proved himself a gallant soldier upon battlefields in Mexico, +being brevetted major for meritorious service. After the war O'Hara +practiced law at Washington for some time; and he went to Cuba with +the Lopez expedition of 1850. After his return to the United States he +edited the Mobile, Alabama, _Register_ for a time; and he was later +editor of the Frankfort, Kentucky, _Yeoman_. O'Hara was a public +speaker of great ability, and his address upon William Taylor Barry, +the Kentucky statesman and diplomat, is one of the climaxes of +Southern oratory. During the Civil War he was colonel of the twelfth +Alabama regiment. After the war Colonel O'Hara went to Columbus, +Georgia, and became a cotton broker. He died near Guerrytown, Alabama, +June 6, 1867. Seven years later his dust was returned to Kentucky, and +re-interred in the State cemetery at Frankfort. If collected Colonel +O'Hara's poems, addresses, political and literary essays, and +editorials would make an imposing volume. His real fame rests upon his +famous martial elegy, _The Bivouac of the Dead_, which he wrote at +Frankfort in the summer of 1847, to remember young Henry Clay, Colonel +McKee, Captain Willis, and the other brave fellows who fell in the war +with Mexico. When their remains were returned to Frankfort and buried +in the cemetery on the hill, Colonel O'Hara, their old companion in +arms, wrote his stately in memoriam for them. He did not read it over +them, as Ranck and the others have written, but he did publish it in +_The Kentucky Yeoman_, a Democratic paper of Frankfort. _The Bivouac +of the Dead_ is the greatest single poem ever written by a Kentucky +hand, is matchless, superb, and is read in the remotest corners of the +world. Its opening lines have been cut deep within memorial shafts in +many military cemeteries. Colonel O'Hara sleeps to-day on the outer +circle of his comrades, one with them in death as in life, with the +lofty military monument, which Kentucky has erected to commemorate her +sons slain in the battles of the republic, casting its long shadows +across his grave. His elegy in honor of Daniel Boone was written at +the "old pioneer's" grave in the Frankfort cemetery before his now +much-mutilated monument was erected. It was originally printed in _The +Kentucky Yeoman_ for December 19, 1850. Two other poems purporting to +be his have been discovered, but there must be others sealed over and +forgotten in the scattered and broken files of Southern newspapers and +periodicals. So the poet has come down to us, like he who wrote _The +Burial of Sir John Moore_, with one slender sheaf under his arm. But +it is enough, enough for both of them. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. George W. Ranck's little books: _O'Hara and His + Elegies_ (Baltimore, 1875); _The Bivouac of the Dead and Its + Author_ (1898; 1909); Daniel E. O'Sullivan's paper in _The + Southern Bivouac_ (Louisville, January, 1887); Robert Burns + Wilson's fine tribute in _The Century Magazine_ (May, 1890). The + late Mrs. Susan B. Dixon, the Henderson historian, left a MS. life + of O'Hara that is to be issued shortly. + + +THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD + + [From _O'Hara and His Elegies_, by George W. Ranck (Baltimore, + 1875)] + + The muffled drum's sad roll has beat + The soldier's last tattoo; + No more on life's parade shall meet + The brave and daring few. + On Fame's eternal camping-ground + Their silent tents are spread, + And Glory guards with solemn round + The bivouac of the dead. + + No answer of the foe's advance + Now swells upon the wind; + No troubled thought at midnight haunts + Of loved ones left behind; + No vision of the morrow's strife + The warrior's dream alarms; + No braying horn nor screaming fife + At dawn shall call to arms. + + Their shivered swords are red with rust; + Their plumed heads are bowed; + Their haughty banner, trailed in dust, + Is now their martial shroud; + And plenteous funeral-tears have washed + The red stains from each brow, + And their proud forms, in battle gashed, + Are free from anguish now. + + The neighing steed, the flashing blade, + The trumpet's stirring blast; + The charge, the dreadful cannonade, + The din and shout, are past; + No war's wild note, nor glory's peal, + Shall thrill with fierce delight + Those breasts that nevermore shall feel + The rapture of the fight. + + Like the dread northern hurricane + That sweeps his broad plateau, + Flushed with the triumph yet to gain, + Came down the serried foe.[9] + Our heroes felt the shock, and leapt + To meet them on the plain; + And long the pitying sky hath wept + Above our gallant slain. + + Sons of our consecrated ground + Ye must not slumber there, + Where stranger steps and tongues resound + Along the headless air. + Your own proud land's heroic soil + Shall be your fitter grave: + She claims from war his richest spoil-- + The ashes of her brave. + + So 'neath their parent turf they rest; + Far from the gory field; + Borne to a Spartan mother's breast + On many a bloody shield. + The sunshine of their native sky + Smiles sadly on them here, + And kindred hearts and eyes watch by + The heroes' sepulchre. + + Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead! + Dear as the blood you gave, + No impious footsteps here shall tread + The herbage of your grave; + Nor shall your glory be forgot + While fame her record keeps, + Or honor points the hallowed spot + Where valor proudly sleeps. + + Yon marble minstrel's voiceless tone + In deathless songs shall tell, + When many a vanquished age hath flown, + The story how ye fell. + Nor wreck, nor change, or winter's blight, + Nor time's remorseless doom, + Shall dim one ray of holy light + That gilds your glorious tomb. + + +THE OLD PIONEER + + [From the same] + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + Knight-errant of the wood! + Calmly beneath the green sod here + He rests from field and flood; + The war-whoop and the panther's screams + No more his soul shall rouse, + For well the aged hunter dreams + Beside his good old spouse. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + Hushed now his rifle's peal; + The dews of many a vanish'd year + Are on his rusted steel; + His horn and pouch lie mouldering + Upon the cabin-door; + The elk rests by the salted spring, + Nor flees the fierce wild boar. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + Old Druid of the West! + His offering was the fleet wild deer, + His shrine the mountain's crest. + Within his wildwood temple's space + An empire's towers nod, + Where erst, alone of all his race, + He knelt to Nature's God. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + Columbus of the land! + Who guided freedom's proud career + Beyond the conquer'd strand; + And gave her pilgrim sons a home + No monarch's step profanes, + Free as the chainless winds that roam + Upon its boundless plains. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + The muffled drum resound! + A warrior is slumb'ring here + Beneath his battle-ground. + For not alone with beast of prey + The bloody strife he waged, + Foremost where'er the deadly fray + Of savage combat raged. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + A dirge for his old spouse! + For her who blest his forest cheer, + And kept his birchen house. + Now soundly by her chieftain may + The brave old dame sleep on, + The red man's step is far away, + The wolf's dread howl is gone. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + His pilgrimage is done; + He hunts no more the grizzly bear + About the setting sun. + Weary at last of chase and life, + He laid him here to rest, + Nor recks he now what sport or strife + Would tempt him further west. + + A dirge for the brave old pioneer! + The patriarch of his tribe! + He sleeps--no pompous pile marks where, + No lines his deeds describe. + They raised no stone above him here, + Nor carved his deathless name-- + An empire is his sepulchre, + His epitaph is Fame. + + +SECOND LOVE + + [From _The Southern Bivouac_ (Louisville, Kentucky, January, + 1887)] + + Thou art not my first love, + I loved before we met, + And the memory of that early dream + Will linger round me yet; + But thou, thou art my last love, + The truest and the best. + My heart but shed its early leaves + To give thee all the rest. + + +A ROLLICKING RHYME + + [From the same] + + I'd lie for her, + I'd sigh for her, + I'd drink the river dry for her-- + But d----d if I would die for her. + + +THE FAME OF WILLIAM T. BARRY + + [From _Obituary Addresses_ (Frankfort, Kentucky, 1855)] + +On his accession to the Presidency, General Jackson--with that +discerning appreciation of the most available ability and worth in his +party which characterized him--called Mr. Barry into his cabinet to +the position of Postmaster General. Here, as one of the most +distinguished of the council of Jackson, during the greater part of +his incumbency, he is entitled to his full share of the fame of that +glorious administration. His health, however, failing him under the +wasting labors of the toilsome department over which he presided, he +was forced to relinquish it before the administration terminated; and +General Jackson, unwilling entirely to lose the benefit of his able +services, appointed him, in 1835, Minister Plenipotentiary and Envoy +Extraordinary to Spain, a post in which, while its dignity did not +disparage his civil rank, it was hoped that the lightness of the +duties, and the influence of a genial climate, might serve to renovate +his impaired health. But it was otherwise ordained above. He had +reached Liverpool on the way to his mission, when the great conqueror, +at whose summons the strongest manhood, the noblest virtue, the +proudest genius, and the brightest wisdom must surrender, arrested his +earthly career on the 30th of August, 1835; and here is all that is +left to us of the patriot, the orator, the hero, the statesman, the +sage--the rest belongs to Heaven and to fame. + +Such, fellow-citizens, is a most cursory and feeble memento of the +life and public services of the illustrious man in whose memory +Kentucky has decreed the solemn honors of this day. It is well for her +that she has felt "the late remorse of love," and reclaimed these +precious ashes to her heart, after they have slumbered so many years +unsepultured in a foreign land; that no guilty consciousness of +unworthy neglect may weigh upon her spirit, and depress her proud +front with shame; that no reproaching echo of that eloquent voice that +once so sweetly thrilled her, pealing back upon her soul amidst her +prideful recollections of the past, may appal her in her feast of +memory, and blast her revel of glory; that no avenging muse, standing +among the shrines of her departed greatness, and searching in vain for +that which should mark her remembrance of one she should so devoutly +hallow, shall have reason to sing of her as she has sung: + + "Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar; + And Scipio, buried by the upbraiding shore." + +Here, beneath the sunshine of the land he loved, and amid the scenes +which he consecrated with his genius, he will sleep well. Sadly, yet +proudly will his fond foster-mother receive within her bosom to-day +this cherished remnant of the child she nursed for fame; doubly +endeared to her, as he expired far away in a stranger land, beyond the +reach of her maternal embrace, and with no kindred eyes to light the +gathering darkness of death, no friendly hand to soften his descent to +the grave, no pious orisons to speed his spirit on its long journey +through eternity. Gently, reverently let us lay him in this proud +tabernacle, where he will dwell embalmed in glory till the last trump +shall reveal him to us all radiant with the halo of his life. Let the +Autumn's wind harp on the dropping leaves her softest requiem over +him; let the Winter's purest snows rest spotless on his grave; let +Spring entwine her brightest garland for his tomb, and Summer gild it +with her mildest sunshine. Here let the marble minstrel rise to sing +to the future generations of the Commonwealth the inspiring lay of his +high genius and his lofty deeds. Here let the patriot repair when +doubts and dangers may encompass him, and he would learn the path of +duty and of safety--an oracle will inhabit these sacred graves, whose +responses will replenish him with wisdom, and point him the way to +virtuous renown. Let the ingenuous youth who pants for the glories of +the forum, and "the applause of listening Senates," come hither to +tune his soul by those immortal echoes that will forever breathe about +this spot and make its silence vocal with eloquence. And here, too, +let the soldier of liberty come, when the insolent invader may profane +the sanctuary of freedom--here by this holy altar may he fitly devote +to the infernal gods the enemies of this country and of liberty. + +We will now leave our departed patriot to his sleep of glory. And let +no tear moisten the turf that shall wrap his ashes. Let no sound of +mourning disturb the majestic solitude of his grand repose. He claims +no tribute of sorrow. His body returns to its mother earth, his +spirit dwells in the Elysian domain of God, and his deeds are written +on the roll of Fame. + + "Let none dare mourn for him." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[9] Some versions show the following stanzas at this point: + + Who heard the thunder of the fray + Break o'er the field beneath, + Knew well the watchword of that day + Was "Victory or Death." + + Long had the doubtful conflict raged + O'er all that stricken plain, + For never fiercer fight had waged + The vengeful blood of Spain; + And still the storm of battle blew, + Still swelled the gory tide; + Not long, our stout old chieftain[10] knew, + Such odds his strength could bide. + + 'Twas in that hour his stern command + Called to a martyr's grave + The flower of his beloved land, + The nation's flag to save. + By rivers of their fathers' gore + His first-born laurels grew, + And well he deemed the sons would pour + Their lives for glory too. + + Full many a norther's breath has swept + O'er Angostura's plain,[11] + And long the pitying sky has wept + Above its mouldered slain. + The raven's scream, or eagle's flight, + Or shepherd's pensive lay, + Alone awakes each sullen height + That frowned o'er that dread fray. + + Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground, + Ye must not slumber there, et cetera. + +[10] Gen. Zachary Taylor. + +[11] Near Buena Vista. + + + + +SARAH T. BOLTON + + +Mrs. Sarah Tittle Bolton, author of _Paddle Your Own Canoe_, was born +at Newport, Kentucky, in 1820. When she was about three years old, her +father removed to Indiana, settling first in Jennings county, but +later moving on to Madison. When a young woman, she contributed poems +to the Madison newspaper which attracted the editor, Nathaniel Bolton, +so strongly that he married the author. They moved to Indianapolis, +and Mrs. Bolton soon gained a wide reputation as a poet. Her ode sung +at the laying of the corner-stone of the Masonic Temple, in 1850, won +her a loving cup from the Masons of Hoosierdom. Two years later her +poem in honor of the hero of Hungary, Louis Kossuth, increased her +fame. In 1855 Mr. Bolton was appointed consul to Geneva, Switzerland, +and his wife accompanied him to his post. They remained in Switzerland +for three years, during which time Mrs. Bolton acted as correspondent +for the Cincinnati _Commercial_. In 1858 she and her husband returned +to Indianapolis, in which city he died some months later. Her _Poems_ +(New York, 1856) brought her newspaper and periodical verse together; +and a complete collection, with a notice of her life, was published at +Indianapolis in 1886. Mrs. Bolton was Indiana's foremost female singer +for many years. She died at Indianapolis in 1893. Of her many poems +_Paddle Your Own Canoe_ is the best known, although _Left on the +Battlefield_ is admired by many of her readers. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, 1860); _The Hoosiers_, by Meredith Nicholson + (New York, 1900). + + +PADDLE YOUR OWN CANOE + + [From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T. + Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)] + + Voyager upon life's sea, + To yourself be true, + And where'er your lot may be, + Paddle your own canoe. + Never, though the winds may rave, + Falter nor look back; + But upon the darkest wave + Leave a shining track. + + Nobly dare the wildest storm, + Stem the hardest gale, + Brave of heart and strong of arm, + You will never fail. + When the world is cold and dark, + Keep an aim in view; + And toward the beacon-mark + Paddle your own canoe. + + Every wave that bears you on + To the silent shore, + From its sunny source has gone + To return no more. + Then let not an hour's delay + Cheat you of your due; + But, while it is called to-day, + Paddle your own canoe. + + If your birth denies you wealth, + Lofty state and power, + Honest fame and hardy health + Are a better dower. + But if these will not suffice, + Golden gain pursue; + And to gain the glittering prize, + Paddle your own canoe. + + Would you wrest the wreath of fame + From the hand of fate? + Would you write a deathless name + With the good and great? + Would you bless your fellow-men? + Heart and soul imbue + With the holy task, and then + Paddle your own canoe. + + Would you crush the tyrant wrong, + In the world's free fight? + With a spirit brave and strong, + Battle for the right. + And to break the chains that bind + The many to the few-- + To enfranchise slavish mind-- + Paddle your own canoe. + + Nothing great is lightly won, + Nothing won is lost; + Every good deed, nobly done, + Will repay the cost. + Leave to Heaven, in humble trust, + All you will to do; + But if you succeed, you must + Paddle your own canoe. + + + + +JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE + + +John Cabell Breckinridge, the youngest of the American +vice-presidents, distinguished as a public speaker, was born near +Lexington, Kentucky, January 21, 1821. He was educated at Centre +College, Danville, Kentucky, and then studied law at Transylvania +University. Breckinridge lived at Burlington, Iowa, for a year, when +he returned to Lexington, Kentucky, to practice law. He served in the +Mexican War, and was afterwards a member of Congress. In 1856, when he +was about thirty-five years of age, he was elected vice-president of +the United States, with James Buchanan as president. In 1860 +Breckinridge was the candidate of the Southern slaveholders for the +presidency, but Abraham Lincoln received 180 electoral votes to his +72, Kentucky failing to support him. He took his seat in the United +States Senate in March, 1861, as the successor of John J. Crittenden, +and he at once became the champion of the Southern Confederacy in that +body. He was expelled from the Senate on December 4, 1861, on which +occasion he delivered his farewell address. Breckinridge then went +South. He was appointed a major-general, and he saw service at Shiloh, +Chickamauga, Cold Harbor, Nashville, and in several other great +battles. From January to April, 1865, General Breckinridge was +Jefferson Davis's secretary of war. When the Confederacy surrendered, +he made his escape to Europe, where he remained for three years, when +he returned to Lexington and to his law practice. General Breckinridge +died at Lexington, Kentucky, May 17, 1875. Ten years later an imposing +statue was erected to his memory on Cheapside, Lexington. He was a man +of most attractive personality, an eloquent orator, a capable +advocate, a brave soldier, an honest public servant, the greatest +member of the house of Breckinridge. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Library of Oratory_ (New York, 1902, v. x); J. + C. S. Blackburn's oration upon Breckinridge; _McClure's Magazine_ + (January, 1901). For many years Col. J. Stoddard Johnston has been + engaged upon a life of Breckinridge. + + +HENRY CLAY + + [From _Obituary Addresses on the Occasion of the Death of the Hon. + Henry Clay_ (Washington, 1852)] + +Imperishably associated as his name has been for fifty years with +every great event affecting the fortunes of our country, it is +difficult to realize that he is indeed gone forever. It is difficult +to feel that we shall see no more his noble form within these +walls--that we shall hear no more his patriot tones, now rousing his +countrymen to vindicate their rights against a foreign foe, now +imploring them to preserve concord among themselves. We shall see him +no more. The memory and fruits of his services alone remain to us. +Amidst the general gloom, the Capitol itself looks desolate, as if the +genius of the place had departed. Already the intelligence has reached +almost every quarter of the Republic, and a great people mourn with us +to-day, the death of their most illustrious citizen. Sympathizing as +we do deeply with his family and friends, yet private affliction is +absorbed in the general sorrow. The spectacle of a whole community +lamenting the loss of a great man, is far more touching than any +manifestation of private grief. In speaking of a loss which is +national, I will not attempt to describe the universal burst of grief +with which Kentucky will receive these tidings. The attempt would be +vain to depict the gloom that will cover her people, when they know +that the pillar of fire is removed, which has guided their footsteps +for the life of a generation. + + * * * * * + +The life of Mr. Clay, sir, is a striking example of the abiding fame +which surely awaits the direct and candid statesman. The entire +absence of equivocation or disguise, in all his acts, was his +master-key to the popular heart; for while the people will forgive the +errors of a bold and open nature, he sins past forgiveness who +deliberately deceives them. Hence Mr. Clay, though often defeated in +his measures of policy, always secured the respect of his opponents +without losing the confidence of his friends. He never paltered in a +double cause. The country was never in doubt as to his opinions or his +purposes. In all the contests of his time, his position on great +public questions was as clear as the sun in a cloudless sky. Sir, +standing by the grave of this great man, and considering these things, +how contemptible does appear the mere legerdemain of politics! What a +reproach is his life on that false policy which would trifle with a +great and upright people! If I were to write his epitaph, I would +inscribe, as the highest eulogy, on the stone which shall mark his +resting-place, "Here lies a man who was in the public service for +fifty years, and never attempted to deceive his countrymen." + +While the youth of America should imitate his noble qualities, they +may take courage from his career, and note the high proof it affords +that, under our equal institutions, the avenues of honour are open to +all. Mr. Clay rose by the force of his own genius, unaided by power, +patronage, or wealth. At an age when our young men are usually +advanced to the higher schools of learning, provided only with the +rudiments of an English education, he turned his steps to the West, +and amid the rude collisions of a border-life, matured a character +whose highest exhibitions were destined to mark eras in his country's +history. Beginning on the frontiers of American civilization, the +orphan boy, supported only by the consciousness of his own powers, and +by the confidence of the people, surmounted all the barriers of +adverse fortune, and won a glorious name in the annals of his country. +Let the generous youth, fired with honorable ambition, remember that +the American system of government offers on every hand bounties to +merit. If, like Clay, orphanage, obscurity, poverty, shall oppress +him; yet if, like Clay, he feels the Promethean spark within, let him +remember that his country, like a generous mother, extends her arms to +welcome and to cherish every one of her children whose genius and +worth may promote her prosperity or increase her renown. + +Mr. Speaker, the signs of woe around us, and the general voice announce +that another great man has fallen. Our consolation is that he was not +taken in the vigour of his manhood, but sank into the grave at the close +of a long and illustrious career. The great statesmen who have filled +the largest space in the public eye, one by one are passing away. Of the +three great leaders of the Senate, one alone remains, and he must +follow soon. We shall witness no more their intellectual struggles in +the American Forum; but the monuments of their genius will be cherished +as the common property of the people, and their names will continue to +confer dignity and renown upon their country. + +Not less illustrious than the greatest of these will be the name of +Clay--a name pronounced with pride by Americans in every quarter of +the globe; a name to be remembered while history shall record the +struggles of modern Greece for freedom, or the spirit of liberty burn +in the South American bosom; a living and immortal name--a name that +would descend to posterity without the aid of letters, borne by +tradition from generation to generation. Every memorial of such a man +will possess a meaning and a value to his countrymen. His tomb will be +a hallowed spot. Great memories will cluster there, and his +countrymen, as they visit it, may well exclaim-- + + "Such graves as his are pilgrim shrines, + Shrines to no creed or code confined; + The Delphian vales, the Palestines, + The Meccas of the mind." + + + + +JAMES WEIR, Sr. + + +James Weir, Senior, an early Kentucky romancer, was born at +Greenville, Kentucky, June 16, 1821. He was the son of James Weir, a +Scotch-Irish merchant and quasi-author. He was graduated from Centre +College, Danville, Kentucky, in 1840, and later studied law at +Transylvania University. He engaged in the practice of law at +Owensboro, Kentucky--first known as the Yellow Banks--and on March 1, +1842, he was married to Susan C. Green, daughter of Judge John C. +Green of Danville. Weir wrote a trilogy of novels which do not deserve +the obscurity into which they have fallen. They were called _Lonz +Powers, or the Regulators_ (Philadelphia, 1850, two vols.); _Simon +Kenton, or the Scout's Revenge_ (Philadelphia, 1852); and _The Winter +Lodge, or Vow Fulfilled_ (Philadelphia, 1854). All of these romances +were thrown upon historical backgrounds, and they created much +favorable criticism at the time of their publication. Weir wrote +numerous sketches and verses, but these were his only published books. +Business, bar sufficient to all literary labors, pressed hard upon +him, and he practically abandoned literature. In 1869 he was elected +president of the Owensboro and Russellville railroad; and for nearly +forty years he was president of the Deposit bank at Owensboro. Weir +died at Owensboro, Kentucky, January 31, 1906. His son, Dr. James +Weir, Junior, was an author of considerable reputation. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); letters of Mr. Paul Weir to the Author. + + +SIMON KENTON + + [From _Simon Kenton; or, The Scout's Revenge_ (Philadelphia, + 1852)] + +By the side of the Sergeant [Duffe, in whose North Carolina home the +tale opens] sat a stout, powerfully framed, and wild-looking being, +whose visage, though none of the whitest (for it was very +unfashionably sunburnt), betokened an Anglo-Saxon; whilst his dress +and equipments went far to proclaim him a savage; and, had it not been +for his language (though none of the purest), it would have been +somewhat difficult to settle upon his race! In a court of justice, +especially in the South, where color is considered _prima facie_ +evidence of slavery, we wouldn't have given much for his chance of +freedom. Simon Kenton, or Sharp-Eye, for such were the titles given +him by his parents, and by his border companions, and he answered +readily to them both, in his dress and appearance, presented a +striking picture of the daring half savage characters everywhere to be +found at that day (and, indeed, at the present time) upon our extreme +western frontier. A contemporary of Boone, and one of the most +skillful and determined scouts of Kentucky, or the "Cane-Land," as it +was then sometimes called, Kenton's dress, composed of a flowing +hunting-shirt of tanned buckskin, with pants, or rather leggins, of +the same material--a broad belt, buckled tight around his waist, +supporting a tomahawk and hunting-knife--a gay pair of worked +moccasins, with a capacious shot-pouch swung around his neck and +ornamented with long tufts of black hair, resembling very much, as in +truth they were, the scalp-locks of the western Indian, gave him a +decidedly savage appearance, and declared at once his very recent +return from a dangerous life upon the frontier. He had been a +fellow-soldier of Duffe during the Revolution; but, after the war, +being of an adventurous and daring disposition, had wandered out West, +where he had already become famous in the many bloody border frays +between the savage and early settler, and was considered second, in +skill and cool bravery, to no scout of the "Dark and Bloody Ground." +On a visit to the Old States, as they were called at that period to +distinguish them from the more recent settlements in the West, Kenton +was sojourning, for the time, with his old friend and companion in +arms, not without a hope that, by his glowing descriptions of the +flowing savannas beyond the Blue Ridge, and of the wild freedom of a +frontier life, he might induce the latter to bear him company upon his +return to Kentucky. Six feet two inches in his moccasins, with a +well-knit sinewy frame to match his great height, and with a broad, +full, and open face, tanned and swarthy, it is true, yet pleasant and +bright, with a quiet, good-humored smile and lighted up by a deep-blue +eye, and with heavy masses of auburn hair, and whiskers sweeping +carelessly around and about his countenance, Kenton exhibited in his +person, as he sat before the fire of the Sergeant, a splendid specimen +of the genuine borderer, and no wonder the Indian brave trembled at +the redoubted name of Sharp-Eye, and instinctively shrank from a +contest with so formidable a foe. Although, now surrounded by friends, +and in the house of an old comrade, the scout, as was natural with him +from long custom, still held grasped in his ready hand the barrel of +his trusty rifle, from which he never parted, not even when he slept, +and, at the same time, kept his ears wide awake to all suspicious +sounds, as if yet in the land of the enemy, and momentarily expecting +the wild yell of his accustomed foe. Notwithstanding he was well +skilled in every species of woodcraft, an adept at following the trail +of the wild beasts of the forest, and familiar with all the cunning +tricks of the wily savage; yet, strange as it may appear, he was the +most credulous of men, and as simple as a child in what is generally +termed the "ways of the world," or, in other words, the tortuous +windings of policy and hypocrisy, so often met with under the garb of +civilization. Indeed, it has been said of him "that his confidence in +man, and his credulity were such that the same man might cheat him +twenty times; and, if he professed friendship, he might cheat him +still!" At the feet of the scout lay the inseparable companion of all +his journeyings, his dog; and Bang, for such was the name of this +prime favorite, was as rough a specimen of the canine species as his +master's countenance was of the face divine! But Bang was, +nevertheless, a very knowing dog, and, ever and anon, now as his +master became excited in his descriptions of western scenes and +adventures, he would raise his head and look intelligently at the +narrator, and so wisely did he wag his shaggy tail, that more than +once the warm-hearted hunter, breaking off suddenly in his narrative, +would pat his trusty comrade upon the head, and swear, with a hearty +emphasis, "that Bang knew all about it!" + + + + +MARY E. W. BETTS + + +Mrs. Mary E. Wilson Betts, the author of a single lyric which has +preserved her name, was born at Maysville, Kentucky, in January, 1824. +Miss Wilson was educated in the schools of her native town, and, on +July 10, 1854, she was married to Morgan L. Betts, editor of the +_Detroit Times_. She died at Maysville two months later, or on +September 19, 1854, of congestion of the brain, believed to have been +caused by the great gunpowder explosion near Maysville on August 13, +1854. Mrs. Betts's husband died in the following October. While she +wrote many poems, her brief tribute to Col. William Logan Crittenden, +kinsman of John J. Crittenden, who was a member of Lopez's +filibustering expedition to Cuba, in 1850, has preserved her name for +the present generation. Colonel Crittenden was captured by the Cubans, +shot, and his brains beaten out. Before the shots were fired he was +requested to kneel, but he made his now famous reply: "A Kentuckian +kneels to none except his God, and always dies facing his enemy!" +When, in her far-away Kentucky home, Mrs. Betts learned of +Crittenden's fate, she wrote her tribute to the memory of the gallant +son of Kentucky, which was first printed in the _Maysville Flag_. The +editor introduced the little poem thus: "The lines which follow are +from one of Kentucky's most gifted daughters of song. Upon gentler +themes the tones of her lyre have oft been heard to breathe their +music. To sing to the warrior, its cords have ne'er been strung till +now; the tragic death, and last eloquent words of the gallant +Crittenden, have caused this tribute to his memory." This poem has +been republished many times and in various forms. During the +Spanish-American war in 1898 it was often seen in print as being +typical of the courage of the soldiers of this country. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Lopez's Expeditions to Cuba_, by A. C. Quisenberry + (Louisville, 1906); _Kentuckians in History and Literature_, by J. + W. Townsend (New York, 1907). + + +A KENTUCKIAN KNEELS TO NONE BUT GOD! + + [From _The Maysville Flag_] + + Ah! tyrants, forge your chains at will-- + Nay! gall this flesh of mine: + Yet, thought is free, unfettered still, + And will not yield to thine! + Take, take the life that Heaven gave, + And let my heart's blood stain thy sod; + But know ye not Kentucky's brave + Will kneel to none but God! + + You've quenched fair freedom's sunny light, + Her music tones have stilled, + And with a deep and darkened blight, + The trusting heart has filled! + Then do you think that I will kneel + Where such as you have trod? + Nay! point your cold and threatening steel-- + I'll kneel to none but God! + + As summer breezes lightly rest + Upon a quiet river, + And gently on its sleeping breast + The moonbeams softly quiver-- + Sweet thoughts of home light up my brow + When goaded with the rod; + Yet, these cannot unman me now-- + I'll kneel to none but God! + + And tho' a sad and mournful tone + Is coldly sweeping by; + And dreams of bliss forever flown + Have dimmed with tears mine eye-- + Yet, mine's a heart unyielding still-- + Heap on my breast the clod; + I'll kneel to none but God! + My soaring spirit scorns thy will-- + + + + +REUBEN T. DURRETT + + +Reuben Thomas Durrett, founder of the Filson Club and editor of its +publications, was born near Eminence, Kentucky, January 22, 1824. He was +graduated from Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, in 1849. The +following year he began the practice of law at Louisville, and for the +next thirty years he was one of the leaders of the Louisville bar. He +was editor of the _Louisville Courier_ from 1857 to 1859, and +throughout his long life he has been a contributor of historical essays +to the Louisville press. Colonel Durrett was imprisoned for his Southern +sympathies during the Civil War, and for this reason he saw little +service. In 1871 he founded the Public Library of Louisville; and in +1884 he organized the now well-known Filson Club, which meets monthly in +his magnificent library--the greatest collection of Kentuckiana in the +world. While his library has never been catalogued, he must possess at +least thirty thousand books, pamphlets, manuscripts, and newspaper +files. Col. Theodore Roosevelt, Dr. Robert M. McElroy, and many other +historical investigators have made important "finds" in Colonel +Durrett's library. He has one of the six extant copies of the first +edition of John Filson's _History of Kentucke_; and he has the copy of +Dean Swift's _Gulliver's Travels_, which Neely, the pioneer, read to +Daniel Boone on Lulbegrub Creek, near Winchester, Kentucky, in 1770, as +they sat around the evening camp fire. The Filson club was founded to +increase the interest then taken in historical subjects in Kentucky, and +to issue an annual publication. That this purpose has been well carried +out may be seen by the twenty-six handsome and valuable monographs which +have appeared.[12] The Club's first book was Colonel Durrett's _The +Life and Writings of John Filson, the first historian of Kentucky_ +(Louisville, 1884). This work brought Filson into world-wide notice and +revived an interest in his precious little history. _An Historical +Sketch of St. Paul's Church, Louisville_ (Louisville, 1889); _The +Centenary of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1892); _The Centenary of Louisville_ +(Louisville, 1893); _Bryant's Station_ (Louisville, 1897); and +_Traditions of the Earliest Visits of Foreigners to North America_ +(Louisville, 1908), all of which are Filson Club publications, comprise +Colonel Durrett's work in book form. This distinguished gentleman and +writer resides at Louisville, where he keeps the open door for any who +would come and partake of the wisdom of himself and of his books. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Memorial History of Louisville_, by J. S. Johnston + (Chicago, 1896); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, + v. iv). + + +LA SALLE: DISCOVERER OF LOUISVILLE[13] + + [From _The Centenary of Louisville_ (Louisville, Kentucky, 1893)] + +In the year 1808, while digging the foundation of the great flouring +mill of the Tarascons in that part of Louisville known as +Shippingport, it became necessary to remove a large sycamore tree, the +trunk of which was six feet in diameter, and the roots of which +penetrated the earth for forty feet around. Under the center of the +trunk of this tree was found an iron hatchet, which was so guarded by +the base and roots that no human hand could have placed it there +after the tree grew. It must have occupied the spot where it was found +when the tree began to grow. The hatchet was made by bending a flat +bar of iron around a cylinder until the two ends met, and then welding +them together and hammering them to a cutting edge, leaving a round +hole at the bend for a handle. The annulations of this tree were two +hundred in number, thus showing it to be two hundred years old +according to the then mode of computation. Here was a find which +proved to be a never-ending puzzle to the early scientists of the +Falls of the Ohio. The annulations of this tree made it two hundred +years old, and so fixed the date earlier than any white man or user of +iron was known to have been at the falls. One thought that Moscoso, +the successor of De Soto, in his wanderings up the Mississippi and +Missouri rivers, might have entered the Ohio and left the hatchet +there in 1542; another, that it might have come from the Spaniards who +settled St. Augustine in 1565; another, that the Spaniards who went up +the Ohio in 1669 in search of silver might have left it where it was +found; and another, that Marquette, when he discovered the Upper +Mississippi in 1673, or La Salle, when he sailed down to its mouth in +1682, might have given the hatchet to an Indian, who left it at the +Falls. But from these reasonable conjectures their learning and +imagination soon led these savants into the wildest theories and +conjectures. One thought that the Northmen, whom the Sagas of +Sturleson made discoverers of America in the eleventh century, had +brought the hatchet to this country; another, that Prince Madoc, who +left a principality in Wales in the twelfth century for a home in the +western wilderness, might have brought it here; and another, that it +might have been brought here by those ancient Europeans whom Diodorus +and Pausanius and other classical writers assure us were in +communication with this country in ancient times. One of these learned +ethnologists finally went so far as to advance the theory of the +Egyptian priests, as related by Plato, that the autochthons of our +race brought it here before the Island of Atlantis, lying between +Europe and America, went down in the ocean and cut off all further +communication between the continents. + +This hatchet, however, really furnished no occasion for such strained +conjectures and wild speculations. If the sycamore under which it was +found was two hundred years old, as indicated by its annulations, it +must have begun to grow about the time that Jamestown in Virginia and +Quebec in Canada were founded. It would have been no unreasonable act +for an Indian or white man to have brought this hatchet from the English +on the James, or from the French on the St. Lawrence, to the Falls of +the Ohio in 1608, just two hundred years before it was discovered by +removing the tree that grew over it. The known habit of the sycamore, +however, to make more than one annulation in years particularly +favorable to growth suggests that two hundred annulations do not +necessarily mean that many years. If we allow about fifty per cent of +the life of the tree to have been during years exceptionally favorable +to its growth, and assign double annulations to these favorable years, +we shall have this tree to have made its two hundred annulations in +about one hundred and thirty-nine years, and to have sprung from its +seed and to have begun its growth about the year 1669 or 1670, when La +Salle, the great French explorer, is believed to have been at the Falls +of the Ohio. We have no account of any one at the Falls in 1608, or +about this time, to support the conjecture that it might have come from +Jamestown or Quebec; but we have La Salle at this place in 1669 or 1670, +and it is not unreasonable that he should have left it here at that +time. In this sense the old rusty hatchet, which is fortunately +preserved, becomes interesting to us all for its connection with the +discovery of Louisville. It is a souvenir of the first white man who +ever saw the Falls of the Ohio. It is a memento of Robert Cavalier de La +Salle, the discoverer of the site of the city of Louisville. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[12] A complete list of the club's publications is: _John Filson_, by +R. T. Durrett (1884); _The Wilderness Road_, by Thomas Speed (1886); +_The Pioneer Press of Kentucky_, by W. H. Perrin (1888); _Life and +Times of Judge Caleb Wallace_, by W. H. Whitsitt (1888); _An +Historical Sketch of St. Paul's Church_, by R. T. Durrett (1889); _The +Political Beginnings of Kentucky_, by J. M. Brown (1889); _The +Centenary of Kentucky_, by R. T. Durrett (1892); _The Centenary of +Louisville_, by R. T. Durrett (1893); _The Political Club of Danville, +Kentucky_, by Thomas Speed (1894); _The Life and Writings of +Rafinesque_, by R. E. Call (1895); _Transylvania University_, by Dr. +Robert Peter (1896); _Bryant's Station_, by R. T. Durrett (1897); _The +First Explorations of Kentucky_, by J. S. Johnston (1898); _The Clay +Family_, by Z. F. Smith and Mrs. Mary R. Clay (1899); _The Battle of +Tippecanoe_, by Alfred Pirtle (1900); _Boonesborough_, by G. W. Ranck +(1901); _The Old Masters of the Bluegrass_, by S. W. Price (1902); +_The Battle of the Thames_, by B. H. Young (1903); _The Battle of New +Orleans_, by Z. F. Smith (1904); _History of the Medical Department of +Transylvania University_, by Dr. Robert Peter (1905); _Lopez's +Expeditions to Cuba_, by A. C. Quisenberry (1906); _The Quest for a +Lost Race_, by Dr. T. E. Pickett (1907); _Traditions of the Earliest +Visits of Foreigners to North America_, by R. T. Durrett (1908); +_Sketches of Two Distinguished Kentuckians_, by J. W. Townsend and S. +W. Price (1909); _The Prehistoric Men of Kentucky_, by B. H. Young +(1910); _The Kentucky Mountains_, by Miss Mary Verhoeff (1911). No +publication was issued in 1912. + +[13] Copyright, 1893, by the Filson Club. + + + + +RICHARD H. COLLINS + + +Richard Henry Collins, whom Mr. James Lane Allen has happily +christened "the Kentucky Froissart," was born at Maysville, Kentucky, +May 4, 1824, over the office of _The Eagle_. He was the son of Lewis +Collins (1797-1870), who published a history of Kentucky in 1847. +Richard H. Collins was a Cincinnati lawyer for eleven years, but he +lived many years at Maysville, where he edited the old _Eagle_, which +his father had made famous. In 1861 he founded the _Danville Review_; +and in 1874 he published a "revised, enlarged four-fold, and brought +down to the year 1874" edition, in two enormous volumes, of his +father's history of Kentucky. Unquestionably this is a work of +tremendous importance, the most magnificent and elaborate history of +this or any other State yet compiled. Traveling the whole State over, +obtaining contributions from each town's ablest writer, and then +building them upon his father's fine foundation, Collins was able to +publish an almost invaluable work. To-day his history of Kentucky, +though it certainly contains many errors of various kinds and degrees, +is the greatest mine of our State's history which all must explore if +they would be informed of our people's past. Dean Shaler and all later +Kentucky historical writers have taken pleasure in paying tribute to +his work. The one mistake that Collins made, which might have been +easily avoided, was to put his manuscripts together in such a manner +that the authorship of the various papers cannot be determined; but in +this he followed his father's methods; and for this reason the writer +has been compelled to reproduce the prefaces of both books, rather +than portions of the actual text, for fear he may use matter prepared +by a contributor. Collins practiced law in different Kentucky towns, +wrote for newspapers and magazines, and spent a very busy and rather +active life. He died at the home of his daughter at Maryville, +Missouri, on New Year's Day of 1888. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by Z. F. Smith (Louisville, + 1892); _The Blue Grass Region of Kentucky_, by James Lane Allen + (New York, 1892). + + +PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION + + [From _History of Kentucky_ (Covington, Kentucky, 1882, v. ii)] + +Twenty-seven years, 1847 to 1874, have elapsed since _Collins's +History of Kentucky_ quietly and modestly claimed recognition among +the standard local histories in the great American republic. That has +been an eventful period. Death, too, has been busy with the names in +the Preface above--has claimed alike the author and compiler, Judge +Lewis Collins, and about one hundred and fifty more of the honored and +substantial names who contributed information or other aid towards +preserving what was then unwritten of the history of the State. The +author of the present edition (now nearly fifty years of age) is the +youngest of the forty-two contributors who are still living; while +several of them are over eighty and one is over ninety-two years of +age. Time has dealt gently with them; fame has followed some, and +fortune others; a few have achieved both fame and fortune, while a +smaller few lay claim to neither. + +It is not often, as in this case, that the mantle of duty as a +state-historian falls from the father to the son's shoulders. It has +been faithfully and conscientiously worn; how well and ably, let the +disinterested and unprejudiced judge. + +The present edition had its origin in this: When Judge Collins died, the +Legislature of Kentucky was in session. As its testimonial and +appreciation of his services and character, this resolution was +unanimously adopted, and on March 21, 1870, approved by Gov. Stevenson: + +"_Resolved by the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Kentucky_: + +"That we have heard with deep regret of the death of Judge Lewis +Collins, of Maysville, Kentucky, which has occurred since the meeting +of this General Assembly. He was a native Kentuckian of great purity +of character and enlarged public spirit; associated for half a century +with the press of the State, which he adorned with his patriotism, his +elevated morals, and his enlightened judgment. He was the author of a +_History of Kentucky_, evidencing extended research, and which +embodies in a permanent form the history of each county in the State, +and the lives of its distinguished citizens, and is an invaluable +contribution to the literature and historical knowledge of the State. +His name being thus perpetually identified with that of his native +State, this General Assembly, from a sense of duty and regard for his +memory, expresses this testimonial of its appreciation of his +irreproachable character and valued services." + +This touching, and tender, and noble tribute to the departed author +and editor, was but the culmination of a sympathy broader than the +State, for it was echoed and sent back by many citizens from a +distance. He had lived to some purpose. It was no small comfort to his +family, to know that their bereavement was regarded as a public +bereavement; and that his name and works would live on, and be green +in the memory of the good people of Kentucky--the place of his birth, +the home of his manhood, the scene of his life's labors, his grave. In +a spontaneous tribute of praise and sympathy, the entire newspaper +press of the State, and many in other States, announced his decease. + + * * * * * + +That action of the State, and those generous outpourings of sympathy and +regard, started fresh inquiries for the work that had made him best +known--_Collins's History of Kentucky_. It had been _out of print_ for +more than twenty years! It was known that I had been associated with my +father as an editor, and then his successor, and had assisted him with +his _History_. Hence, many applications and inquiries for the book were +made to me; always with the suggestion that I ought to prepare a new +edition, enlarged, and bring down to the present the history of the +State. It was an important undertaking--as delicate as important. I +shrank from the great responsibility, and declined. But the urgency +continued, for the necessity of a State history was felt. The great +State of Kentucky, the mother of statesmen and heroes, the advance guard +of civilization west of the great Appalachian chain, had no published +_History_ of the last twenty-six years; and no _History_ at all in book +form, _now accessible_ to more than a few thousand of the intelligent +minds among her million-and-a-third of inhabitants. The duty of +preparing this _History_ sought _me_, and not I _it_. It has been a task +of tremendous labor, extending through the long weary months of nearly +four years. But it has been a sweet and a proud task, and the _destiny_ +that seemed driving me on is almost fulfilled. I wish I could know the +verdict of the future upon my labors, but that is impossible. The +carping and noisy fault-finding of the dissatisfied and ungenerous few +are far from being pleasant; but the consciousness of duty done, with an +honest heart, and the praise of the liberal ones who will appreciate the +work, will be a noble and a proud satisfaction, and a joy ceasing only +with my life. + +[Then follow three pages of names of persons whom he thanks for +assistance.] + + + + +ANNIE C. KETCHUM + + +Mrs. Annie Chambers Ketchum, poet, naturalist, and novelist, was born +near Georgetown, Kentucky, November 8, 1824, the daughter of Benjamin +Stuart Chambers, founder of Cardome Academy; her mother was a member +of the famous Bradford family of journalists. Miss Chambers was +graduated from Georgetown Female College with the M. A. degree. Her +first husband was William Bradford, whom she married in 1844, and from +whom she was subsequently divorced. After her separation from her +husband, she went to Memphis, Tennessee, and opened a school for +girls, which she conducted for several years. In 1858 she was married +to Leonidas Ketchum, a Tennessean, who was mortally wounded at the +battle of Shiloh in 1863. After her husband's death, Mrs. Ketchum +returned to Kentucky and conducted a school at Georgetown for three +years, but, in 1866, she returned to Memphis, where she again taught +for a number of years. Mrs. Ketchum spent the winter of 1875 at +Paris, France, pursuing her literary work, and on May 24, 1876, she +entered upon the novitiate in a convent there. She afterwards returned +to America and her last years were spent in Kentucky. Mrs. Ketchum +died in 1904. Her first literary work to attract attention was a +novel, entitled _Nellie Bracken_ (Philadelphia, 1855). From 1859 to +1861 Mrs. Ketchum was editor of _The Lotus_, a monthly magazine +published at Memphis. _Benny: A Christmas Ballad_ (New York, 1869) was +the first of her poems to attract any considerable attention; and her +best known poem, _Semper Fidelis_, originally published in _Harper's +Magazine_ for October, 1873, is a long, leisurely thing that makes one +wonder at its once wide popularity. All of her poems Mrs. Ketchum +brought together in _Lotus Flowers_ (New York, 1878). _Lotus_ was her +shibboleth, and she never missed an opportunity to make use of it. She +made many translations from Latin, German, and French writers, her +finest work in this field being _Marcella, a Russian Idyl_ (New York, +1878). _The Teacher's Empire_ (1886) was a collection of educational +essays contributed to various journals. Mrs. Ketchum's _Botany for +Academies and Colleges_ (Philadelphia, 1887), was a text-book in many +institutions for several years subsequent to its publication. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ + (New York, 1887, v. iii); B. O. Gaines's _History of Scott County, + Kentucky_ (1905, v. ii). + + +APRIL TWENTY-SIXTH + + [From _The Southern Poems of the War_, edited by Emily V. Mason + (Baltimore, 1867)] + + Dreams of a stately land, + Where roses and lotus open to the sun, + Where green ravine and misty mountains stand, + By lordly valor won. + + Dreams of the earnest-browed + And eagle-eyed, who late with banners bright, + Rode forth in knightly errantry, to do + Devoir for God and right. + + Shoulder to shoulder, see + The crowning columns file through pass and glen! + Hear the shrill bugle! List the rolling drum, + Mustering the gallant men! + + Resolute, year by year, + They keep at bay the cohorts of the world; + Hemmed in, yet trusting in the Lord of Hosts, + The cross is still unfurled. + + Patient, heroic, true, + And counting tens where hundreds stood at first; + Dauntless for truth, they dare the sabre's edge, + The bombshell's deadly burst. + + While we, with hearts made brave + By their proud manhood, work, and watch, and pray, + Till, conquering fate, we greet with smiles and tears + The conquering ranks of grey! + + Oh, God of dreams and sleep, + Dreamless they sleep--'tis we, the sleepless, dream, + Defend us while our vigil dark we keep, + Which knows no morning beam! + + Bloom, gentle spring-tide flowers-- + Sing, gentle winds, above each holy grave, + While we, the women of a desolate land, + Weep for the true and brave. + +Memphis, Tennessee. + + + + +FRANCIS H. UNDERWOOD + + +Francis Henry Underwood, "the editor who was never the editor" of _The +Atlantic Monthly_, though he was indeed the projector and first +associate editor of that famous magazine, was born at Enfield, +Massachusetts, January 12, 1825, the son of Roswell Underwood. He +spent the year of 1843-1844 at Amherst College, and in the summer of +1844 he came out to Kentucky and settled at Bowling Green as a school +teacher. Underwood read law at Bowling Green and was admitted to the +bar of that town in 1847. On May 18, 1848, he was married to Louisa +Maria Wood, of Taylorsville, Kentucky, to whom he afterwards dedicated +his Kentucky novel. While in Kentucky Underwood wrote verses which he +submitted to N. P. Willis, who was then at Washington. The celebrated +critic wrote him: "Your poetry is as good as Byron's was at the same +stage of progress--correct, and evidently inspired, and capable of +expansion into stuff for fame." None of it, however, has come down to +us. Underwood's intense hatred of slavery caused him to quit Kentucky, +in 1850, after having lived for six years in this State, and to return +to Massachusetts, where he was admitted to the bar of Northampton. He +enlisted in the Free-soil movement with heart and soul. In 1852 he was +clerk of the Massachusetts Senate, which position he left to become +literary adviser for the then leading publishers of New England, +Phillips, Sampson and Company. In 1853 Underwood conceived the idea of +a Free-soil literary magazine, but a publisher's failure delayed its +appearance. In November, 1857, however, the first issue of _The +Atlantic Monthly_ appeared, Dr. Holmes having christened the "baby," +with James Russell Lowell as editor-in-chief, and Underwood as +assistant editor. Lowell and Underwood were great friends and they +worked together with pleasure and harmony. For two years they were the +editors, when the breaking up of the firm of Phillips, Sampson and +Company, and the passing of the periodical into the hands of Ticknor +and Fields, caused Underwood to resign. From 1859 to 1870 he was clerk +of the Superior Criminal Court of Boston; and from 1861 to 1875 he was +a member of the Boston School Committee. Underwood's first three works +were a _Handbook of English Literature_ (Boston, 1871); _Handbook of +American Literature_ (Boston, 1872); and _Cloud Pictures_ (Boston, +1872), a group of musical stories. Then came his Kentucky novel, +entitled _Lord of Himself_ (Boston, 1874), which was really a series +of pictures of life at Bowling Green in 1844. This tale was well +received by the Kentucky press and public, the background and +characters were declared realistic, and the author's effort to make +something pathetic out of the old system of slavery was smiled at and +dismissed in the general pleasure his story gave. In his imaginary +Kentucky county of Barry, Underwood had a merry time rehabilitating +the past. The character of Arthur Howard is the author himself. _Lord +of Himself_ is a work of high merit, and it does not deserve the +oblivion into which it has fallen. In 1880 Underwood's second novel, +_Man Proposes_, was published, together with his _The True Story of +Exodus_. Two years later his biographies of Longfellow and Lowell were +issued; and in 1883 his study of Whittier was published. In 1885 +President Cleveland named Underwood United States Consul at Glasgow; +and three years later the University of Glasgow granted him LL.D. +During Cleveland's second administration Underwood was consul at +Edinburgh. While in Scotland he wrote his last two novels, called +_Quabbin_ (Boston, 1892), and _Dr. Gray's Quest_. In _Quabbin_ he +described his native town of Enfield in much the same manner that he +had years before written of Bowling Green, Kentucky. Underwood died at +Edinburgh, August 8, 1894. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Biographical Catalogue of Amherst College_; _The + Author of "Quabbin,"_ by J. T. Trowbridge (_Atlantic Monthly_, + January, 1895); _The Editor who was Never the Editor_, by Bliss + Perry (_Atlantic Monthly_, November, 1907). Mr. Perry's paper is + especially notable for the great number of letters reproduced + which Underwood received from the celebrities of his time. + + +ALOYSIUS AND MR. FENTON + + [From _Lord of Himself_ (Boston, 1874)] + +It was at this juncture that the youth of many locks and ample Byronic +shirt collar appeared on the scene. Aloysius Pittsinger was his name. +He was a consolation. His very name, Aloysius, had a sweet gurgle in +the sound, resembling the anticipatory and involuntary noises from +children's mouths at the sight of sugar lollipops. He was a clerk in +Mr. Goldstein's store. There he dispensed tobacco, both fine-cut and +plug, assorted nails, New Orleans sugar, Rio coffee, Porto Rico +molasses, Gloucester mackerel, together with foreign cloths and +homespun jeans, and all the gimcracks which little negroes coveted and +the swarms of summer flies had spared. + +The appearance of Aloysius happened in this wise. Mr. Fenton was an +early riser, but was loath to go to his shop without his breakfast. On +the fateful morning he had come down rather earlier than usual. After +due search and discussion, it was announced to him that there was +nothing at once appetizing and substantial in the house that could, +within the desired period, be got ready for the table; and his wife +made bold to ask if in this emergency he wouldn't go out and get +something. To a hungry man, in the faint interval after a "nipper" and +before a solid bit, such a proposition is an unpleasant surprise. But, +after devoting the cook and the household generally to immediate pains +and inconveniences, and to something more hereafter, Mr. Fenton put on +his slouched hat and started out. He mused also. + +If I were ambitious of the fame of the great American novelist, or were +contending for the fifty thousand dollar prize offered by the publishers +of the Metropolitan Album, and hoped to have my thrilling descriptions +read by its subscribing army of three hundred and fifty-one thousand +chambermaids, I might paint the current of his swift thought thus: + +"The air bites shrewdly. Ha, by the mass! Shall I to the _abattoir_ +and ask the slayer of oxen for a steak? or a chop from the loin of +sheep, a bell-wether of Kentucky's finest flock--Kentucky, state +renowned for dainty mutton? Or does the slayer of oxen yet sleep, +supinely stertorous, heavy with the lingering fumes of the mighty +Bourbon? Perchance he has no steak, no chop!--all gone to feed an +insatiable people! Bethink me. Ay--and the _abattoir_ is far, though +its perfume is nigh; it is thrice a hundred yards from hence. I will +go to the house of the Israelite, Goldstein, and get a fish--a fish +dear to losel Yankees, and not scorned by the sons of the sun-land +either. 'Tis well. I will make the trial. Haply I shall find that the +young man, Pittsinger, whose praenomen is Aloysius, has arisen, and is +even now combing his ambrosial locks." + +What he _did_ think was something like this: + +"It's doggon cold this mornin'. I wonder whether that derned old +drunken Bill Stone's got ary bit of fresh meat--and if he's up yet. I +don't b'lieve it, for he was drunk's an owl last night at old Red Eye. +Besides, it's fer to the slaughter-house. Le's see. I might get a +mackerel at Goldstein's. I'll do it. B'iled a little, to take the salt +out, and then het with cream, it ain't bad, by a derned sight." + +He walked out to the square, occasionally blowing his cold fingers. The +shutters were not taken down from Goldstein's front windows, but Mr. +Fenton knew that the clerk slept in a little room in a ruinous lean-to +back of the store, and he rattled the door to call him. There was no +answer, nor sound of any one stirring, and he rattled again. His +powerful shake made the square resound. He called, endeavoring to throw +his voice through the key-hole, "Aloysius, ain't you up yit? I want a +mackerel." + +The silence was aggravating, and there were internal qualms that made +Fenton doubly impatient. + +"Aloysius, you lazy bones! Do you hear? I want a mackerel for +breakfast. You're thest the no-countest boy I ever see! If 'twan't for +your father, you'd thest starve." + +Fenton sadly meditated, and was about to give it up, when he heard a +voice within, saying, "Never too late, Mr. Fenton. You shall have your +mackerel. You needn't wait. As soon as I get my clothes on I'll tote +you over one." + + +AN AMAZING PROPHECY + + [From the same] + +"The hardest strain upon the republic is yet to come," said Mr. +Pierrepont. "God only knows how the slavery question is to be settled; +but no change in policy will be adopted without a severe struggle. If +the South is worsted, it will have the terrible problem of the status +of the negroes to solve, and it will be a tumultuous time for a +generation. The danger to the North in the event of success, or of +defeat either, will arise from its wealth. The accumulations at the +commercial centres are to make them enormously rich. Money is a power, +and never a quiescent one. Your rich men will put themselves into +office, or they will send their paid attorneys to legislate for them. +They will so touch the subtle springs of finance as to make every +affair of state serve their personal advantage. They will make +corruption honorable, and bribery a fine art. It is now a mark of +decency and a badge of distinction for a public man to be poor. +Everyone knows that a public man can't be rich honestly; but you will +live to see congressmen going to the capital carrying travelling-bags, +and returning home with wagon loads of trunks, and with stocks and +bonds that will enable them to snap their fingers at constituents." + +"It is the old story of republics," said Mr. Howard. "They are founded +by valor, reared by industry, with frugality and equal laws. Wealth +follows, then corruption, then the public conscience is debauched, +faith is lost, and justice thrust out. Then the general rottenness is +shaken by the coming of a new Caesar, and an empire is welcomed because +liberty had already been lost, and anything is better than anarchy. +However, let us hope this is far away." + + + + +STEPHEN C. FOSTER + + +Stephen Collins Foster, the celebrated song writer, was born at +Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, July 4, 1826. At the age of fifteen years he +entered Jefferson College, at Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, but music had +set its seal upon him and he soon returned to Pittsburgh to pursue it. +The next few years were almost entirely devoted to his musical studies, +though he had a living to make. The year of 1842 found Foster clerking +in a Cincinnati store; and during this time his first song, _Open Thy +Lattice, Love_, was published at Baltimore. _Uncle Ned_, and _O +Susannah!_ followed fast upon his first effort, and the three launched +him upon his career. He relinquished his business cares, and surrendered +his life to song. In 1850 Foster married Jane McDowell of Pittsburgh, +and they lived at New York City for a short time before settling at +Pittsburgh. His _Camptown Races_, and _My Old Kentucky Home, Goodnight_, +appeared in 1850. It is surely a regrettable fact that the most famous +Kentucky song was not written by a Kentucky hand. Foster's only child, +Mrs. Marion Foster Welsh, of Pittsburgh, has recently repudiated the +ancient tale that is told of the origin of _My Old Kentucky Home_, but +as she declined to furnish the real history of the song, saying she +would make it known at the proper time, nothing better than the often +repeated story can be told here. Foster was visiting his kinsman, Judge +John Rowan, at his home, "Federal Hill," near Bardstown, Kentucky, and +on this typical Southern plantation, with its negroes and their cabins, +_My Old Kentucky Home_ was written. The story is usually elaborated, but +as it has been set aside by the author's daughter, further comment is +not worth while. It is enough to know that it was written in Kentucky. +Foster went to New York City in 1860, and the same year _Old Black Joe_ +appeared. _Old Folks at Home_, _Nelly was a Lady_, _Nelly Bly_, _Massa's +in the Cold, Cold Ground_, _Old Dog Tray_, _Don't Bet Your Money on the +Shanghai_, _We Are Coming, Father Abraham_, and dozens of other songs +have kept Foster's fame green. His beautiful serenade, _Come Where My +Love Lies Dreaming_, is his highest note in genuine scientific music. +Foster died at New York, January 13, 1864, and he was buried in +Allegheny cemetery, Pittsburgh. In 1906 the Kentucky home-comers never +seemed to tire of _My Old Kentucky Home_, and a fitting memorial was +unveiled at Louisville by Foster's daughter in honor of the song's +maker. It is known and sung in the remotest corners of the world. Mr. +James Lane Allen's fine tribute to the poet's memory may be found in +_The Bride of the Mistletoe_: + +"More than half a century ago the one starved genius of the Shield +[Kentucky], a writer of songs, looked out upon the summer picture of +this land, its meadows and ripening corn tops; and as one presses out +the spirit of an entire vineyard when he bursts a solitary grape upon +his tongue, he, the song writer, drained drop by drop the wine of that +scene into the notes of a single melody. The nation now knows his +song, the world knows it--the only music that has ever captured the +joy and peace of American home life--embodying the very soul of it in +the clear amber of sound." + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Atlantic Monthly_ (November, 1867); _Current + Literature_ (September, 1901). Strangely enough no formal + biography of Foster has been written. + + +MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME, GOOD-NIGHT + + [From _Stephen Collins Foster Statue_ (Louisville, Kentucky, 1906, + a pamphlet)] + + The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home, + 'Tis summer, the darkies are gay; + The corn-top's ripe and the meadow's in the bloom, + While the birds make music all the day; + The young folks roll on the little cabin floor, + All merry, all happy, and bright, + By'n-by hard times comes a-knocking at the door, + Then my old Kentucky home, good-night! + + CHORUS: + + Weep no more, my lady, O weep no more to-day! + We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home, + For the old Kentucky home far away. + + They hunt no more for the 'possum and the coon, + On the meadow, the hill, and the shore; + They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon, + On the bench by the old cabin door; + The day goes by, like a shadow o'er the heart, + With sorrow, where all was delight; + The time has come when the darkies have to part, + Then my old Kentucky home, good-night! + + CHORUS: + + Weep no more, my lady, O weep no more to-day! + We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home, + For the old Kentucky home far away. + + The head must bow and the back will have to bend, + Wherever the darkey may go; + A few more days and the trouble all will end + In the field where the sugar-cane grows; + A few more days for to tote the weary load-- + No matter, 'twill never be light; + A few more days till we totter on the road, + Then my old Kentucky home, good-night! + + CHORUS: + + Weep no more, my lady, O weep no more to-day! + We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home, + For the old Kentucky home far away. + + + + +ZACHARIAH F. SMITH + + +Zachariah Frederick Smith, the Kentucky historian, was born near +Eminence, Kentucky, January 7, 1827. He was educated at Bacon College, +Harrodsburg, Kentucky. During the Civil War he was president of Henry +College at New Castle, Kentucky. From 1867 to 1871 he was +superintendent of public instruction in Kentucky. Professor Smith was +subsequently interested in various enterprises, and for four years he +was connected with the publishing firm of D. Appleton and Company. For +more than fifty years he was a curator of Transylvania University. His +_History of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1885; 1892), is the only exhaustive +and readable history of the Commonwealth from the beginnings down to +the date of its publication. In a sense it is the chronicles of the +Collinses transformed from the encyclopedic to the continuous +narrative form. Professor Smith's other works are: _A School History +of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1889); _Youth's History of Kentucky_ +(Louisville, 1898); _The Mother of Henry Clay_ (Louisville, 1899); and +_The Battle of New Orleans_ (Louisville, 1904). He spent the final +years of his life upon _The History of the Reformation of the 19th +Century, Inaugurated, Advocated, and Directed by Barton W. Stone, of +Kentucky: 1800-1832_, which was almost ready for publication when he +died. In this work Professor Smith set forth that Barton W. Stone, and +not Alexander Campbell, was the founder of the Christian +("Campbellite") so-called "reformation" in this State, and that its +adherents are "Stoneites," not "Campbellites," as they are called by +the profane. Professor Smith died at Louisville, Kentucky, July 4, +1911, but he was buried at Eminence. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Kentucky in the Nation's History_, by R. M. McElroy + (New York, 1909); _The Register_ (Frankfort, Kentucky, September, + 1911). + + +EARLY KENTUCKY DOCTORS + + [From _The History of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1892)] + +It is probable Dr. Thomas Walker, of Virginia, was the first physician +who ever visited Kentucky. In 1745 he came and negotiated treaties +with the Indian tribes for the establishment of a colony, which was +announced in Washington's journal (1754) as Walker's settlement on the +Cumberland, accompanied by a map, dated 1750. Some time just before +1770, Dr. John Connolly, of Pittsburgh, visited the Falls of the Ohio, +and three years later, in company with Captain Thomas Bullitt, +patented the land on which Louisville now stands. But little is known +of the professional performances of either Walker or Connolly, except +the fact that they were both men of superior intelligence, and of far +more than average cultivation. They were both known as enterprising +business men rather than great practitioners of medicine. In a +_History of the Medical Literature of Kentucky_, Dr. Lunsford P. +Yandell (the elder) says: "The first surgical operation ever performed +in Kentucky by a white man occurred in 1767." Colonel James Smith, in +that year, accompanied by his black servant, Jamie, traveled from the +mouth of the Tennessee river across the country to Carolina, now +Tennessee. On their way, Colonel Smith stepped upon a projecting +fragment of cane, which pierced his foot, and was broken off level +with the skin. Swelling quickly came on, causing the flesh to rise +above the end of the cane. Having no other instruments than a knife, a +moccasin awl, and a pair of bullet-molds, the colonel directed his +servant to seize the piece of cane with the bullet-molds, while he +raised the skin with the awl and cut the flesh away from around the +piece of cane, and, with the assistance of Jamie, the foreign body was +drawn out. Colonel Smith then treated the wound with the bruised bark +from the root of a lind tree, and subsequently by poultices made of +the same material, using the mosses of the old logs in the forest, +which he secured with strips of elm bark, as a dressing. + +Dr. Frederick Ridgely, a favorite pupil of Dr. Rush, was sent from +Philadelphia early in 1779, as a surgeon to a vessel sailing with +letters of marque and reprisal off the coast of Virginia. This vessel +was chased into the Chesapeake Bay by a British man-of-war. As the +ship's colors were struck to the enemy, Dr. Ridgely leaped overboard, +and narrowly escaped capture by swimming two miles to the shore. He +was at once thereafter appointed an officer in the medical department +of the Colonial army. A few months later, he resigned his commission, +and settled, in 1790, at Lexington, where he speedily attained a +leading position as a master of the healing art. From Lexington he was +frequently called, in the capacity of surgeon, to accompany militia in +their expeditions against the Indians. He was appointed +surgeon-general to the army of "Mad Anthony Wayne," returning finally +to Lexington, where he took part in the organization of the first +medical college established in the West. Dr. Ridgely was a frequent +contributor to the _American Medical Repertory_, published at +Philadelphia. He was the intimate friend of Dr. Samuel Brown, also of +Lexington. At the organization of the medical department of +Transylvania University, in 1799, Brown and Ridgely were the first +professors. Ridgely, in that year, delivered a course of lectures to a +small class, and, as the organization of the faculty had not been +completed, no further attempts at teaching were made. Dr. Samuel +Brown, like his colleague, Ridgely, was a surgeon of great ability and +large experience. These two gentlemen added greatly to the growth and +popularity of Lexington by their renown as surgeons. They attracted +patients from the remote settlements on the frontier, and were both +frequent contributors to the medical literature of that time. The +cases reported by these gentlemen were numerous, interesting, +carefully observed, and ably reported. Dr. Brown was a student at the +University of Edinburgh with Hosack, Davidge, Ephraim McDowell, and +Brockenborough, of Virginia. Hosack became famous as a professor in +the College of Physicians and Surgeons, at New York; Davidge laid the +foundation of the University of Maryland; Brown was one of the first +professors in Transylvania University, at Lexington, while McDowell +achieved immortal fame in surgery as the father of ovariotomy. Strong +rivalry in the practice of medicine at Lexington, between Brown and +Ridgely, and Fishback and Pindell, had much to do with the +difficulties attending the efforts of the two former to establish the +medical school. In 1798, Jenner made public his great discovery of the +protective power of vaccination. Dr. Brown, of Lexington, was his +first imitator on this continent. Within three years from the date of +Jenner's first publication, and before the experiment had been tried +elsewhere in this country, Brown had already vaccinated successfully +more than five hundred people at Lexington. + + + + +JOHN A. BROADUS + + +John Albert Broadus, the most distinguished clergyman and writer +Kentucky Baptists have produced, was born near Culpepper, Virginia, +January 24, 1827. At the age of sixteen years Broadus united with the +Baptist church; and he shortly afterwards decided to study for the +ministry of his church. He taught school for a time before going to +the University of Virginia, in 1846, and he was graduated four years +later with the M.A. degree. While at the University Broadus was +greatly impressed by Professors Gessner Harrison, Wm. H. McGuffey, and +E. H. Courtenay. In 1851 Broadus declined a professorship in +Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky, in order to become assistant +instructor of ancient languages in his _alma mater_ and pastor of the +Charlottesville Baptist church. In 1857 it was decided to establish +the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary at Greenville, South +Carolina, and Broadus, James P. Boyce, Basil Manly, Jr., William +Williams, and E. T. Winkler, were the committee on establishment. +Boyce and Manly urged the curriculum system, but Broadus advocated the +elective system so earnestly that he completely won them over. "So, as +Mr. Jefferson had drawn a new American university, Mr. Broadus drew a +new American seminary." The Seminary opened in 1859 with the members +of the committee, with the exception of Williams, as the professors. +Boyce was elected president, and Broadus occupied the chair of New +Testament Interpretation and Homiletics. Twenty-six students greeted +the faculty; and all were soon hard at work. After a few years, +however, the Civil War came and the Seminary shortly suspended. During +the war Dr. Broadus was a chaplain in the Confederate armies. At the +close of the war work in the Seminary was resumed with seven students +enrolled, Dr. Broadus having but one student in homiletics, and he was +blind! The lectures he prepared for this blind brother were the basis +of the work that made him famous, _The Preparation and Delivery of +Sermons_ (Philadelphia, 1870), which is at the present time the finest +thing on the subject, a text-book in nearly every theological school +in Christendom. Dr. Broadus declined chairs in Chicago and Brown +universities, and the presidency of Vassar College, in order to remain +with the Seminary, the darling of his dreams. In 1873 he read his +notable paper in memory of Gessner Harrison at the University of +Virginia; and the next year he joined Dr. Boyce in Kentucky in the +effort that was then being made to remove the Seminary to Louisville. +His lectures before the Newton Theological Seminary were published as +_The History of Preaching_ (New York, 1876). In 1877 the Seminary was +removed to Louisville, Dr. Boyce remaining as president and Dr. +Broadus as professor of homiletics. From the first the Seminary was a +success, it now being the largest in the United States. In 1879 Dr. +Broadus delivered his noted address upon Demosthenes before Richmond +College, Virginia, which is regarded as one of the very finest efforts +of his life. In Louisville he became the city's first citizen, honored +and beloved by all classes. In 1886 Harvard conferred the degree of +Doctor of Divinity upon him; and later in the same year one of the +most important of his books appeared, _Sermons and Addresses_ +(Baltimore, 1886). This was followed by his famous _Commentary on +Matthew_ (Philadelphia, 1887), which was begun during the darkest days +of the Civil War, and is now considered the best commentary in English +on that Gospel. Dr. Boyce died at Pau, France, in 1888, and Dr. +Broadus succeeded him as president of the Seminary. In January, 1889, +he delivered the Lyman Beecher lectures on _Preaching_ at Yale; and +some months later his _Translation of and Notes to Chrysostom's +Homilies_ (New York, 1889) appeared. In the spring of 1890 Dr. Broadus +delivered three lectures before Johns Hopkins University, which were +published as _Jesus of Nazareth_ (New York, 1890). He spent the summer +of 1892 in Louisville preparing his _Memoir of James P. Boyce_ (New +York, 1893); and _A Harmony of the Gospels_ (New York, 1893), his +final works. Dr. Broadus died at Louisville, Kentucky, March 16, 1895. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life and Letters of John Albert Broadus_, by A. T. + Robertson (Philadelphia, 1900); _Library of Southern Literature_ + (Atlanta, 1909, v. ii). + + +OXFORD UNIVERSITY[14] + + [From _Life and Letters of John A. Broadus_, by A. T. Robertson + (Philadelphia, 1901)] + +We had four and a half hours at Oxford, and spent it with exceeding +great pleasure, and most respectably heavy expense. + +At University College we saw a memorial of Sir Wm. Jones, by Flaxman, +which I am sure I shall never forget--worthy of Sir Wm. and worthy of +Flaxman. At Magdalen College we saw the varied and beautiful grounds, +with the Poet's Walk, where Addison loved to stroll. At New College we +visited the famous and beautiful chapel. (New College is now five +hundred years old.) These are the most remarkable of the nineteen +colleges. You know they are entirely distinct establishments, as much +as if a hundred miles apart, and that the University of Oxford is +simply a general organization which gives degrees to the men prepared +by the different colleges. Then we spent one and a half hours at the +famous Bodleian Library, the most valuable (British Museum has the +largest number of books) in the world. Oh, the books, the books--the +early and rare editions, the illuminated manuscripts of the Middle +Ages, the autographs of famous persons, and the portraits, the +portraits of hundreds of the earth's greatest ones. Happy students, +fellows, professors, who have constant access to the Bodleian Library. + + +SPURGEON + + [From the same] + +I was greatly delighted with Spurgeon, especially with his conduct of +public worship. The congregational singing has often been described, and +is as good as can well be conceived. Spurgeon is an excellent reader of +Scripture, and remarkably impressive in reading hymns, and the prayers +were quite what they ought to have been. The sermon was hardly up to his +average in freshness, but was exceedingly well delivered, without +affectation or apparent effort, but with singular earnestness, and +directness. The whole thing--house, congregation, order, worship, +preaching, was as nearly up to my ideal as I ever expect to see in this +life. Of course Spurgeon has his faults and deficiencies, but he is a +wonderful man. Then he preaches the real gospel, and God blesses him. +After the services concluded, I went to a room in the rear to present my +letter, and was cordially received. Somebody must tell Mrs. V---- that I +"thought of her" repeatedly during the sermon, and "gave her love" to +Spurgeon, and he said such a message encouraged him. (I made quite a +little story of it, and the gentlemen in the room were apparently much +interested, not to say amused.) + +We went straight towards St. Paul's, where Liddon has been preaching +every Sunday afternoon in September, and there would be difficulty in +getting a good seat. We lunched at the Cathedral Hotel, hard by, and +then stood three-quarters of an hour at the door of St. Paul's, +waiting for it to open. Meantime a good crowd had collected behind us, +and there was a tremendous rush when the door opened, to get chairs +near the preaching stand. The crowd looked immense in the vast +cathedral, and yet there were not half as many as were quietly seated +in Spurgeon's Tabernacle. There everybody could hear, and here, in the +grand and beautiful show-place, Mr. Liddon was tearing his throat in +the vain attempt to be heard by all. The grand choral service was all +Chinese to me. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[14] Copyright, 1901, by the American Baptist Publication Society. + + + + +MARY J. HOLMES + + +Mrs. Mary Jane Holmes, a family favorite for fifty years, was born at +Brookfield, Massachusetts, April 5, 1828. She became a teacher at an +early age, and at Allen's Hill, New York, on August 9, 1849, she was +married to Daniel Holmes, a Yale man of the class of 1848, who had +been teaching the year between his graduation and marriage at +Versailles, Kentucky. Immediately after the ceremony he and his bride +started to Kentucky, where Mrs. Holmes joined her husband in teaching. +In 1850 they gave up the school at Versailles, taking charge of the +district school at Glen's Creek, near Versailles. Here they taught for +two years, when Mr. Holmes decided to relinquish teaching for the +practice of law, and they removed to Brockport, New York, their home +henceforth. Mrs. Holmes returned to Kentucky in 1857, for a visit, and +this, with the three years indicated above, included her Kentucky +life. Having settled at Brockport, she began her career as a novelist. +Her first and best known book, _Tempest and Sunshine, or Life in +Kentucky_, was published in 1854. Mr. Middleton, one of the chief +characters in this novel, was a rather close characterization of a +Kentucky planter, Mr. Singleton, who resided some miles from +Versailles; and his daughter, Sue Singleton, subsequently Mrs. Porter, +always claimed, though facetiously, that she was the original of +_Tempest_. It is now known, however, that Mrs. Holmes had not thought +of her in delineating the character, and that the Singleton home is +the only thing in the book that is drawn from actual life with any +detail whatever. In her Kentucky books that followed _Tempest and +Sunshine_, she usually built an accurate background for characters +that lived only in her imagination. Besides _Tempest and Sunshine_, +Mrs. Holmes was the author of thirty-four books, published in the +order given: _The English Orphans_; _Homestead on the Hillside_, a +book of Kentucky stories; _Lena Rivers_, a Kentucky novel, superior to +_Tempest and Sunshine_; _Meadow Brook_; _Dora Deane_; _Cousin Maude_; +_Marian Grey_, a Kentucky story; _Darkness and Daylight_; _Hugh +Worthington_, another Kentucky novel; _The Cameron Pride_; _Rose +Mather_; _Ethelyn's Mistake_; _Millbank_; _Edna Browning_; _West +Lawn_; _Edith Lyle_; _Mildred_; _Daisy Thornton_; _Forrest House_; +_Chateau D'Or_; _Madeline_; _Queenie Hetherton_; _Christmas Stories_; +_Bessie's Fortune_; _Gretchen_; _Marguerite_; _Dr. Hathern's +Daughters_; _Mrs. Hallam's Companion_; _Paul Ralston_; _The Tracy +Diamonds_; _The Cromptons_; _The Merivale Banks_; _Rena's Experiment_; +and _The Abandoned Farm_. About two million copies of Mrs. Holmes's +books have been sold by her authorized publishers; how many have been +sold in pirated editions cannot, of course, be ascertained. Mrs. +Holmes died at Brockport, New York, October 6, 1907. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Allibone's _Dictionary of Authors_ (Philadelphia, + 1897, v. ii); _The Nation_ (October 10, 1907). + + +THE SCHOOLMASTER + + [From _Lena Rivers_ (New York, 1856)] + +And now Mr. Everett was daily expected. Anna, who had no fondness for +books, greatly dreaded his arrival, thinking within herself how many +pranks she'd play off upon him, provided 'Lena would lend a helping +hand, which she much doubted. John Jr., too, who for a time, at least, +was to be placed under Mr. Everett's instruction, felt in no wise +eager for his arrival, fearing, as he told 'Lena that "between the +'old man' and the tutor, he would be kept a little too straight for a +gentleman of his habits;" and it was with no particular emotions of +pleasure that he and Anna saw the stage stop before the gate one +pleasant morning toward the middle of November. Running to one of the +front windows, Carrie, 'Lena, and Anna watched their new teacher, each +after her own fashion commenting upon his appearance. + +"Ugh," exclaimed Anna, "what a green, boyish looking thing! I reckon +nobody's going to be afraid of him." + +"I say he's real handsome," said Carrie, who being thirteen years of +age, had already, in her own mind, practiced many a little coquetry +upon the stranger. + +"I like him," was 'Lena's brief remark. + +Mr. Everett was a pale, intellectual looking man, scarcely twenty +years of age, and appearing still younger so that Anna was not wholly +wrong when she called him boyish. Still there was in his large black +eye a firmness and decision which bespoke the man strong within him, +and which put to flight all of Anna's preconceived notions of +rebellion. With the utmost composure he returned Mrs. Livingstone's +greeting, and the proud lady half bit her lip with vexation as she saw +how little he seemed awed by her presence. + +Malcolm Everett was not one to acknowledge superiority where there was +none, and though ever polite toward Mrs. Livingstone, there was +something in his manner which forbade her treating him as aught save +an equal. He was not to be trampled down, and for once in her life +Mrs. Livingstone had found a person who would neither cringe to her +nor flatter. The children were not presented to him until dinner time, +when, with the air of a young desperado, John Jr. marched into the +dining-room, eyeing his teacher askance, calculating his strength, and +returning his greeting with a simple nod. Mr. Everett scanned him from +head to foot, and then turned to Carrie half smiling at the great +dignity which she assumed. With Lena and Anna he seemed better +pleased, holding their hands and smiling down upon them through rows +of teeth which Anna pronounced the whitest she had ever seen. + +Mr. Livingstone was not at home, and when his mother appeared, Mrs. +Livingstone did not think proper to introduce her. But if by this +omission she thought to keep the old lady silent, she was mistaken, +for the moment Mrs. Nichols was seated, she commenced with, "Your name +is Everett, I b'lieve?" + +"Yes, ma'am," said he, bowing very gracefully toward her. + +"Any kin to the governor what was?" + +"No, ma'am, none whatever," and the white teeth became slightly +visible for a moment, but soon disappeared. + +"You are from Rockford, 'Lena tells me?" + +"Yes, ma'am. Have you friends there?" + +"Yes--or that is, Nancy Scovandyke's sister, Betsy Scovandyke that +used to be, lives there. Maybe you know her. Her name is Bacon--Betsy +Bacon. She's a widder and keeps boarders." + +"Ah," said he, the teeth this time becoming wholly visible, "I've +heard of Mrs. Bacon, but have not the honor of her acquaintance. You +are from the east, I perceive." + +"Law, now! how did you know that?" asked Mrs. Nichols, while Mr. +Everett answered, "I _guessed_ at it," with a peculiar emphasis on the +word guessed, which led 'Lena to think he had used it purposely and +not from habit. + +Mr. Everett possessed in a remarkable degree the faculty of making +those around him both respect and like him, and ere six weeks had +passed, he had won the love of all his pupils. Even John Jr. was +greatly improved, and Carrie seemed suddenly reawakened into a thirst +for knowledge, deeming no task too long, and no amount of study too +hard, if it won the commendation of the teacher. 'Lena, who committed +to memory with great ease, and who consequently did not deserve so +much credit for her always perfect lessons, seldom received a word of +praise, while poor Anna, notoriously lazy when books were concerned, +cried almost every day, because as she said, "Mr. Everett didn't like +her as he did the rest, else why did he look at her so much, watching +her all the while, and keeping her after school to get her lessons +over, when he knew how she hated them." + +Once Mrs. Livingstone ventured to remonstrate, telling him that Anna +was very sensitive, and required altogether different treatment from +Carrie. "She thinks you dislike her," said she, "and while she retains +this impression, she will do nothing as far as learning is concerned; +so if you do not like her, try and make her think you do!" + +There was a peculiar look in Mr. Everett's dark eyes as he answered, +"You may think it strange, Mrs. Livingstone, but of all my pupils I +love Anna the best! I know I find more fault with her, and am, +perhaps, more severe with her than with the rest, but it's because I +would make her what I wish her to be. Pardon me, madam, but Anna does +not possess the same amount of intellect with her cousin or sister, +but by proper culture she will make a fine, intelligent woman." + +Mrs. Livingstone hardly relished being told that one child was inferior +to the other, but she could not well help herself--Mr. Everett would say +what he pleased--and thus the conference ended. From that time Mr. +Everett was exceedingly kind to Anna, wiping away the tears which +invariably came when told that she must stay with him in the schoolroom +after the rest were gone; then, instead of seating himself in rigid +silence at a distance until her task was learned, he would sit by her +side, occasionally smoothing her long curls and speaking encouragingly +to her as she poured over some hard rule of grammar, or puzzled her +brains with some difficult problem in Colburn. Ere long the result of +all this became manifest. Anna grew fonder of her books, more ready to +learn, and--more willing to be kept after school! + +Ah, little did Mrs. Livingstone think what she was doing when she bade +young Malcolm Everett make her warm-hearted, impulsive daughter +_think_ he liked her! + + + + +ROSA V. JEFFREY + + +Mrs. Rosa Vertner Jeffrey, one of the most beautiful of Kentucky +women, whose personal loveliness has caused some critics to forget she +was a gifted poet, was born at Natchez, Mississippi, in 1828, the +daughter of John Y. Griffith, a writer of considerable reputation in +his day. Her mother died when she was but nine months old, and she was +reared by her aunt. When Rosa was ten years of age her adopted parents +removed to Lexington, Kentucky, where she was educated at the +Episcopal Seminary. In 1845 Miss Vertner--she had taken the name of +her foster parents--was married to Claude M. Johnson, a wealthy +citizen of Lexington, and she at once took her place as a great social +and literary leader. One of her sons, Mr. Claude M. Johnson, was mayor +of Lexington for several years, and he was afterwards in the service +of the United States government. In 1861 Mrs. Johnson's husband died, +and she removed to Rochester, New York, where she resided for two +years, when she was married to Alexander Jeffrey, of Edinburgh, +Scotland, and they returned to Lexington, her home for the remainder +of her life. Mrs. Jeffrey died at Lexington, Kentucky, October 6, +1894, and no woman has yet arisen in Kentucky to take her position as +society's favorite beauty and poet. She began her literary career as a +contributor of verse to Prentice's _Louisville Journal_. Her pen-name +was "Rosa," and under this name her first volume of poems was +published, entitled _Poems, by Rosa_ (Boston, 1857). This was followed +by _Florence Vale_; _Woodburn_, a novel; _Daisy Dare and Baby Power_ +(Philadelphia, 1871), a book of poems; _The Crimson Hand and Other +Poems_ (Philadelphia, 1881), her best known work; and _Marah_ +(Philadelphia, 1884), a novel. Mrs. Jeffrey was also the author of a +five-act comedy, called _Love and Literature_. As a novelist or +playwright she did nothing especially strong, but as a writer of +pleasing poems her place in the literature of Kentucky seems secure. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, + Kentucky, 1882); _The Register_ (Frankfort, January, 1911). + + +A GLOVE + + [From _The Crimson Hand and Other Poems_ (Philadelphia, 1881)] + + In a box of airy trifles--fans, flowers, and ribbons gay-- + I chanced to find a tasselled glove, worn once on the first of + May. + How long ago? Ah me, ah me! twelve years, twelve years today! + Alas! for that beautiful, fragrant time, so far in the past away, + And crowned with sweeter memories than any other May, + Standing alone, in a checkered life--it was my wedding day! + + The passing hours were shod with light, and their glowing sandals + made + Such sunny tracks that they guide me yet through a retrospect of + shade. + Through changes and shadows of twelve long years, down that + love-lit path I stray; + The winters come and the winters go, yet it leads to an endless + May. + No leaves of the autumn have fallen there, and never a flake of + snow + Has chilled the path of those May-day hours that gleam through the + long ago! + + The flowering cherry's wild perfume came stealing, bitter sweet, + From fragrant breezes drifting heaps of blossoms to my feet; + The flowers are dust, but the bees that bore their subtle sweets + away + Dropped golden honey on the path of that beautiful first of May. + And the sweetness clings, for I gather it in wandering back today. + + Twelve years! twelve years!--a long, long life for a little + tasselled glove! + Yet, I treasure it still for his dear sake who clasped with so + much love + The hand that wore, on that festal night, this delicate, dainty + thing-- + His forever! bound to him by the link of a wedding ring! + The glove is soiled and faded now, but the ring is as bright today + As the love that flooded my life with light on that beautiful + first of May. + + +A MEMORY + + [From the same] + + A memory filled my heart last night + With all its youthful glow; + Under the ashes, out of my sight, + I buried it long ago; + I buried it deep, I bade it rest, + And whispered a long "good-by;" + But lo! it has risen--too sweet, too blest + Too cherished a thing to die. + + In the dim, dim past, where the shadows fall, + I left it, but, crowned with light, + A spirit of joy in the banquet-hall, + It haunted my soul last night. + One earnest, tender, passionate glance-- + I cherished it--that was all, + As we drifted on through the mazy dance + To a musical rise and fall. + + It rose with a weird and witching swell, + 'Mid the twinkling of merry feet, + And clasped me close in a wild, strange spell + Of memories bitter-sweet; + Bitter--because they left a sting + And vanished: a lifelong pain; + Sweet--because nothing can ever bring + Such joy to my heart again. + + To me it was nothing, only a waltz; + To the other it meant no wrong; + Men may be cruel--who are not false-- + And women remember too long. + + + + +SALLIE R. FORD + + +Mrs. Sallie Rochester Ford, the mother of good _Grace Truman_, was +born at Rochester Springs, near Danville, Kentucky, in 1828. Miss +Rochester was graduated from the female seminary at Georgetown, +Kentucky, in 1849, and six years later she was married to Rev. Samuel +H. Ford (1823-1905), a Baptist preacher and editor of Louisville and +St. Louis. She was her husband's associate in his literary +enterprises, rendering him excellent service at all times. Her last +years were spent at St. Louis, in which city she died in February, +1910, having rounded out more than four score years. Mrs. Ford's +religious novel, _Grace Truman, or Love and Principle_ (New York, +1857) attracted wide attention in its day, and it was reprinted many +times. It was read by thousands of young girls; and ministers +descanted upon it in their sermons. While the work sets forth that the +Baptist road is the only right of way to heaven, and is sentimental to +the core, it is fairly well-written, and it undoubtedly did much good. +A copy of it may be found in almost any collection of Kentucky books. +_Grace Truman_ was followed by _Mary Bunyan_ (New York, 1859); _Morgan +and His Men_ (Mobile, Ala., 1864); _Ernest Quest_ (New York, 1877); +_Evangel Wiseman_ (1907); and Mrs. Ford's final work, published at St. +Louis, _The Life of Rochester Ford, the Successful Christian Lawyer_. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _How I Came to Write "Grace Truman: An Appendix_ to + the 1886 edition; Adams's _Dictionary of American Authors_ + (Boston, 1905). + + +OUR MINISTER MARRIES + + [From _Grace Truman_ (St. Louis, 1886)] + +May roses fling abroad their rich fragrance on the evening air! May +dews glide noiselessly to the newly awakened earth, and lose +themselves in her fresh, green bosom. A soft May moon steals above the +eastern horizon, and gilds with radiant luster the brow of night. +Gentle May zephyrs from their airy home glide over the earth, kissing +the lips of the rose, and the tender cheek of the hedge-row violet. +Young and tender May leaves whisper to each other tales of love, away, +away, in the dark old forests. + +And other lips than those of the dancing leaves have whispered tales +of love; and mortal ears have heard its sweet low murmurings; and +mortal hearts have felt its thrilling inspiration, until the soul, +fired beneath its ecstatic power, has tasted of bliss which mortal +tongue can never say. + +In the hospitable mansion of Mr. Gray, all is excitement and +expectancy. She to whom their hearts were so closely wedded, the +living, joyous Annie, is tonight to take upon her the marriage vow. +She is to wed the man of her heart's free choice, the object of her +pure unsullied love. She is to stand in the presence of God and many +witnesses, and promise to love and cherish, yea as long as life shall +last, him upon whom she has bestowed her girlhood's fresh full +confidence and affection. + +The house is brilliantly lighted throughout, and everything bears the +testimony of free Kentucky hospitality. 'Tis but the twilight +hour--early, yet the guests are fast assembling. + + * * * * * + +It was a simple yet beautiful and impressive scene--that little group +as it stood, while the aged man of God, in a solemn and touching +manner, united in indissoluble ties the two warm loving hearts before +him. The vailed form of the bride, leaning on the arm of him who was +henceforth to be her earthly stay; the calm dignified form, and +earnest, we might say, almost holy expression of him who was receiving +the precious trust--the bent form, and hoary locks, and tremulous +voice of the minister--all conspired to make the scene one of solemn +beauty and intense interest. + +Congratulations followed, and many were the kisses that pressed the +blushing cheek of the happy bride, who, with her vail thrown back from +her brow and the color playing over her bright face "like moonlight +over streams," looked the very embodiment of grace and loveliness. + +Fannie calmly waited till the excitement was measurably over; and then +approaching her new cousin, leaning on the arm of Mr. Ray, gave them +each a fervent kiss and her warmest wishes for their future happiness. + + * * * * * + +The time passed most delightfully to all present. Mr. and Mrs. Gray +moved about among the guests dispensing pleasure and enjoyment +wherever they went. But the bride and bridegroom were the chief +attraction; she, with her naturally exuberant spirits, heightened by +the excitement of the occasion, and yet tempered by her husband's +dignified cheerfulness; and he, with his fine conversational powers +and affable manner, drew around them an admiring crowd wherever they +were. The young ladies and gentlemen promenaded and chatted gayly, +while the more elderly ones grouped themselves together in different +parts of the room for the purpose of social conversation. + + * * * * * + +Supper was served in liberal, handsome style; and Mr. and Mrs. Gray, +assisted by Mr. and Mrs. Truman, attended to the wants of their guests +in the most obliging and attentive manner. And when the hour arrived +for the company to disperse to their respective homes, each one went +away happy in the thoughts of having passed a most agreeable hour. + +Mr. and Mrs. Gray accompanied their daughter to Weston the day after +the wedding, when they met with a most welcome reception from Mr. and +Mrs. Holmes, who had provided an evening entertainment for the bridal +party, and had called together many of their friends. + +They remained several days, during which time they saw their daughter +nicely and comfortably ensconced in a neat little brick cottage, +situated in a very pleasant part of the village, and which was +henceforth called "The Parsonage." + +Annie, or, we should rather say, Mrs. Lewis, united with the little +church of which her husband was now the almost idolized pastor, on the +Saturday after her marriage. It had been so arranged by Mr. Lewis that +they should be married on Tuesday previous to their church meeting, +that she might thus soon cast her lot among his people. She was +welcomed with warm hearts and affectionate greeting; and when, on the +following morning, her husband led her down into the stream, where but +a few months before he had followed Christ in baptism, they received +her from the liquid grave, a member of the household of faith, a +laborer with them in the vineyard of the Lord. + + + + +JOHN E. HATCHER + + +Col. John E. Hatcher ("G. Washington Bricks"), a newspaper humorist +who won wide fame in his day and generation, but who is now quite +sealed over and forgotten, was born near Charlottesville, Virginia, in +1828. When a boy his parents emigrated to Tennessee. At the age of +twenty years Hatcher became editor of _The American Democrat_ at +Florence, Alabama; and in 1852 he purchased _The Mirror_, a paper +which General Zollicoffer had established at Columbia, Tennessee. Some +time later Hatcher disposed of that property, and accepted a position +on the _Nashville Patriot_. He was fast gaining a reputation for his +humorous sketches, paragraphs, and rhymes, which were floating through +many Southern newspapers under his pen-name of "G. Washington Bricks." +Hatcher relinquished the pen for the sword when the Civil War began, +becoming an officer on the staff of General Cheatham. After the war, +or in 1867, Colonel Hatcher settled at Louisville, Kentucky, joining +the staff of Prentice's then fast-expiring _Journal_. When, in the +following year, the _Journal_ was united with the _Courier_, he became +editor of the _Daily Democrat_; and when that paper was consolidated +with the other two to make _The Courier-Journal_, he became one of the +editors of the new paper, and continued to write for it so long as he +lived. For a short time he did some special work for a Louisville +publication known as _The Evening Express_, conducted by Mr. Overton. +A few years before his death Colonel Hatcher returned to his old home +at Columbia, Tennessee, and founded _The Mail_; but he became "outside +editor" of _The Courier-Journal_, laying down his pen for that paper +only with his death, which occurred at Columbia, Tennessee, March 26, +1879. Consumption caused his demise and robbed Southern journalism of +one of its finest minds. Colonel Hatcher married Miss Lizzie +McKnight, daughter of a prosperous merchant at Iuka, Mississippi, and +the early death of their only child, a daughter, coupled with +consumption, hastened his own death. As an editorial paragraphist +Colonel Hatcher has never had a peer in Kentucky or the South. +Prentice, the father of the paragraph, was a wit; Hatcher was a +humorist; and his writings were often credited to Prentice by those +who were not acquainted with the inner workings of the office. Henry +Watterson has written this fine tribute to Colonel Hatcher's memory: + +He was one of the silent singers of the press, but he lacked nothing +of eminence except good fortune; for he was a humorist of the very +first water, and had he lived under different conditions could not +have failed of the celebrity to which his talents entitled him. Born +not merely poor, but far inland, with no early advantages, and later +in life with none except those furnished by a rural newspaper; ill +health overtook him before he had divined his own powers.... His wit +was not so aggressive as that of Mr. Prentice. But he had more humor. +He died in the prime of life and left behind him a professional +tradition, which is cherished by the little circle of friends to whom +a charming personality and many brilliant gifts made him very dear. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Courier-Journal_ (March 27, 1879); _Oddities of + Southern Life_, by Henry Watterson (Boston, 1882). + + +NEWSPAPER PARAGRAPHS + + [From _The Courier-Journal_] + +Garters with monogram clasps are now worn by the pretty girls. They +are rather a novelty yet, but we hope to see more of them. + +"The New York _Telegraph_ advises people to marry for love and not for +money." Good advice, certainly; but inasmuch as you will always be in +want of money if you marry for love, and always in want of love if you +marry for money, your safest way is to marry for a little of both. + +Some of our contemporaries will persist in speaking of us as a +"rebel." That we fought for the stars and bars with a heroism of which +Marathon, Leuctra, and Thermopylae never even dreamed, the bones of +half-a-dozen substitutes which lie bleeding upon as many "stormy +heights and carnage covered fields" bear testimony abundant and +indisputable, and that we suffer ourselves still to be called a +"rebel" without unsheathing the avenging dagger and wading up to our +knees in gore, is simply because there is already as much blood upon +the hands of our substitutes as we can furnish soap to wash off +without becoming a bankrupt. Nevertheless, if this thing is much +longer persisted in, there may come a time when virtue will cease to +be a forebearance. One more taste of blood, this sanguinary arm once +more uplifted to smite, and the world will shudder. + +General Grant says he won't call an extra session of Congress unless +the war in Europe is likely to give us trouble. So he is determined +that if the gods bring us one calamity, he will immediately step +forward with another. + +For list of candidates see first page.--_Banner_. For the candidates +themselves--but you needn't trouble yourself to see them; they'll see +you. + +The French General Failly, who was killed by a Prussian shell, and was +afterward murdered by his own soldiers, and subsequently blew out his +own brains, is now a prisoner at Mayence--whether dead or alive, the +telegraph does not inform us. + +The Glasgow _Times_ tells of a man in Georgia, fifty years of age, who +never in his life drank a glass of whiskey, smoked a pipe, or courted +a woman. The poor wretch has lived utterly in vain. The man who has +never sat by a beautiful woman, with a pipe in his mouth, a glass of +whiskey in one hand, and the whalebones of her palpitating stays in +the other, and "with a lip unused to the cool breath of reason, told +his love," has no more idea of Paradise than a deaf and dumb +orang-outang has of metaphysics. Even without the pipe and whiskey +there is, strictly speaking, nothing disagreeable about it. + +The United States navy has but one Admiral Poor. We wish we could say +it has but one poor admiral. + + + + +WILLIAM C. WATTS + + +William Courtney Watts, author of a single historical novel which is +regarded by many as the finest work of its kind yet done by a Kentucky +hand, was born at Salem, Kentucky, February 7, 1830. His family has no +record of his school days, but he was married to Miss Nannie Ferguson +when a young man, and six children were born to them. Watts's early +years were spent at Salem and Smithland, Kentucky, but he later went +to New Orleans as a clerk in the firm of Givens, Watts and Company, +cotton brokers. He shortly afterwards joined the New York branch of +this New Orleans house, known as Watts, Crowe and Company, as a +partner in the business; and from New York Watts went to Liverpool, +England, to represent the firm of W. C. Watts and Company, which was +the foreign title for the New Orleans and New York houses. For some +years the business was very prosperous, and Watts, of course, shared +largely in the firm's success. After the usual congratulatory messages +between England and the United States had been exchanged, Watts is +said to have sent the first cablegram across the Atlantic. After many +years of prosperity, failure overtook the house of Watts, and he +returned to New York, setting up in business with a Mr. Slaughter. +Some time subsequently he came back to Kentucky, making his home in +Smithland, but rheumatism ruined his health, causing lameness, and +making him an invalid for the remainder of his life. In Smithland, +during days of illness, Watts wrote his splendid story, _The +Chronicles of a Kentucky Settlement_ (New York, 1897). This novel of +early Kentucky life is one of the most charming and delightful tales +ever told by an American author, although founded upon fact and, in a +sense, twice-told. _The Chronicles_ is the only book Watts wrote, and +he has come down to posterity with this single story in his feeble +hand. The preface, signed on the sixty-seventh anniversary of his +birth, was done but ten months before his death, which occurred at +Smithland, Kentucky December 27, 1897. He is buried in the cemetery of +the little Kentucky town over which he cast the glamour of romance, +almost unknown to its citizen of this day, and still unappreciated and +unheralded by Kentuckians. His _Chronicles_ is known only to the +student and collector, as it was never properly put before the public, +though published by a powerful New York firm. His family knows little +of his life and is quite careless of his fame. In years to come the +_Chronicles_ may take high rank among the finest series of historical +pictures ever penned of a single Southern settlement, and then William +Courtney Watts will come into his very own. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Courier-Journal_ (December 28, 1897); letter + from Watts's daughter to the author. + + +A WEDDING AND A DANCE[15] + + [From _Chronicles of a Kentucky Settlement_ (New York, 1897)] + +A few weeks after the race there was a grand wedding, and, this time, +Squire Howard united in holy matrimony Jefferson Brantley and Emily +Wilmot, the ceremony taking place at the residence of the bride's +father. Joseph Adair and Horace Benton were the groomsmen, and Laura +Howard and Ada Howard the bridesmaids. A young lady from Princeton was +to have been one of the bridesmaids, but illness prevented her +attendance, and Ada Howard took her place. The residence of Mr. Wilmot +was too small to admit of dancing, but the company present had a merry +time--the fun and frolic being kept up until a late hour. It was then +the custom to "give" (hold) the infare at the residence of the groom's +parents or some other near relative, but, as Mr. Brantley had no +relatives in the county, his infare was held at the Brick Hotel in +Salem, and great were the preparations made on the occasion--never had +such an elegant and sumptuous table been spread in those "parts"; there +were meats of many sorts, including barbacued pigs, and cakes, +pastries, fruits, nuts, and wines and liquors in abundance. Silas Holman +and Billy Wilmot were never in better trim, and their fiddles seemed the +fountain of such ecstatic sounds as to set the nerves of old as well as +young tingling with a pleasurable excitement which could only find its +true expression in the quick and graceful movements of the dance. And +dancing there was, and such dancing! There was Bird McCoy, who could +"cut the double shuffle,"--spring into the air, strike his feet together +thrice before lighting, and not lose step to the music. And among the +young ladies--many of them country girls whose lives in the open air +made them as active as squirrels and as graceful as fawns--were many +good dancers, but it was conceded that among them all the slight, +sylph-like Ada Howard was the best--"the pick of the flock." And the +mirth and fun grew "fast and furious," and the "dancers quick and +quicker flew." Nor did the fun and frolic cease until faint streaks of +light in the East heralded the coming morn. They almost literally + + "Danced all night 'til broad daylight, + And went home with the girls in the morning." + +And yet, be it said that, while there was a good deal of drinking that +night, there was no drunkenness, rowdyism, unseemly behavior, or +ungentlemanly conversation; for woe to the young man who at such a +time and place, when ladies were present, had violated the recognized +rules of decorum! + +It is certain, however, that several young persons came very near that +night being "fiddled out of the church." There was one gay, +good-humored, hearty country girl who, when "churched" for dancing +that night, admitted that she was "on the floor with the so-called +dancers"; that she had a "partner," and took part in the movements; +but, she contended, that inasmuch as she had not _crossed her feet_, +she had violated no rule of the church. "What," she asked, "if I walk +forward and backward and turn and bow _without_ music, is that +dancing? And if I do the same when there _is_ music, does that make it +dancing?" And the good old brethren, who were sitting in judgment, +after mature deliberation, came to the conclusion that they were not +"cl'ar on the p'int 'bout crossin' the feet." "And," said one, "if we +err, let it be on the side o' marcy." "Yes," replied another, "but let +the young sister understand that she must n't do it ag'in." And so the +matter was settled. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[15] Copyright, 1897, by G. P. Putnam's Sons. + + + + +J. PROCTOR KNOTT + + +James Proctor Knott, he who made Duluth famous, was born at Lebanon, +Kentucky, August 29, 1830. In 1851 he became a Missouri lawyer, and +later a member of the Missouri legislature. For a time he was +attorney-general of the state but, refusing to take certain test oaths +prescribed for officials, his office was declared vacant and he +returned to Lebanon, his birthplace. In 1866 Knott was sent to the +lower house of Congress, and he was re-elected two years later. On +January 27, 1871, he delivered his celebrated Duluth speech upon the +St. Croix and Superior land grant, which effort brought him a national +reputation as an orator and humorist, but which injured him as a +constructive statesman--if he ever was or could be such a statesman! +Knott was in Congress again from 1875 until 1883, when he was elected +governor of Kentucky. Governor Knott was not an overly forceful +executive, but the people enjoyed his witty stories and speeches, and +thus his term wore on and out. It was an era of good feeling, +Kentuckians smiling and taking their governor good naturedly at all +times. His brief eulogy to remember James Francis Leonard, the +Kentucky telegrapher, was the finest literary thing he did while +governor of Kentucky. The governor was dean of the law faculty of +Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, from 1894 to 1901, when, old age +coming on, he returned to his home at Lebanon, where the final years +of his life were passed, and where he died on June 18, 1911. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY: _Oddities in Southern Life and Character_, by Henry + Watterson (Boston, 1883); _The Life of James Francis Leonard_, by + J. W. Townsend (Louisville, 1909). + + +FROM THE DULUTH SPEECH + + [From _Oddities in Southern Life and Character_, edited by Henry + Watterson (Boston, 1883)] + +Hence, as I have said, sir, I was utterly at a loss to determine where +the terminus of this great and indispensable road should be, until I +accidentally overheard some gentleman the other day mention the name of +"Duluth." [Great laughter.] Duluth! The word fell upon my ear with +peculiar and indescribable charm, like the gentle murmur of a low +fountain stealing forth in the midst of roses, or the soft, sweet +accents of an angel's whisper in the bright, joyous dream of sleeping +innocence. Duluth! 'Twas the name for which my soul had panted for +years, as the hart panteth for the water-brooks. [Renewed laughter.] But +where was Duluth? Never, in all my limited reading, had my vision been +gladdened by seeing the celestial word in print. [Laughter.] And I felt +a profounder humiliation in my ignorance that its dulcet syllables had +never before ravished my delighted ear. [Roars of laughter.] I was +certain the draughtsman of this bill had never heard of it, or it would +have been designated as one of the termini of this road. I asked my +friends about it, but they knew nothing of it. I rushed to the library +and examined all the maps I could find. [Laughter.] I discovered in one +of them a delicate, hair-like line, diverging from the Mississippi near +a place marked Prescott, which I supposed was intended to represent the +river St. Croix, but I could nowhere find Duluth. + +Nevertheless, I was confident it existed somewhere, and that its +discovery would constitute the crowning glory of the present century, +if not of all modern times. [Laughter.] I knew it was bound to exist +in the very nature of things; that the symmetry and perfection of our +planetary system would be incomplete without it [renewed laughter]; +that the elements of material nature would long since have resolved +themselves back into original chaos if there had been such a hiatus in +creation as would have resulted from leaving out Duluth. [Roars of +laughter.] In fact, sir, I was overwhelmed with the conviction that +Duluth not only existed somewhere, but that wherever it was it was a +great and glorious place. I was convinced that the greatest calamity +that ever befell the benighted nations of the ancient world was in +their having passed away without a knowledge of the actual existence +of Duluth; that their fabled Atlantis, never seen save by the hallowed +vision of inspired poesy, was, in fact, but another name for Duluth; +that the golden orchard of the Hesperides was but a poetical synonym +for the beer gardens in the vicinity of Duluth. [Great laughter.] I +was certain that Herodotus had died a miserable death because in all +his travels and with all his geographical research he had never heard +of Duluth. [Laughter.] I knew that if the immortal spirit of Homer +could look down from another heaven than that created by his own +celestial genius upon the long lines of pilgrims from every nation of +the earth to the gushing fountain of poesy opened by the touch of his +magic wand; if he could be permitted to behold the vast assemblage of +grand and glorious productions of the lyric art called into being by +his own inspired strains, he would weep tears of bitter anguish that, +instead of lavishing all the stores of his mighty genius upon the fall +of Ilion, it had not been his more blessed lot to crystalize in +deathless song the rising glories of Duluth. [Great and continued +laughter.] Yet, sir, had it not been for this map, kindly furnished me +by the legislature of Minnesota, I might have gone down to my obscure +and humble grave in an agony of despair, because I could nowhere find +Duluth. [Renewed laughter.] Had such been my melancholy fate, I have +no doubt that, with the last feeble pulsation of my breaking heart, +with the last faint exhalation of my fleeting breath, I should have +whispered, "Where is Duluth?" [Roars of laughter.] + + + + + +GEORGE G. VEST + + +George Graham Vest, exquisite eulogist of man's good friend, the dog, +was born at Frankfort, Kentucky, December 6, 1830. At the age of +eighteen years Vest was graduated from Centre College, Danville, +Kentucky; and five years later Transylvania University granted him his +degree in law. The year of his graduation from Transylvania, 1853, Vest +went to Missouri, settling at Georgetown. He rapidly attained a +State-wide reputation as a lawyer and orator. In 1860 he was a +presidential elector on the Democratic ticket, and a member of the +Missouri House of Representatives. Vest's sympathy lay with the South +and he resigned his seat in the legislature in order to become a member +of the Confederate Congress. He served two years in the Confederate +House and one year in the Senate. After the war he resumed the practice +of his profession at Sedalia, but he later removed to Kansas City. In +1878 Vest was elected United States Senator from Missouri and this +position he held until 1903. In the Senate his powers as an orator and +debater were generally recognized, and he became a national figure. Of +the many speeches that Senator Vest made, his tribute to the dog, made +in a jury trial, is the one thing that will keep his memory green for +many years. It appears that Senator Vest was called into a case in which +one party was endeavoring to recover damages for the death of a favorite +dog, and when it came time for him to speak he arose and delivered his +tribute to the dog, and then resumed his seat without having mentioned +the case before the jury in any way whatsoever. The jury understood +however, and the Senator won his case. Senator Vest died at Sweet +Springs, Missouri, August 9, 1904. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1888, v. vi); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, + 1910, v. xii). + + +JEFFERSON'S PASSPORTS TO IMMORTALITY[16] + + [From _The Writings of Thomas Jefferson_ (Washington, 1905, v. + xii)] + +Upon the canvas of the past, Washington and Jefferson stand forth the +central figures in our struggle for independence. The character of the +former was so rounded and justly proportioned, that, so long as our +country lives, or a single community of Americans can be found, +Washington will be "First in war, first in peace, and first in the +hearts of his countrymen." + +To Washington we are more indebted than to any one man for national +existence; but what availed the heroism of Bunker Hill, the sufferings +of Valley Forge, or the triumph of Yorktown, if the government they +established had been but an imitation of the monarchy from which we +had separated? + +To Jefferson we owe eternal gratitude for his sublime confidence in +popular government, and his unfaltering courage in defending at all +times and in all places, the great truth, that "All governments derive +their just powers from the consent of the governed." + +The love of liberty is found not in palaces, but with the poor and +oppressed. It flutters in the heart of the caged bird, and sighs with +the worn and wasted prisoner in his dungeon. It has gone with martyrs +to the stake, and kissed their burning lips as the tortured spirit +winged its flight to God! + +In the temple of this deity Jefferson was high priest! + +For myself, I worship no mortal man living or dead; but if I could +kneel at such a shrine, it would be with uncovered head and loving +heart at the grave of Thomas Jefferson. + + +EULOGY OF THE DOG + + [From _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1910, v. xii)] + +Gentlemen of the Jury: + +The best human friend a man has in the world may turn against him and +become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving +care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, +those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name may become +traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies +away from him, perhaps, when he needs it most. A man's reputation may be +sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are +prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us may +be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud +upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that a man can have +in this selfish world, the one that never deceives him, the one that +never proves ungrateful and treacherous is his dog. + +A man's dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and +in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground where the wintry wind +blows and the snow drifts fiercely, if only he may be near his +master's side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer. He +will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounter with the +roughness of the world. He guards the sleep of his pauper master as if +he were a prince. When all other friends desert he remains. When +riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in +his love as the sun in its journeys through the heavens. If fortune +drives the master forth an outcast in the world, friendless and +homeless, the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of +accompanying, to guard against danger, to fight against his enemies, +and when, the last scene of all comes and when death takes the master +in its embrace and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter +if all other friends pursue their way, there by the graveside may the +noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open +in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[16] Copyright, 1905, by the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association. + + + + +WILLIAM P. JOHNSTON + + +William Preston Johnston, biographer and poet, was born at Louisville, +Kentucky, January 5, 1831, the son of the famous Confederate general, +Albert Sidney Johnston. He was graduated from Yale in 1852. During the +Civil War young Johnston was on the staff of Jefferson Davis. After +the war he was professor of history and literature in Washington and +Lee University, Lexington, Virginia, for ten years. In 1880 he +accepted the presidency of Louisiana State University, at Baton Rouge. +Paul Tulane's magnificent gift in 1883 made Tulane University +possible, and Johnston became its first president. This position he +held until his death, which occurred at New Orleans, July 16, 1899. +President Johnston's _Life of General Albert Sidney Johnston_ (New +York, 1878), is one of the most admirable biographies ever written by +a Kentuckian. His graphic description of the battle of Shiloh, in +which his famous father met death and the South defeat, is now +accepted, even in the North, as the best account of that desperate +conflict. Had General Johnston lived a day longer no one can even +guess what it would have meant to the South and to the North. +President Johnston was also the author of _The Prototype of Hamlet_ +(1890), in which his power as a Shakesperian scholar is well proved; +and he published _The Johnstons of Salisbury_. He was a maker of +charming verse, which may be read in his three collections, _My Garden +Walk_ (1894), _Pictures of the Patriarchs_ (1896), and _Seekers After +God_ (Louisville, 1898), a book of sonnets. As a man, Johnston was a +true type of the courtly Southern soldier and scholar. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Appletons' _Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1888, v. iii); _William Preston Johnston's Work for a New + South_, by A. D. Mayo (Washington, 1900); _Library of Southern + Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, v. vii). + + +BATTLE OF SHILOH--SUNDAY MORNING + + [From _The Life of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston_ (New York, 1879)] + +Saturday afternoon, April 5th, the sun, breaking through the mists +which drifted away, set in a cloudless sky. The night was clear, calm, +and beautiful. General Johnston, tired out with the vigils of the +night before, slept quietly in an ambulance-wagon, his staff +bivouacking by the camp-fires around him. Some of Hardee's troops +having wasted their rations, he and Bragg spent a large part of the +night getting up provisions for them. Before the faintest glimmer of +dawn, the wide forest was alive with preparations for the mighty +contest of the coming day. No bugle-note sounded, and no drum beat the +reveille; but men took their hasty morning meal, and looked with sharp +attention to the arms that were to decide the fortunes of the fight. +The cool, gray dawn found them in motion. Morning opened with all the +delicate fragrance and beauty of the season, enhanced by the contrast +of the day before. The sky was serene, the air was bracing, the dew +lay heavy on the tender green of leaf and herb, and the freshness of +early spring was on all around. When the sun rose it was with +unclouded brilliancy; and, as it shed its glories over the coverts of +the oak-woods, the advancing host, stirred by the splendor of the +scene and the enthusiasm of the hour, passed the omen from lip to lip, +and welcomed its rising as another "sun of Austerlitz." + +The native buoyance of General Johnston's self-repressed temper broke +its barriers at the prospect of that struggle which should settle for +all time by the arbitrament of arms the dispute as to his own military +ability and skill and the fate of the Confederate cause in the West. +He knew the hazard; but he knew, too, that he had done all that +foresight, fortitude, energy, and strategy, could accomplish to secure +a victory, and he welcomed with exultant joy the day that was about to +decide not only these great questions, but for him all questions, +solving the mysteries of life and death. Men who came within his +influence on the battle-field felt and confessed the inspiration of +his presence, his manner, and his words. As he gave his orders in +terse sentences, every word seemed to ring with a presage of victory. + +Turning to his staff, as he mounted, he exclaimed, "Tonight we will +water our horses in the Tennessee River." It was thus that he formulated +his plan of battle. It must not stop short of entire victory. + +As he rode forward he encountered Colonel Randal L. Gibson, who was +the intimate friend of his son. When Gibson ordered his brigade to +salute, General Johnston took him warmly by the hand and said: +"Randal, I never see you but I think of William. I hope you may get +through safely to-day, but we must win a victory." Gibson says he felt +greatly stirred by his words. + +Sharp skirmishing had begun before he reached the front. Here he met +Colonel John S. Marmaduke, commanding the Third Arkansas Regiment. +This officer, in reply to General Johnston's questions, explained, +with some pride, that he held the _centre_ of the front line, the +other regiments forming on him. Marmaduke had been with General +Johnston in Utah, at Bowling Green, and in the retreat to Corinth, and +regarded him with the entire affection and veneration of a young +soldier for his master in the art of war. General Johnston put his +hand on Marmaduke's shoulder, and said to him with an earnestness that +went to his heart, "_My son_, we must this day conquer or perish!" +Marmaduke felt himself moved to a tenfold resolution. + +General Johnston said to the ambitious Hindman, who had been in the +vanguard from the beginning: "You have _earned_ your spurs as +major-general. Let this day's work win them." + +"Men of Arkansas!" he exclaimed to a regiment from that State, "they +say you boast of your prowess with the bowie-knife. To-day you wield a +nobler weapon--the bayonet. Employ it well." It was with such words, +as he rode from point to point, that he raised a spirit in that host +which swept away the serried lines of the conquerors of Donelson. + + + + +WILL WALLACE HARNEY + + +Will Wallace Harney, poet, was born at Bloomington, Indiana, June 20, +1832, the son of John H. Harney, professor of mathematics in the +University of Indiana, and author of the first _Algebra_ edited by an +American. When the future poet was seven years of age his father removed +to Louisville, Kentucky, to accept the presidency of Louisville College. +In 1844 President Harney became editor of the Louisville _Daily +Democrat_, which he conducted for nearly twenty-five years. Will Wallace +Harney was educated by the old grammarian, Noble Butler, and at +Louisville College. He became a teacher in the public schools of the +city, in which he taught for five years; and he was the first principal +of the high school there, holding the position for two years. +Know-Nothingism then swept the city and elected a new board of trustees, +which requested Harney's resignation. He was appointed to a +professorship in the State Normal School at Lexington, which he held for +two years. He then returned to Louisville to practice law, but he was +shortly afterwards asked to become assistant editor of the _Daily +Democrat_; and after his father's death, in 1867, he became editor of +that paper. Harney's masterpiece, _The Stab_, that John J. Piatt called +"a tragic little night-piece which Heine could not have surpassed in its +simple, graphic narration and vivid suggestiveness," was written in +Kentucky before 1860. In 1869 Harney removed to Florida, where he +planted an orange grove and wrote for the high-class magazines and +newspapers of the East and South. From 1883 to 1885 he was editor of +_The Bitter Sweet_, a newspaper of Kissimmee. Harney spent the final +years of his life with his only son, William R. Harney, a business man +of Jacksonville, to whom he inscribed his one book, _The Spirit of the +South_ (Boston, 1909). This volume brought together his poems and short +stories which he cared to preserve from newspapers and periodicals. The +poet died at Jacksonville, Florida, March 28, 1912. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Blades o' Blue Grass_, by Fannie P. Dickey + (Louisville, 1892); _Memorial History of Louisville, Kentucky_, by + J. S. Johnston (Chicago, 1896). + + +THE STAB[17] + + [From _The Spirit of the South_ (Boston, 1909)] + + On the road, the lonely road, + Under the cold white moon, + Under the ragged trees, he strode; + He whistled, and shifted his heavy load; + Whistled a foolish tune. + + There was a step timed with his own; + A figure that stooped and bowed; + A cold white blade that flashed and shone, + Like a splinter of daylight downward thrown-- + And the moon went behind a cloud. + + But the moon came out, so broad and good, + The barn cock woke and crowed; + Then roughed his feathers in drowsy mood, + And the brown owl called to his mate in the wood, + That a dead man lay on the road. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[17] Copyright, 1909, by the Author. + + + + +J. STODDARD JOHNSTON + + +Josiah Stoddard Johnston, journalist and historian, was born at New +Orleans, February 10, 1833. He is the nephew of the celebrated +Confederate cavalry leader, General Albert Sidney Johnston. Left an +orphan when but five years old, he was reared by relatives in Kentucky. +He was graduated from Yale in 1853; and the following year he was +married to Miss Elizabeth W. Johnson, daughter of George W. Johnson, +Confederate governor of Kentucky. Johnston was a cotton planter in +Arkansas from 1855 to 1859, and a Kentucky farmer until the Civil War +began. He served throughout the war upon the staffs of Generals Bragg, +Buckner, and Breckinridge. Colonel Johnston was editor of the old +Frankfort _Yeoman_ for more than twenty years; and from 1903 to 1908 he +was associate editor of the Louisville _Courier-Journal_. In 1871 +Colonel Johnston was Adjutant-General of Kentucky; and Secretary of +State from 1875 to 1879. He has been vice-president of the Filson Club +of Louisville since 1893; and he is now consulting geologist of the +Kentucky Geological Survey. Colonel Johnston's knowledge of plants and +mammals is very extensive and most surprising in a man of literary +tastes. His tube-roses and flower gardens is one of the traditions of +the old town of Frankfort. Colonel Johnston has published _The Memorial +History of Louisville, Kentucky_ (Chicago, 1896, two vols.); _The First +Explorations of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1898); and _The Confederate +History of Kentucky_. Colonel Johnston is one of the finest men in +Kentucky to-day, dignified, cultured, and deeply learned in the history +of Kentucky and the West. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Memorial History of Louisville_ (Chicago, 1896); + _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, v. vi). + + +"CAPTAIN MOLL"[18] + + [From _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Louisville, Kentucky, + 1898)] + +The Revolutionary War was drawing to a close, involving Virginia in +its last throes in the devastation of an invading army. The whole +eastern portion was overrun by the British forces under Arnold and +Tarleton, the capital taken, and much public and private property +destroyed everywhere. Charlottesville, to which the legislature had +adjourned, Monticello, and Castle Hill were raided by Tarleton's +dragoons, and the legislature, Mr. Jefferson, and Doctor Walker barely +escaped capture. An interesting incident of the raid is recorded well +illustrating the spirit which actuated the American women of that +period. Not far distant from Charlottesville, on an estate known as +"The Farm," resided Nicholas Lewis, the uncle and guardian of +Meriwether Lewis, of the Lewis and Clark expedition to the Pacific. +His wife was Mary Walker, the eldest daughter of Doctor Walker. Her +husband was absent in the army when Tarleton with his raiders swooped +down on her home and proceeded to appropriate forage and every thing +eatable and portable. She received the British cavalryman with spirit +and dignity, and upbraided him sharply for his war on defenseless +women, telling him to go to the armies of Virginia and meet her men. +Tarleton parried her thrusts with politeness as well as he could, and +after his men were rested, resumed his march. + +After his departure Mrs. Lewis discovered that his men had carried off +all her ducks except a single old drake. This she caused to be caught +and sent it to Tarleton by a messenger, who overtook him, with her +compliments, saying that the drake was lonesome without his companions, +and as he had evidently overlooked it, she wished to reunite them. From +that time she was known as "Captain Moll," and bears that sobriquet in +the family records. She was a woman of strong character, was still +living at "The Farm" in 1817, and left many descendants in Virginia and +in and near Louisville, Kentucky. On the 19th of October, 1781, +Tarleton's career closed, and Virginia was relieved from similar +devastation for a period of eighty years by the surrender at Yorktown. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[18] Copyright, 1898, by John P. Morton and Company. + + + + +JULIA S. DINSMORE + + +Miss Julia Stockton Dinsmore ("F.V."), poet, was born in Louisiana +about 1833, but most of her long life of nearly eighty years has been +spent in Kentucky. For many years Miss Dinsmore published an +occasional poem in the newspapers of her home town, Petersburg, +Kentucky, but, in 1910, when she was seventy-seven years of age, the +New York firm of Doubleday, Page and Company discovered Miss Dinsmore +to be a poet of much grace and charm, and they at once issued the +first collection of her work, entitled "Verses and Sonnets." This +little volume contains more than eighty exquisite lyrics, which have +been favorably reviewed by the literary journals of the country. _Love +Among the Roses_, _Noon in a Blue Grass Pasture_, _Far 'Mid the +Snows_, _That's for Remembrance_, and several of the sonnets are very +fine. Miss Dinsmore is a great lover of Nature, as her poems reveal, +and she is often in the saddle. A most remarkable woman she surely is, +having won the plaudits of her people when most women of her years +have their eyes turned toward the far country. Another volume of her +verse may be published shortly. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Current Literature_ (June, 1910); _The Nation_ + (July 14, 1910). + + +LOVE AMONG THE ROSES[19] + + [From _Verses and Sonnets_ (New York, 1910)] + + "What, dear--what dear?" + How sweet and clear + The redbird's eager voice I hear; + Perched on the honeysuckle trellis near + He sits elate, + Red as the cardinal whose name he bears, + And tossing high the gay cockade he wears + Calls to his mate, + "What, dear--what, dear?" + + She stirs upon her nest, + And through her ruddy breast + The tremor of her happy thoughts repressed + Seems rising like a sigh of bliss untold, + There where the searching sunbeams' stealthy gold + Slips past the thorns and her retreat discloses, + Hid in the shadow of June's sweetest roses. + Her russet, rustic home, + Round as inverted dome + Built by themselves and planned, + Within whose tiny scope, + As though to them the hollow of God's hand, + They gladly trust their all with faith and hope. + + "What, dear--what, dear?" + Are all the words I hear, + The rest is said, or sung + In some sweet, unknown tongue. + Whose music, only, charms my alien ear; + But bird, my heart can guess + All that its tones express + Of love and cheer, and fear and tenderness. + + It says, "Does the day seem long-- + The scented and sunny day + Because you must sit apart? + Are you lonesome, my own sweetheart? + You know you can hear my song + And you know I'm alert and strong + And a match for the wickedest jay + That ever could do us wrong. + As I sit on the snowball spray + Or this trellis not far away, + And look at you on the nest, + And think of those beautiful speckled shells + In whose orbs the birds of the future rest, + My heart with such pride and pleasure swells + As never could be expressed. + + "But, dear--but, dear!"-- + Now I seem to hear + A change in the notes so proud and clear-- + "But, dear--but, dear! + Do you feel no fear + When day is gone and the night is here? + When the cold, white moon looks down on you, + And your feathers are damp with the chilly dew, + And I am silent, and all is still, + Save the sleepless insects, sad and shrill, + And the screeching owl, and the prowling cat, + And the howling dog--when the gruesome bat + Flits past the nest in his circling flight + Do you feel afraid in the lonely night?" + + "Courage! my own, when daylight dawns + You shall hear again in the cheerful morns + My madrigal among the thorns, + Whose rugged guardianship incloses + Our link of love among the roses." + +FOOTNOTE: + +[19] Copyright, 1910, by Doubleday, Page and Company. + + + + +HENRY T. STANTON + + +Henry Thompson Stanton, one of the most popular poets Kentucky has +produced, was born at Alexandria, Virginia, June 30, 1834. He was +brought by his father, Judge Richard Henry Stanton, to Maysville, +Kentucky, when he was only two years old. Stanton was educated at the +Maysville Academy and at West Point, but he was not graduated. He +entered the Confederate army as captain of a company in the Fifth +Kentucky regiment, and through various promotions he surrendered as a +major. Major Stanton saw much service on the battlefields of Kentucky, +Tennessee, and Virginia. After the war he practised law for a time and +was editor of the Maysville _Bulletin_ until 1870, when he removed to +Frankfort, Kentucky, to become chief assistant to the State +Commissioner of Insurance. Major Stanton's first volume of verse was +_The Moneyless Man and Other Poems_ (Baltimore, 1871). This title +poem, written for a wandering elocutionist who "struck" the town of +Maysville one day, and asked the major to write him "a poem that would +draw tears from any audience," made him famous and miserable for the +rest of his life. For the nomad he "dashed off this special lyric and +it brought all Kentucky to the mourners' bench. It was more deadly as +a tear-provoker than 'Stay, Jailer, Stay,' and though the author wrote +other things which were far better, the public would never admit it, +and many people innocently courted death by rushing up to Stanton and +exclaiming: 'Oh, and is this Major Stanton who wrote 'The Moneyless +Man?' So glad to meet you.'" One Kentucky poet took the philosophy of +_The Moneyless Man_ too seriously, and _A Reply to the Moneyless Man_ +was the pathetic result. The rhythm of the poem is very pleasing, but +it is, in a word, melodramatic. Major Stanton's second and final +collection of his verse was _Jacob Brown and Other Poems_ (Cincinnati, +1875). It contains several poems that are superior to _The Moneyless +Man_, but the general reader refuses to read them. From 1875 till 1886 +he edited the Frankfort _Yeoman_; and during President Cleveland's +first administration he served as Land Commissioner. Besides his +poems, Major Stanton wrote a group of paper-backed novels, entitled +_The Kents; Social Fetters_ (Washington, 1889); and _A Graduate of +Paris_ (Washington, 1890). Major Stanton died at Frankfort, Kentucky, +May 8, 1898. Two years later _Poems of the Confederacy_ (Louisville, +1900), containing the war lyrics of the major, was artistically +printed as a memorial to his memory. The introduction to the little +book was written by Major Stanton's friend and fellow man of letters, +Colonel J. Stoddard Johnston, and it is an altogether fitting +remembrance for the author of _The Moneyless Man_. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Poems of the Confederacy_ (Louisville, 1900); + _Confessions of a Tatler_, by Elvira Miller Slaughter (Louisville, + 1905). + + +THE MONEYLESS MAN + + [From _The Moneyless Man and Other Poems_ (Baltimore, 1871)] + + Is there no secret place on the face of the earth, + Where charity dwelleth, where virtue has birth? + Where bosoms in mercy and kindness will heave, + When the poor and the wretched shall ask and receive? + Is there no place at all, where a knock from the poor, + Will bring a kind angel to open the door? + Ah, search the wide world wherever you can + There is no open door for a Moneyless Man! + + Go, look in yon hall where the chandelier's light + Drives off with its splendor the darkness of night, + Where the rich-hanging velvet in shadowy fold + Sweeps gracefully down with its trimmings of gold, + And the mirrors of silver take up, and renew, + In long lighted vistas the 'wildering view: + Go there! at the banquet, and find, if you can, + A welcoming smile for a Moneyless Man! + + Go, look in yon church of the cloud-reaching spire, + Which gives to the sun his same look of red fire, + Where the arches and columns are gorgeous within, + And the walls seem as pure as a soul without sin; + Walk down the long aisles, see the rich and the great + In the pomp and the pride of their worldly estate; + Walk down in your patches, and find, if you can, + Who opens a pew to a Moneyless Man. + + Go, look in the Banks, where Mammon has told + His hundreds and thousands of silver and gold; + Where, safe from the hands of the starving and poor, + Lies pile upon pile of the glittering ore! + Walk up to their counters--ah, there you may stay + 'Til your limbs grow old, 'til your hairs grow gray, + And you'll find at the Banks not one of the clan + With money to lend to a Moneyless Man! + + Go, look to yon Judge, in his dark-flowing gown, + With the scales wherein law weighteth equity down; + Where he frowns on the weak and smiles on the strong, + And punishes right whilst he justifies wrong; + Where juries their lips to the Bible have laid, + To render a verdict--they've already made: + Go there, in the court-room, and find, if you can, + Any law for the cause of a Moneyless Man! + + Then go to your hovel--no raven has fed + The wife who has suffered too long for her bread; + Kneel down by her pallet, and kiss the death-frost + From the lips of the angel your poverty lost: + Then turn in your agony upward to God, + And bless, while it smites you, the chastening rod, + And you'll find, at the end of your life's little span, + There's a welcome above for a Moneyless Man! + + +"A MENSA ET THORO" + + [From _Jacob Brown and Other Poems_ (Cincinnati, 1875)] + + Both of us guilty and both of us sad-- + And this is the end of passion! + And people are silly--people are mad, + Who follow the lights of Fashion; + For she was a belle, and I was a beau, + And both of us giddy-headed-- + A priest and a rite--a glitter and show, + And this is the way we wedded. + + There were wants we never had known before, + And matters we could not smother; + And poverty came in an open door, + And love went out at another: + For she had been humored--I had been spoiled, + And neither was sturdy-hearted-- + Both in the ditches and both of us soiled, + And this is the way we parted. + + +A SPECIAL PLEA + + [From the same] + + Prue and I together sat + Beside a running brook; + The little maid put on my hat, + And I the forfeit took. + + "Desist," she cried; "It is not right, + I'm neither wife nor sister;" + But in her eye there shone such light, + That twenty times I kiss'd her. + + +SWEETHEART[20] + + [From _Blades o' Bluegrass_, by Mrs. F. P. Dickey (Louisville, + Kentucky, 1892)] + + Sweetheart--I call you sweetheart still, + As in your window's laced recess, + When both our eyes were wont to fill, + One year ago, with tenderness. + I call you sweetheart by the law + Which gives me higher right to feel, + Though I be here in Malaga, + And you in far Mobile. + + I mind me when, along the bay + The moonbeams slanted all the night; + When on my breast your dark locks lay, + And in my hand, your hand so white; + This scene the summer night-time saw, + And my soul took its warm anneal + And bore it here to Malaga + From beautiful Mobile. + + The still and white magnolia grove + Brought winged odors to your cheek, + Where my lips seared the burning love + They could not frame the words to speak; + Sweetheart, you were not ice to thaw, + Your bosom neither stone nor steel; + I count to-night, at Malaga, + Its throbbings at Mobile. + + What matter if you bid me now + To go my way for others' sake? + Was not my love-seal on your brow + For death, and not for days to break? + Sweetheart, our trothing holds no flaw; + There was no crime and no conceal, + I clasp you here in Malaga, + As erst in sweet Mobile. + + I see the bay-road, white with shells, + I hear the beach make low refrain, + The stars lie flecked like asphodels + Upon the green, wide water-plain-- + These silent things as magnets draw, + They bear me hence with rushing keel, + A thousand miles from Malaga, + To matchless, fair Mobile. + + Sweetheart, there is no sea so wide, + No time in life, nor tide to flow, + Can rob my breast of that one bride + It held so close a year ago. + I see again the bay we saw; + I hear again your sigh's reveal, + I keep the faith at Malaga + I plighted at Mobile. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[20] Copyright, 1892, by the Author. + + + + +SARAH M. B. PIATT + + +Mrs. Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt, one of Kentucky's most distinguished +poets, was born near Lexington, Kentucky, August 11, 1836. Her +grandfather was Morgan Bryan, brother-in-law of Daniel Boone, and one of +the proprietors of Bryan's Station, near Lexington, famous in the old +Indian wars. When only three years old she left Lexington to make her +home near Versailles, Kentucky, where her beautiful mother died in 1844. +After her mother's death she was sent to her aunt's home at New Castle, +Kentucky. Miss Bryan was graduated from Henry Female College, New +Castle; and on June 18, 1861, she was married to John James Piatt, the +Ohio poet. George D. Prentice, of course, was the first to praise and +print Mrs. Piatt's poems and start her upon a literary career. Her +husband, too, has been her chief critic, and responsible for the +publication of her work in book form. From the first Mrs. Piatt's poems +have been deeply introspective, voicing the heart of a woman in every +line. Her work has been cordially commended by Bayard Taylor, William +Dean Howells, John Burroughs, Hamilton Wright Mabie, and many other +well-known and capable critics in America and Europe. Several of Mrs. +Piatt's poems were published in _The Nests at Washington and Other +Poems_ (Cincinnati, 1861), but her first independent volume, issued +anonymously, was _A Woman's Poems_ (Boston, 1871). This is her best +known work, made famous by Bayard Taylor in his delightful little book, +_The Echo Club_. This was followed by _A Voyage to the Fortunate Isles +and Other Poems_ (1874); _That New World and Other Poems_ (1876); _Poems +in Company with Children_ (1877); _Dramatic Persons and Moods_ (1880); +_The Children Out of Doors and Other Poems_ (with her husband, 1885); +_An Irish Garland_ (1885); _Selected Poems_ (1885); _In Primrose Time_ +(1886); _Child's-World Ballads_ (1887); _The Witch in the Glass_ (1889); +_An Irish Wild-Flower_ (1891); _An Enchanted Castle_ (1893); _Complete +Poems_ (1894, two vols.); _Child's-World Ballads_ (1896, second series); +and _The Gift of Tears_ (Cincinnati, 1906). These volumes prove Mrs. +Piatt to be one of the most prolific and finest female poets America has +produced. English reviewers have often linked her name with Mrs. +Browning's and Miss Rossetti's, and if she has not actually reached +their rank, she has surely shown work worthy of a high place in the +literature of her native country. Mrs. Piatt is at the present time +residing at North Bend, Ohio, near Cincinnati. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Echo Club_, by Bayard Taylor (Boston, 1876); + _The Poets of Ohio_, by Emerson Venable (Cincinnati, 1909). + + +IN CLONMEL PARISH CHURCHYARD + +AT THE GRAVE OF CHARLES WOLFE + + [From _An Irish Garland_ (North Bend, Ohio, 1885)] + + Where the graves were many, we looked for one. + Oh, the Irish rose was red, + And the dark stones saddened the setting sun + With the names of the early dead. + Then, a child who, somehow, had heard of him + In the land we love so well, + Kept lifting the grass till the dew was dim + In the churchyard of Clonmel. + + But the sexton came. "Can you tell us where + Charles Wolfe is buried?" "I can-- + See, that is his grave in the corner there. + (Ay, he was a clever man, + If God had spared him!) It's many that come + To be asking for him," said he. + But the boy kept whispering, "Not a drum + Was heard,"--in the dusk to me. + + (Then the gray man tore a vine from the wall + Of the roofless church where he lay, + And the leaves that the withering year let fall + He swept, with the ivy away; + And, as we read on the rock the words + That, writ in the moss, we found, + Right over his bosom a shower of birds + In music fell to the ground). + + ... Young poet, I wonder did you care, + Did it move you in your rest + To hear that child in his golden hair, + From the mighty woods of the West, + Repeating your verse of his own sweet will, + To the sound of the twilight bell, + Years after your beating heart was still + In the churchyard of Clonmel? + + +A WORD WITH A SKYLARK (A CAPRICE OF HOMESICKNESS)[21] + + [From _Songs of Nature_, edited by John Burroughs (New York, + 1901)] + + If this be all, for which I've listened long, + Oh, spirit of the dew! + You did not sing to Shelley such a song + As Shelley sung to you. + + Yet, with this ruined Old World for a nest, + Worm-eaten through and through,-- + This waste of grave-dust stamped with crown and crest,-- + What better could you do? + + Ah me! but when the world and I were young, + There was an apple-tree, + There was a voice came in the dawn and sung + The buds awake--ah me! + + Oh, Lark of Europe, downward fluttering near, + Like some spent leaf at best, + You'd never sing again if you could hear + My Blue-Bird of the West! + + +THE GIFT OF TEARS[22] + + [From _The Gift of Tears_ (Cincinnati, Ohio, 1906)] + + The legend says: In Paradise + God gave the world to man. Ah me! + The woman lifted up her eyes: + "Woman, I have but tears for thee." + But tears? And she began to shed, + Thereat, the tears that comforted. + + (No other beautiful woman breathed, + No rival among men had he, + The seraph's sword of fire was sheathed, + The golden fruit hung on the tree. + Her lord was lord of all the earth, + Wherein no child had wailed its birth), + + Tears to a bride? Yea, therefore tears. + In Eden? Yea, and tears therefore. + Ah, bride in Eden, there were fears + In the first blush your young cheek wore, + Lest that first kiss had been too sweet, + Lest Eden withered from your feet! + + Mother of women! Did you see + How brief your beauty, and how brief, + Therefore, the love of it must be, + In that first garden, that first grief? + Did those first drops of sorrow fall + To move God's pity for us all? + Oh, sobbing mourner by the dead-- + One watcher at the grave grass-grown! + Oh, sleepless for some darling head + Cold-pillowed on the prison-stone, + Or wet with drowning seas! He knew, + Who gave the gift of tears to you! + +FOOTNOTES: + +[21] Copyright, 1901, by McClure, Phillips and Company. + +[22] Copyright, 1906, by John James Piatt. + + + + +BOYD WINCHESTER + + +Boyd Winchester, author of a charming book on Switzerland, was born in +Ascension Parish, Louisiana, September 23, 1836. He came to Kentucky +when a youth and entered Centre College, Danville, where he studied +for three years. He subsequently spent two years at the University of +Virginia. Mr. Winchester was graduated from the Law School of +Louisville, Kentucky, in 1858, and that city has been his home ever +since. He rose rapidly in his profession; and he later served a single +term in the Kentucky legislature, and two terms in the lower House of +Congress. President Cleveland appointed Mr. Winchester United States +Minister to Switzerland, in 1885, and the next four years he resided +at Berne. While in Switzerland Mr. Winchester was an ardent student of +the country's history and a keen observer of its aspects and +institutions. On his return to the United States he wrote his +well-known book, _The Swiss Republic_ (Philadelphia, 1891). A fire his +publishers, the Lippincotts, suffered shortly after his volume was +issued, destroyed the unsold copies, and the small first edition was +soon exhausted. The work has thus become exceedingly scarce. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _National Cyclopaedia of American Biography_ (New + York, 1906, v. xiii); _General Catalogue of Centre College_. + + +LAKE GENEVA[23] + + [From _The Swiss Republic_ (Philadelphia, 1891)] + +The Lake of Geneva is the largest of Western Europe, being fifty-seven +miles long, and its greatest width nine miles; it has its storms, its +waves, and its surge; now placid as a mirror, now furious as the +Atlantic; at times a deep-blue sea curling before the gentle waves, +then a turbid ocean dark with the mud and sand from its lowest depths; +the peasants on its banks still laugh at the idea of there being +sufficient cordage in the world to reach the bottom of the +_Genfer-See_. It is eleven hundred and fifty-four feet above the sea, +and having the same depth, its bottom coincides with the sea-level; +the water is of such exceeding purity that when analyzed only 0.157 in +1000 contain foreign elements. The lake lies nearly in the form of a +crescent stretching from the southwest towards the northeast. +Mountains rise on every side, groups of the Alps of Savoy, Valais, and +Jura. The northern or the Swiss shore is chiefly what is known as a +_cote_, or a declivity that admits of cultivation, with spots of +verdant pasture scattered at its feet and sometimes on its breast, +with a cheery range of garden, chalet, wood, and spire; villas, +hamlets, and villages seem to touch each other down by the banks, and +to form but one town, whilst higher up, they peep out from among the +vineyards or nestle under the shade of walnut-trees. At the foot of +the lake is the white city of Geneva, of which Bancroft wrote, "Had +their cause been lost, Alexander Hamilton would have retired with his +bride to Geneva, where nature and society were in their greatest +perfection." The city is divided into two parts by the Rhone as it +glides out of the basin of the lake on its course towards the +Mediterranean. The Arve pours its turbid stream into the Rhone soon +after that river issues from the lake. The contrast between the two +rivers is very striking, the one being as pure and limpid as the other +is foul and muddy. The Rhone seems to scorn the alliance and keeps as +long as possible unmingled with his dirty spouse; two miles below the +place of their junction a difference and opposition between this +ill-assorted couple is still observable; these, however, gradually +abate by long habit, till at last, yielding to necessity, and to the +unrelenting law which joined them together, they mix imperfect union +and flow in a common stream to the end of their course. At the head of +the lake begins the valley of the Rhone, where George Eliot said, +"that the very sunshine seemed dreary mid the desolation of ruin and +of waste in this long, marshy, squalid valley; and yet, on either side +of the weary valley are noble ranges of granite mountains, and hill +resorts of charm and health...." Standing at almost any point on the +Lake of Geneva, to the one side towers Dent-du-Midi, calm, proud, and +dazzling, like a queen of brightness; on the other side is seen the +Jura through her misty shroud extending in mellow lines, and a +cloudless sky vying in depths of color with the azure waters. So +graceful the outlines, so varied the details, so imposing the +framework in which this lake is set, well might Voltaire exclaim, "Mon +lac est le premier," (my lake is the first). For richness combined +with grandeur, for softness around and impressiveness above, for a +correspondence of contours on which the eye reposes with unwearied +admiration, from the smiling aspect of fertility and cultivation at +its lower extremity to the sublimity of a savage nature at its upper, +no lake is superior to that of Geneva. Numberless almost are the +distinguished men and women who have lived, labored, and died upon the +shores of this fair lake; every spot has a tale to tell of genius, or +records some history. In the calm retirement of Lausanne, Gibbon +contemplated the decay of empires; Rousseau and Byron found +inspiration on these shores; there is + + "Clarens, sweet Clarens, birthplace of deep love! + Thine air is the young breath of passionate thought; + Thy trees take root in love." + +Here is Chillon, with its great white wall sinking into the deep calm +of the water, while its very stones echo memorable events, from the +era of barbarism in 830, when Count Wala, who had held command of +Charlemagne's forces, was incarcerated within the tower of this +desolate rock during the reign of Louis le Debonnaire, to the +imprisonment of the Salvation Army captain. + + "Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls; + A thousand feet in depth below, + Its massy waters meet and flow; + Below the surface of the lake + The dark vault lies" + +where Bonnivard, the prior of St. Victor and the great asserter of the +independence of Geneva, was found when the castle was wrested from the +Duke of Savoy by the Bernese. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[23] Copyright, 1891, by J. B. Lippincott Company. + + + + +THOMAS M. GREEN + + +Thomas Marshall Green, journalist and historian, was born near +Danville, Kentucky, November 23, 1836, the son of Judge John Green, an +early Kentucky jurist of repute, who died when his son was but two +years old. Green was graduated from Centre College, Danville, in what +is now known as the famous class of '55, which included several men +afterwards distinguished. In 1856 Green joined the staff of the +_Frankfort Commonwealth_, then a political journal of wide influence; +and in the following year he became editor of that paper. He left the +_Commonwealth_ in 1860, to become editor of the _Maysville Eagle_, of +which he made a pronounced success, its screams smacking not at all of +the dignified days of its first editors, the Collinses, father and +son. His _Historic Families of Kentucky_ (Cincinnati, 1889), gave him +a place among Kentucky historians, but the late Colonel John Mason +Brown, of Louisville, gave to Green his greatest opportunity when he +published his _The Political Beginnings of Kentucky_ (Louisville, +1889). This work of Colonel Brown's was, in effect, an avowed +vindication of the reputation of his grandfather, John Brown, first +United States Senator from Kentucky, who, in the stormy days in which +his lot had been cast, had been violently attacked for his alleged +connection with the Spanish Conspiracy of Aaron Burr, which was +charged in a controversy running through many years of violent +disputation, to have been an attempt in connection with General James +Wilkinson, Judges Sebastian, Wallace, and Innes of the Kentucky Court +of Appeals and others to detach Kentucky from her allegiance to the +United States, and annex her territory to the Spanish dominions of the +South and South-west, through which the much-desired free navigation +of the Mississippi would be assured. Colonel Brown was a brilliant man +of unusual scholarly attainments and deeply read in American history. +These qualities with his large legal training enabled him to present a +strong case in the vindication of his grandfather's reputation. His +arguments, theories, and proofs were illuminating, able, and to many +minds most convincing, while they fell with small effect upon Green +and many others who held the opposite view. For this reason Green +wrote and published _The Spanish Conspiracy_ (Cincinnati 1891), a +wonderfully well informed and clever work, and the one upon which he +takes his place among Western historians. Students who would be fully +informed as to the many phases--the charges and matter relied upon for +defense, pro and con, in this bitter controversy which marshalled +Kentucky into two hostile camps, whose alignments were more or less +maintained through many strenuous years--must study these two books. +They present the last word on either side. Colonel Brown's untimely +death, which occurred in 1890, some months before the appearance of +Green's book, probably lost Kentucky a reply to the Maysville +historian that would have added to the flood of light thrown on this +early and vital crisis. _The Spanish Conspiracy_ was supplemented and +supported in its conclusions by Mr. Anderson C. Quisenberry's _The +Life and Times of Hon. Humphrey Marshall_ (Winchester, Kentucky, +1892). Thomas M. Green died at Danville, Kentucky, April 7, 1904. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Biographical Encyclopaedia of Kentucky_ + (Cincinnati, 1878); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, + 1910, v, xv). + + +THE CONSPIRATORS[24] + + [From _The Spanish Conspiracy_ (Cincinnati, 1891)] + +The grief of the reader in learning from the _Political Beginnings_, +that Humphrey Marshall was "violent, irreligious and profane," will be +mollified by the assurance given in the same work that Harry Innes +"was a sincerely religious man." It might with equal truth have been +stated that Caleb Wallace, who had abandoned the Presbyterian pulpit +to go into politics, kept up his church relations, and practiced his +devotions with the utmost regularity. Sebastian also, who had cast off +the gown of the Episcopal ministry in his pursuit of the "flesh pots +of Egypt," continued, it is believed, the exercise of all religious +observations, and, in the depth of his piety, deemed a treasonable +overture entirely too good to be communicated to an infidel. While +John Brown, who had absorbed faith as he sat under the very droppings +of the sanctuary, it will be cheerfully conceded was the most devout +of the four. On the other hand, John Wood, one of the editors of the +_Western World_, whom they afterwards bought, was a reprobate; and +young Joseph M. Street, whom they could neither bribe nor intimidate, +and the attempt to assassinate whom proved a failure, was a sinner. It +is distressing to think that, like Gavin Hamilton, the latter "drank, +and swore, and played at cards." It may be that the wickedness of the +editors of the _Western World_, and the contemplation of their own +saintliness, justified in the eyes of the four Christian jurists and +statesmen the several little stratagems they devised, and paid Littell +for introducing into his "Narrative," in order to obtain the advantage +of the wicked editors in the argument. The contrast of their +characters made innocent those little mutilations by Innes of his own +letter to Randolph! The same process of reasoning made laudable John +Brown's suppression of his Muter letter, his assertion that it was +identical with the "sliding letter," and his claim that the acceptance +of Gardoqui's proposition would have been consistent with the alleged +purpose to make some future application for the admission of Kentucky +into the new Union! While the suppression of the resolution of Wallace +and Wilkinson in the July convention, and the declaration that such a +_motion never was made_, in order to prove the unhappy editors to be +liars, became as praiseworthy as the spoiling of the Egyptians by the +Israelites! The scene of those four distinguished gentlemen seated +around a table, with a prayer-book in the center, planning the screen +for themselves and the discomfiture of the editors, would be a subject +worthy of the brush of a Hogarth. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[24] Copyright, 1891, by Robert Clarke Company. + + + + +FORCEYTHE WILLSON + + +Forceythe Willson, "the William Blake of Western letters," was born at +Little Genesee, New York, April 10, 1837, the elder brother of the +latest Republican governor of Kentucky, Augustus E. Willson. When +Forceythe was nine years old, his family packed their household goods +upon an "ark," or Kentucky flatboat, at Pittsburgh, and drifted down +the Ohio river, landing at Maysville, Kentucky, where they resided for +a year, and in which town the future governor of Kentucky was born. In +1847 the Willsons removed to Covington, Kentucky, and there +Forceythe's education was begun. The family lived at Covington for six +years, at the end of which time Forceythe entered Harvard University, +but an attack of tuberculosis compelled him to leave without his +degree. He returned to the West, making his home at New Albany, +Indiana, a little town just across the Ohio river from Louisville. A +year later Willson joined the editorial staff of the _Louisville +Journal_, and together he and Prentice courted the muse and defended +the cause of the Union. Willson's masterpiece, _The Old Sergeant_, +was the "carrier's address" for January 1, 1863, printed anonymously +on the front page of the _Journal_. The author's name was withheld +until Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes pronounced it the best ballad the war +had produced, when Willson was heralded as its author. _The Old +Sergeant_ recites an almost literally true story, and it is +wonderfully well done. In the fall of 1863 Willson was married to the +New Albany poet, Elizabeth C. Smith, and they removed to Cambridge, +Massachusetts, where the future executive of the Commonwealth of +Kentucky was a student in Harvard University. The Willsons purchased a +home near Lowell's, and they were soon on friendly terms with all of +the famous New England writers. In 1866 _The Old Sergeant and Other +Poems_ appeared at Boston, but it did not make an appeal to the +general public. Forceythe Willson died at Alfred Centre, New York, +February 2, 1867, but his body was brought back to Indiana, and buried +on the banks of the Whitwater river. Willson believed it quite +possible for the living to hold converse with the dead, and this, with +other strange beliefs, entered largely into his poetry. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. His authoritative biographer, Mr. John James Piatt, + the Ohio poet, has written illuminatingly of this rare fellow, + with his "almond-shaped eyes," as Dr. Holmes called them, and his + Oriental look and manner, in _The Atlantic Monthly_ (March, 1875); + _Lexington Leader_ (September 13, 1908). His brother, Hon. + Augustus E. Willson, will shortly utter the final word concerning + him and his work. + + +THE OLD SERGEANT + + [From _The Old Sergeant and Other Poems_ (Boston, 1867)] + + The Carrier cannot sing to-day the ballads + With which he used to go, + Rhyming the glad rounds of the happy New Years + That are now beneath the snow: + + For the same awful and portentous Shadow + That overcast the earth, + And smote the land last year with desolation, + Still darkens every hearth. + + And the carrier hears Beethoven's mighty death-march + Come up from every mart; + And he hears and feels it breathing in his bosom, + And beating in his heart. + + And to-day, a scarred and weather-beaten veteran, + Again he comes along, + To tell the story of the Old Year's struggles + In another New Year's song. + + And the song is his, but not so with the story; + For the story, you must know, + Was told in prose to Assistant-Surgeon Austin, + By a soldier of Shiloh; + + By Robert Burton, who was brought up on the Adams, + With his death-wound in his side; + And who told the story to the Assistant-Surgeon, + On the same night that he died. + + But the singer feels it will better suit the ballad, + If all should deem it right, + To tell the story as if what it speaks of + Had happened but last night. + + "Come a little nearer, Doctor--thank you--let me take the cup: + Draw your chair up--draw it closer--just another little sup! + Maybe you may think I'm better; but I'm pretty well used up-- + Doctor, you've done all you could do, but I'm just a-going up! + + "Feel my pulse, sir, if you want to, but it ain't much use to + try--" + "Never say that," said the Surgeon, as he smothered down a sigh; + "It will never do, old comrade, for a soldier to say die!" + "What you _say_ will make no difference, Doctor, when you + come to die." + + "Doctor, what has been the matter?" "You were very faint, they + say; + You must try to get to sleep now." "Doctor, have I been away?" + "Not that anybody knows of!" "Doctor--Doctor, please to stay! + There is something I must tell you, and you won't have long to + stay! + + "I have got my marching orders, and I'm ready now to go; + Doctor, did you say I fainted?--but it couldn't ha' been so-- + For as sure as I'm a Sergeant, and was wounded at Shiloh, + I've this very night been back there, on the old field of Shiloh! + + "This is all that I remember: The last time the Lighter came, + And the lights had all been lowered, and the noises much the same, + He had not been gone five minutes before something called my name. + 'Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton!'--just that way it called my + name. + + "And I wondered who could call me so distinctly and so slow, + Knew it couldn't be the Lighter--he could not have spoken so-- + And I tried to answer, 'Here, sir!' but I couldn't make it go; + For I couldn't move a muscle, and I couldn't make it go! + + "Then I thought: It's all a nightmare, all a humbug and a bore; + Just another foolish _grape-vine_[25]--and it won't come any more; + "But it came, sir, notwithstanding, just the same way as before: + 'Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton!'--even plainer than before. + + "That is all that I remember, till a sudden burst of light, + And I stood beside the River, where we stood that Sunday night, + Waiting to be ferried over to the dark bluffs opposite, + When the river was perdition and all hell was opposite!-- + + "And the same old palpitation came again in all its power, + And I heard a Bugle sounding, as from some celestial Tower; + And the same mysterious voice said: 'It is the eleventh hour! + Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton--it is the eleventh hour!' + + "Doctor Austin!--what _day_ is this?" "It is Wednesday night, + you know." + "Yes--to-morrow will be New Year's, and a right good time below! + What _time_ is it, Doctor Austin?" "Nearly Twelve." "Then + don't you go! + Can it be that all this happened--all this--not an hour ago! + + "There was where the gunboats opened on the dark rebellious host; + And where Webster semicircled his last guns upon the coast; + There were still the two log-houses, just the same, or else their + ghosts-- + And the same old transport came and took me over--or its ghost! + + "And the old field lay before me all deserted far and wide; + There was where they fell on Prentiss--there McClernand met the + tide; + There was where stem Sherman rallied, and where Hurlbut's heroes + died-- + Lower down, where Wallace charged them, and kept charging till he + died. + + "There was where Lew Wallace showed them he was of the canny kin, + There was where old Nelson thundered, and where Rousseau waded in; + There McCook sent 'em to breakfast, and we all began to win-- + There was where the grape-shot took me, just as we began to win. + + "Now, a shroud of snow and silence over everything was spread; + And but for this old blue mantle and the old hat on my head, + I should not have even doubted, to this moment, I was dead-- + For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead! + + "Death and silence! Death and silence! all around me as I sped! + And behold, a mighty Tower, as if builded to the dead-- + To the Heaven of the heavens, lifted up its mighty head, + Till the Stars and Stripes of Heaven all seemed waving from its + head! + + "Round and mighty-based it towered--up into the infinite-- + And I knew no mortal mason could have built a shaft so bright; + For it shone like solid sunshine; and a winding stair of light, + Wound around it and around it till it wound clear out of sight! + + "And, behold, as I approached it--with a rapt and dazzled stare-- + Thinking that I saw old comrades just ascending the great Stair-- + Suddenly the solemn challenge broke of--'Halt, and who goes + there!' + 'I'm a friend,' I said, 'if you are.' 'Then advance, sir, to the + Stair!' + + "I advanced! That sentry, Doctor, was Elijah Ballantyne! + First of all to fall on Monday, after we had formed the line! + 'Welcome, my old Sergeant, welcome! Welcome by that countersign!' + And he pointed to the scar there, under this old cloak of mine! + + "As he grasped my hand, I shuddered, thinking only of the grave; + But he smiled and pointed upward with a bright and bloodless + glaive: + 'That's the way, sir, to Head-quarters.' 'What Head-quarters!' + 'Of the Brave.' + 'But the great Tower?' 'That,' he answered, 'Is the way, sir, of + the Brave!' + + "Then a sudden shame came o'er me at his uniform of light; + At my own so old and tattered, and at his so new and bright; + 'Ah!' said he, 'you have forgotten the New Uniform to-night-- + Hurry back, for you must be here at just twelve o'clock to-night!' + + "And the next thing I remember, you were sitting _there_, and I-- + Doctor--did you hear a footstep? Hark! God bless you all! Good by! + Doctor, please to give my musket and my knapsack, when I die, + To my Son--my Son that's coming--he won't get here till I die! + + "Tell him his old father blessed him as he never did before-- + And to carry that old musket"--Hark! a knock is at the door! + "Till the Union--" See! it opens! "Father! Father! speak once + more!" + "_Bless you!_"--gasped the old, gray Sergeant, and he lay and + said no more! + +FOOTNOTE: + +[25] Canard. + + + + +W. C. P. BRECKINRIDGE + + +William Campbell Preston Breckinridge, orator and journalist, was born +at Baltimore, Maryland, August 28, 1837, the son of Rev. Robert J. +Breckinridge (1800-1871), and an own cousin of John C. Breckinridge +(1821-1875). He was graduated from Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, +in the famous class of '55, after which he studied medicine for a +year, when he abandoned it to enter the Louisville Law School. Before +he was of age he was admitted to the Fayette County Bar, and he was a +member of it when he died. In July, 1862, he entered the Confederate +Army as a captain in John Hunt Morgan's command; and during the last +two years of the war was colonel of the Ninth Kentucky Cavalry. The +war over, Colonel Breckinridge returned to Lexington and became editor +of _The Observer and Reporter_, which he relinquished a few years +later in order to devote his entire attention to the law. In 1884 +Colonel Breckinridge was elected to the lower House of Congress from +the Ashland district, and he took his seat in December, 1885, which +was the first session of the Forty-ninth Congress. One of his +colleagues from Kentucky was the present Governor of the Commonwealth, +James B. McCreary; another was John G. Carlise, who was chosen speaker +over Thomas B. Reed of Maine. Colonel Breckinridge served ten years in +the House, closing his career there in the Fifty-third Congress. In +Washington he won a wide reputation as a public speaker, being +commonly characterized as "the silver tongue orator from Kentucky." In +1894, after the most bitter congressional campaign of recent Kentucky +history, he was defeated for re-election; and two years later as the +"sound money" candidate he again met defeat, Evan E. Settle, who was +also known in Congress as a very eloquent orator, and who hailed from +the Kentucky county of "Sweet Owen," triumphing over him. Colonel +Breckinridge was never again a candidate for public office. In 1897 he +resumed his newspaper work, becoming chief editorial writer on _The +Lexington Herald_, which paper was under the management of his son, +Mr. Desha Breckinridge, the present editor. During the last eight +years of his life Colonel Breckinridge achieved a new and fresh fame +as a writer of large information upon State and national affairs. +Simplicity was the goal toward which he seemed to strive in his +discussions of great and small questions. His articles upon the Goebel +tragedy were really State papers of importance. Upon more than one +occasion his editorial utterances were wired to a New York paper, +appearing simultaneously in that paper and in his own. He declined +several offers to become editor of metropolitan newspapers. While at +the present time Colonel Breckinridge is remembered by the great +common people as an orator of unsurpassed gifts, and while a great +memorial mass of legends have grown about his name, it is as a writer +of real ability, who had all the requisites and inclinations of a man +of letters save one of the chief essentials: leisure. When his +speeches and writings are collected and his biography written his true +position in the literature of Kentucky will be more clearly and +generally appreciated than it now is. Colonel Breckinridge died at +Lexington, Kentucky, November 19, 1904. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. The eulogy of John Rowan Allen is the finest summing + up of Colonel Breckinridge's life and labors (_Lexington Leader_, + November 23, 1904); _Kentucky Eloquence_, edited by Bennett H. + Young (Louisville, Kentucky, 1907). His papers, together with + those of his grandfather and father, are now in possession of the + Library of Congress. + + +"IS NOT THIS THE CARPENTER'S SON?" + + [From _The Lexington Herald_ (Christmas Day, 1899)] + +"And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by." And this has +been the universal truth since those days--the one unchangeable, +pregnant, vital truth of development, of progress, of civilization, of +happiness, of freedom, of charity. The perpetual presence, the +ceaseless personal influence, the potent force of His continual +association alone renders human history intelligible or makes possible +the solution of any grave problem which man meets in his upward march +to better life and more wholesome conditions. And to-day the accepted +anniversary of the birth of the "carpenter's son" is the one day whose +celebration is in all civilized nations, among all independent people +and in all learned tongues. The world has not yet accepted Him; there +are nations very large in numbers, very old in histories, very devout +in their accepted religions, which have not accepted His claim to be +divine, nor bowed to the reign of His supreme authority. And the +contrast between such nations and those who have accepted His claim +and modeled their laws upon His teachings form the profoundest reason +for the verity of that claim and the beneficence of those teachings. + +Millions to-day will assemble themselves in their accustomed houses of +worship, and with songs and instruments of music, with garlands and +wreaths, with glad countenances and uplifted hearts, render adoration +to the carpenter's son of Nazareth; adoration to the lowly Jew who was +born in a manger and died upon a cross. Many millions will not attend +worship, but still render unconscious testimony to the wondrous power +which He has exercised through the centuries in the glad happiness +which springs from conditions which are only possible under His +teachings and by the might of His perpetual presence. They will not +know that "Jesus of Nazareth passeth by," but the day is full of joy, +the homes are radiant with happiness, the cheer is jovial and the +laughter jocund, the eye brightens under the glances of loved +ones--because He has passed by and scattered love and charity with +profuse prodigality along the pathway He trod. + +He has walked through the gay hearts of little children, and joy has +sprung up as wild flowers where His footsteps fell; He has lingered at +the mother's bedside and ineffable love has filled the heart of her +who felt His gentle presence. In carpenter shops like unto that in +which He toiled for thirty years, in humble homes, in the counting +rooms of bankers, in the offices of lawyers and doctors, in the +charitable institutions which are memorials of His teachings, He has +passed by; those within may not have been conscious thereof; they were +possibly too absorbed to feel the sweet and pervading fragrance of the +omnipotent force which He always exerts; yet over them and their +thoughts He did exert that irresistible power; and to-day the world is +better, sweeter, more joyful, more loving, because of Him. + +It is in its secular aspect that we venture to submit these thoughts; +it is His transforming power secularly to which we call attention this +sweet Christmas morning. "Christ the Lord Has Risen," but it is Jesus +the man--Jesus of Nazareth, the son of the carpenter, the new teacher +of universal brotherhood, the man who went about doing good; the +obscure Jew who brought the new and nobler era of charity and +forgiveness and love into actual existence that _The Herald_, a mere +secular paper, desires to hold up. + +And peculiarly to that aspect of His life that was social; the friend +of Lazarus; the diner at the table of Zaccheus; the pleased and kindly +guest at the wedding of Cana; the man who leaned His head on the breast +of His friend, the simple gentleman who took little children in His arms +and loved them; the obedient son, the loyal friend, the forbearing +associate, the forgiving master, the tender healer of disease, the +loving man who was touched with a sense of all our infirmities. + +To-day with jollity let us turn the water of our common lives into the +wine of sweet domestic happiness; let us take the children of +misfortune to our breast; let us be loyal to our weaker friends; let +us share our fullness with our brethren who are lean in this world's +goods, and, shedding smiles and kind words, and pleasant phrases +through the day, it may be that some stricken heart made glad may say: +"Jesus of Nazareth passeth by." + + + + +BASIL W. DUKE + + +General Basil Wilson Duke, historian of Morgan's men, was born near +Georgetown, Kentucky, May 28, 1838. He was educated at Georgetown and +Centre Colleges, after which he studied law at Transylvania University. +He was admitted to the bar, in 1858, and entered upon the practice at +St. Louis. In 1861 he was a member of the Kentucky legislature; and in +June of that year he married the sister of John Hunt Morgan and enlisted +in Morgan's command. Upon Morgan's death, in 1864, General Duke +succeeded him as leader of the band. After the war he settled at +Louisville, Kentucky, as a lawyer, and that city is his home today. From +1875 to 1880 General Duke was commonwealth's attorney for the Fifth +Judicial District; and since 1895 he has been a commissioner of Shiloh +Military Park. His _Morgan's Cavalry_ (Cincinnati, 1867; New York, +1906), is the authoritative biography of the noted partisan leader and +history of his intrepid band. General Duke was one of the editors of +_The Southern Bivouac_, a Louisville magazine, from 1885 to 1887. His +_History of the Bank of Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1895), filled a gap in +Kentucky history; and his _Reminiscences_ (New York, 1911), was a +delightful volume of enormous proportions. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky_ (Chicago, 1897); + _The Bookman_ (December, 1907). + + +MORGAN, THE MAN + + [From _Morgan's Cavalry_ (Cincinnati, 1867)] + +General Morgan had more of those personal qualities which make a man's +friends devoted to him than any one I have ever known. He was himself +very warm and constant in the friendships which he formed. It seemed +impossible for him to do enough for those to whom he was attached, or +to ever give them up. His manner, when he wished, prepossessed every +one in his favor. He was generally more courteous and attentive to his +inferiors than to his equals and superiors. This may have proceeded in +a great measure from his jealousy of dictation and impatience of +restraint, but was the result also of warm and generous feeling. His +greatest faults arose out of his kindness and easiness of disposition, +which rendered it impossible for him to say or do unpleasant things, +unless when under the influence of strong prejudice or resentment. +This temperament made him a too lax disciplinarian, and caused him to +be frequently imposed upon. He was exceedingly and unfeignedly modest. +For a long time he sought, in every way, to avoid the applause and +ovations which met him everywhere in the South, and he never learned +to keep a bold countenance when receiving them. + +His personal appearance and carriage were striking and graceful. His +features were eminently handsome and adapted to the most pleasing +expressions. His eyes were small, of a grayish blue color, and their +glances keen and thoughtful. His figure on foot or on horseback was +superb. He was exactly six feet in height, and although not at all +corpulent, weighed one hundred and eighty-five pounds. His form was +perfect and the rarest combination of strength, activity, and grace. +His constitution seemed impervious to the effects of privation and +exposure, and it was scarcely possible to perceive that he suffered +from fatigue or lack of sleep. + +Men are not often born who can wield such an influence as he exerted, +apparently without an effort; who can so win men's hearts and stir +their blood. He will, at least, be remembered until the Western +cavalrymen and their children have all died. The bold riders who lived +in the border-land, whose every acre he made historic, will leave many +a story of his audacity and wily skill. + + + + +HENRY WATTERSON + + +Henry Watterson, the foremost Kentucky journalist, and one of the most +widely known newspaper men in the United States, was born at Washington, +D. C., February 16, 1840. This accident of birth was due to the fact +that his father, Harvey McGee Watterson, with his wife, was in +Washington as a member of the lower house of Congress from his native +state, Tennessee. In consequence of defective vision, Henry Watterson +was educated by private tutors; but he did attend the Episcopal School +at Philadelphia for a short time. At the age of eighteen years he became +a reporter on the Washington _States_; but, in 1861, he returned to +Nashville, Tennessee, to edit the _Republican Banner_. Watterson was a +staff officer in the Confederate Army, and in 1864 chief of scouts for +General Joseph E. Johnston, but throughout the war he was also editing a +newspaper. After the war he married and revived the _Banner_, which he +edited for about two years, when he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, and +succeeded George D. Prentice as editor of the _Journal_. In the +following year Watterson, with Walter N. Haldeman, consolidated the +_Journal_, _Courier_, and _Daily Democrat_ to form _The +Courier-Journal_. The first issue of this paper appeared November 8, +1868, and Colonel Watterson has been its editor ever since. He has made +it the greatest newspaper in Kentucky, if not in the South or West, and +one of the best known papers printed in the English language. His +editorials are unequalled by any other writer in America, either from +the point of thought or construction; and his style is always more +interesting than his substance. Colonel Watterson has held but one +public office, having been a member of the Forty-fourth Congress, in +1876, and the personal friend and most ardent supporter of Samuel J. +Tilden in the infamous Hayes-Tilden controversy of that year. Colonel +Watterson has been a delegate-at-large from Kentucky in many Democratic +presidential conventions, in all of which bodies he has been a +conspicuous figure. He is famous as a journalist, orator, and author. +His eulogy upon Abraham Lincoln has been listened to in almost every +state in the Union, and it is his best known effort in oratory. Though +now past his three score years and ten, Colonel Watterson is as vigorous +and vindictive as ever in the handling of public questions and of his +legion of enemies, as the country witnessed in the presidential campaign +of 1912. He edited _Oddities of Southern Life and Character_ (Boston, +1882); and he has written _The History of the Spanish-American War_ +(Louisville, 1898); _The Compromises of Life: Lectures and Addresses_ +(New York, 1902), containing his ablest speeches delivered upon many +occasions; and _Old London Town_ (Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1911), a group of +his European letters to _The Courier-Journal_, edited by Joseph Fort +Newton. Colonel Watterson has an attractive country home near +Louisville, "Mansfield," but in recent years his winters have been spent +at Naples-on-the-Gulf, in Florida, and his summers in "grooming +presidential candidates!" + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Bookman_ (February, 1904); _Harper's Weekly_ + (November 12, 1904); _The Booklovers Magazine_ (March, 1905). + + +OLD LONDON TOWN[26] + + [From _Old London Town, and Other Travel Sketches_ (Cedar Rapids, + Iowa, 1910)] + +London, less than any of the great capitals of the world--even less than +Berlin--has changed its aspects in the last four decades of alteration +and development. During the Second Empire, and under the wizard hand of +Baron Hauseman, a new Paris sprang into existence. We know what has +happened in New York and Chicago. But London, except the Thames +Embankment and the opening of a street here and there betwixt the City +and the West End--the mid-London of Soho and the Strand--is very much +the London I became acquainted with nearly forty years ago. To be sure +many of the ancient landmarks, such as Temple Bar, the Cock and the +Cheshire Cheese, have gone to the ash heap of the forgotten, whilst some +imposing hostelries have risen in the region about Trafalgar Square; +but, in the main, the biggest village of Christendom has lost none of +its familiar earmarks, so that the exile set down anywhere from Charing +Cross and Picadilly Circus to the bustling region of the Old Lady of +Threadneedle Street, blindfold, would, the instant the bandage were +removed from his eyes, exclaim, "It is London!" + +Yes, it is London; the same old London; the same old cries in the +street; the same old whitey-brown atmosphere; even the same old Italian +organ-grinders, the tunes merely a trifle varied. Nor yet without its +charm, albeit to me of a rather ghostly, reminiscental sort. I came here +in 1866, with a young wife and a roll of ambitious manuscript, found +work to do and a publisher, lived for a time in the clouds of two +worlds, that of Bohemia, of which the Savage Club was headquarters, and +that of the New Apocalypse of Science which eddied about the School of +Mines in Jermyn Street and the _Fortnightly Review_, then presided over +by George Henry Lewes, my nearest friend and sponsor the late Professor +Huxley. I alternated my days and nights between a somewhat familiar +intimacy with Spencer and Tyndall and a wholly familiar intimacy with +Tom Robertson and Andrew Halliday. Artemus Ward was in London and it was +to him that I owed these later associations. Sir Henry Irving had not +made his mark. Sir Charles Wyndham was still in America. There were +Keenes and Kembles yet upon the stage. Charles Matthews ruled the roost +of Comedy. George Eliot was in the glory of her powers and her +popularity. Thackeray was gone, but Charles Dickens lived and wrote. +Bulwer-Lytton lived and wrote. Wilkie Collins and Charles Reade vied +with one another for current favor. Modern Frenchification had invaded +neither the restaurants nor the music halls. Evans's Coffee House +(Pendennis core of Harmony) prevailed after midnight in Covent Garden +Market. In short, the solidarities of Old England, along with its roast, +succulent, abundant and intact. + + * * * * * + +To me London was Mecca. The look of it, the very smell of it, was +inspiration. Incidentally--I don't mind saying--there were some cakes +and ale. The nights were jolly enough down in the Adelphi, where the +barbarians of the Savage Club held high revel, and George Augustus +Sala was Primate, and Edmund Yates and Tom Robertson were High +Priests. Temple Bar blocked the passage from Belgravia to the Bank of +England, and there was no Holborn Viaduct nor Victorian Embankment. + +Aye, long ago! How far away it seems, and how queer! To me it was the +London of story-books; of Whittington and his cat and Goody Two-Shoes +and the Canterbury Shades; of Otway and Marlowe and Chatterton; of +Nell Gwynne and Dick Steele and poor Goldsmith; of all that was +bizarre and fanciful in history, that was strange and romantic in +legend; and not the London of the Tower, the Museum and Westminster +Abbey; not the London of Cremorne Gardens, newly opened, nor the +Argyle Rooms, which should have been burned to the ground before they +were opened at all. + +Since then I have been in and out of London many times. I have been +amused here and bored here; but give me back my old fool's paradise +and I shall care for naught else. + +One may doubt which holds him closest, the London of History or the +London of Fiction, or that London which is a mingling of both, and may +be called simply the London of Literature, in which Oliver Goldsmith +carouses with Tom Jones, and Harry Fielding discusses philosophy with +the Vicar of Wakefield, where Nicholas Nickleby makes so bold as to +present himself to Mr. William Makepeace Thackeray and to ask his +intercession in favor of a poor artist, the son of a hairdresser of +the name of Turner in Maiden Lane, and even where "Boz," as he passes +through Longacre, is tripped up by the Artful Dodger, and would +perchance fall upon the siding if not caught in the friendly arms of +Sir Richard Steele on his way to pay a call upon the once famous +beauty, the Lady Beatrix Esmond. + +But yesterday I strolled into Mitre Court, and threading my way +through the labyrinth of those dingy old law chambers known as the +Middle and Inner Temple, found myself in the little graveyard of the +Temple Church and by the side of the grave of Oliver Goldsmith. Though +less than a stone's throw from Fleet Street and the Strand, the place +is quiet enough, only a faint hum of wheels penetrating the cool +precincts and gloomy walls. There, beneath three oblong slabs, put +together like an outer stone coffin, lies the most richly endowed of +all the vagabonds, with the simple but sufficient legend: + + "Here lies Oliver Goldsmith, + "Born Nov. 10th, 1728. Died April 4th, 1774." + +to tell a story which for all its vagrancy and folly, is somewhat dear +to loving hearts. He died leaving many debts and a few friends. He +lived a lucky-go-devil, who could squander in a night of debauch more +than he could earn in a month of labor. Yet he gave us the good +Primrose and _The Deserted Village_ and _The Traveler_, and many a +care-dispelling screed beside. + +The Frenchman would say "his destiny." The less fanciful Briton, "his +temperament." Poor Noll! He seemed to know himself fairly well in +spite of his dissipations and his vanity, and he sleeps sound enough +now, perhaps as soundly as the rest of those who in life held him in a +rather equivocal admiration and affectionate contempt. There are a few +other tombs--an effigy or two--round about, the weird old Chapel of +the Templars, shut in by great walls from the streets beyond, to keep +them solemn company. For Goldsmith, at least, there seems a fitness; +for his life, and such labor as he did, eddied round these sad +precincts. Nigh at hand was the Mitre tavern, across the way the +Cock, and down the street the Cheshire Cheese. Without the Vandal has +been busy enough, within all remains as it was the day they buried +him. Perhaps he was not a desirable visiting acquaintance. I dare say +he was rather a trying familiar friend. Pen-craft and purse-making are +often wide apart. The charm of authorship ends in most cases upon the +printed page. The man carries his sentiment in a globule of ink and it +evaporates by exposure to the atmosphere of the world of action. The +song of Dickens died by its own fireside. Kipling, for all his +word-painting, is hardly a miracle of grace. Why should one wish to +have known Goldsmith, or grudge him his place by the side of the great +old Doctor, and Burke, and Reynolds, and Garrick? He lived his own +life, and, though it was not very clean and wholly unprosperous, +perhaps he enjoyed it. He left us some rich fruitage dangling over a +wall, which may well conceal all else. Of the dead, no ill! Their +faults to the past. The rest to Eternity! + +Gradually, but surely, a new London is showing itself above the debris +of the old. Miles of roundabout are reduced by short cuts. Thoroughfares +are ruthlessly cut through sacred precincts and landmarks obliterated to +make room for imposing edifices and widened streets. In the end, London +will be rebuilt to rival Paris in the splendor, without the uniformity +of its architecture. The grime will, of course, attach itself in time to +the modern city as it did in the ancient, so that the London that is to +be will grow old to the coming generations as the London that was grew +old to the generations that went before. + + "To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow + Creeps on this petty pace from day to day, + And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death." + +Ever and ever the old times, the dear old times! Were they really any +better than these? I don't think so--we only fancy them so. They had +their displacements. It was then, as now, "eat, drink, and be merry, +for to-morrow ye die," life the same old walking shadow, the same old +play, or, lagging superfluous, or laughing his hour upon the stage +and seen no more, the same old + + "... tale told by an idiot, + Full of sound and fury, + Signifying nothing." + +Somehow, London has a tendency to call up such reflections; sombre, +serious itself, to provoke moralizing, albeit a turmoil, with incessant +flashes of light and shade, the contrasts the vividest and most +precipitate on earth, deep and penetrating, even from Hyde Park corner +to St. Martins-in-the-Field, and on eastward beyond the Tower and into +the purlieus of Whitechapel and the solitudes of Bethnal Green. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[26] Copyright, 1910, by The Torch Press. + + + + +GILDEROY W. GRIFFIN + + +Gilderoy Wells Griffin, essayist, was born at Louisville, Kentucky, +March 6, 1840, the son of a merchant. He was educated in the University +of Louisville, and admitted to the bar just as he attained his majority. +He soon became private secretary for George D. Prentice, and this +pointed his path from law to letters. Griffin was dramatic critic of the +Louisville _Journal_ until after Prentice's death; and his first book +was a biographical study of the great editor. His _Studies in +Literature_ (Baltimore, 1870), a small group of essays, was followed by +the final edition of _Prenticeana_ (Philadelphia, 1871), which he +revised and to which he also contributed a new sketch of Prentice. +Griffin was appointed United States Consul to Copenhagen, in 1871. His +_Memoir of Col. Charles S. Todd_ (Philadelphia, 1872), was an excellent +piece of writing. The most tangible result of his sojourn in Copenhagen +was _My Danish Days_ (1875), one of the most delightful of his works. In +Denmark his most intimate friend, perhaps, was Hans Christian Anderson. +His _A Visit to Stratford_ (1875), was worth while. The year following +its publication, Griffin was transferred to a similar position in the +Samoan Islands, and he left in manuscript a work on the Islands which +has never been published. In 1879 Griffin was again transferred, this +time being sent to Aukland, New Zealand, where he remained until 1884; +and the time of his departure witnessed the appearance of his last work, +_New Zealand: Her Commerce and Resources_ (Wellington, N. Z., 1884). +President Arthur sent him as consul to Sydney, which post he held for +seven years. Griffin's death occurred while he was visiting his old +home, Louisville, Kentucky, October 21, 1891. His brother was the +step-father of the famous Mary Anderson, the former actress, and she has +a goodly word for the memory of Griffin in her autobiography. He was a +patron of the drama, a faithful and far-seeing diplomat, and a very able +writer. His wife, Alice M. Griffin, published a volume of _Poems_ +(Cincinnati, 1864). + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Courier-Journal_ (October 22, 1891); _A Few + Memories_, by Mary Anderson de Navarro (London, 1896). + + +THE GYPSIES + + [From _Studies in Literature_ (Baltimore, 1870)] + +The Gypsies are wholly ignorant of their origin, and have kept but an +imperfect record of their migrations; but it is evident that they are +a distinct race of people. Like the Jews, they have no country of +their own, and are scattered over all parts of the globe. Time has +made little or no change in their peculiarities. They have the same +language, personal appearance, habits, and customs, that they had +centuries ago. The name of Gypsies (meaning Egyptians) is doubtless an +incorrect one. At least we know of nothing to justify them in the +assumption of the title. In Italy they are called "Zingari," in +Germany "Zigeuner," in Spain "Gitanos," in Turkey "Tchengenler," in +Persia "Sisech Hindu," in Sweden "Tartars," and in France "Bohemiens." + +Borrow expresses the opinion that the name of Gypsies originated +among the priests and learned men of Europe, who expected to find in +Scripture some account of their origin and some clew to their skill in +the occult sciences. + +Simson, the author of a recent work entitled the _History of the +Gypsies_, believes that they are a mixture of the shepherd-kings and the +native Egyptians, who formed part of the "mixed multitude" mentioned in +the Biblical account of the expulsion of the Jews from Egypt. Grellman, +however, traces their origin to India. He says that they belong to the +Soodra caste. Vulcanius describes them simply as robbers and outlaws, +and Hervas regards their language as "a mere jargon of banditti." + +Their keen black eyes, swarthy complexion, long raven locks, high +cheek-bones, and projecting lower jaws evidently indicate Asiatic +origin. It is certain that neither their language nor physiognomy are +African. It is argued that if really Egyptians, they would in all +probability have preserved a religion, or some of the forms of worship +so characteristic of the descendants of that people; whereas, the +Gypsies have no religion at all. + +Indeed, it is a proverb with them that "the Gypsy church was built of +lard, and the dogs ate it." + +Whether Egyptians or not, they are doubtless what they claim to be, +"Rommany Chals," and not "Gorgios." Very few who have seen them will +refuse to believe that they do not understand the art of making +horse-shoes, and of snake-charming, fortunetelling, poisoning with the +drows, and of singing such songs as the following: + + "The Rommany chi + And the Rommany chal + Shall jaw tasaulor + To drab the bawlor, + And dook the gry + Of the farming rye. + + "The Rommany churl + And the Rommany girl + To-morrow shall hie + To poison the sty, + And bewitch on the mead + The farmer's stead." + + + + +JOHN L. SPALDING + + +John Lancaster Spalding, the poet-priest, was born at Lebanon, Kentucky, +June 2, 1840. He is a nephew of Archbishop Martin John Spalding. John L. +Spalding was graduated from St. Mary's College, Maryland, in 1859; and a +short time later he was ordained as a priest in the Roman Catholic +church. In 1865 he was secretary to the bishop of Louisville; and four +years later he built St. Augustine's church for the Catholic negroes of +Louisville. In 1871 Spalding was chancellor of the diocese of +Louisville. From 1872 to 1877 he was stationed in New York City. He was +consecrated bishop of Peoria, Illinois, May 1, 1877, which position he +held until 1908, when ill-health compelled his retirement. Bishop +Spalding was appointed by President Roosevelt as one of the arbitrators +to settle the anthracite coal strike of 1902, and this appointment +brought him before the whole country for a time. In 1909 he was created +titular archbishop of Scyphopolis. Bishop Spalding continues his +residence at Peoria, but recently his health has broken so badly that +his life has been despaired of more than once. For many years it has +been his custom to spend his summers in Kentucky with his boyhood +friends and neighbors. He is the author of _The Life of the Most Rev. +Martin John Spalding, Archbishop_ (New York, 1872); _Essays and Reviews_ +(1876); _Religious Mission of the Irish People_ (1880); _Lectures and +Discourses_ (1882); _America and Other Poems_ (1885); _Education and the +Higher Life_ (Chicago, 1891); _The Poet's Praise_ (1891); _Things of the +Mind_ (Chicago, 1894); _Means and End of Education; Thoughts and +Theories of Life and Education_ (Chicago, 1897); _Songs: Chiefly from +the German_ (1896); _God and the Soul; Opportunity and Other Essays_ +(Chicago, 1901); _Religion, Agnosticism, and Education_ (Chicago, +1902); _Aphorisms and Reflections_ (Chicago, 1901); _Socialism and +Labor_ (Chicago, 1902); _Glimpses of Truth_ (Chicago, 1903); _The +Spalding Year Book_ (1905); _Religion and Art, and other Essays_ +(Chicago, 1905). Bishop Spalding's biography of his famous kinsman, +Archbishop Spalding, is his finest prose work, and as a poet he has done +some pleasing verse, most of which, of course, is marred by being woven +into his religion. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Harper's Weekly_ (October 25, 1902); _The Dial_ + (January 1, 1904). + + +AN IVORY PAPER-KNIFE.[27] + + [From _The Hesperian Tree_, edited by J. J. Piatt (Columbus, Ohio, + 1903)] + + O snow-white blade, thou openest for me + So many a page filled with delightful lore + Where deathless minds have left the precious store + Of words that breathe and truth that makes us free. + To hold thee in my hand, or but to see + Thee lying on my desk, O ivory oar, + Waiting to drive my bark to any shore, + Is fortaste of fresh joy and liberty. + Thou bringest dreams of the Dark Continent + Where herded elephants in freedom roam, + Or blow their trumpets when they danger scent, + Or in wide rivers shoot the pearly foam, + Yet art of vital books all redolent, + Where highest thoughts have made themselves a home. + + +FOOTNOTE: + +[27] Copyright, 1902, by John James Piatt. + + + + +NATHANIEL S. SHALER + + +Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, the distinguished Harvard geologist, poet, +historian, and sociologist, was born at Newport, Kentucky, February +20, 1841. He was graduated from Harvard in 1862, where he had the +benefit of almost private instruction from the great Agassiz. Shaler +returned to Kentucky, and for the next two years he served in the +Union army. In 1864 he was appointed assistant in palentology at +Harvard; and four years later he became assistant in zoology and +geology in the Lawrence Scientific School and head of the department +of palentology. In 1873 the Governor of Kentucky appointed Professor +Shaler director of the Kentucky Geological Survey, and he devoted +parts of the next seven years to this work. He was the most efficient +State geologist Kentucky has ever known, and his work for the Survey +pointed out the path trodden by his successors. His assistant, +Professor John R. Proctor, followed him as Director, and he stands +next to his chief in the work he accomplished. _The Kentucky +Geological Survey_ (1874-1880, 6 vols.), volume three of which, +entitled _A General Account of the Commonwealth of Kentucky_ +(Cambridge, Mass., 1876), was written entirely by Shaler, are +excellent memorials of the work he did for his native state. In 1884 +Shaler was placed in charge of the Atlantic division of the United +States Geological Survey; and in 1891 he was chosen dean of the +Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard. This position he held until a +year or two before his death. Dean Shaler published _Thoughts on the +Nature of Intellectual Property_ (Boston, 1878); _Glaciers_ (Boston, +1881); _The First Book of Geology_ (Boston, 1884); _Kentucky: A +Pioneer Commonwealth_ (Boston, 1885), the philosophy of Kentucky +history summarized; _Aspects of the Earth_ (New York, 1889); _Nature +and Man in America_ (New York, 1891); _The Story of Our Continent_ +(Boston, 1892); _Sea and Land_ (New York, 1892); _The United States_ +(New York, 1893); _The Interpretation of Nature_ (Boston, 1893); +_Domesticated Animals_ (New York, 1895); _American Highways_ (New +York, 1896); _Outlines of the Earth's History_ (New York, 1898); _The +Individual_ (New York, 1900); _Elizabeth of England_ (Boston, 1903, +five vols.), a "dramatic romance," celebrating "the spacious times of +great Elizabeth"; _The Neighbor_ (Boston, 1904); _The Citizen_ (New +York, 1904); _Man and the Earth_ (New York, 1905); and _From Old +Fields_ (Boston, 1906), a book of short poems. Besides these books, +Dean Shaler wrote hundreds of magazine articles, reports, scientific +memoirs, miscellaneous essays. He died at Cambridge, Massachusetts, +April 10, 1906, just as he was about to make ready for a final journey +to Kentucky. Dean Shaler was loved and honored more at Harvard, +perhaps, than any other teacher the University has ever known. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The World's Work_ (June, 1906); _Science_ (June 8, + 1906); _The Autobiography of Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, with a + Supplementary Memoir by his Wife_, published posthumously (Boston, + 1909), is a charming record of his days at Harvard and in Kentucky. + + +THE ORPHAN BRIGADE[28] + + [From _From Old Fields_ (Boston, 1906)] + + Eighteen hundred and sixty-one: + There in the echo of Sumter's gun + Marches the host of the Orphan Brigade, + Lit by their banners, in hope's best arrayed. + Five thousand strong, never legion hath borne + Might as this bears it forth in that morn: + Hastings and Cressy, Naseby, Dunbar, + Cowpens and Yorktown, Thousand Years' War, + Is writ on their hearts as onward afar + They shout to the roar of their drums. + + Eighteen hundred and sixty-two: + Well have they paid to the earth its due. + Close up, steady! the half are yet here + And all of the might, for the living bear + The dead in their hearts over Shiloh's field-- + Rich, O God, is thy harvest's yield! + Where faith swings the sickle, trust binds the sheaves, + To the roll of the surging drums. + + Eighteen hundred and sixty-three: + Barring Sherman's march to the sea-- + Shorn to a thousand; face to the foe + Back, ever back, but stubborn and slow. + Nineteen hundred wounds they take + In that service of Hell, yet the hills they shake + With the roar of their charge as onward they go + To the roll of their throbbing drums. + + Eighteen hundred and sixty-four: + Their banners are tattered, and scarce twelve score, + Battered and wearied and seared and old, + Stay by the staves where the Orphans hold + Firm as a rock when the surges break-- + Shield of a land where men die for His sake, + For the sake of the brothers whom they have laid low, + To the roll of their muffled drums. + + Eighteen hundred and sixty-five: + The Devil is dead and the Lord is alive, + In the earth that springs where the heroes sleep, + And in love new born where the stricken weep. + That legion hath marched past the setting of sun: + Beaten? nay, victors: the realms they have won + Are the hearts of men who forever shall hear + The throb of their far-off drums. + + +"TOM" MARSHALL[29] + + [From _The Autobiography of Nathaniel Southgate Shaler_ (Boston, + 1909)] + +I have referred above to Thomas F. Marshall, a man of singular +attractiveness and talents with whom I had a curious relation. I first +met him when I was about fourteen years of age, when he, for some time a +congressman, had through drunkenness fallen into a curious +half-abandoned mode of life. He was then an oldish fellow, but retained +much of his youthful splendor. He was about six feet three inches high, +but so well built that he did not seem large, until you stood beside +him. His face, even when marred by drink, had something of majesty in +it. Marshall, when I knew him, picked up a scanty living as a lecturer. +When sober, which he often was for months at a time, his favorite +subject was temperance. On this theme he was as eloquent as Gough; in +his season of spree, he turned to history. The gradations were not +sharp, for he would, as I have seen him, preach most admirably of the +evil of drink while he supported himself in his fervent oratory with +whiskey from a silver mug. In matters of history, he had read widely. +One of his favorite themes was the mediaeval history of Italy. I recall +with a distinctness which shows the impressiveness of his discourses his +story of Florence, so well told that ten years after, when I saw the +town for the first time, the shape of it and of the neighboring places +was curiously familiar. Along with some other youths, I noted down the +dates of events as he gave them and looked them up. We never caught him +in an error, though at times he was so drunk that he could hardly stand +up. I have known many historians who doubtless much exceeded him in +learning, but never another who seemed to have such a capacity for +living in the events he narrated. + +I had no sooner met "Tom" Marshall than we became friends. He at once +took a curious fancy to me, talked to me as though we were of an age, +and gave me my first chance of such contact with a man of learning and +imagination. The relation, while on one side largely profitable to me, +became embarrassing, for the unhappy man got the notion that I could +stop his drinking if I would stay with him. A number of times when he +had his dipsomaniac fury upon him I found that by sitting by his bed +and talking with him on some historical subject, or rather listening +to his talk, he would apparently forget about his drink and in a few +hours drop asleep and awake to be sober for some months. + +Sometimes these quiet interviews were most interesting to me. I recall +one of them when I found him in an attack of half delirium. His +memory, always active, took him back to the days when he was in +Congress and to the scene when he, a very young member of the House, +had been chosen by some careful elders to lead an attack on John +Quincy Adams. They, the elders, were to come to his support when he +had drawn the enemy's fire. It all became so real to him, that he +sprang out of bed and in his tattered nightgown gave, first his own +speech with all the actions of a young orator, and then the +deliberate, crushing rejoinder of his mighty antagonist. At the end of +it he fell back upon his bed, cursing the villains who led him into +the fight and left him to take the consequences. + +My relations with Marshall continued until I went to Cambridge but my +influence over his drinking gradually lessened as he sank lower, and +his able mind began to be permanently clouded. When I had been some +months at college, I espied the poor fellow in the street, carpet-bag +in hand, evidently making for my quarters. I sent word by a messenger +to my chum, Hyatt, to receive and care for him, but to say that I had +left town, which was true, for I went at once to Greenfield, where I +had friends. Hyatt was also to provide the wanderer with a suit of +clothes and a railway ticket back to Kentucky. I stayed away until I +learned that Marshall was on his way home. I have always been ashamed +of my conduct in this matter, but the unhappy man was at that time of +his degradation an impossible burthen for me to carry; once ensconced +in my quarters it would have been impossible to provide him with a +dignified exit, and there was no longer hope that I might reform him. +Yet the cowardice of the action has grieved me to this day. + +Two years afterwards, in 1862, I saw Marshall for the last time. I was +with a column of troops going through the town of Versailles, +Kentucky. He was seated in front of a bar-room, with his chin upon +the top of his cane. He was so far gone that the sight merely troubled +his wits without affording him any explanation of what it meant. His +bleared though still noble face stays in my memories as one of the +saddest of those weary years. + + +LINCOLN IN KENTUCKY + + [From the same] + +Among the interesting and in a way shaping incidents of my boyhood, +was a brief contact with Abraham Lincoln about 1856. He was coming on +foot from the town of Covington; I was on horseback, and met him near +the bridge over the Licking River. He asked the way to my +grandfather's house, which was about a mile off. Attracted by his +appearance, I dismounted and asked him to get on my horse, which he +declined to do; so I walked beside him. Probably because he knew how +to talk to a lad--few know the art, and those the large natures +alone--we became at once friendly. When I had shown him into the +house, I hung about to find his name. As I had never heard of Mr. +Lincoln of Illinois, it was explained to me that he was the man who +was "running against" the Little Giant. We lads all knew Stephen A. +Douglas, who was so popular that farm tools were named for him: the +Little Giant this and that of cornshellers or ploughs. While Mr. +Lincoln was with my grandfather, my mother dined or supped with him. +When she came home she said: "I have had a long talk with Mr. Lincoln, +who is called an Abolitionist; if he is an Abolitionist, I am an +Abolitionist." I well remember the horror with which this remark +inspired the household: if my mother had said she was Satan, it could +not have been worse. The droll part of the matter is that all the +reasonable people about me were in heart haters of slavery. They saw +and deplored its evils, and were full of fanciful schemes for making +an end of it. But the name Abolitionist was abominated. + +I never knew what brought Mr. Lincoln to my grandfather's house. It is +likely that he came because a certain doctor of central Kentucky, an +uncle of Mr. Lincoln, a widower, had recently married an aunt of mine, +a widow. This union of two middle-aged people, each with large +families, brought trouble; since family traditions were against +divorce, a separation was effected which had an amusing though tragic +finish. When all other matters of property had been arranged and P. +had betaken himself to his plantation in Mississippi, as an +afterthought he set up a supplementary claim to a saddle mule +belonging to my aunt which he had forgotten to demand in the +settlement. This reopened the question, and it was determined in +family council that the grasping doctor should not be satisfied. We +boys had the notion that Mr. Lincoln's visit related to this episode +of the mule, for shortly after the "critter" was sent with a servant +by steamboat, to be delivered to the claimant at the landing of his +plantation on the Mississippi River. In due time the negro returned +and made report: It was that the unworthy suitor came with a group of +his friends to witness his success, mounted, and started to ride away, +but the beast, frisky from its long confinement, "stooped up behind," +as the darkeys phrase it, and threw his master and killed him. Whether +Lincoln had a hand in the negotiations which led to this finish or +not, I am sure that the humor of it must have tickled him. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[28] Copyright, 1906, by Houghton, Mifflin Company. + +[29] Copyright, 1909, by Houghton, Mifflin Company. + + + + +WILLIAM L. VISSCHER + + +William Lightfoot Visscher, poet, was born at Owingsville, Kentucky, +November 25, 1842. He was educated at the Bath Seminary, Owingsville, +and graduated in law from the University of Louisville, but he never +practiced. He was a soldier in the Civil War for four years. Colonel +Visscher--which title he did not win upon the battlefield!--has been +connected with more newspapers than he now cares to count; and he has +written hundreds of verses which have appeared in periodicals and in +book form. He is the author of five novels: _Carlisle of Colorado_; +_Way Out Yonder_; _Thou Art Peter_; _Fetch Over the Canoe_ (Chicago, +1908); and _Amos Hudson's Motto_. The first of these is the best known +work he has done in prose fiction. His _Thrilling and Truthful History +of the Pony Express_ (Chicago, 1908), filled a small gap in American +history. A little group of biographical sketches and newspaper +reminiscences, called _Ten Wise Men and Some More_ (Chicago, 1909), is +interesting. Colonel Visscher has also published five books of verse: +_Black Mammy; Harp of the South; Blue Grass Ballads and Other Verse_ +(Chicago, 1900); _Chicago: an Epic_, and his most recent volume, +_Poems of the South and Other Verses_ (Chicago, 1911). The colonel is +also a popular lecturer; and he has actually put paint on his face and +essayed acting. He is a poet of the Old South, one reading his verse +would at once conclude that not to have been born in Kentucky before +the war, one might as well never have lived at all. He is a versified, +pocket-edition of Mr. Thomas Nelson Page; and while he has not reached +the sublime heights of true poesy, he has written some delicious +dialect and much pleasing verse. _Proem_, printed in two of his books, +is certainly the best thing he has done hitherto. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Century Magazine_ (July, 1902); _Who's Who in + America_ (1912-1913). + + +PROEM[30] + + [From _Poems of the South and Other Verse_ (Chicago, 1911)] + + In the evening of a lifetime + While the shadows, growing long, + Fall eastward, and the gloaming + Brings the spell of vesper song, + Fond memory turns backward + To the bright light of the day, + Where joys, like troops of fairies, + Gaily dance along the way, + Full-armed with mirth and music, + Driving skirmishers of care + Howling, back into the forest, + And their dark, uncanny lair. + So the pastures of Kentucky, + And the fields of Tennessee, + The bloom of all the Southland + And the old-time melody; + The vales, and streams, and mountains; + The bay of trailing hounds; + The neigh of blooded horses + And the farm-yard's cheery sounds; + The smiles of wholesome women + And the hail of hearty men, + Come sweeping back, in fancy, + And, behold, I'm young again. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[30] Copyright, 1911, by the Author. + + + + +BENNETT H. YOUNG + + +Bennett Henderson Young, historian and antiquarian, was born at +Nicholasville, Kentucky, May 25, 1843, the son of blue-stocking +Presbyterians. His academic training was received at Centre College, +Danville, Kentucky, and Queen's College, Toronto, Canada. He was +graduated in law from Queen's College, Belfast, Ireland. Colonel Young +was with General John Hunt Morgan and his men during the Civil War, +being in charge of the raid through St. Alban's, Vermont. He was a +member of the fourth Constitutional convention which formulated +Kentucky's present constitution. Colonel Young is now one of the +leading lawyers of Louisville, and commander-in-chief of the United +Confederate Veterans. He has published _The History of the Kentucky +Constitutions_ (1890); _The History of Evangelistic Work in Kentucky_ +(1891); _History of the Battle of the Blue Licks_ (Louisville, 1897); +_The History of Jessamine County, Kentucky_ (Louisville, 1898); _The +History of the Division of the Presbyterian Church in Kentucky_ +(1898); _The Battle of the Thames_ (Louisville, 1901); _Kentucky +Eloquence_ (Louisville, 1907); and _The Prehistoric Men of Kentucky_ +(Louisville, 1910). Colonel Young has taken a keen interest in "the +prehistoric men of Kentucky," the mound-builders; and his collection +is one of the finest in the country. His work upon these ancient +people is far and away the ablest volume he has written. It +represented the researches of a life-time, and the results of his +labors are quite obvious. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky_ (Chicago, 1897); + _Who's Who in America_ (1912-1913). + + +PREHISTORIC WEAPONS[31] + + [From _The Prehistoric Men of Kentucky_ (Louisville, Kentucky, + 1910)] + +The life of prehistoric man, judging from the large number of +fortifications existing in Kentucky to this day, must have been one of +constant and general warfare. His weapons were all constructed for +conflict at short range. + +First was his ax of two kinds, grooved and grooveless. The indications +are that these were used contemporaneously, and though this is not +certain, their proximity to each other in so many places would tend to +show that they were made during the same period. The grooved ax would +be more reliable either in domestic use or in war than the grooveless +ax, because of the grip of the handle, aided materially by the groove, +permitting it to be held much more closely and to admit of heavier +strokes and more constant action. The battle-axes vary in weight from +one to thirty-two pounds. They were doubtless so variant in weight by +reason of the conditions that surrounded the makers, and also by +reason of the ability of the user to carry either light or heavy +weight. With handles from three to six feet and firmly bound with +rawhide, which could be obtained from several animals, these men were +enabled to fasten the handle tightly around the ax, either grooved or +ungrooved. These axes would require close contact in battle. They had +flint saws or knives which enabled them to cut the hickory withe or +sapling from which these handles were made. After soaking the handle +in hot water, or for that matter in cold water, it could easily have +been bent around the ax and tied with rawhide, which, by its +contraction when drying, would press the handle closely in the groove. + +They also used what is known as a battle-ax blade, that is, a thin +piece of flint, oval in shape, about five by three and a half inches. +By splitting the handle and placing the flint blade between it, and +then binding with rawhide, they were enabled to fasten it very +securely. These handles were about two or two and a half feet in +length, and with the blade projecting on either side, became a +dangerous weapon at close range. + +The most damage, however, done by these prehistoric people was doubtless +accomplished by the bow and arrow. The bows were about six feet in +length, judging by the strings which we have seen and one of which the +writer has been able to secure from Salts Cave. They would be made of +many woods, preferably of hickory, cedar, or ash, but hickory usually +possesses greater strength than other timbers of similar size. It is not +probable that they had any tools with which they could split the hickory +trees. They would, therefore, be compelled to use the hickory saplings +in the manufacture of bow staves. + +The penetrative force of the stone-tipped arrow, driven by the strong +and skillful arms of these prehistoric men, must have been very great. +Quite a number of instances are known and specimens preserved in which +they were driven practically through the larger bones of the body. The +author has a human pelvis found in a cave in Meade County. Imbedded in +this is a portion of a flint arrow-point, the position of which shows +that it had been driven through the body, penetrating the bone on the +opposite side from which it entered. The point reached into the socket +of the hip joint. There it remained, causing necrosis of the bone, +until by processes of Nature the wastage was stopped, and the point +remained in the bone until the death of the individual, which the +indications show occurred long after receiving the wound. In one +instance an arrowhead was driven three inches into the bone of the leg +just below its union with the hip, and evidently caused the death of +the party into whom it had been shot. A number of instances are known +in which these arrowheads penetrated several inches into bone, and it +was no unusual thing that they attained sufficient penetrative force +to drive them through both coverings of the skull. + +Three of these arrowheads that have come under the immediate +observation of the author are not sharp at all, but rather blunt. The +smaller triangular arrowheads, if sufficiently strong--and probably +they were--could have been driven readily into bone without the use of +any great force, but an arrow-point about three inches in length, and +with a blunt point, thus driven into the bones of the body, +demonstrates beyond all question that the power which was used in +their propulsion must have been comparatively very great. + +The wooden or cane shafts probably were tipped with many kinds of +points, some beveled, some serrated, some triangular, some blunt, +being fastened thereto with the sinew of the deer or other animal. +There are some evidences, although not entirely conclusive, that these +arrow-points were often tipped with poison. It is said that at one +time the Shawnees in Western Kentucky were so well versed in the use +of poisons that they could place them in springs and thus destroy +their enemies, and also that quite large streams of water were +impregnated with these dangerous elements. We sometimes comment upon +the savageness of the methods of these people, but the poisoned arrow +is no worse than the soft-nose or explosive bullet, which has been +used by civilized nations in the memory of living people. + +The next weapon was the spear. These carried points so large that they +could not have been used with the ordinary bow. They must have been +attached to a larger piece of wood or cane than the arrow-shaft. They +were probably mounted upon cane or pieces of wood from four and +one-half to seven feet in length. They were doubtless used also in the +destruction of the larger animals, either bears or buffaloes, during +the buffalo period in Kentucky. The spear would be much more +formidable in close quarters with an animal even as large as the +wildcat than the bow and arrow. It would be comparatively as efficient +as the bayonet of modern times. + +Many of the flint knives were mounted on wooden handles. These +sometimes measure from one to ten inches in length, and at very close +range would become formidable weapons--not as formidable, however, as +the battle-ax blade which has been described above. + +In Kentucky there are no evidences of the cross-bow having been used. +The five weapons which we have described completed the military +accoutrement of these men, who must have spent a large portion of +their lives in warlike scenes and exploits. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[31] Copyright, 1910, by the Filson Club. + + + + +JAMES H. MULLIGAN + + +James Hilary Mulligan, the author of _In Kentucky_, was born at +Lexington, Kentucky, November 21, 1844. He was graduated at St. Mary's +College, Montreal, Canada, in 1864; and five years later Kentucky +(Transylvania) University granted him his degree in law. For forty years +Judge Mulligan has been known in Kentucky as a lawyer, orator, and maker +of clever, humorous verse. He was editor of the old Lexington _Morning +Transcript_ for a year; and for six years he was judge of the Recorder's +Court of Lexington, from which work he won his title of "judge." From +1881 to 1888 Judge Mulligan was a member of the Kentucky House of +Representatives; and from 1890 to 1894 he was in the State Senate. In +1894 President Cleveland appointed Judge Mulligan Consul-General at +Samoa, and this post he held for two years. While in Samoa he saw much +of Robert Louis Stevenson, who was working upon _Weir of Hermiston_, and +well upon his way to the undiscovered country when the Kentucky diplomat +met him. When Stevenson died, December 4, 1894, the first authoritative +news of his passing came in a now rare and precious little booklet of +thirty-seven pages which Lloyd Osbourne, Judge Mulligan, Bazett Haggard, +brother of the English novelist, and another writer, sent out to the +world, entitled _A Letter to Mr. Stevenson's Friends_ (Apia, Samoa, +1894). It contained a detailed account of the writer's last days, his +death, and funeral. Mr. Osbourne "ventured also to reprint Mr. Gosse's +beautiful lines, _To Tusitala in Vailima_, which reached Mr. Stevenson +but three days before his death." President Cleveland offered to send +Judge Mulligan to Cape Town, Africa, but he declined the appointment, +and came home. For the past fifteen years he has devoted his attention +to the law and to the writing of verse and prose. His _Samoa, the +Government, Commerce, and People_ (Washington, 1896), is said to be the +most exhaustive account of that island ever published. Judge Mulligan's +little humorous poem, _In Kentucky_, has made him famous. First read at +a banquet in the old Phoenix Hotel, Lexington, in 1902, it has been +declaimed in the halls of Congress and gotten into the _Congressional +Record_. It has been parodied a thousand times, reproduced in almost +every newspaper in English, illustrated, and at least one Kentuckian has +heard it chanted by an Englishman in the shadow of the Pyramids in +Egypt! More than a million souvenir postal cards have been sold with the +verses printed upon them; and had the author had _In Kentucky_ +copyrighted, he would have reaped a harvest of golden coins. As poetry +Judge Mulligan's _Over the Hills to Hustonville_, or _The Bells of Old +St. Joseph's_, are superior to _In Kentucky_, but they are both +comparatively unknown to the general public. Judge Mulligan's home, +"Maxwell Place," on the outskirts of Lexington, was the birthplace of +_In Kentucky_. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Lexington Leader_ (April 4, 1909); _Library of + Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1910, v. xiv). + + +IN KENTUCKY + + [From _The Lexington Herald_ (February 12, 1902)] + + The moonlight falls the softest + In Kentucky; + The summer days come oftest + In Kentucky; + Friendship is the strongest, + Love's light glows the longest, + Yet, wrong is always wrongest + In Kentucky. + + Life's burdens bear the lightest + In Kentucky; + The home fires burn the brightest + In Kentucky; + While players are the keenest, + Cards come out the meanest, + The pocket empties cleanest + In Kentucky. + + The sun shines ever brightest + In Kentucky; + The breezes whisper lightest + In Kentucky; + Plain girls are the fewest, + Their little hearts the truest, + Maiden's eyes the bluest + In Kentucky. + + Orators are the grandest + In Kentucky; + Officials are the blandest + In Kentucky; + Boys are all the fliest, + Danger ever nighest, + Taxes are the highest + In Kentucky. + + The bluegrass waves the bluest + In Kentucky; + Yet, bluebloods are the fewest(?) + In Kentucky; + Moonshine is the clearest, + By no means the dearest, + And, yet, it acts the queerest + In Kentucky. + + The dovenotes are the saddest + In Kentucky; + The streams dance on the gladdest + In Kentucky; + Hip pockets are the thickest, + Pistol hands the slickest, + The cylinder turns quickest + In Kentucky. + + The song birds are the sweetest + In Kentucky; + The thoroughbreds are fleetest + In Kentucky; + Mountains tower proudest, + Thunder peals the loudest, + The landscape is the grandest-- + And politics--the damnedest + In Kentucky. + + +OVER THE HILL TO HUSTONVILLE + + [From _The Lexington Leader_ (April 4, 1909)] + + Over the hill to Hustonville, + Past mead and vale and waving grain + With fleecy clouds and glad sunshine + And the balm of the coming rain; + On where hidden beneath the hill, + In the widening vale below-- + Chime and smith and distant herd + Sing a song of the long ago. + + Over the hill to Hustonville + Where silent fields are sad and brown, + And the crow's lone call is blended + With the anvil beat of the town; + Where sweet the hamlet life flows on, + And the doors ever open wide, + Welcome the worn and wandering + To the ingle and cheer inside. + + Over the hill to Hustonville + I knew and loved as a child, + A scene that yet lights up to me + With a radiant glow and mild; + With drowsy lane and quiet street, + Gables quaint and the houses gray, + Ancient inn with battered sign, + And an air of the far-away. + + Over the hill to Hustonville + Where men are yet sturdy and strong + As were their sires in days long past-- + As true as their flint-locks long. + And maids are shy and soft of speech-- + As the wild-rose, lithsome and true, + Eyes alight as the coming dawn, + Softly blue, as their skies are blue. + + Some--sometime--in the bye and bye, + With all my life-won riches rare-- + Dead hopes and faded memories-- + A silken floss of baby hair; + Fast locked close within my heart-- + Worn of strife and the empty quest-- + I'll over the hill to Hustonville, + To dream ever--and rest--and rest. + + + + +NELLY M. McAFEE + + +Mrs. Nelly (Nichol) Marshall McAfee, novelist and verse writer, was +born at Louisville, Kentucky, May 8, 1845, the daughter of Humphrey +Marshall, the younger. When but eighteen years of age she embarked +upon a literary career. Her verse and short-stories appeared in many +of the best American newspapers and magazines, and they brought her a +wide reputation. On February 13, 1871, after a romantic courtship of +some years, Miss Marshall was married to Captain John J. McAfee, a +former Confederate soldier, then a member of the Kentucky legislature. +Mrs. McAfee published two volumes of verse, entitled _A Bunch of +Violets_, and _Leaves From the Book of My Heart_. Her novels include +_Eleanor Morton, or Life in Dixie_ (New York, 1865); _Sodom Apples_ +(1866); _Fireside Gleamings_ (Chicago, 1866); _Dead Under the Roses_ +(1867); _Wearing the Cross_ (Cincinnati, 1868); _As by Fire_ (New +York, 1869); _Passion, or Bartered and Sold_ (Louisville, 1876); and +_A Criminal Through Love_ (Louisville, 1882). Mrs. McAfee died at +Washington, D. C., about 1895. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Woods-McAfee Memorial History_, by N. M. Woods + (Louisville, 1905); _Dictionary of American Authors_, by O. F. + Adams (Boston, 1905). + + +FINALE + + [From _A Criminal Through Love_ (Louisville, Kentucky, 1882)] + +Many years have been gathered to the illimitable past, and we find +ourselves, with undiminished interest, seeking to learn all we can in +regard to the positions and attainments of the characters who have +been with us for so long. + +This is the gist of what we have learned about them. + +Walter Floor's firm has grown and flourished; the dark cloud of sorrow +that so long overshadowed his sky, has rolled away, and he is +nevermore melancholy or oppressed. His home is the resting-place and +haven for everybody who chooses to enjoy shelter and repose. Constant +and Valentine are standing guests at the Floor mansion; the talented +painter has no longer any need to work for money. The mention of his +name opens every door to him, and Fortune and Fame await him with +their arms laden with golden sheaves and shining laurel wreaths. His +greatest work of art--his masterpiece--was taken from Mozart's Opera +of _Don Juan_. At a glance any one could tell that the artist painted +the portrait _con amore_, for Donna Anna was nothing more than a +portrait of Margarethe Heinold--whom we must ever after this moment +remember only as Margarethe Hendrik. More happiness than came with +this name to her could scarcely be enjoyed by mortal. Great sums were +offered again and again to Constant for this picture, but he refused +to sell it; it now graces the elegant _Salon_ of Julian Hendrik in his +magnificent villa, which stands on the banks of the Rhine. + +Margarethe, after the night of her brilliant _debut_, never stepped +upon the boards. She was often urged to let the world hear her +splendid voice, which returned to her in all its volume and beauty +after she regained her health, but she refused to entertain the +proposition for an instant, declaring that public life, however +glorious, had no charms for her; that she lived only for her husband, +to whom she becomes ever more tenderly attached the better she became +acquainted with his noble heart, elevated mind, and peerless character +as a man and a gentleman. + +Didier Mametin is still in Paris; at the death of old Vincent he +became his heir, and was at last able to open such a photographer's +_Atelier_ as other artists pronounced perfect in every detail. The +lighthearted Frenchman, never accustomed to an extravagant mode of +living, is just as merry in humor and abstemious in diet as of yore. +Henriette often declares that he acts as if he were afraid of +starving--he is such a hoarder for "rainy days." But Didier had a +varied experience, and the lessons he learned were not easily +forgotten. One happy fact remains: He and Henriette love each other +dearly, and would not exchange their places or give up their home to +be a king and queen and live in a palace. + +Roderick Martens attends to the ship-building interests of Jyphoven, +in Amsterdam, and occupies the old Jyphoven mansion. Herr and Madame +Jyphoven continue to reside in Paris. Bella is enchanted with life in +the French city, and declares that to be mistress of the whole +world--if she would go but for a day--could be no inducement to her to +set her foot in the old Holland fishery, as she now describes it to +be. She is entirely reconciled to Francisca. The beauty and happiness +of the young wife would captivate the most callous heart. + +And Von Kluyden? This man who devoted himself to intrigue and +rascality for so long, knew not, while he lived, how otherwise to +occupy his time. He was never satisfied. Nemesis held him fast in her +cruel clutches. When the time came for Hendrik to assert and prove his +rights, he did so most successfully; and that for which Isabella +bartered her honor, and beauty, and youth, passed like sand through +the fingers, and was hers no more. Von Kluyden was successful in +nothing that he undertook to accomplish; the ghost of the murdered +Horst followed him day and night;--he finally died in a madhouse! +Isabella had, a little while before his dementia, entrusted herself +and her million of money into the hands of a young man of the titled +nobility--who in his turn did not love the young widow even for her +marvelous beauty--but for the _thalers_ and _gulden_ that brought +plenty to his empty coffers and luxury to his impoverished home. In +this marriage Isabella did not find the happiness she expected to +find, and for which she had so long waited. The Prince squandered her +enormous fortune, as Princes are usually supposed to squander +fortunes, in about the half of a year's duration, and by that time, +having found out and enjoyed all that life held for him of pleasure or +excitement, he closed his career by putting a pistol-ball through his +head, early one morning, while the sun was shining, and the birds were +singing, and flowers were blooming on every side. + +So it has come to pass that Isabella--although not yet twenty-five +years of age, has been twice a widow--(and a very charming one she +is!) not likely now ever to be aught else! The sale of her beauty, her +honor, her peace of mind, has brought to her, as a recompense for what +she has lost, a varied and rich experience, which will save her +forever hereafter from the chance of being deceived and betrayed +through the tenderest and noblest impulses of the human heart. + +And so the curtain goes down forever between us and those with whom we +have whiled away some pleasant hours, and gathered, it may be, profit +or amusement from their acting on the stage of life. + +_Voila tout._ + + + + +MARY F. CHILDS + + +Mrs. Mary Fairfax Childs, maker of dialect verse, was born at +Lexington, Kentucky, May 25, 1846. She is the daughter of the Rev. +Edward Fairfax Berkley (1813-1897), who was rector of Christ Church, +Lexington, for nineteen years. Dr. Berkley baptized Henry Clay, in +1847, and buried him five years later. Miss Berkley was a pupil at the +Misses Jackson's Seminary for young ladies until her thirteenth year, +or, in 1858, when her father accepted a call to St. Louis, in which +city he labored for the following forty years. In St. Louis, she +continued her studies at a private school for girls, when she left +prior to her graduation in order to devote herself more especially to +music, Latin, and French. Miss Berkley was married, in 1870, to +William Ward Childs, a returned Confederate soldier; and in 1884 they +removed to Clinton, Missouri, where they resided for seven years, when +business called them to New York, their home until Mr. Child's death +in 1911. Mrs. Childs's life in New York was a very busy one. She was +prominent in several social and literary groups; and for many years +she was corresponding secretary of the New York Chapter of the United +Daughters of the Confederacy. Her first poem that attracted wide +attention was entitled _De Namin' ob de Twins_, which originally +appeared in _The Century Magazine_ for December, 1903. It was the +second in a group of _Eleven Negro Songs_, written by Joel Chandler +Harris, Grace MacGowan Cooke, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, and one or two +other poets. That Mrs. Childs's masterpiece was the flower of the +flock admits of little question: it is one of the best negro dialect +poems yet written by a Southern woman. Exactly a year later the same +periodical published her _A Christmas Warning_, with the well-known +refrain, _Roos' high, chicken--roos' high_. These, with many others, +were brought together in an attractive volume, entitled _De Namin' ob +de Twins, and Other Sketches from the Cotton Land_ (New York, 1908). +This collection is highly esteemed by that rather small company of +lovers of dialect verse. Mrs. Childs's poem, _The Boys Who Wore the +Gray_, has been printed, and is well-known throughout the South. She +has recently completed another collection of sketches, called +_Absolute Monarchy_, which will appear in 1913. At the present time +Mrs. Childs is historian of the Society of Kentucky Women of New York, +although she is residing at Kirkwood, Missouri, near St. Louis. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Letters from Mrs. Childs to the present writer; _The + Century Magazine_ (January, 1906). + + +DE NAMIN' OB DE TWINS[32] + + [From _De Namin' ob de Twins, and Other Sketches from the Cotton + Land_ (New York, 1908)] + + What I gwine name mah Ceely's twins? + I dunno, honey, yit, + But I is jes er-waitin' fer de fines' I kin git, + De names is purty nigh run out, + So many niggahs heah, + I 'clar' dey's t'ick as cotton-bolls in pickin'-time o' yeah. + + But 't ain' no use to 'pose to me + Ole secondary names, + Lak 'Liza_beth_ an' Jose_phine_, or Caesah, Torm, an' James, + 'Ca'se dese heah twinses ob mah gal's + Is sech a diff'ent kind, + Dey's 'titled to do grandes' names dat ary one kin find. + + Fer sho dese little shiny brats + Is got de fus'-cut look, + So mammy wants fine city names, lak you gits out a book; + I ax Marse Rob, an' he done say + Some 'rageous stuff lak dis: + He'd call de bruddah Be'lze_bub_, de sistah Gene_sis_; + + Or Alphy an' Omegy--de + Beginnin' an' de en'-- + But den, ob co'se no man kin tell, what mo' de Lawd 'll sen'; + Fer de pappy ob dese orphans-- + You heah me?--I'll be boun', + While dey's er-crawlin' on de flo', he'll be er-lookin' roun'; + + 'Ca'se I done seen dem Judas teahs + He drap at Ceely's grabe, + A-peepin' 'hind his han'kercher, at ole Tim's yaller Gabe; + A-mekin' out to moan an' groan, + Lak he was gwine 'o bus'-- + Lawd! honey, dem dat howls de mos,' gits ober it de fus'. + + Annynias an' Saphiry, + Sis Tab done say to me, + But he'p me, Lawd! what _do_ she 'spec' dese chillum gwine o' + be? + 'Sides, dem names 's got er cur'us soun'-- + You says I's hard to please? + Well, so 'ould any granny be, wid sech a pa'r as dese. + + Ole Pahson Bob he 'low dat I + Will suttinly be sinnin', + Onless I gibs 'em names dat starts 'em right in de beginnin'; + "Iwilla" fer de gal, he say, + F'om de tex' "I will a-rise," + An' dat 'ould show she's startin' up, todes glory in de skies; + + An' fer dis man chile, Aberham-- + De fardah ob' em all-- + Or else Belshazzah, who done writ dat writin' on de wall; + But Pahson Bob--axcuse me, Lawd!-- + Hed bettah sabe his bref + To preach de gospel, an' jes keep his "visin" to hiss'f; + + Per nary pusson, white nor black, + Ain' gib no p'int to me + 'Bout namin' dese heah Chris'mus gifs, asleep on granny's knee; + (Now heshaby--don' squirm an' twis', + Be still you varmints, do! + You anin' gwine hab no niggah names to tote aroun' wide you!) + + 'Ca'se on de question ob dese names + I sho is hed mah mine + _Per_zactly an' _per_cidedly done med up all de time; + Fer mah po' Ceely Ann--yas, Lawd, + Jes nigh afo' she died, + She name' dis gal, "Neu-ral-gy," her boy twin, "Hom-i-cide." + +FOOTNOTE: + +[32] Copyright, 1908, by B. W. Dodge and Company. + + + + +WILLIAM T. PRICE + + +William Thompson Price, dramatic critic, creator of playwrights, was +born near Louisville, Kentucky, December 17, 1846. He was educated in +the private schools of Louisville, but the Civil War proved more +interesting than text-books, so he ran away with Colonel E. P. Clay, +whom he left, in turn, for John H. Morgan, and Generals Forrest and +Wheeler. He was finally captured and imprisoned but he, of course, +escaped. After the war Mr. Price went to Germany and studied for three +years at the Universities of Leipzig and Berlin. From 1875 to 1880 he +was dramatic critic for the Louisville _Courier-Journal_; and the +following five years he devoted to editorial work for various +newspapers, and to collecting material for his enormous biography of +the Rev. George O. Barnes, a noted and eccentric Kentucky evangelist, +which appeared under the title of _Without Scrip or Purse_ +(Louisville, 1883). Mr. Price went to New York in the early eighties, +and that city has remained his home to this day. In 1885 he was +dramatic critic for the now defunct New York _Star_, which he left +after a year to become a reader of new plays for A. M. Palmer, the +leading manager of his time, whom he was associated with for more than +twenty years. Mr. Price's _The Technique of the Drama_ (New York, +1892), gave him a high position among the dramatic writers of the +country. A new edition of it was called for in 1911, and it seems +destined to remain the chief authority in its field for many years. In +1901 Mr. Price became playreader for Harrison Grey Fiske; and in the +same year he founded the American School of Playwriting, in which men +and women, whom the gods forgot, are transformed into great +dramatists--perhaps! His second volume upon the stage, _The Analysis +of Play Construction and Dramatic Principle_ (New York, 1908), is the +text-book of his school. At the present time Mr. Price is editor of +_The American Playwright_, a monthly magazine of dramatic discussion. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. Letters from Mr. Price to the present writer; _Who's + Who in America_ (1912-1913). + + +THE OFFENBACH AND GILBERT OPERAS[33] + + [From _The Technique of the Drama_ (New York, 1892)] + +The light-hearted genius of Paris composed a new style of opera for +the general merriment of the world. Who can describe the surprises, +the quaintness of song, the drolleries of action of the Offenbach +school? It was the intoxicating wine of music. Gladstone, when premier +of England, found time to say that the world owed as much in its +civilization to the discovery of the fiddle as it did to steam. + +This cannot be applied in its whole sense to Offenbach, but this +master of satire and the sensuous certainly expressed his times. He +set laughter to song. It was democratic. It spared not king, courtier, +or the rabble. It was wisdom and sentiment in disguise. It was born +among despotisms, and jested when kingdoms fell. It was the stalking +horse behind which Offenbach hunted the follies of the day and bagged +the absurdities of the hour. If it had _double entendre_, its +existence had a double meaning. Its music and purpose defied national +prejudices. Under its laughter-compelling notes the sober bass-viol +put on a merry disposition, and your cornet-a-piston became a wag. It +was flippant, the glorification of youthful mirth and feelings, and it +made many a melancholy Jacques sing again the song of Beranger, + + "_Comme je regrette ma jambe si dodu._" + +It is not the purpose here to commend its delirious dances, but to +admit that there was genius in it. In a technical sense the dramatic +part of them are models compared with the inane and vague compositions +of a later school. + +The opera bouffe is in a stage beyond decadence, and no longer regards +consistency, even of nonsense, in its dramatic elements. Some of the +conventionalisms of its technique remain. + +We hear again and again the old choruses, the drinking songs, the +letter songs, the wine songs, the conspirators' songs, the departure +for the war, the lovers' duets, and what-not, with the old goblets, +the old helmets and all in use; but order is lost, and the topical +song often saves the public patience, apart from the _disjecta +membra_, upon which are fed the eye and the ear. + +The Gilbert opera. The delicate foolery of Gilbert and the interpreting +melody of Sullivan created an inimitable form of opera that delighted +its generations. In its way perfection marks it. There is much in it +that ministers to inward quiet and enjoyment. "Pinafore," "The Mikado," +and all the list, are products of genius. "Ruddygore" is structurally +weak, proving that even nonsense must have a logical treatment. +Successful in a manner as "Ruddygore" was, it was filled with +characteristic quaintness. We accept Rose Maybud as a piece of good +luck, from the moment her modest slippers demurely patter to the front; +and it is a sober statement to say that our generation has seen nothing +more charming than her artful artlessness and innocence. She is worthy +of Gilbert. His taste is refined beyond the point of vulgarity in +essence or by way of expediency. His fancy is not tainted with the +corruption of flesh-tight limbs, and he holds fast only to such physical +allurements as the "three little maids just from school" in the "Mikado" +or the impossibly good and dainty Rose Maybud may tempt us with. In the +dance there is no lasciviousness, only joy. Gilbert and Sullivan have +called a halt to the can-can and bid the world be decent. The whole +history of comic opera is filled with proof that music first consented +to lend itself to foolery on condition that there should be some heart +in it; and even Offenbach, the patriarch of libidinous absurdities, +could not get along without stopping by the wayside to make his sinners +sing love-songs filled with pure emotion. + +Rose Maybud is a piece of delicate coquetry with the mysterious +simplicity of maidenhood, giving offense in no way. These authors are +satirists, not burlesquers and fakirs. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[33] Copyright, 1892, by Brentano's. + + + + +GEORGE M. DAVIE + + +George Montgomery Davie, a verse-maker of cleverness and charm, was +born near Hopkinsville, Kentucky, March 16, 1848. He began his +collegiate career at Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, but he later +went to Princeton, from which institution he was graduated in 1868. +Two years later he established himself as a lawyer at Louisville. +Davie rose rapidly in his profession, and he was soon recognized as +one of the ablest lawyers in Kentucky. Though busy with his practice, +he found time to write verse and short prose papers for periodicals +that were appreciated by many persons. Davie was a Latinist of decided +ability, and he often employed himself in turning the odes of Horace +into English. His original work, however, is very charming and clever, +a smile being concealed in almost every line he wrote, though it is a +very quiet and dignified smile, never boisterous. He was one of the +founders of the now celebrated Filson Club, of Louisville. He died at +New York, February 22, 1900, but he sleeps to-day in Louisville's +beautiful Cave Hill cemetery. _Verses_ (Louisville, Kentucky, n. d.), +a broadside, contains Davie's best original poems and translations and +it is a very scarce item at this time. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Courier-Journal_ (February 23, 1900); _Kentucky + Eloquence_ (Louisville, 1907). + + +"FRATER, AVE ATQUE VALE!" + +(Catullus, Car. CI.) + + [From _Verses_ (Louisville, Kentucky, n. d.)] + + Through many nations, over many seas, + Brother, I come to thy sad obsequies: + To bring the last gifts for the dead to thee, + And speak to thy mute ashes--left to me + By the hard fate, that on a cruel day, + From me, dear brother, called Thyself away. + Receive these gifts, wet with fraternal tears; + And the last rites, that custom old endears; + These fond memorials would my sorrow tell-- + Brother! forever, hail thee--and farewell! + + +HADRIAN, DYING, TO HIS SOUL + + [From the same] + + Animula vagula blandula, + Hospes comesque corporis, + Quae nunc abibis in loca, + Pallidula rigida nudula; + Nec, ut soles, dabis jocos? + + Thou sprite! so charming, uncontrolled, + Guest and companion of my clay, + Into what places wilt thou stray, + When thou art naked, pale, and cold? + Wilt then make merry--as of old? + + + + +JOHN URI LLOYD + + +John Uri Lloyd, novelist and scientist, was born at West Bloomfield, +New York, April 19, 1849. He is the son of a civil engineer who came +West, in 1853, for the purpose of surveying a railroad between +Covington and Louisville, known as the "River Route." Mr. Lloyd was +thus four years old when his father settled at Burlington, Boone +county, Kentucky, near the line of the road. The panic of 1854 came +and the railroad company failed, but his parents preferred their new +Kentucky home to the old home in the East, and they decided to remain, +taking up their first vocations, that of teaching. For several years +they taught in the village schools of the three little Kentucky towns +of Burlington, Petersburg, and Florence. Mr. Lloyd lived at Florence +until he was fourteen years of age, when he was apprenticed to a +Cincinnati druggist, but he continued to be a resident of Kentucky +until 1876, since which time he has lived at Cincinnati. In 1878 he +became connected with the Cincinnati College of Pharmacy, and this +connection has continued to the present day. In 1880 he was married to +a Kentucky woman. Mr. Lloyd is one of the most distinguished +pharmaceutical chemists in the United States. He has a magnificent +library and museum upon his subjects; and he is generally conceded to +be the world's highest authority on puff-balls. Mr. Lloyd's scientific +works include _The Chemistry of Medicines_ (1881); _Drugs and +Medicines of North America_ (1884); _King's American Dispensatory_ +(1885); _Elixirs, their History and Preparation_ (1892); and he, as +president, has edited the publications of the Lloyd Library, as +follows: _Dr. B. S. Barton's Collections_ (1900); _Dr. Peter Smith's +Indian Doctor's Dispensatory_ (1901); _A Study in Pharmacy_ (1902); +_Dr. David Schopf's Materia Medica Americana_ (1903); _Dr. Manasseh +Cutler's Vegetable Productions_ (1903); _Reproductions from the Works +of William Downey, John Carver, and Anthony St. Storck_ (1907); +_Hydrastis Canadensis_ (1908); _Samuel Thomson and Thomsonian Materia +Medica_ (1909). Dr. Lloyd has won his general reputation as a writer +of novels descriptive of life in northern Kentucky. His first work to +attract wide attention was entitled _Etidorpha, or the End of Earth_ +(New York, 1895), a work which involved speculative philosophy. This +was followed by a little story, _The Right Side of the Car_ (Boston, +1897). Then came the Stringtown stories, which made his reputation. +"Stringtown" is the fictional name for the Kentucky Florence of his +boyhood. There are four of them: _Stringtown on the Pike_ (New York, +1900); _Warwick of the Knobs_ (New York, 1901); _Red Head_ (New York, +1903); and _Scroggins_ (New York, 1904). In these stories the +author's aim was not to be engaged solely as a novelist, "but to +portray to outsiders a phase of life unknown to the world at large, +and to establish a folk-lore picture in which the scenes that occurred +in times gone by, would be paralleled in the events therein narrated." +_Stringtown on the Pike_ is Mr. Lloyd's best known book, but _Warwick +of the Knobs_ is far and way the finest of the four. + + BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Bookman_ (May, 1900); _The Outlook_ (November + 16, 1901); _The Bookman_ (December, 1910). + + +"LET'S HAVE THE MERCY TEXT"[34] + + [From _Warwick of the Knobs_ (New York, 1901)] + +Warwick made no movement; no word of greeting came from his lips, no +softening touch to his furrowed brow, no sparkle to his cold, gray +eye. As though gazing upon a stranger, he sat and pierced the girl +through and through with a formal stare, that drove despair deeper +into her heart and caused her to cling closer to her brother. + +"Pap, sister's home ag'in," the youth repeated. + +"I know nothing of a sister who claims a home here." + +Mary would have fallen but for the strong arm of her brother, who +gently, tenderly guided her to a great rocking-chair. Then he turned +on his father. + +"I said thet sister's home agin, and I means it, pap." + +Turning the leaves of the Book to a familiar passage, Warwick read +aloud: + +"'The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life +is not of the Father, but of the world.' This girl has no home here. +She is of the world." + +"Father, ef sister hes no home here, I hav'n't none, either. Ef she +must go out into the world, I'll go with her." + +The man of God gazed sternly at the rebellious youth. Then he turned +to the girl. + +"The good Book says, 'A fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the +earth.'" + +Joshua stepped between the two and hid the child from her father. + +"Pap, thet book says tough things to-night. The text you preached from +to-day was a better one. I remember et, and I'll leave et to you ef I +am not right. 'I am merciful, saith the Lord, and I will not keep my +anger forever.' Thet's a better text, and I takes et, God was in a +better humor when He wrote et." + +"Joshua!" spoke the father, shocked at his son's irreverence. + +"Listen, pap. I hate to say et, but I must. You preached one thing +this morning, and you acts another thing now. Didn't you say thet God +'retaineth not His anger forever, because He delighteth in mercy?' I +may not hev the words right, but I've got the sense." + +"My son!" + +"Pap, I axes the question on the square. Ain't thet what you preached?" + +"That was the text." + +"It ain't fair to preach one text in the meetin'-house and act another +text at home." + +"Joshua!" + +"Let's hev the mercy text to-night. Pap, sister's home ag'in. Let's +act the fergivin' text out." + +Joshua stepped aside and the minister, touched in spite of himself, +glanced at his daughter, a softened glance, that spoke of affection, +but he made no movement. Then the girl slowly rose and turned toward +the door, still keeping her eyes on her father's face. She edged +backward step by step toward the door by which she had entered. Her +hand grasped the latch; the door moved on its hinges. + +"Stop, sister," said Joshua. "Pap, ef sister opens thet door I go with +her, and then you will sit alone in this room ferever. You will be the +last Warwick of the Knob." + +Warwick, with all his coldness and strength, could not stand the ordeal. + +"Come back, my children," he said. "It is also written, 'I will be +merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities +will I remember no more.'" And then, as in former times, Mary's head +rested on her father's knee. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[34] Copyright, 1901, by Dodd, Mead and Company. + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + +Obvious punctuation and spelling errors have been fixed throughout. + +The oe ligature in this etext has been replaced with oe. + +Inconsistent hyphenation is as in the original. + +Page xxi: The title of the Emerson poem "Goodby Proud World" is as in +the original. + +Page 251: 1833 has been changed to 1883 as this follows chronologically +from the surrounding sentences. (... and in 1883 his study ...) + +Page 273: A missing quote in (... to Write "Grace Truman: ...) is as in +the original. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Kentucky in American Letters, v. 1 of 2, by +John Wilson Townsend + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KENTUCKY IN AMERICAN *** + +***** This file should be named 39406.txt or 39406.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/4/0/39406/ + +Produced by Brian Sogard, Douglas L. 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