Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and "Evangeline". He was also the first American to translate Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy and was one of the five members of the group known as the Fireside Poets.

Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine and studied at Bowdoin College. After spending time in Europe he became a professor at Bowdoin and, later, at Harvard College. His first major poetry collections were Voices of the Night (1839) and Ballads and Other Poems (1841). Longfellow retired from teaching in 1854 to focus on his writing, though he lived the remainder of his life in Cambridge, Massachusetts in a former headquarters of George Washington.

Longfellow predominantly wrote lyric poetry, known for its musicality, which often presented stories of mythology and legend. He became the most popular American poet of his day and also had success overseas. He has been criticized, however, for imitating European styles and writing specifically for the masses.

Life and work

Early life and education

Birthplace in c. 1910Longfellow was born on February 27, 1807, to Stephen Longfellow and Zilpah (Wadsworth) Longfellow in Portland, Maine, and he grew up in what is now known as the Wadsworth-Longfellow House. His father was a lawyer, and his maternal grandfather, Peleg Wadsworth, was a general in the American Revolutionary War and a Member of Congress. He was named after his mother's brother Henry Wadsworth, a Navy lieutenant who died only three years earlier at the Battle of Tripoli. Young Longfellow was the second of eight children; his siblings were Stephen (1805), Elizabeth (1808), Anne (1810), Alexander (1814), Mary (1816), Ellen (1818), and Samuel (1819).

Henry was enrolled in a dame school at the age of three and by age six was enrolled at the private Portland Academy. In his years there, he earned a reputation as being very studious and became fluent in Latin. He printed his first poem — a patriotic and historical four stanza poem called "The Battle of Lovell's Pond" — in the Portland Gazette on November 17, 1820. He remained at the Portland Academy until the age of fourteen. He spent much of his summers as a child at his grandfather Peleg's farm in the western Maine town of Hiram.

In the fall of 1822, the 15-year old Longfellow enrolled at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine alongside his brother Stephen. His grandfather was a founder of the college and his father was a trustee. There, Longfellow met Nathaniel Hawthorne, who would later become his lifelong friend. He boarded with a clergyman for a time before rooming on the third floor of what is now Maine Hall in 1823. He joined the Peucinian Society, a group of students with Federalist leanings. In his senior year, Longfellow wrote to his father about his aspirations:

"I will not disguise it in the least... the fact is, I most eagerly aspire after future eminence in literature, my whole soul burns most ardently after it, and every earthly thought centres in it... I am almost confident in believing, that if I can ever rise in the world it must be by the exercise of my talents in the wide field of literature".

He pursued his literary goals by submitting poetry and prose to various newspapers and magazines. Between January 1824 and his graduation in 1825, he had published nearly 40 minor poems. About 24 of them appeared in the short-lived Boston periodical The United States Literary Gazette. When Longfellow graduated from Bowdoin, he was ranked fourth in the class and gave the student commencement address.

European tours and professorships

After graduating in 1825, he was offered a job as professor of modern languages at his alma mater. The story, possibly apocryphal, is that an influential trustee, Benjamin Orr, had been so by impressed Longfellow's translation of Horace that he was hired under the condition that he travel to Europe to study French, Spanish, and Italian. Whatever the motivation, he began his tour of Europe in May 1826 aboard the ship Cadmus. His time abroad would last three years and cost his father an estimated $2,604.24. He traveled to France, Spain, Italy, Germany, back to France, then England before returning to the United States in mid-August 1829. While in Madrid, he spent time with Washington Irving and was encouraged by the author to write. Longfellow was saddened to learn his favorite sister Elizabeth had died of tuberculosis at the age of 20 that May while he was abroad.

On August 27, 1829, he wrote to the president of Bowdoin that he was turning down the professorship because he considered the $600 salary "disproportionate to the duties required". The trustees raised his salary to $800 with an additional $100 to serve as the college's librarian, a post which required one hour of work per day. During his years teaching at the college, he wrote textbooks in French, Italian, and Spanish; his first published book was in 1833, a translation of the poetry of medieval Spanish poet Jorge Manrique. He also published a travel book, Outre-Mer: A Pilgrimage Beyond the Sea, first published in serial form before a book edition was released in 1835. Shortly after the book's publication, Longfellow attempted to join the literary circle in New York and asked George Pope Morris for an editorial role at one of Morris's publications. Longfellow was considering moving to New York after New York University considered offering him a newly-created professorship of modern languages, though there would be no salary. The professorship was not created and Longfellow agreed to continue teaching at Bowdoin.

On September 14, 1831, Longfellow married Mary Storer Potter, a childhood friend from Portland. The couple settled in Brunswick, though the two were not happy there. Longfellow published several nonfiction and fiction prose pieces inspired by Irving, including "The Indian Summer" and "The Bald Eagle" in 1833.

In December 1834, Longfellow received a letter from Josiah Quincy III, president of Harvard College, offering him the Smith Professorship of Modern Languages position with the stipulation that he spend a year or so abroad. In October 1835, during the trip, his wife Mary had a miscarriage about six months into her pregnancy. She did not recover and died after several weeks of illness at the age of 22 on November 29, 1835. Longfellow had her body embalmed immediately and placed into a lead coffin inside an oak coffin which was then shipped to Mount Auburn Cemetery near Boston. Three years later, he was inspired to write the poem "Footsteps of Angels" about her. Several years later, he wrote the poem "Mezzo Cammin" to express his sorrow over her death.

When he returned to the United States in 1836, Longfellow took up the professorship at Harvard. He was required to live in Cambridge to be close to the campus and moved in to the Craigie House in the spring of 1837, now preserved as the Longfellow National Historic Site. The home, built in 1759, had once been the headquarters of George Washington during the Siege of Boston beginning in July 1775. Previous occupants also included Jared Sparks, Edward Everett, and Joseph Emerson Worcester. Longfellow began publishing his poetry, including Voices of the Night in 1839 and Ballads and Other Poems in 1841. The latter included "The Village Blacksmith" and "The Wreck of the Hesperus", which were instantly popular.

Courtship of Frances "Fanny" Appleton

After a seven-year courtship, Longfellow married Frances Appleton in 1843.Longfellow began courting Frances "Fanny" Appleton, the daughter of a wealthy Boston industrialist, Nathan Appleton. At first, she was not interested but Longfellow was determined. In July 1839, he wrote to a friend: "[V]ictory hangs doubtful. The lady says she will not! I say she shall! It is not pride, but the madness of passion". During the courtship, he frequently walked from Harvard to her home in Boston, crossing the Boston Bridge. That bridge was subsequently demolished and replaced in 1906 by a new bridge, which was eventually renamed the Longfellow Bridge.

During his courtship, Longfellow continued writing and, in the fall of 1839, published Hyperion, a book of travel writings discussing his trips abroad. In 1843, he also published a play, The Spanish Student, reflecting his memories from his time in Spain in the 1820s. There was some confusion over its original manuscript. After being printed in Graham's Magazine, its editor Rufus Wilmot Griswold saved the manuscript from the trash. Longfellow was surprised to hear that it had been saved, unusual for a printing office, and asked to borrow it so that he could revise it, forgetting to return it to Griswold. The often vindictive Griswold wrote an angry letter in response.

On May 10, 1843, after seven years, Longfellow received a letter from Fanny agreeing to marry him and, too restless to take a carriage, walked 90 minutes to meet her at her house. They were married shortly thereafter. Nathan Appleton bought the Craigie House as a wedding present to the pair. Longfellow would live there for the remainder of his life. His love for Fanny is evident in the following lines from Longfellow's only love poem, the sonnet "The Evening Star", which he wrote in October 1845: "O my beloved, my sweet Hesperus! My morning and my evening star of love!"

He and Fanny had six children: Charles Appleton (1844–1893), Ernest Wadsworth (1845–1921), Fanny (1847–1848), Alice Mary (1850–1928), Edith (1853–1915), and Anne Allegra (1855–1934). Their second-youngest daughter, Edith, married Richard Henry Dana III, son of the popular writer Richard Henry Dana, Jr., author of Two Years Before the Mast. When the younger Fanny was born on April 7, 1847, Dr. Nathan Cooley Keep administered ether as the first obstetric anesthetic in the United States to Fanny Longfellow. A few months later, on November 1, 1847, the poem "Evangeline" was published for the first time. His literary income was increasing considerably: in 1840, he had made $219 from his work but the year 1850 brought him $1,900.

On June 14, 1853, Longfellow held a farewell dinner party at his Cambridge home for his friend Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was preparing to move overseas. Shortly thereafter in 1854, Longfellow retired from Harvard, devoting himself entirely to writing. He was awarded an honorary doctorate of Laws from Harvard in 1859.

Death of Frances

On July 9, 1861, a hot day, Fanny was putting locks of her children's hair into an envelope and attempting to seal it with hot sealing wax while Longfellow took a nap. Her dress suddenly caught fire, though it is unclear exactly how; it may have been burning wax or a lighted candle which fell on her dress. Longfellow, awoken from his nap, rushed to help her and threw a rug over her, though it was too small. He stifled the flames with his body as best he could, but she was already badly burned. Over a half a century later, Longfellow's youngest daughter Annie explained the story differently, claiming that there was no candle or wax but the fire started from a self-lighting match that had fallen on the floor. In both versions of the story, however, Fanny was taken to her room to recover and a doctor was called. She was in and out of consciousness throughout the night and was administered ether. The next morning, July 10, 1861, she died shortly after 10 o'clock after requesting a cup of coffee. Longfellow, in trying to save her, had burned himself badly enough that he was unable to attend her funeral. His own injuries to his face were bad enough that he stopped shaving, thereafter wearing the beard which has become his trademark.

Devastated by her death, he never fully recovered and occasionally resorted to laudanum and ether to deal with it. He expressed his grief in the sonnet "The Cross of Snow" (1879), which he wrote eighteen years later to commemorate her death:

Such is the cross I wear upon my breast

These eighteen years, through all the changing scenes

And seasons, changeless since the day she died.

Later life and death

Longfellow spent several years translating Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. To aid him in perfecting the translation and reviewing proofs, he invited friends to weekly meetings every Wednesday starting in 1864. The "Dante Club", as it was called, regularly included William Dean Howells, James Russell Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton and other occasional guests. By 1868, Longfellow's annual income was over $48,000.

During the 1860s, Longfellow supported abolitionism and especially hoped for reconciliation between the northern and southern states after the American Civil War. He wrote in his journal in 1878: "I have only one desire; and that is for harmony, and a frank and honest understanding between North and South".

On August 22, 1879, a female admirer went to Longfellow's house in Cambridge and, unaware to whom she was speaking, asked Longfellow: "Is this the house where Longfellow was born?" Longfellow told her it was not. The visitor then asked if he had died here. "Not yet", he replied. In March 1882, Longfellow went to bed with severe stomach pain. He endured the pain for several days with the help of opium before he died surrounded by family on Friday, March 24, 1882. He had been suffering from peritonitis. At the time of his death, his estate was worth an estimated $356,320. He is buried with both of his wives at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Writing Style

Longfellow from a posthumous edition of his poetryThough much of his work is categorized as lyric poetry, Longfellow experimented with many forms, including hexameter and free verse. His published poetry shows great versatility, utilizing anapestic and trochaic forms, blank verse, heroic couplets, ballads and sonnets. Typically, Longfellow would carefully consider the subject of his poetic ideas for a long time before deciding on the right metrical form for it. Much of his work is recognized for its melody-like musicality. As he says, "what a writer asks of his reader is not so much to like as to listen".

Longfellow often used allegory in his work. In "Nature", for example, death is depicted as bedtime for a cranky child. Though he often used didacticism in his poetry, he focused on it less in his later years. Many of the metaphors he used in his poetry as well as subject matter came from legends, mythology, and literature. He was inspired, for example, by Norse mythology for "The Skeleton in Armor" and by Finnish legends for The Song of Hiawatha. In fact, Longfellow rarely wrote on current subjects and seemed detached from contemporary American concerns. Even so, Longfellow, like many during this period, called for the development of quality American literature. In Kavanagh, a character says:

We want a national literature commensurate with our mountains and rivers... We want a national epic that shall correspond to the size of the country... We want a national drama in which scope shall be given to our gigantic ideas and to the unparalleled activity of our people... In a word, we want a national literature altogether shaggy and unshorn, that shall shake the earth, like a herd of buffaloes thundering over the prairies.

He was also important as a translator; his translation of Dante became a required possession for those who wanted to be a part of high culture.

Critical response

Longfellow's early collections, Voices of the Night and Ballads and Other Poems, made him instantly popular. The New-Yorker called him "one of the very few in our time who has successfully aimed in putting poetry to its best and sweetest uses". The Southern Literary Messenger immediately put Longfellow "among the first of our American poets". Poet John Greenleaf Whittier said that Longfellow's poetry illustrated "the careful moulding by which art attains the graceful ease and chaste simplicity of nature". The rapidity with which American readers embraced Longfellow was unparalleled in publishing history in the United States; by 1874, he was earning $3,000 per poem] In the last two decades of his life, he often received requests for autographs from strangers, which he always sent. John Greenleaf Whittier suggested it was this massive correspondence that lead to Longfellow's death, writing: "My friend Longfellow was driven to death by these incessant demands".

Contemporary writer Edgar Allan Poe wrote to Longfellow in May 1841 of his "fervent admiration which [your] genius has inspired in me" and later called him "unquestionably the best poet in America". However, after Poe's reputation as a critic increased, he publicly accused Longfellow of plagiarism in what has been since termed by Poe biographers as "The Longfellow War". His assessment was that Longfellow was "a determined imitator and a dextrous adapter of the ideas of other people", specifically Alfred, Lord Tennyson. His accusations may have been a publicity stunt to boost readership of the Broadway Journal, for which he was the editor at the time. Longfellow did not respond publicly, but, after Poe's death, he wrote: "The harshness of his criticisms I have never attributed to anything but the irritation of a sensitive nature chafed by some indefinite sense of wrong".

Margaret Fuller judged him "artificial and imitative" and lacking force. Poet Walt Whitman also considered Longfellow an imitator of European forms, though he praised his ability to reach a popular audience as "the expressor of common themes – of the little songs of the masses".Lewis Mumford said that Longfellow could be completely removed from the history of literature without much effect. Towards the end of his life, contemporaries considered him more of a children's poet as many of his readers were children. A contemporary reviewer noted in 1848 that Longfellow was creating a "Goody two-shoes kind of literature... slipshod, sentimental stories told in the style of the nursery, beginning in nothing and ending in nothing". A more modern critic said, "Who, except wretched schoolchildren, now reads Longfellow?] A London critic in the London Quarterly Review, however, condemned all American poetry, saying, "with two or three exceptions, there is not a poet of mark in the whole union" but singled out Longfellow as one of those exceptions.

Legacy

National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Dana Gioia and Katherine C. Tobin, member of the USPS Board of Governors, unveil the new U.S. postage stamp in honor of poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in 2007.Longfellow was the most popular poet of his day. He was such an admired figure in the United States during his life that his 70th birthday in 1877 took on the air of a national holiday, with parades, speeches, and the reading of his poetry. He had become one of the first American celebrities and was also popular in Europe. It was reported that 10,000 copies of The Courtship of Miles Standish sold in London in a single day. In 1884 he was the first and only non-British writer for whom a commemorative sculpted bust was placed in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey in London.

Over the years, Longfellow's personality has become part of his reputation. He has been presented as a gentle, placid, poetic soul: an image perpetuated by his brother Samuel Longfellow, who wrote an early biography which specifically emphasized these points. As James Russell Lowell said, Longfellow had an "absolute sweetness, simplicity, and modesty". At Longfellow's funeral, his friend Ralph Waldo Emerson called him "a sweet and beautiful soul". In reality, Longfellow's life was much more difficult than was assumed. He suffered from neuralgia, causing constant pain, and he also had poor eyesight. He wrote to friend Charles Sumner: "I do not believe anyone can be perfectly well, who has a brain and a heart". Longfellow was very quiet, reserved, and private. In later years, he was known for being unsocial and avoided leaving home.

Over time, Longfellow's popularity rapidly declined, beginning shortly after his death and into the 20th century as academics began to appreciate poets like Walt Whitman, Edwin Arlington Robinson, and Robert Frost.

More recently, he was honored in March 2007 when the United States Postal Service made a stamp commemorating him. A number of schools are named after him in various states as well. He is a protagonist in Matthew Pearl's murder mystery The Dante Club (2003).

List of works

• Outre-Mer: A Pilgrimage Beyond the Sea (Travelogue) (1835)
• Hyperion, a Romance (1839)
• The Spanish Student. A Play in Three Acts (1843)
• Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie (epic poem) (1847)
• "Kavanagh: A Tale" (1849)
• "The Golden Legend" (poem)(1851)
• The Song of Hiawatha (epic poem) (1855)
• The Children's Hour (1860)
• Household Poems (1865)
• The New England Tragedies (1868)
• The Divine Tragedy (1871)
• Christus: A Mystery (1872)
• "Aftermath" (poem) (1873)
• The Reaper and the Flowers (unknown)
• The Bell of Atri (From The Sicilian's Tale)(1863-1872)
• Poetry collections
• Birds of Passage
• Voices of the Night (1839)
• Ballads and Other Poems (1841)
• Poems on Slavery (1842)
• The Belfry of Bruges and Other Poems (1845)
• The Seaside and the Fireside (1850)
• The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other Poems (1858)
• Tales of a Wayside Inn (1863)
• Flower-de-Luce (1867)
• Three Books of Song (1872)
• The Masque of Pandora and Other Poems (1875)
• Kéramos and Other Poems (1878)
• Ultima Thule (1880)
• In the Harbor (1882)

Anthologies and translations

• Coplas de Don Jorge Manrique (Translation from Spanish) (1833)
• The Waif (Anthology of other writers – 1845)
• Poets and Poetry of Europe (Translations) (1844)
• Dante's Divine Comedy (Translation) (1867)

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A descendant of eight Mayflower Passengers, Richard Warren, John Howland, Elizabeth Tilley, Henry Samson, William Mullins and Wife Alice.

• Richard Warren m. Elizabeth Walker
  • Mary Warren m. Robert Bartlett
    • Joseph Bartlett m. Hannah Fallowell Pope
      • Joseph Bartlett m. Lydia Griswold
        • Samuel Bartlett m. Elizabeth Lathrop
• John Howland m. Elizabeth Tilley
  • Desire Howland m. Capt. John Gorham
    • James Gorham m. Hannah Huckins
      • Experience Gorham m. Thomas Lathrop
        • Elizabeth Lathrop m. Samuel Bartlett
          • Elizabeth Bartlett m. Brig. Gen. Peleg Wadsworth, Jr.
• William Mullins m. Alice
  • John Alden m. Priscilla Mullins
    • Elizabeth Alden m. William Pabodie
      • Ruth Pabodie m. Benjamin Bartlett, Jr.
        • Priscilla Bartlett m. John Sampson
• Henry Samson m. Sarah Ann Plummer
  • Stephen Samson m. Elizabeth Sprague
    • John Sampson m. Priscilla Bartlett
      • Susanna Sampson m. Deacon Peleg Wadsworth
        • Brig. Gen. Peleg Wadsworth, Jr. m. Elizabeth Bartlett
          • Zilpah Wadsworth m. Stephen Longfellow IV
            • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Biography

written by Roberto Rabe

Probably the best loved of American poets the world over is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Many of his lines are as familiar to us as rhymes from Mother Goose or the words of nursery songs learned in early childhood. Like these rhymes and melodies, they remain in the memory and accompany us through life.

There are two reasons for the popularity and significance of Longfellow's poetry. First, he had the gift of easy rhyme. He wrote poetry as a bird sings, with natural grace and melody. Read or heard once or twice, his rhyme and meters cling to the mind long after the sense may be forgotten.

Second, Longfellow wrote on obvious themes which appeal to all kinds of people. His poems are easily understood; they sing their way into the consciousness of those who read them. Above all, there is a joyousness in them, a spirit of optimism and faith in the goodness of life which evokes immediate response in the emotions of his readers.

Americans owe a great debt to Longfellow because he was among the first of American writers to use native themes. He wrote about the American scene and landscape, the American Indian ('Song of Hiawatha'), and American history and tradition ('The Courtship of Miles Standish', 'Evangeline'). At the beginning of the 19th century, America was a stumbling babe as far as a culture of its own was concerned. The people of America had spent their years and their energies in carving a habitation out of the wilderness and in fighting for independence. Literature, art, and music came mainly from Europe and especially from England. Nothing was considered worthy of attention unless it came from Europe.

But "the flowering of New England," as Van Wyck Brooks terms the period from 1815 to 1865, took place in Longfellow's day, and he made a great contribution to it. He lived when giants walked the New England earth, giants of intellect and feeling who established the New Land as a source of greatness. Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and William Prescott were a few of the great minds and spirits among whom Longfellow took his place as a singer and as a representative of America.

The first Longfellow came to America in 1676 from Yorkshire, England. Among the ancestors of the poet on his mother's side were John and Priscilla Alden, of whom he wrote in 'The Courtship of Miles Standish'. His mother's father, Peleg Wadsworth, had been a general in the Revolutionary War. His own father was a lawyer. The Longfellow home represented the graceful living which was beginning to characterize the age.

Henry was the son of Stephen Longfellow and Zilpah Wadsworth Longfellow. He was born February 27, 1807, in Portland, Maine. Portland was a seaport, and this gave its citizens a breadth of view lacking in the more insular New England towns. The variety of people and the activity of the harbors stirred the mind of the boy and gave him a curiosity about life beyond his own immediate experience. He was sent to school when he was only three years old. When he was six, the following report of him was received at home:"Master Henry Longfellow is one of the best boys we have in school. He spells and reads very well. He can also add and multiply numbers. His conduct last quarter was very correct and amiable."

From the beginning, it was evident that this boy was to be drawn to writing and the sound of words. His mother read aloud to him and his brothers and sisters the high romance of Ossian, the legendary Gaelic hero. Cervantes' 'Don Quixote' was a favorite among the books he read. But the book which influenced him most was Washington Irving's 'Sketch Book'. Irving was another American author for whom the native legend and landscape were sources of inspiration.

"Every reader has his first book," wrote Longfellow later. "I mean to say, one book among all others which in early youth first fascinates his imagination, and at once excites and satisfies the desires of his mind. To me, the first book was the 'Sketch Book' of Washington Irving."

Longfellow's father was eager to have his son become a lawyer. But when Henry was a senior at Bowdoin College at 19, the college established a chair of modern languages. The recent graduate was asked to become the first professor, with the understanding that he should be given a period of time in which to travel and study in Europe.

In May of 1826, the fair-haired youth with the azure blue eyes set out for Europe to turn himself into a scholar and a linguist. He had letters of introduction to men of note in England and France, but he had his own idea of how to travel. Between conferences with important people and courses in the universities, Longfellow walked through the countries. He stopped at small inns and cottages, talking to peasants, farmers, traders, his silver flute in his pocket as a passport to friendship. He travelled in Spain, Italy, France, Germany, and England, and returned to America in 1829. At 22, he was launched into his career as a college professor. He had to prepare his own texts, because at that time none were available.

Much tribute is due him as a teacher. Just as he served America in making the world conscious of its legend and tradition, so he opened to his students and to the American people the literary heritage of Europe. He created in them the new consciousness of the literature of Spain, France, Italy, and especially writings from the German, Nordic, and Icelandic cultures.

In 1831, he married Mary Storer Potter, whom he had known as a schoolmate. When he saw her at church upon his return to Portland, he was so struck by her beauty that he followed her home without courage enough to speak to her. With his wife, he settled down in a house surrounded by elm trees. He expended his energies on translations from Old World literature and contributed travel sketches to the New England Magazine, in addition to serving as a professor and a librarian at Bowdoin.

In 1834, he was appointed to a professorship at Harvard and once more set out for Europe by way of preparation. This time his young wife accompanied him. The journey ended in tragedy. In Rotterdam, his wife died, and Longfellow came alone to Cambridge and the new professorship. The lonely [Longfellow] took a room at historic Craigie House, an old house overlooking the Charles River. It was owned by Mrs. Craigie, an eccentric woman who kept much to herself and was somewhat scornful of the young men to whom she let rooms. But she read widely and well, and her library contained complete sets of Voltaire and other French masters. Longfellow entered the beautiful old elm-encircled house as a lodger, not knowing that this was to be his home for the rest of his life. In time, it passed into the possession of Nathan Appleton. Seven years after he came to Cambridge, Longfellow married Frances Appleton, daughter of Nathan Appleton, and Craigie House was given to the Longfellows as a wedding gift.

Meantime, in the seven intervening years, he remained a rather romantic figure in Cambridge, with his flowing hair and his yellow gloves and flowered waistcoats. He worked, however, with great determination and industry, publishing 'Hyperion', a prose romance that foreshadowed his love for Frances Appleton, and 'Voices of the Night', his first book of poems. He journeyed again to Europe, wrote 'The Spanish Student', and took his stand with the abolitionists, returning to be married in 1843.

The marriage was a happy one, and the Longfellow house became the center of life in the University town. The old Craigie House was a shrine of hospitality and gracious living. The young people of Cambridge flocked there to play with the five Longfellow children - two boys and the three girls whom the poet describes in 'The Children's Hour' as "grave Alice and laughing Allegra and Edith with golden hair."

From his friend Nathaniel Hawthorne, Longfellow got a brief outline of a story from which he composed one of his most favorite poems, 'Evangeline'. The original story had Evangeline wandering about New England in search of her bridegroom. Longfellow extended her journey through Louisiana and the western wilderness. She finds Gabriel, at last, dying in Philadelphia.

'Evangeline' was published in 1847 and was widely acclaimed. Longfellow began to feel that his work as a teacher was a hindrance to his own writing. In 1854, he resigned from Harvard and with a great sense of freedom gave himself entirely to the joyous task of his own poetic writing. In June of that year, he began 'The Song of Hiawatha'.

Henry Schoolcraft's book on Indians and several meetings with an Ojibway chief provided the background for 'Hiawatha'. The long poem begins with Gitche Matino, the Great Spirit, commanding his people to live in peace and tells how Hiawatha is born. It ends with the coming of the white man and Hiawatha's death.

The publication of 'Hiawatha' caused the greatest excitement. For the first time in American literature, Indian themes gained recognition as sources of imagination, power, and originality. The appeal of 'Hiawatha' for generations of children and young people gives it an enduring place in world literature.

The gracious tale of John Alden and Priscilla came next to the poet's mind, and 'The Courtship of Miles Standish' was published in 1858. It is a work which reflects the ease with which he wrote and the pleasure and enjoyment he derived from his skill. Twenty-five thousand copies were sold during the first week of its publication, and 10,000 were ordered in London on the first day of publication.

In 1861, the happy life of the family came to an end. Longfellow's wife died of burns she received when packages of her children's curls, which she was sealing with matches and wax, burst into flame. Longfellow faced the bitterest tragedy of his life. He found some solace in the task of translating Dante into English and went to Europe for a change of scene.

The years following were filled with honors. He was given honorary degrees at the great universities of Oxford and Cambridge, invited to Windsor by Queen Victoria, and called by request upon the Prince of Wales. He was chosen a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences and of the Spanish Academy.

When it became necessary to remove "the spreading chestnut tree" of Brattle Street, which Longfellow had written about in his 'Village Blacksmith', the children of Cambridge gave their pennies to build a chair out of the tree and gave it to Longfellow. He died on March 24, 1882. "Of all the suns of the New England morning," says Van Wyck Brooks, "he was the largest in his golden sweetness."

Wadsworth-Longfellow House

In 1784 Peleg and Elizabeth Bartlett Wadsworth, the poet's maternal grandparents, arrived in Falmouth, Maine, which was soon to be renamed Portland. Falmouth had been bombarded and burned by the British in 1775, but was being rebuilt from the ruins. Peleg, commanding general of American forces in Massachusetts's District of Maine during the war, had been wounded, taken prisoner, escaped, and continued the fight against British encroachment on the northeastern frontier. After the war, he, like so many other veterans, saw opportunity for a new, prosperous life in Maine. In 1785 he began building in the promising seaport. The house was completed in 1786. Peleg and Elizabeth moved to the new house with their six children: Charles, Zilpah (mother of the poet), Elizabeth, John, Lucia, and Henry (called Harry). Four more Wadsworth children were born there: George, Alexander, Samuel, and Peleg Jr. Zilpah's son, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, grew up in the house.

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Longfellow in 1868 by Julia Margaret Cameron Born February 27, 1807 Portland, Maine, United States Died March 24, 1882 (aged 75) Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States Occupation Poet Professor Literary movement Romanticism Signature Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. He was also the first American to translate Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy and was one of the five Fireside Poets.

Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine, then part of Massachusetts, and studied at Bowdoin College. After spending time in Europe he became a professor at Bowdoin and, later, at Harvard College. His first major poetry collections were Voices of the Night (1839) and Ballads and Other Poems (1841). Longfellow retired from teaching in 1854 to focus on his writing, living the remainder of his life in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in a former headquarters of George Washington. His first wife, Mary Potter, died in 1835 after a miscarriage. His second wife, Frances Appleton, died in 1861 after sustaining burns when her dress caught fire. After her death, Longfellow had difficulty writing poetry for a time and focused on his translation. He died in 1882.

Longfellow wrote predominantly lyric poems, known for their musicality and often presenting stories of mythology and legend. He became the most popular American poet of his day and also had success overseas. He has been criticized, however, for imitating European styles and writing specifically for the masses.

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GEDCOM Note

1850 MA Census: Middlesex Co. Cambridge, p.153b, lines 39-42 & p. 154a, lines 1-4
Series M432, roll 325, dwelling 2027, family 2476, 17 September 1850

Henry W. LONGFELLOW, age 43, Prof. Harvard College, $30,000 Real Estate, b. Maine Fanny E., age 33, b. Mass. Charley A., age 6, b. Mass., attends school Ernest W., age 5, b. Mass., attends school Mary DUNN, age 29, b. Newfoundland, cannot read or write Mary PATTEN, age 58, b. Ireland, cannot read or write Ellen F. MAY, age 24, b. Mass. John MOARCY, age 56, Laborer, b. Ireland _________________________________________

1860 MA Census: Middlesex Co. Cambridge, Ward 1, p. 77, lines 6-14 Series M653, roll 508, dwelling 533, family 589, 27 August 1860

Henry W. LONGFELLOW, age 45, Author, $150,000 Real Estate / $20,000 Personal Estate, b. Mass. Fannie E., age 33, b. Mass. Charles A., age 16, Student, attends school Ernest W., age 14, attends school Mary, age 10, attends school Edith W., age 7, attends school Annie, age 4, attends school Rachael [surname blank], age 38, servant, b. Ireland Kate MOODY, age 25, servant, b. Ireland _________________________________________

1870 MA Census: Middlesex Co. Cambridge, Ward 1, p. 306b, line 40 & p. 307a, lines Series M593, roll 623, dwelling 955, family 968, 26 July 1870

Henry W. LONGFELLOW, age 60, Poet, b. Mass. Charles A., age 25, no occupation Ernest, age 23, artist Alice, age 18; Edith, age 16, attends school; Annie, age 14, attends school _________________________________________

1880 MA Census: Middlesex Co. Cambridge, #105 Brattle St. ed 426, p. 16, lines 34-40 Series T9, roll 543, dwelling 145, family 153, 5 June 1880

Henry W. LONGFELLOW, age 73, widowed, Poet & Author, b. Maine, parents b. Maine Alice M., age 29, daughter, single; Ann A., age 24, daughter, single Chas. A., age 36, son, single, Traveller Bridget BOYLAN, age 41, servant, b. Ireland Bridget CAVANAGH, age 42, servant, b. Ireland Catherine DONAGHUE, age 38, servant, b. Ireland _________________________________________

Boston, MA: The Boston Daily Globe, issue of Friday, 24 March 1882, p. 2, col. 6

HENRY W. LONGFELLOW DYING.

The Death of the Great American Poet Momentarily Expected.

Mr. Henry W. Longfellow, the well-known poet, at 4 o'clock this morning was in a dying condition from peritonitis, and death was momentarily expected. His bedside was surrounded by his family. The poet has been ailing for some time past, but yesterday he sank very rapidly, and at midnight all hopes of his recovery were abandoned. _________________________________________

Boston, MA: The Boston Daily Globe, issue of Saturday, 25 March 1882, p. 1, cols. 1-4

LONGFELLOW.

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Death of the Great Poet at Cambridge.

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His Last Hours Soothed by the Members of His Family.

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Sketch of His Tranquil Life and Many Works.

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Some Reminiscences of America's Favorite Bard.

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The Secret of the Birth of Many of the Poems Divulged.

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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the poet, died at his residence in Cambridge, at 3.10 o'clock yesterday afternoon, at the age of 75 years and 25 days.

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HIS ILLNESS AND DEATH.

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Bells Tolling and Cambridge Mourning His Loss--The School Children and the Dead Poet.

The details of Professor Longfellow's illness, as given by Dr. Wyman, his family physician, are very simple. Last Saturday he was in his usual health. In the afternoon he walked for some time on the piazza of his residence, which, as everyone knows, was the old mansion on Brattle street, once Washington's headquarters. Late in the day he felt chilled and during the night was attacked with vomiting, pain, and the usual symptoms of inflammation of the bowels. This lasted through Sunday, but Sunday night, by means of opiates, he got some rest. Monday he was more comfortable, but Monday evening it was evident that he was very dangerously ill. His family were all notified, and his son-in-law, R.H. Dana, who was making arrangements for a trip to Europe, was informed that he had best delay them, for if the illness did not prove fatal it would at least be very severe. By Wednesday almost all his pain had left him. He slept a good deal, on Thursday especially being very drowsy. Thursday night and yesterday he was conscious but a small part of the time. His breathing had been growing more difficult for the last forty-eight hours, and all the signs of immediate dissolution were present. At last on Friday afternoon, a little after 3 o'clock, he passed peacefully away. His illness was short and not very painful, and his life ended as it had passed, quietly and serenely. Within a half an hour the solemn tolling of the alarm bells let Cambridge know that her greatest and best citizen was no more. The seventy-five awe-inspiring peals reminded the startled city of the time of rejoicing but so short a time ago, only a few weeks, when Cambridge, America, the whole world joined in singing the praises of our greatest poet, and thanked heaven that his life had been spared the even three-quarters of a century. Now he is gone.

Among none did the news of his death spread faster than among the school children of Cambridge. He was their friend and they loved him. His seventy-fifth birthday was celebrated not only by the children of the Cambridge schools, but by those of almost every city in the land. Longfellow loved the boys and girls. An old resident of Cambridge, who has known him for fifty years, was telling yesterday how he had refused to make an address at the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the founding of Cambridge, but when he saw so many children present he had to say something to them, and how, after he had finished, they crowded round him on the platform and kept him busy till the dinner signing his autograph in their albums; then he told the rest all to come to his house and he would write his name for every one. Your reporter remembers once, when he was a small boy, being with a large company of ladies and gentlemen whom Longfellow had kindly consented to show over the quaint old mansion where he lived. All the rest had been introduced save the one boy, and he was evidently thought too insignificant; but the kind-hearted poet saw the omission, and grasping his hand gave him a more cordial greeting even than he had given to the rest of the party. It was such never-to-be-forgotten acts as this which endeared him to all who met him, acquaintance or stranger. To people of the latter class he was especially kind.

Professor Longfellow left quite a large family, several of his children being well-known to every citizen of Boston and Cambridge. Of his immediate family there are his sons Ernest and Charles, and his daughters, Edith (Mrs. Richard H. Dana), Annie and Alice; his son-in-law, Richard D. Dana; his brother, Alexander, of Portland; his sisters, Mrs. James Greenleaf of Cambridge, and Mrs. Pierce of Portland; his daughter-in-law, Mrs. Ernest Longfellow, and his brothers-in-law, Thomas and Nathan Appleton.

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SKETCH OF HIS LIFE.

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How the Great Poet Endeared Himself to the Hearts of the People by His Writings-- His First and Last Work.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born in Portland, Me.--then a town in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts--February 27, 1807. His father, Hon. Stephen Longfellow, was a celebrated statesman and jurist, and was a lineal descendant of William Longfellow of Newbury, Mass., the first of the name who came to America, while on his mother's side the poet was a descendant of John Alden, who came over in the Mayflower, and who was the first white man that landed at Plymouth. Entering Bowdoin College in 1821, Longfellow graduated in the class of 1825 with Hawthorne and other noted men. Early in his life he gave evidences of poetic taste. During his college life he contributed to the periodicals of the day "An April Day," "Autumn," "Hymn of the Moravian Nuns," "The Spirit of Poetry," "Woods in Winter" and "Sunrise on the Hills," which were received with great favor, as early blossoms of a spring of peculiar promise, and still retain a place in later editions of his maturer productions. Some of them appeared in the Literary Gazette, a Boston publication.

When Mr. Longfellow left college he began the study of law in his father's office; but he had no heart for professional life, and in a year or two the position, for which he was peculiarly fitted and which he adorned, was opened for him. The professorship of modern languages, for which Mme. Bowdoin some years before had given $1000 as a corner-stone at least for its foundation, was established, and he cheerfully accepted the appointment to the professorship and immediately took passage for Europe, where he spent nearly four years in Spain, France, Italy and Germany, preparing himself for the inviting sphere now opening before him. In 1829 he assumed the duties of the office, which he faithfully and successfully performed until, with the regret and disappointment of his colleagues and the authorities of the college, he accepted a similar position at Harvard, succeeding the distinguished Professor Ticknor as "Smith Professor of Modern Literature."

He was married in 1831 to Mary S. Potter, daughter of Judge Barrett Potter of Portland. His wife died while he was in Rotterdam, four years later. While at Bowdoin he proved himself a teacher who never wearied of his work. He won by his gentle grace, and commanded respect by his self-respect and his respect for his office, never allowing an infringement of the decorum of the recitation-room. The department was a new one, and in lack of suitable text-books he prepared a translation of a popular French grammar, "Proverbes Dramatiques," "Spanish Tales" for the class-room, a translation of "Coplas de Jorge Manrique," with an essay on the "Moral and Devotional Poetry of Spain"--the version highly commended by Professor Ticknor in his "History of Spanish Literature." He also about this time penned the sketches of travel in

"Outre Mer,

A Pilgrimage Beyond the Sea." Previous to entering upon the arduous duties of the work before him in Harvard College, Mr. Longfellow took a trip to Europe, visiting Denmark, Sweden, Holland and Switzerland. In 1837 he moved to Cambridge, occupying the house used in revolutionary times as Washington's headquarters. Here he has lived ever since, and every visitor to Cambridge is familiar with the historic mansion and its surroundings. In 1842 Mr. Longfellow again visited Europe, and on his return the following year was married to Frances Elizabeth Appleton, daughter of Hon. Nathan Appleton of Boston. After holding the position of professor for nearly twenty years, the poet retired in 1854 to the undisturbed enjoyment of literary leisure. During the period of his duties at the university he had found time and opportunity to pen some of his choicest works, which will live for many years to come, and during the past quarter of a century there have appeared "The autumn fruitage of a mind eminent for the fragrance and luxuriance of its early blossoms, and whose golden summer has not unbeseem'd the promise of its spring." As before stated, his first poems were published during his college life, and the earliest collection in a single volume appeared in Cambridge, in 1839, under the title of

"Voices of the Night,"

which includes the great poem, "The Psalm of Life." In 1842 he published "Ballads and Other Poems," and "Poems on Slavery." The former has the translation of "The Children of the Lord's Supper," from the Swedish of Bishop Tegner. His drama of the "Spanish Student" appeared in 1843, followed by "Poets and Poetry of Europe" (1845); "The Belfry of Bruges and Other Poems" (1846); "Evangeline," one of the most admired of all his productions, and pronounced "the most perfect specimen extant of the rhythm and melody of the English hexameter" (1847); "Seaside and Fireside" (1849); "Golden Legend" (1851); "The Song of Hiawatha" (1855); "The Courtship of Miles Standish" (1858); "Tales of a Wayside Inn" (1864); "Flower-de-Luce" (1866); "New England Tragedies" (1868); "Divine Tragedy" (1870); "Three Books of Song" (1872), including, in "Tales of a Wayside Inn--Second Day," the beautiful poem, "Lady Wentworth"; "Aftermath" (1873); "Hanging of the Crane" (1874); "The Masque of Pandora" (1875); "Keramos" (1878). "Poems of Places," a collection of poems, as its name indicates, of different places, countries, etc., edited by him, is the last of his great works. While he has wrought in the field of poetry, prose has not been neglected, and of his writings in this field of effort "Outre Mer" (1835), "Hyperion," a romance (1839), and "Kavanagh," a novel (1849), beside numerous articles in the North American Review, form his most important contributions to this department of literature. No English poet-scholar has ever made such masterly translations as Longfellow, and his rendering of Dante's "Divina Comedia" (1867) is remarkable for its literalness and fidelity to the original, and can be read now in the very spirit of the great Italian poet.

The Works of Longfellow

are not only well known in this country and to the readers of the English language, but many of them have been translated into French, Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish, Polish, Russian, Latin, Hebrew, Chinese and Sanskrit languages. From 1839 to 1857, 325,500 volumes of his various works found a place in the homes and libraries of the world. From 1867 to 1881, 194,000 copies of the four editions of his collected works were sold, and last year over 45,000 volumes of his works were sold, and 15,000 copies of the "Birthday Book" edited by Miss Bates. Among his contributions to reviews, which display a fine scholarship, may be mentioned the following, among the wide range of themes: "Origin and Progress of the French Language," "Defence of Poetry," "Spanish Language and Literature," "Old English Romances," "The Great Metropolis," "Lawthorne's Twice-Told Tales," "Tegner Frithiof's Saga," and "Anglo-Saxon Literature." There is no more popular author in England and among the English people than Longfellow. The whole world honors him, and he has endeared himself to all classes in all nationalities. It is stated on good authority that in England and the British kingdom, his works are read more extensively than those of any living poet, and probably he is

More Widely Quoted

than any poet of our own or foreign nations since the time of Pope (1688-1744), and if in the quotation of lines and couplets by our greatest orators, preachers, statesmen and moral teachers one may find the true test of poetic thought and inspiration, surely the greatest distinction should be given the name and fame of Longfellow, and here the test may be found. Longfellow's poetry is not an experiment, but an assured and lasting fact. It is full of grand and healthy lessons, which have been widespread in their power and influence. Everything that he touched by his muse was humanized, and his lyre had nothing alien to any soil. He was always young and full of sunshine, always imparting strength and courage to endeavor, and always singing in his own peculiar way that "Life is real, life is earnest," that we must strive to "act in the living present," and that still achieving, still pursuing, should be the end of our flying and fleeting existence. In 1859 Mr. Longfellow received the degree of LL.D. from Harvard University, and on revisiting Europe in 1868-69 he received the degree of D.C.L. at both Oxford and Cambridge. Such is the story of a life that is honored throughout the civilized world, and

Thousands Will Mourn

the loss of one of whom the poet Lowell wrote several years ago: "He is the most popular of American poets, and this popularity may safely be assumed to contain in itself the elements of permanence, since it has been fairly earned. His are laurels honorably gained and gently worn. Without comparing him with others, it is enough if we declare our conviction that he has composed poems which will live as long as the language in which they are written."

One of the latest and probably the last poem ever written by the distinguished author appeared in the February number of the Century, and is entitled "Hermes Trismegistus." The following preface is given to the poem:

"As Seleucus narrates, Hermes described the principles that rank as wholes in two myriads of books: or, as we are informed by Manetho, he perfectly unfolded these principles in three myriads, 6525 volumes. Our ancestors dedicated the inventions of their wisdom to this deity, inscribing all their own writings with the name of Hermes.--Iamblicus."

The poem is as follows:

Still through Egypt's desert places Flows the lordly Nile, From its banks the great stone faces Gaze with patient smile; Still the pyramids imperious Pierce the cloudless skies, And the Sphinx stares with mysterious, Solemn, stony eyes.

But where are the old Egyptian Demi-gods and kings? Nothing left but an inscription Graven on stones and rings. Where are Helius and Hephoestus, Gods of eldest eld? Where is Hermes Trismegiatus, Who their secrets held?

Where are now the many hundred Thousand books he wrote? By the Thaumaturgists plundered, Lost in lands remote; In oblivion sunk forever, As when o'er the land Blows a storm wind, in the river Sinks the scattered sand.

Something unsubstantial, ghostly, Seems this Theurgist, In deep meditation mostly Wrapped, as in a mist. Vague, phantasmal and unreal, To our thought he seems, Walking in a world ideal, In a land of dreams.

Was he one, or many, merging Name and fame in one, Like a stream, to which, converging, Many streamlets run? Till, with gathered power proceeding, Ampler sweep it takes, Downward the sweet waters leading From unnumbered lakes.

By the Nile I see him wandering, Pausing now and then, On the mystic union pondering Between gods and men; Half-believing, wholly feeling, With supreme delight. How the gods, themselves concealing, Lift men to their height.

Or in Thebes, the hundred-gated, In the thoroughfare Breathing, as if consecrated, A diviner air; And amid discordant noises, In the jostling throng, Hearing far, celestial voices Of Olympian song.

Who shall call his dreams fallacious? Who has searched or sought All the unexplored and spacious Universe of thought? Who, in his own skill confiding, Shall with rule and line Mark the border-land dividing Human and divine?

Trismegistus! three times greatest! How thy name sublime Has descended to this latest Progeny of time! Happy they whose written pages Perish with their lives If amid the crumbling ages Still their name survives!

Thine, O priest of Egypt, lately Found I in the vast, Weed-encumbered, sombre, stately Graveyard of the Past; And a presence moved before me On that gloomy shore, As a waft of wind, that o'er me Breathed, and was no more.

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REMINISCENCES.

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Anecdotes of the Noted Poet--His Peculiarities and Characteristics-- How Some of his Works Were Conceived.

Probably no public man of the many in and around Boston was more visited by strangers than Longfellow. Yet he never seemed bored, and was apparently always glad to extend all the hospitality in his power to whoever appreciated his work enough to desire his acquaintance. Last year two young ladies from Iowa, visiting in Boston, wrote a note to him, telling how much they loved his poems and what a wish they had to see him. In the next mail came a most cordial reply, appointing a time when he would be at liberty to meet them, and since then they have loved the man even more than his poetry.

This is but one instance of his universal kindness. His neighbors and friends in his own city will feel his loss far more than his world-wide circle of admirers. Said a gentleman who had known him long: "I shall miss his familiar form, which I used to see so often on our street; I shall miss the cheery voice and gracious wave of the hand with which he always greeted me. I don't believe he had an enemy in the world, and I am sure that every person who ever knew him feels that he has lost a friend."

The following story is told by Prof. Luigi Monti: For many years he had been in the habit of dining with the poet on Saturday. On Christmas day, as he was walking briskly toward the old historic house, he was accosted by a girl about 12 years old, who inquired the way to Longfellow's home. He told her it was some distance down the street, but if she would walk along with him he would show her. When they reached the gate, she said, "Do you think I can go in the yard?" "Oh, yes," said Signor Monti, "Do you see the room on the left? That's where Martha Washington held her receptions a hundred years ago. If you look at the windows on the right you will probably see a white-haired gentleman reading a paper. Well, that will be Mr. Longfellow." She looked gratified and happy at the unexpected pleasure of really seeing the man whose poems she said she loved. As Signor Monti drew near the house he saw Mr. Longfellow standing with his back against the window, his head, of course, out of sight. When he went in the kind hearted Italian said, "Do look out of the window and bow to that little girl, who wants to see you very much." "A little girl wants to see me very much--where is she?" He hastened to the door, and, beckoning with his hand, called out, "Come here, little girl; come here, if you want to see me." She needed no second invitation, and after shaking her hand and asking her name, he kindly took her into the house, showed her the "old clock on the stairs," the chair made from the village smithy's chestnut tree, presented to him by the Cambridge children, and the beautiful pictures and souvenirs gathered in many years of foreign residence. That child will carry all her life delightful memories of her Christmas call at Mr. Longfellow's. This little incident shows how deep and genuine was the love for children, which found such frequent expression in Mr. Longfellow's verse.

Among the many opinions of the dead poet recorded in every tongue there may be mentioned those of Dom Pedro II, of Brazil. In 1855, Rev. J.C. Fletcher took a number of specimens of American literature, art and manufactures to the capital of Brazil, where he was permitted to exhibit them in the National Museum. They were first visited by Dom Pedro, who, after an examination of the various works, made remarks on Irving, Cooper and Prescott, showing an intimate acquaintance with each. He then, with great earnestness of manner, said: "M. Fletcher, avez-vous les poemes de M. Longfellow?" Mr. Fletcher replied in the negative, whereupon his majesty said: "I am exceedingly sorry, for I have sought in every book store in Rio de Janeiro for Longfellow, and I cannot find it. I have a number of beautiful morceaux from him, but I wish the whole work. I admire him so much." Afterward, at the palace of S. Christopher, when Mr. Fletcher took leave of the Emperor, the latter said to him: "When you return to your country have the kindness to say to Mr. Longfellow how much pleasure he has given me, and be pleased to tell him combien je l'estime, combien je l'aime."

Tribute of a Well-Known Poet.

One of the best-known poets and authors in this vicinity, whose renown is as wide as the knowledge of the English tongue, whose sentiments are of the tenderest in human nature, who has been for many years officially connected with the same institution of learning which his departed friend so long served, and who is ripe with honors and years, on learning of the sad event said that it was a severe loss to the literary fraternity of Boston; nay, also to the literary fraternity of the world, and that none felt it more than himself. Of his life and works, he said, it is yet too early to speak. Many a biographical notice will be written, much will be said and sung of the poet who has gone from us, and he too will in due time give his thoughts to the world. In his official connection with some of the societies of which Longfellow was a member, he will probably have much to say of his fellow worker in the field of literature. Personally he had not met Professor Longfellow for a long time. The latter seldom left his house at Cambridge, and he himself was so tied down to his work in Boston that he had not seen nearly as much of the poet as he would have wished. Formerly they met frequently in Boston circles, but of late years few opportunities of exchanging social greetings have occurred. Even though connected with the same university they never came into official contact with one another. As literary men they worked in harmony, and the gap he leaves in the band of literati is by none more deplored than the gentleman in question.

How Some of His Poems Were Conceived.

Mr. James T. Fields writes as follows: "As I happened to know of the birth of many of Longfellow's poems, let me divulge to you a few of their secrets. 'The Psalm of Life' came into existence on a bright summer morning in July, 1838, in Cambridge, as the poet sat between two windows, at a small table, in the corner of his chamber. It was a voice from his inmost heart, and he kept it unpublished for a long time; it expressed his own feelings at that time, when recovering from a deep affliction, and he hid it in his own heart for many months. The poem of 'The Reaper Death' came without effort, crystalized into his mind. 'The Light of the Stars' was composed on a serene and beautiful summer evening, exactly suggestive of the poem. The 'Wreck of the Hesperus' was written the night after a violent storm had occurred, and as the poet sat smoking his pipe, the 'Hesperus' came sailing into hid mind; he went to bed, but could not sleep, and rose and wrote the celebrated verses. It hardly caused him an effort, but flowed on without let or hindrance. On a summer afternoon in 1849, as he was riding on the beach, 'The Skeleton in Armor' rose, as out of the deep, before him, and would not be laid. One of the best-known of all Longfellow's shorter poems is 'Excelsior.' That one word happened to catch his eye one autumn evening in 1841, on a torn piece of newspaper, and straightway his imagination took fire at it. Taking up a piece of paper, which happened to be the back of a letter received that day from Charles Sumner, he crowded it with verses. As first written down, 'Excelsior' differs from the perfected and published version, but it shows a rush and glow worthy of its author. 'The Story of Evangeline' was first suggested to Hawthorne by a friend who wished him to found a romance on it. Hawthorne did not quite coincide with the idea, and he handed it over to Longfellow, who saw in it all the elements of a deep and tender idyll."

An Old and Very Intimate Friend

of Professor Longfellow on being asked to give a few reminiscences or incidents in the life of the poet said: "Well, you have imposed a hard task upon me now. I became acquainted with Mr. Longfellow about the time of the starting of the Atlantic Monthly and there is practically nothing that I now recall that is like a reminiscence. Springing from a family of ample means and with an earnest natural desire for study, Mr. Longfellow was a professor of languages at an age when most young men are amusing themselves yachting or running through the woods or over mountains. His life was like a river, broad and placid, and spreading out without a break or ripple. While mild and gentle in his manners there was an outspoken frankness about him which won all hearts. He delighted to draw around him his intimate friends, and many of his works only thinly disguised their friendship. Among his most intimate social connections were Professor Felton, Charles Sumner, Mr. Lowell, Mr. Emerson, and, in his earlier life, Mr. Hawthorne. Of late he has been very friendly with Professor Moroti. Of course there were many others who were intimates of the house, but those that I have mentioned were his warmest friends. In regard to his literary work he was most quiet and unassuming, and always perfected his productions before allowing them to be seen by the outside world. His copy when sent to the publisher was always in a printed form, for he maintained a private printing office, and had his work thus perfected before parting with it. In this connection there is another thing that is not perhaps generally known; Mr. Longfellow has the original manuscripts of all his works elegantly bound and arranged on the shelves of his library. As I before said, not a single reminiscence comes to my mind at the present time, and it is almost impossible for me to conceive that he is dead. Why, I called on him about a week go and found him so lighthearted and gay that I remarked the circumstance and commented upon it and hoped that it would continue. During his early life at Cambridge in 1836 it is stated that he applied to Craigie House for rooms, but was refused, the reason being given that they did not let rooms to students. On his explaining that he was a professor he was accommodated with rooms, which he occupied for many years. The suddenness of the announcement that the silver cord is loosed and the loved voice is hushed has driven all else from my mind and I cannot think of anything that could be of interest at this time."

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IN GENERAL.

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Circulation of His Works--The Funeral Arrangements as Far as Perfected, Etc.

It is safe to say that the circulation of Mr. Longfellow's writings has been number by millions. Twenty-five years ago, in 1857, the total sales of his works in this country had reached 325,550 copies, and eighteen different English publishers were supplying the English market with rival editions. The last twenty-five years have been fruitful years, for the most part, and new volumes have been welcomed by an always eager public, while his earlier writings have kept their place in the popular regard. Translations of his writings have also been made in German, Swedish and other European tongues, and there is no living poet writing in the English tongue whose fame may be so accurately described as world-wide as his.

Among those who sent letters of inquiry, or called personally at the house yesterday before the death of the poet, were Dr. Holmes, President Eliot of Harvard and all of the professors there, John G. Whittier, Mayor Green, Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, Walt Whitman, James Russell Lowell, George W. Childs.

The Funeral Arrangements.

Nothing definite has been decided as to the funeral and burial. It will take place probably on Monday, from Appleton chapel, and will be private, only the relatives and most intimate friends being present. The arrangements will not be decided upon until some time today. In the city of Cambridge all the public buildings will be closed, and flags will be raised to half-mast. Many of the stores will close, and the day will be given to mourning and prayer.

The Dead Poet's Brother Too Late.

PHILADELPHIA, March 24.--Rev. Samuel Longfellow, pastor of the Unitarian church of Germantown and brother of the dead poet, left here this morning on receipt of a telegram from Boston announcing his brother's alarming condition, but too late to be on hand at the last moment.

Sympathy in London.

LONDON, March 25.--The news of the death of the poet Longfellow was received here too late for the morning journals to give a detailed announcement. They all, however, make short notices, which are fervid and sympathetic in tone. _________________________________________

Boston, MA: The Boston Daily Globe, issue of Sunday, 26 March 1882, p. 8, cols. 1-3

THE DEAD POET.

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Many Incidents of Note in the Life of Longfellow.

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Tribute to His Memory from the Poet Whittier.

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The Arrangements for the Funeral Services Completed.

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There are many incidents in the life of a great man which more clearly portray his character than the most carefully-written biography. Thus it was with Longfellow. His unassuming manner, coupled with an intellect that had won laurels ere the boy-poet had stepped into the thoughts and desires of manhood, opened for him the bright road which he so evenly trod. His early songs are the childish hymns of American literature, which may be said to have seen the light with his boyhood productions. They came like the glimmer of stars in midnight's hour to startle the few narrow, intolerant and controversial religious weeklies which then were so generally accepted as guides and teachers. It was a time when the writers of our day were awaiting for the light which the youthful Longfellow in his "Woods in Winter," "An April Day," "Hymn of the Moravian Nuns," and "Sunrise on the Hills" shone down upon them. Companionship in letters then became a reality; before, it hardly existed. Bryant had indeed published his "Thanatopsis," and Washington Irving his "Knickerbocker's History of New York" a few years previous, but Poe had not yet issued his first book. Motley was trying his pen unsuccessfully at fiction and was yet to learn that he was a historian. Whittier was just leaving the farm and the shoemaker's bench to become editor of a short-lived tariff newspaper. Cooper had yet in the crucible his unformed stories of Indian and pioneer life. Hawthorne was buried in the college cloister, and Prescott, the brilliant essayist, unknown except to the limited circle of readers of the North American Review. To the youthful Longfellow does American literature owe much of the impetus that ne'er stopped until its great and grand monument was built with the dead poet surmounting its topmost pillar. He comes of

The Good Old Colonial Stock,

being a descendant on his mother's side of the famous John Alden of Revolutionary days; his father a leader of the Maine bar and a member of the national Congress. Hon. Stephen Longfellow was known to a wide circle of friends as "the honest lawyer," which would indicate that honest lawyers were rare three-quarters of a century ago. Entering Bowdoin College in 1825, he had as classmates John S.C. Abbott, the popular historian; Jonathan Cilley, who was one of the readiest debaters in Congress of his time, and who was killed in the memorable duel with Graves; J.W. Bradley, eminent in law and politics; George B. Cheever, the Gideon of the anti-slavery campaign, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, of whom it is said that Longfellow obtained the plot which led to the writing of Evangeline. Hawthorne was about to prose the mournful story of the English work in Arcadia, when Longfellow, seeing the great latitude for beautiful imagery, secured the plot and wove the longings of the fair Evangeline. At college his pen made pretty things, which were published in the poet's corner of the Portland papers at the compensation of $2 a poem. He graduated in his eighteenth year, and, in order that his alma mater might not lose him, they extended to him, six months after graduating, the chair of professor of modern languages and literature, which had been created specially for him. It came about in this way: While yet a college student, young Longfellow wrote a metrical translation of one of Horace's odes. The beauty of expression in the translation attracted the attention of the examiners, and when the board of trustees voted to establish the chair, Hon. Benjamin Orr, a distinguished lawyer of Maine and a lover of Horace, nominated Mr. Longfellow and referred to his translations as proof of his fitness. The translation itself, with the autographs of Longfellow, Calvin Stowe and John A. Andrew, is now in the collection of Professor Egbert C. Smyth of Andover. To fit himself for the position he spent

Three Years of His Life Abroad,

studying French, German, Italian and Spanish. President Hamlin wrote of him after one year's occupancy of the chair, about as follows: "When I entered Bowdoin College in 1830 our class numbered fifty-two, and many of its members were attracted by Longfellow's reputation. His intercourse with the students was perfectly simple, frank and gentlemanly. His pupils always left him with admiration for him, and were guided, helped and inspired by him. In 1835, while studying abroad, preparatory to accepting the chair of modern languages at Harvard College, he lost his young wife at Rotterdam. How acceptably he filled his new position Rev. Edward E. Hale, who was one of his pupils, writes in a letter dated Roxbury, February 5, 1881. Mr. Hale wrote that the section which Mr. Longfellow taught when he first went to Cambridge are now all near 60 years old, and yet every one of them would expect Mr. Longfellow to readily recognize him and enter into a familiar talk. "He chose to take with us the relation of a personal friend a few years older than we were. He instructed the section, not in a dingy recitation room, but in a sort of a parlor, carpeted, hung with pictures, and handsomely furnished, which was known as "the corporation room." The pupils gathered around a mahogany table, which was reported to be meant for the dinners of the trustees, and the whole affair had the aspect of a friendly gathering in a private house."

With his first coming to Cambridge is related a memorable incident. About half a mile from Harvard College, and a little back from the elm-shaded avenue which leads to Mount Auburn, stands an old-fashioned square house with a broad piazza looking out upon its garden, and its front windows commanding a view of the quiet Charles river. It is the Craigie mansion, and has been Mr. Longfellow's home since 1837. Mrs. Andrew Craigie used to let her rooms to lodgers, and in the summer of that year a slight,

Studious-Looking Young Man

banged the huge brass knocker on her front door, and asked if there was a room in the house which he might occupy. The stately old lady who came to the door, looking all the more dignified for the turban which was wound around her head, replied, as she looked at the youthful figure:

"I lodge students no longer."

"But I am not a student; I am a professor in the university."

"A professor?" She looked curiously at one so unlike most professors in appearance.

"I am Professor Longfellow," said the young man.

The name seemed to remove all the old lady's doubts, and she invited him in, with "I will show you what there is." The house had been General Washington's headquarters when he took command of the Revolutionary forces in Cambridge. The old lady, proud of her house, led the young man through it, showing one spacious room after another, but always shutting the doors of each with the admonition, "You cannot have that." At length she led him into the southeast corner room of the second story, saying: "This was General Washington's room, and this you may have." Here the young man gladly set up his home. In this house Edward Everett and Jared Sparks had lived, and after Mr. Longfellow bought it he had Mr. Joseph E. Worcester share it with him. The old house, which witnessed the plannings and plottings of the early patriots in their struggles for liberty, also sheltered the best loved among the literary men of America. Mr. Longfellow's works reach world-wide. He was a hard student and a great digger into the annals and customs of the past. "The Golden Legend" was the first fruit of three years and a half study in European life and literature. He carefully studied the Indian legends of Schoolcraft, Carlin and Heck-welder, and then produced his renowned "Hiawatha." He caught the wild and rhythmical language of legends in the measures of the Flemish and Spanish poets, and worked it into this beautiful poem on the "Forest Life of American Aborigines."

Within a Year 50,000 Volumes

of the work was sold in this country, and it was reprinted in England in several editions. It appeared in Germany in two translations. "Minnehaha" and "Hiawatha" became popular catchwords. The beautiful three-decked ship Minnehaha, launched from a Boston ship-yard, served as a peripatetic monument. Mr. Longfellow was both a versatile and profound scholar. He was thoroughly familiar with all the European languages and literatures, except the Russian. He never wrote on any theme till patient study had made him its master. How he ever found time for his studies was a mystery which his most intimate friends could not solve. He wrote rapidly, but revised slowly. He often left a poem in his portfolio for months before giving it to the public. He never wrote till expression became a necessity, or, at least, an impulse. "Excelsior" was written one evening on the back of a letter received from Charles Sumner, the theme having been suggested by the word "excelsior," which caught his eye in an evening paper. One evening he and Professor Felton sat before the study fire; the queer antique pitcher with its Bacchanalian forms and vases was brought in to furnish them a drink of water, and the famous drinking song was born and written, it is believed, that very night. From what is known of Mr. Longfellow's character, many of his readers have been led to suppose that the picture of the student drawn in the poem of "The Wayside Inn" was not a description of himself. The wayside Inn is the old red house at Sudbury, Mass., the story-tellers are guests who used to gather there. The names given to the story-tellers are as follows: The Sicilian, Professor Luigi Monti; the student, Henry Wales; the musician, Ole Bull; the poet, Theophilus Parsons; the merchant, Edulei, a Boston oriental dealer; the theologian, Professor Treadwell, the inn-keeper, Lyman Howe. That portion of the poem which relates to the student, and is confidently supposed by many of the late poet's friends

To Have Been the Writer Himself,

runs as follows:

A youth was there, of quiet ways, A student of old books and days, To whom all tongues and lands were known, And yet a lover of his own, With many a social virtue grand, And yet a friend of solitude; A man of such a genial mood The heart of all things he embraced, And yet of such fastidious taste He never found the best too good. Books were his passion and delight, And in his upper room at home Stood many a rare and sumptuous tome In vellum bound, with gold bedight, Great volumes garmented in white, Recalling Florence, Pisa, Rome. He loved the twilight that surrounds The border-land of old romance; Where glitter herbeck, helm and lance, And banner waves and trumpet sounds, And ladies ride with hawk on writs, And mighty warriors sweep along, Magnified by the purple mist The dusk of centuries and of song, The chronicles of Charlemagne, Of Merlin and the Mort d'Arthur, Mingled together in his brain With tales of Flores and Blanchefleur, Sir Ferumbras, Sir Eglamore, Sir Launcelot, Sir Morgadom, SIr Gay, Sir Bevis, Sir Gawain.

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THE FUNERAL.

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The Brother of the Dead Poet to Officiate at the Services, Which Will be Strictly Private.

The arrangements for the funeral have been completed and are of a very simple nature, quite in keeping with the unostentatious life of the deceased. At 3 o'clock this afternoon services will be held at the late residence. The services will be strictly private, and only the relatives and few of the most intimate friends of the poet will be present. It is understood that Rev. Samuel Longfellow of Philadelphia, a brother of the deceased, will conduct the religious exercises, which will be very brief. There will be no music, and directly after the family and friends have taken a last look at the features of the loved one the remains will be taken to Mount Auburn for interment. There will be no opportunity for the general public to look at the face of the dead poet, and no one will be admitted to the cemetery at the time of the funeral. A detachment from Station 1 will be on duty during the afternoon, and although there may be many would-be visitors on the occasion none can pass the gates.

At 4.30 public religious services will be held in Appleton Chapel, in the College yard, to be conducted by the officials of Harvard. The addresses of the occasion will be given by Rev. Francis Peabody and Rev. C.C. Everett. It is expected that many prominent people will attend this meeting, which is in the nature of a public expression of sorrow.

The casket in which the remains of the poet repose is covered with black cloth, and no attempt at display is made, even the handles being covered with the same plain material. The plate upon the casket tells the story in a simple manner:

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. BORN FEBRUARY 27, 1807. DIED MARCH 24, 1882.

Mr. Longfellow during his college work attended divine service at the chapel, but for the past quarter of the century has attended the First Unitarian Church, Harvard Square, where he owned a pew.

Rev. Oscar F. Safford, pastor of the First Universalist Church, Cambridge, will give a memorial discourse in his church this evening, and in most of the pulpits reference will be made to the sad event which has cast a shadow of gloom over the entire community.

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ANECDOTES AND REMINISCENCES.

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The Leading Traits of the Poet's Character Illustrated by Incidents in His Life-- Interesting Facts Concerning Him and His History.

At the present time anything relating to the great poet will be read with a peculiar interest. The anecdotes and reminiscences given below are gathered from trustworthy sources, are here printed for the first time, and if explanation were needed would do much to explain the remarkable love and esteem in which the venerable poet was held:

It is the general impression that the "old clock on the stairs," which Longfellow made the subject of one of his most beautiful poems, is the clock which now stands on the landing half-way up the stairs in the old Craigie house at Cambridge, and which has been gazed upon with wonder and veneration by so many visitors. This, however, is a mistake. The original clock, which served as the inspiration of the poem, is an heirloom in the Appleton family, and stands at present at the head of the staircase in the home of Mr. Thomas G. Appleton, No. 10 Commonwealth avenue, in this city. Mrs. Longfellow's mother was a Miss Gold of Pittsfield, and the clock originally stood in the family mansion at that place, where the Appletons resided for some thirty years. When Mr. Appleton decided to remove to the seaside in 1853 he sold the old home, the purchaser being a Mr. Plunkett. At this time Mr. Thomas G. Appleton insisted that the clock should not be sold with the house, and his wishes were complied with, although Mrs. Plunkett was very unwilling to give it up. The clock is in an excellent state of preservation, and from its appearance one would hardly realize that its age is so great as it actually is. Mr. Longfellow picked up a handsome old-fashioned clock at an auction sale in this city several years ago, and this is the one now standing on the staircase in the Craigie house. Visitors naturally associated the clock with the poem, and it was not always possible or convenient to correct the error. Another clock of similar appearance, which now stands in the old family mansion in Pittsfield, has also been erroneously taken for the clock mentioned in the poem. The poem refers entirely to incidents in the history of the Appleton family, and was written by Mr. Longfellow while spending a summer in Pittsfield. One of his friends asked the poet one day if he would not write a poem upon some subject which he had in mind. Mr. Longfellow replied that he thought he had an idea, and the next day he produced the completed poem which has since then

Touched So Many Hearts.

Mr. Longfellow passed an entire summer at the old Melville house in Pittsfield, where the family dined in the hall, as was the custom in these houses. A lady once told Mr. Thomas G. Appleton that in this same hall she had once dined, seated between Colonel Hamilton and Aaron Burr. The house was situated half a mile from the village on the road to Lenox, quite near Dr. Holmes' house. During the summer that he spent there, Longfellow wrote "Kavanagh," which is full of description of Berkshire scenery.

His best prose work, "Hyperion," was the result of a summer passed in Switzerland, where he met his wife's family for the first time. Mr. Nathan Appleton, Mrs. Longfellow's father, was traveling in style through the country, with his footmen and postillions, and at Zurich the inn-keeper, as inn-keepers often do, thought he could charge heavily for what he gave. Mr. Appleton had written his name in the travellers' book, with compliments to the hotel, which he regretted when the bill was brought to him. "But I have not written my nmae," said Mr. Longfellow, "and if you will allow me I will treat the innkeeper as he deserves." The name of the inn was "The Raven." Mr. Longfellow withdrew with the book, and in five minutes returned with these witty lines written under his name:

Beware of the Raven of Zurich, 'Tis a bird of omen ill, With an ugly unclean nest And a very, very long bill.

Mr. Longfellow had a strong sense of the humorous, and many a witty impromptu resulted from the occurrence of some slight incident or accident. One summer, twenty years ago and more, when the Appletons were living in Lynn, the poet's son, Charles Longfellow, who was always very fond of sailing a boat, and who has since become known as a great yachtsman, came over in his boat one day to make a call.

The Surf Was Very High,

the boat was capsized, and he was thrown into the water. He was wet to the skin, of course, and was compelled to make an entire change of clothing. Captain Nathan Appleton, in place of his shoes, loaned him a pair of slippers, which he wore home. A few days afterward his father, Mr. Longfellow, returned the slippers in a neatly-wrapped parcel, with the following lines written on the outside:

Slippers that, perhaps another Sailing o'er the bay of Lynn, A forlorn or shipwrecked nephew Seeing, may purloin again.

The mother of Captain Nathan Appleton was a Miss Sumner, a cousin of Charles Sumner. She was of about the same age as Longfellow, and the two were always intimate friends. Before she married Mr. Appleton, and before Mr. Longfellow married his wife, one day when he came from Portland to call upon her he wore a pair of new boots, which were very noisy. When he went away the next day, he left a little poem written on a card, which Captain Appleton still has in his possession. It is as follows:

I knew by the boots that so terribly creaked, Along the front entry, a stranger was near; I said, if there's grease to be found in the world, My friend from the East stands in need of it here.

The war made a very great impression upon Mr. Longfellow personally, from the fact that his oldest son then was a lieutenant in the First Massachusetts Cavalry. Lieutenant Longfellow was very severely wounded in the Mine Run campaign in Virginia, in the autumn of 1863, and Mr. Longfellow went down to meet him at Washington. While in the city he suffered from an attack of malaria. It is very likely that his beautiful poem,

"Killed at the Fords"

is inspired by this incident.

Mr. Longfellow was very fond of the theatre, and was a frequent attendant upon theatrical performances. He always extended a cordial welcome to any members of the theatrical profession who were properly introduced to him. Among others who visited him and who were received by him with him the cordial hospitality which he always showed to strangers, may be mentioned Rossi, Salvini, Miss Nillsson the singer, Miss Neilson, the beautiful English actress, Miss Genevieve Ward, Blanche Roosevelt, Miss Sarah Jewett, whose poems he thoroughly appreciated, and whom he encouraged with his advice both as an actress and a poet, and many others who have a charming recollection of their reception at the Craigie house. When Mlle. Rhea was here in the early winter she expressed an earnest desire to visit Cambridge and be introduced to the great poet. Mr. Longfellow was unwell at the time, and there was some doubt as to whether he would be able to see her. She was driven out by Captain Nathan Appleton, however, and to her great joy the poet was able to receive her in his customary gracious manner. The short call was highly enjoyed both by the poet and the actress. Mlle. Rhea recited to the author in English the little poem, "The Maiden and the Weathercock," then recently written, a graceful compliment, which gave great pleasure to the venerable poet.

The Last Two Summers

Mr. Longfellow spent at Nahant, his daughter and her children being there. He found the sea air very cold, however, and it was his custom to wear a heavy overcoat to protect him from the chill breezes. At Nahant Mr. Longfellow wrote very little. He took only a few volumes with him, but received impressions which he later expressed in verse. He generally matured his poems before he wrote them. This he did sometimes completely. All his poems are written, not with a pen, but with a pencil. The original manuscripts are all preserved, and in handsome bindings now stand on the shelves of his library. He always liked to be alone while writing, and always said he could do better work in his own library at home than anywhere else.

At Nahant he was constantly receiving visitors, some of whom came from distant countries across the ocean. Often they would drive with him, at the early hour of 3, and return to Boston on the afternoon boat. Two summers ago a Bulgarian lady, resident in Italy, herself a writer, the Princess Ghika, known as Dora d'Istria, called upon him, and the poet, to her great delight, recited to her his poem of "The Maid and Weather-Cock," which he had just written. The same summer Lady Duffus Hardy, who has written a most pleasant book on America, also called upon him with her daughter.

The number of people who have taken an interest in Longfellow's poems, and to whom they have become household words, is simply legion. Mrs. Kate Chase Sprague is fond of telling how when she was a little girl she used to learn Longfellow's anti-slavery poems by heart. Her father was one of the leaders in the anti-slavery movement, and she was always made to repeat, before any strangers who called Longfellow's first poem on slavery, "The Slave's Dream." This poem among many others she still remembers by heart today.

Longfellow was a Strong Republican

in sentiment, although he took no active part in politics. He endorsed all that was good in the Republican doctrine, and his sympathies were with that party. He felt strongly that something ought to be done to bring about some arrangement with regard to copyright between America and foreign countries. Personally of course he was largely interested in this question, but, aside from his personal interest, he was international in his views and believed that a man's writings were his personal property and should be secured to him just as a patent is to an inventor. He wanted to have right done by all authors, and he felt that this could be done in no other way than by the passage of an international copyright law.

It was Longfellow's custom always to visit Portland, his old home, for a week or so every year. He was always glad, however, to get back to Cambridge, which he regarded as his home, and from which he never liked to be absent. With him, in reality, "to stay at home" was "best." He had a very large correspondence, every mail bringing him letters from his admirers in all parts of the world. He was extremely conscientious about answering these letters, and always made some reply whenever it was required, even if it were only a brief word or two. He always did his writing at the table in his library and seemed to feel that he could not compose except at his own table. His courtesy to strangers who visited him, too, was something remarkable. Of the thousands who called upon him, all were welcome, and each was received with such friendly hospitality as to make him feel almost like a particular guest.

Longfellow's first successful volume, his "Voices of the Night," was published by Mr. John Owen, who, until Mr. Longfellow's death, was one of his bosom friends, and who still survives him. The volume was gotten up in unpretentious style, with a picture on the cover representing a pine tree with an owl on it staring at the moon. A greater contrast than that between this little book and the magnificent illustrated edition of his works, which was recently published by the Osgoods, and in which the poet took great pride, could hardly be imagined. Mr. Niles, the publisher, says that when he first went into the book trade many years ago he found in his stock 150 copies of one of Longfellow's first books, entitled "Coplas de Manirque." He does not remember what became of these books, but thinks they went to the paper mill, being altogether unsalable. They would now probably be

Worth Their Weight in Gold.

Mr. Owen was of great use to Mr. Longfellow in the preparation of his "Poems of Places." Another of the surviving friends of Mr. Longfellow, and a friend of his youth, is Mr. George W. Greene, the historian, and a grandson of General Greene. When they were both young they roomed together in the Piazza Navona, in Rome, where Mr. Longfellow was nursed through an attack of the Roman fever by his friend Greene.

Mr. Longfellow was an enthusiastic admirer of the climate and scenery of the south of France, and often expressed a desire to revisit the localities with which he was so charmed. He talked quite seriously of accompanying Mr. and Mrs. Dana in their proposed trip to Europe this spring, but it is improbable that his health would have permitted him to leave home for such an extended journey.

One who was intimately connected with Mr. Longfellow, both by family ties and the bonds of friendship, says of him: "Mr. Longfellow always seemed to have time to spare for a friend or a visitor. He was never caught writing a poem. His artistic skill was so great that each poem had a natural, apparently inevitable beginning, middle and end. He never put in verses to fill up. His melody was his own, not exceeded by any lyricist in English. His rhymes are always perfect and he was unforgiving of negligence in others. Anything slovenly was repugnant to him. One of his especial traits was his appositeness and originality of his similes. But beyond his melody, his shaping skill, and his perfect rhymes, was what painters call tone, something breathing through all refinement, purity and charm. Though he sometimes expressed a moral lesson in verse, yet this tone comes nearer to us, like an atmosphere, and is what the reader so often feels does him good. His verse is never a toy or a tour de force; it is an incident or a picture of life, and the lesson it conveys is a part of its existence. He not only gives the reader a beautiful work of art, but at the same time he subtly instills his own nobleness, good cheer and purity. He has probably done men more good than any poet of his time. His great rival, Tennyson, might well envy him this quality, which no doubt he does."

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WHITTIER'S RECOLLECTIONS.

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How the Sad News was Received by the Venerable Poet.

[Special Despatch to The Sunday Globe.]

SALEM, March 25.--About 7.30 this morning a Globe correspondent rode up to the pleasant residence of John G. Whittier at Oak Knoll, Danvers. Presenting his card he was ushered into the parlor, and in a few moments was greeted by the venerable poet, to whom the reporter imparted the sad news of the decease of his friend, H.W. Longfellow. The news was sudden, although not unexpected, as on Saturday last he had visited Longfellow's home and was unable to see him. His first introduction to Mr. Longfellow was in 1845, at the residence of the late James T. Fields, with whom Mr. Whittier was then making his first arrangements for the publication of his works. Mr. Whittier has never been as intimate with the deceased as he wished, but in all his relations with him, as with other American authors, there has been a perfect freedom from all jealousy, professional or otherwise. His death was a great loss to Boston and to the world, as no man was more beloved. His ways were always cheerful with all, and he never lost patience even with interviewers. He considered him the foremost of American poets, and only second to Tennyson. His culture, travel and experience written into his works showed him the man and the scholar. One week ago he met Dr. Holmes in Boston, and conversed with him in regard to the inevitable separation that must come sooner or later, and none could tell which one would be first called. Longfellow had once visited him at his residence in Amesbury, in company with his life-long friend, the late Charles Sumner, and all his meetings had been unusually pleasant. Mr. Whittier alluded more than once to the entire absence of jealousy among Boston's authors, and expressed his regrets that he could not say more in regard to the deceased.

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IN GENERAL.

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Longfellow's Poetic Dramas.

Longfellow's poetic dramas, of which "The Spanish Student" remains the finest example, have been but seldom brought out upon the stage in English. But the work just mentioned has, we believe, been represented behind the footlights in several theatres on the continent, and the representation has been attended with success. Longfellow was very fond of the drama as well as of music, and his face was very often seen at the play and the opera. Two years ago he was much interested in Miss Blanche Roosevelt's scheme to produce on the stage his "Masque of Pandora," and in furtherance of the project gave the poem a recast, adding a few verses for its acting form. Mr. Alfred Cellier, the composer of "Prince Toto," wrote the score for "The Masque," and a special company, including Miss Roosevelt, Mr. Hugh Talbot and others, was engaged for its presentation. But the work, though it was brought out at the Boston in January, 1880, in very complete style, failed to possess dramatic interest, and was strangely devoid in attractive power. In time, "THe Masque of Pandora" was a stage failure, and it is understood that the poet was himself a considerable loser by the presentation. It is worthy of note that another effort to make "The Masque" a success on the stage will be made by a New York manager in a few weeks. _________________________________________