Chapter II: Literature of the New Nation (1800-1840) (1)

Behind him lay the gray Azores,
Behind, the gates of Hercules;
Before him not the ghost of shores,
Before him only shoreless seas.
The good mate said, "Now must we pray,
For lo! the very stars are gone:
Brave Admiral, speak; what shall I say?"
"Why say, 'Sail on! sail on! and on!'"

Joaquin Miller, "Columbus"

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND. It was in the early part of the nineteenth
century that America began to be counted among the great nations of
the world, and it was precisely at that time that she produced her
first national literature, a literature so broadly human that it
appealed not only to the whole country but to readers beyond the
sea. Irving, Cooper and Bryant are commonly regarded as the first
notable New World writers; and we may better understand them and
their enthusiastic young contemporaries if we remember that they
"grew up with the country"; that they reflected life at a time when
America, having won her independence and emerged from a long period
of doubt and struggle, was taking her first confident steps in the
sun and becoming splendidly conscious of her destiny as a leader
among the world's free people.

[Sidenote: NATIONAL ENTHUSIASM]

Indeed, there was good reason for confidence in those early days;
for never had a young nation looked forth upon a more heartening
prospect. The primitive hamlets of Colonial days had been replaced
by a multitude of substantial towns, the somber wilderness by a
prosperous farming country. The power of a thousand rivers was
turning the wheels of as many mills or factories, and to the
natural wealth of America was added the increase of a mighty
commerce with other nations. By the Louisiana Purchase and the
acquisition of Florida her territory was vastly increased, and
still her sturdy pioneers were pressing eagerly into more spacious
lands beyond the Mississippi. Best of all, this enlarging nation,
once a number of scattered colonies holding each to its own course,
was now the Union; her people were as one in their patriotism,
their loyalty, their intense conviction that the brave New World
experiment in free government, once scoffed at as an idle dream,
was destined to a glorious future. American democracy was not
merely a success; it was an amazing triumph. Moreover, this
democracy, supposed to be the weakest form of government, had
already proved its power; it had sent its navy abroad to humble the
insolent Barbary States, and had measured the temper of its soul
and the strength of its arm in the second war with Great Britain.

In fine, the New World had brought forth a hopeful young giant of a
nation; and its hopefulness was reflected, with more of zeal than
of art, in the prose and poetry of its literary men. Just as the
enthusiastic Elizabethan spirit reflected itself in lyric or drama
after the defeat of the Armada, so the American spirit seemed to
exult in the romances of Cooper and Simms; in the verse of
Pinckney, Halleck, Drake and Percival; in a multitude of national
songs, such as "The American Flag," Warren's Address, "Home Sweet
Home" and "The Star-Spangled Banner." We would not venture to liken
one set of writings to the other, for we should be on the weak side
of an Elizabethan comparison; we simply note that a great national
enthusiasm was largely responsible for the sudden appearance of a
new literature in the one land as in the other.

LITERARY ENVIRONMENT. In the works of four writers, Irving, Cooper, Bryant and Poe, we have the best that the early national period produced; but we shall not appreciate these writers until we see them, like pines in a wood, lifting their heads over numerous companions, all drawing their nourishment from the same soil and air. The growth of towns and cities in America had led to a rapid increase of newspapers, magazines and annuals (collections of contemporary prose and verse), which called with increasing emphasis for poems, stories, essays, light or "polite" literature. The rapid growth of the nation set men to singing the old psalm of _Sursum Corda_, and every man and woman who felt the impulse added his story or his verse to the national chorus. When the first attempt at a summary of American literature was made in 1837, the author, Royal Robbins, found more than two thousand living writers demanding his attention.

[Sidenote: KNICKERBOCKER SCHOOL]

It was due, one must think, to geography rather than to any spirit of sectionalism, to difficulty of travel between the larger towns rather than to any difference of aim or motive, that the writers of this period associated themselves in a number of so-called schools or literary centers. New York, which now offered a better field for literary work than Boston or Philadelphia, had its important group of writers called the Knickerbocker School, which included Fitz-Greene Halleck and Joseph Rodman Drake, both poets and cheerful satirists of New World society; the versatile Nathaniel Parker Willis, writer of twenty volumes of poems, essays, stories and sketches of travel; and James Kirke Paulding, also a voluminous writer, who worked with Irving in the _Salmagundi_ essays and whose historical novels, such as _The Dutchman's Fireside_ (1831), are still mildly interesting. [Footnote: Irving, Cooper and Bryant are sometimes classed among the Knickerbockers; but the work of these major writers is national rather than local or sectional, and will be studied later in detail.]

[Sidenote: SOUTHERN WRITERS]

In the South was another group of young writers, quite as able and enthusiastic as their northern contemporaries. Among these we note especially William Gilmore Simms (1806-1870), whose _Yemassee_, _Border Beagles_, _Katherine Walton_ and many other historical romances of Colonial and Revolutionary days were of more than passing interest. He was a high-minded and most industrious writer, who produced over forty volumes of poems, essays, biographies, histories and tales; but he is now remembered chiefly by his novels, which won him the title of "the Cooper of the South." At least one of his historical romances should be read, partly for its own sake and partly for a comparison with Cooper's work in the same field. Thus _The Yemassee_ (1835), dealing with frontier life and Indian warfare, may be read in connection with Cooper's _The Deerslayer_ (1841), which has the same general theme; or _The Partisan_ (1835), dealing with the bitter struggle of southern Whigs and Tories during the Revolution, may well be compared with Cooper's _The Spy_ (1821), which depicts the same struggle in a northern environment.

Other notable writers of the South during this period were Richard Henry Wilde the poet, now remembered by the song (from an unfinished opera) beginning, "My life is like the summer rose"; William Wirt, the essayist and biographer; and John Pendleton Kennedy, writer of essays and stories which contain many charming pictures of social life in Virginia and Maryland in the days "before the war."

[Sidenote: NEW ENGLAND AND THE WEST]

In New England was still another group, who fortunately avoided the name of any school. Sparks, Prescott, Ticknor, Story, Dana,--the very names indicate how true was Boston to her old scholarly traditions. Meanwhile Connecticut had its popular poet in James Gates Percival; Maine had its versatile John Neal; and all the northern states were reading the "goody goody" books of Peter Parley (Samuel Goodrich), the somewhat Byronic _Zophiel_ and other emotional poems of Maria Gowen Brooks (whom Southey called "Maria del Occidente"), and the historical romances of Catherine Sedgwick and Sarah Morton.

The West also (everything beyond the Alleghenies was then the West) made its voice heard in the new literature. Timothy Flint wrote a very interesting _Journal_ from his missionary experiences, and a highly colored romance from his expansive imagination; and James Hall drew some vigorous and sympathetic pictures of frontier life in _Letters from the West_, _Tales of the Border_ and _Wilderness and Warpath_.

There are many other writers who won recognition before 1840, but those we have named are more than enough; for each name is an invitation, and invitations when numerous are simply bothersome. For example, the name of Catherine Sedgwick invites us to read _Hope Leslie_ and _The Linwoods_, both excellent in their day, and still interesting as examples of the novels that won fame less than a century ago; or the name of Kennedy leads us to _Swallow Barn_ (alluring title!) with its bright pictures of Virginia life, and to _Horseshoe Robinson_, a crude but stirring tale of Revolutionary heroism. The point in naming these minor writers, once as popular as any present-day favorite, is simply this: that the major authors, whom we ordinarily study as typical of the age, were not isolated figures but part of a great romantic movement in literature; that they were influenced on the one hand by European letters, and on the other by a host of native writers who were all intent on reflecting the expanding life of America in the early part of the nineteenth century.

* * * * *

WASHINGTON IRVING (1783-1859)

A very pleasant writer is Irving, a man of romantic and somewhat sentimental disposition, but sound of motive, careful of workmanship, invincibly cheerful of spirit. The genial quality of his work may be due to the fact that from joyous boyhood to serene old age he did very much as he pleased, that he lived in what seemed to him an excellent world and wrote with no other purpose than to make it happy. In summarizing his career an admirer of Irving is reminded of what the Book of Proverbs says of wisdom: "Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace."

[Sidenote: THE MAN AND HIS TIMES]

The historian sees another side of Irving's work. Should it be asked, "What did he do that had not been as well or better done before him?" the first answer is that the importance of any man's work must be measured by the age in which he did it. A schoolboy now knows more about electricity than ever Franklin learned; but that does not detract from our wonder at Franklin's kite. So the work of Irving seems impressive when viewed against the gray literary dawn of a century ago. At that time America had done a mighty work for the world politically, but had added little of value to the world's literature. She read and treasured the best books; but she made no contribution to their number, and her literary impotence galled her sensitive spirit. As if to make up for her failure, the writers of the Knickerbocker, Charleston and other "schools" praised each other's work extravagantly; but no responsive echo came from overseas, where England's terse criticism of our literary effort was expressed in the scornful question, "Who reads an American book?"

Irving answered that question effectively when his _Sketch Book_, _Bracebridge Hall_ and _Tales of a Traveller_ found a multitude of delighted readers on both sides of the Atlantic. His graceful style was hardly rivaled by any other writer of the period; and England, at a time when Scott and Byron were playing heroic parts, welcomed him heartily to a place on the literary stage. Thus he united the English and the American reader in a common interest and, as it were, charmed away the sneer from one face, the resentment from the other. He has been called "father of our American letters" for two reasons: because he was the first to win a lasting literary reputation at home and abroad, and because of the formative influence which his graceful style and artistic purpose have ever since exerted upon our prose writers.

LIFE. Two personal characteristics appear constantly in Irving's
work: the first, that he was always a dreamer, a romance seeker;
the second, that he was inclined to close his eyes to the heroic
present and open them wide to the glories, real or imaginary, of
the remote past. Though he lived in an American city in a day of
mighty changes and discoveries, he was far less interested in the
modern New York than in the ancient New Amsterdam; and though he
was in Europe at the time of the Napoleonic wars, he apparently saw
nothing of them, being then wholly absorbed in the battles of the
long-vanished Moors. Only once, in his books of western
exploration, did he seriously touch the vigorous life of his own
times; and critics regard these books as the least important of all
his works.

[Sidenote: BOYHOOD]

He was born in New York (1783) when the present colossal city was a
provincial town that retained many of its quaint Dutch
characteristics. Over all the straggling town, from the sunny
Battery with its white-winged ships to the Harlem woods where was
good squirrel shooting, Irving rambled at ease on many a day when
the neighbors said he ought to have been at his books. He was the
youngest of the family; his constitution was not rugged, and his
gentle mother was indulgent. She would smile when he told of
reading a smuggled copy of the _Arabian Nights_ in school,
instead of his geography; she was silent when he slipped away from
family prayers to climb out of his bedroom window and go to the
theater, while his sterner father thought of him as sound asleep in
his bed.

Little harm came from these escapades, for Irving was a merry lad
with no meanness in him; but his schooling was sadly neglected. His
brothers had graduated from Columbia; but on the plea of delicate
health he abandoned the idea of college, with a sigh in which there
was perhaps as much satisfaction as regret. At sixteen he entered a
law office, where he gave less time to studying Blackstone than to
reading novels and writing skits for the newspapers.

[Sidenote: FINDING HIMSELF]

This happy indifference to work and learning, this disposition to
linger on the sunny side of the street, went with Irving through
life. Experimentally he joined his brothers, who were in the
hardware trade; but when he seemed to be in danger of consumption
they sent him to Europe, where he enjoyed himself greatly, and
whence he returned perfectly well. Next he was sent on business to
England; and there, when the Irving Brothers failed, their business
having been ruined by the War of 1812, Irving manfully resolved to
be no longer a burden on others and turned to literature for his
support. With characteristic love of doing what he liked he refused
a good editorial position (which Walter Scott obtained for him) and
busied himself with his _Sketch Book_ (1820). This met with a
generous welcome in England and America, and it was followed by the
equally popular _Bracebridge Hall_ and _Tales of a
Traveller_. By these three works Irving was assured not only of
literary fame but, what was to him of more consequence, of his
ability to earn his living.

[Sidenote: LIFE ABROAD]

Next we find him in Spain, whither he went with the purpose of
translating Navarrete's _Voyages of Columbus_, a Spanish book,
in which he saw a chance of profit from his countrymen's interest
in the man who discovered America. Instead of translating another
man's work, however, he wrote his own _Life and Times of
Columbus_ (1828). The financial success of this book (which is
still our most popular biography of the great explorer) enabled
Irving to live comfortably in Spain, where he read diligently and
accumulated the material for his later works on Spanish history.

By this time Irving's growing literary fame had attracted the
notice of American politicians, who rewarded him with an
appointment as secretary of the legation at London. This pleasant
office he held for two years, but was less interested in it than in
the reception which English men of letters generously offered him.
Then he apparently grew homesick, after an absence of seventeen
years, and returned to his native land, where he was received with
the honor due to a man who had silenced the galling question, "Who
reads an American book?"

[Sidenote: HIS MELLOW AUTUMN]

The rest of Irving's long life was a continued triumph. Amazed at
first, and then a little stunned by the growth, the hurry, the
onward surge of his country, he settled back into the restful past,
and was heard with the more pleasure by his countrymen because he
seemed to speak to them from a vanished age. Once, inspired by the
tide of life weeping into the West, he journeyed beyond the
Mississippi and found material for his pioneering books; but an
active life was far from his taste, and presently he built his
house "Sunnyside" (appropriate name) at Tarrytown on the Hudson.
There he spent the remainder of his days, with the exception of
four years in which he served the nation as ambassador to Spain.
This honor, urged upon him by Webster and President Tyler, was
accepted with characteristic modesty not as a personal reward but
as a tribute which America had been wont to offer to the profession
of letters.

CHIEF WORKS OF IRVING. A good way to form a general impression of Irving's works is to arrange them chronologically in five main groups. The first, consisting of the _Salmagundi_ essays, the _Knickerbocker History_ and a few other trifles, we may call the Oldstyle group, after the pseudonym assumed by the author. [Footnote: Ever since Revolutionary days it had been the fashion for young American writers to use an assumed name. Irving appeared at different times as "Jonathan Oldstyle," "Diedrich Knickerbocker" and "Geoffrey Crayon, Gent."] The second or Sketch-Book group includes the _Sketch Book_, _Bracebridge Hall_ and _Tales of a Traveller_. The third or Alhambra group, devoted to Spanish and Moorish themes, includes _The Conquest of Granada_, _Spanish Voyages of Discovery_, _The Alhambra_ and certain similar works of a later period, such as _Moorish Chronicles_ and _Legends of the Conquest of Spain_. The fourth or Western group contains _A Tour on the Prairies_, _Astoria_ and _Adventures of Captain Bonneville_. The fifth or Sunnyside group is made up chiefly of biographies, _Oliver Goldsmith_, _Mahomet and his Successors_ and _The Life of Washington_. Besides these are some essays and stories assembled under the titles of _Spanish Papers_ and _Wolfert's Roost_.

The _Salmagundi_ papers and others of the Oldstyle group would have been forgotten long ago if anybody else had written them. In other words, our interest in them is due not to their intrinsic value (for they are all "small potatoes") but to the fact that their author became a famous literary man. Most candid readers would probably apply this criticism also to the _Knickerbocker History_, had not that grotesque joke won an undeserved reputation as a work of humor.

[Sidenote: KNICKERBOCKER HISTORY]

The story of the Knickerbocker fabrication illustrates the happy-go-lucky method of all Irving's earlier work. He had tired of his _Salmagundi_ fooling and was looking for variety when his eyes lighted on Dr. Mitchill's _Picture of New York_, a grandiloquent work written by a prominent member of the Historical Society. In a light-headed moment Irving and his brother Peter resolved to burlesque this history and, in the approved fashion of that day, to begin with the foundation of the world. Then Peter went to Europe on more important business, and Irving went on with his joke alone. He professed to have discovered the notes of a learned Dutch antiquarian who had recently disappeared, leaving a mass of manuscript and an unpaid board-bill behind him. After advertising in the newspapers for the missing man, Irving served notice on the public that the profound value of Knickerbocker's papers justified their publication, and that the proceeds of the book would be devoted to paying the board-bill. Then appeared, in time to satisfy the aroused curiosity of the Historical Society, to whom the book was solemnly dedicated, the _History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty, by Diedrich Knickerbocker_ (1809).

This literary hoax made an instant sensation; it was denounced for its scandalous irreverence by the members of the Historical Society, especially by those who had Dutch ancestors, but was received with roars of laughter by the rest of the population. Those who read it now (from curiosity, for its merriment has long since departed, leaving it dull as any thrice-repeated joke) are advised to skip the first two books, which are very tedious fooling, and to be content with an abridged version of the stories of Wouter van Twiller, William the Testy and Peter the Headstrong. These are the names of real Dutch governors of New Amsterdam, and the dates given are exact dates; but there history ends and burlesque begins. The combination of fact and nonsense and the strain of gravity in which absurdities are related have led some critics to place the _Knickerbocker History_ first in time of the notable works of so-called American humor. That is doubtless a fair classification; but other critics assert that real humor is as purely human as a smile or a tear, and has therefore no national or racial limitations.

[Sidenote: SKETCH BOOK]

The _Sketch Book_, chief of the second group of writings, is perhaps the best single work that Irving produced. We shall read it with better understanding if we remember that it was the work of a young man who, having always done as he pleased, proceeds now to write of whatever pleasant matter is close at hand. Being in England at the time, he naturally finds most of his material there; and being youthful, romantic and sentimental, he colors everything with the hue of his own disposition. He begins by chatting of the journey and of the wide sea that separates him from home. He records his impressions of the beautiful English country, tells what he saw or felt during his visit to Stratford on Avon, and what he dreamed in Westminster Abbey, a place hallowed by centuries of worship and humanized by the presence of the great dead. He sheds a ready tear over a rural funeral, and tries to make us cry over the sorrows of a poor widow; then to relieve our feelings he pokes a bit of fun at John Bull. Something calls his attention to Isaac Walton, and he writes a Waltonian kind of sketch about a fisherman. In one chapter he comments on contemporary literature; then, as if not quite satisfied with what authors are doing, he lays aside his record of present impressions, goes back in thought to his home by the Hudson, and produces two stories of such humor, charm and originality that they make the rest of the book appear almost commonplace, as the careless sketches of a painter are forgotten in presence of his inspired masterpiece.

These two stories, the most pleasing that Irving ever wrote, are "Rip van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." They should be read if one reads nothing else of the author's twenty volumes.

[Sidenote: SPANISH THEMES]

The works on Spanish themes appeal in different ways to different readers. One who knows his history will complain (and justly) that Irving is superficial, that he is concerned with picturesque rather than with important incidents; but one who likes the romance of history, and who reflects that romance plays an important part in the life of any people, will find the legends and chronicles of this Spanish group as interesting as fiction. We should remember, moreover, that in Irving's day the romance of old Spain, familiar enough to European readers, was to most Americans still fresh and wondrous. In emphasizing the romantic or picturesque side of his subject he not only pleased his readers but broadened their horizon; he also influenced a whole generation of historians who, in contrast with the scientific or prosaic historians of to-day, did not hesitate to add the element of human interest to their narratives.

[Sidenote: THE ALHAMBRA]

The most widely read of all the works of the Spanish group is _The Alhambra_ (1832). This is, on the surface, a collection of semihistorical essays and tales clustering around the ancient palace, in Granada, which was the last stronghold of the Moors in Europe; in reality it is a record of the impressions and dreams of a man who, finding himself on historic ground, gives free rein to his imagination. At times, indeed, he seems to have his eye on his American readers, who were then in a romantic mood, rather than on the place or people he was describing. The book delighted its first critics, who called it "the Spanish Sketch Book"; but though pleasant enough as a romantic dream of history, it hardly compares in originality with its famous predecessor.

[Sidenote: WESTERN STORIES]

Except to those who like a brave tale of exploration, and who happily have no academic interest in style, Irving's western books are of little consequence. In fact, they are often omitted from the list of his important works, though they have more adventurous interest than all the others combined. _A Tour on the Prairies_, which records a journey beyond the Mississippi in the days when buffalo were the explorers' mainstay, is the best written of the pioneer books; but the _Adventures of Captain Bonneville_, a story of wandering up and down the great West with plenty of adventures among Indians and "free trappers," furnishes the most excitement. Unfortunately this journal, which vies in interest with Parkman's _Oregon Trail_, cannot be credited to Irving, though it bears his name on the title-page. [Footnote: The _Adventures_ is chiefly the work of a Frenchman, a daring free-rover, who probably tried in vain to get his work published. Irving bought the work for a thousand dollars, revised it slightly, gave it his name and sold it for seven or eight times what he paid for it. In _Astoria_, the third book of the western group, he sold his services to write up the records of the fur house established by John Jacob Astor, and made a poor job of it.]

[Sidenote: BIOGRAPHIES]

Of the three biographies _Oliver Goldsmith_ (1849) is the best, probably because Irving had more sympathy and affinity with the author of "The Deserted Village" than with Mahomet or Washington. The _Life of Washington_ (1855-1859) was plainly too large an undertaking for Irving's limited powers; but here again we must judge the work by the standards of its own age and admit that it is vastly better than the popular but fictitious biographies of Washington written by Weems and other romancers. Even in Irving's day Washington was still regarded as a demigod; his name was always printed in capitals; and the rash novelist who dared to bring him into a story (as Cooper did in _The Spy_) was denounced for his lack of reverence. In consequence of this false attitude practically all Washington's biographers (with the exception of the judicious Marshall) depicted him as a ponderously dignified creature, stilted, unlovely, unhuman, who must always appear with a halo around his head. Irving was too much influenced by this absurd fashion and by his lack of scholarship to make a trustworthy book; but he gave at least a touch of naturalness and humanity to our first president, and set a new biographical standard by attempting to write as an honest historian rather than as a mere hero-worshiper.

AN APPRECIATION OF IRVING. The three volumes of the Sketch-Book group and the romantic _Alhambra_ furnish an excellent measure of Irving's literary talent. At first glance these books appear rather superficial, dealing with pleasant matters of no consequence; but on second thought pleasant matters are always of consequence, and Irving invariably displays two qualities, humor and sentiment, in which humanity is forever interested. His humor, at first crude and sometimes in doubtful taste (as in his _Knickerbocker History_) grew more refined, more winning in his later works, until a thoughtful critic might welcome it, with its kindness, its culture, its smile in which is no cynicism and no bitterness, as a true example of "American" humor,--if indeed such a specialized product ever existed. His sentiment was for the most part tender, sincere and manly. Though it now seems somewhat exaggerated and at times dangerously near to sentimentality, that may not be altogether a fault; for the same criticism applies to Longfellow, Dickens and, indeed, to most other writers who have won an immense audience by frankly emphasizing, or even exaggerating, the honest sentiments that plain men and women have always cherished both in life and in literature.

[Sidenote: STYLE OF IRVING]

The style of Irving, with its suggestion of Goldsmith and Addison (who were his first masters), is deserving of more unstinted praise. A "charming" style we call it; and the word, though indefinite, is expressive of the satisfaction which Irving's manner affords his readers. One who seeks the source of his charm may find it in this, that he cherished a high opinion of humanity, and that the friendliness, the sense of comradeship, which he felt for his fellow men was reflected in his writing; unconsciously at first, perhaps, and then deliberately, by practice and cultivation. In consequence, we do not read Irving critically but sympathetically; for readers are like children, or animals, in that they are instinctively drawn to an author who trusts and understands them.

Thackeray, who gave cordial welcome to Irving, and who called him "the first ambassador whom the New World of letters sent to the Old," was deeply impressed by the fact not that the young American had an excellent prose style but that "his gate was forever swinging to visitors." That is an illuminating criticism; for we can understand the feeling of the men and women of a century ago who, having read the _Sketch Book_, were eager to meet the man who had given them pleasure by writing it. In brief, though Irving wrote nothing of great import, though he entered not into the stress of life or scaled its heights or sounded its deeps, we still read him for the sufficient but uncritical reason that we like him.

In this respect, of winning our personal allegiance, Irving stands in marked contrast to his greatest American contemporary, Cooper. We read the one because we are attracted to the man, the other for the tale he has to tell.

* * * * *

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT (1794-1878)

Bryant has been called "the father of American song," and the year 1821, when his first volume appeared, is recorded as the natal year of American poetry. Many earlier singers had won local reputations, but he was the first who was honored in all the states and who attained by his poetry alone a dominating place in American letters.

That was long ago; and times have changed, and poets with them. In any collection of recent American verse one may find poems more imaginative or more finely wrought than any that Bryant produced; but these later singers stand in a company and contribute to an already large collection, while Bryant stood alone and made a brave beginning of poetry that we may honestly call native and national. Before he won recognition by his independent work the best that our American singers thought they could do was to copy some English original; but after 1821 they dared to be themselves in poetry, as they had ever been in politics. They had the successful Bryant for a model, and the young Longfellow was one of his pupils. Moreover, he stands the hard test of time, and seems to have no successor. He is still our Puritan poet,--a little severe, perhaps, but American to the core,--who reflects better than any other the rugged spirit of that puritanism which had so profoundly influenced our country during the early, formative days of the republic.

LIFE. In the boyhood of Bryant we shall find the inspiration for
all his enduring work. He was of Pilgrim stock, and was born (1794)
in the little village of Cummington, in western Massachusetts.
There, with the Berkshire Hills and the ancient forest forever in
sight, he grew to man's stature, working on the farm or attending
the district school by day, and reading before the open fire at
night. His father was a physician, a scholarly man who directed his
son's reading. His mother was a Puritan, one of those quiet,
inspiring women who do their work cheerfully, as by God's grace,
and who invariably add some sign or patent of nobility to their
sons and daughters. There was also in the home a Puritan
grandfather who led the family devotions every evening, and whose
prayers with their rich phraseology of psalm or prophecy were
"poems from beginning to end." So said Bryant, who attributed to
these prayers his earliest impulse to write poetry.

Between these two influences, nature without and puritanism within,
the poet grew up; in their shadow he lived and died; little else of
consequence is reflected in the poems that are his best memorial.

[Sidenote: THE CITIZEN]

The visible life of Bryant lies almost entirely outside the realm
of poesie. He as fitted for Williams by country ministers, as was
customary in that day; but poverty compelled him to leave college
after two brief terms. Then he studied law, and for nine or ten
years practiced his profession doggedly, unwillingly, with many a
protest at the chicanery he was forced to witness even in the
sacred courts of justice. Grown weary of it at last, he went to New
York, found work in a newspaper office, and after a few years'
apprenticeship became editor of _The Evening Post_, a position
which he held for more than half a century. His worldly affairs
prospered; he became a "leading citizen" of New York, prominent in
the social and literary affairs of a great city; he varied the
routine of editorship by trips abroad, by literary or patriotic
addresses, by cultivating a country estate at Long Island. In his
later years, as a literary celebrity, he loaned his name rather too
freely to popular histories, anthologies and gift books, which
better serve their catchpenny purpose if some famous man can be
induced to add "tone" to the rubbish.

[Sidenote: THE POET]

And Bryant's poetry? Ah, that was a thing forever apart from his
daily life, an almost sacred thing, to be cherished in moments
when, his day's work done, he was free to follow his spirit and
give outlet to the feelings which, as a strong man and a Puritan,
he was wont to restrain. He had begun to write poetry in childhood,
when his father had taught him the value of brevity or compression
and "the difference between poetic enthusiasm and fustian."
Therefore he wrote slowly, carefully, and allowed ample time for
change of thought or diction. So his early "Thanatopsis" was hidden
away for years till his father found and published it, and made
Bryant famous in a day. All this at a time when English critics
were exalting "sudden inspiration," "sustained effort" and poems
"done at one sitting."

Once Bryant had found himself (and the blank verse and simple
four-line stanza which suited his talent) he seldom changed, and he
never improved. His first little volume, _Poems_ (1821),
contains some of his best work. In the next fifty years he added to
the size but not to the quality of that volume; and there is little
to indicate in such poems as "Thanatopsis" and "The Flood of Years"
that the one was written by a boy of seventeen and the other by a
sage of eighty. His love of poetry as a thing apart from life is
indicated by the fact that in old age, to forget the grief
occasioned by the death of his wife, he gave the greater part of
six years to a metrical translation of the Greek poet Homer. That
he never became a great poet or even fulfilled his early promise is
due partly to his natural limitations, no doubt, but more largely
to the fact that he gave his time and strength to other things. And
a poet is like other men in that he cannot well serve two masters.

THE POETRY OF BRYANT. Besides the translation of the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_ there are several volumes of prose to Bryant's credit, but his fame now rests wholly on a single book of original poems. The best of these (the result of fifty years of writing, which could easily be printed on fifty pages) may be grouped in two main classes, poems of death and poems of nature; outside of which are a few miscellaneous pieces, such as "The Antiquity of Freedom," "Planting of the Apple Tree" and "The Poet," in which he departs a little from his favorite themes.

[Sidenote: POEMS OF DEATH]

Bryant's poems on death reflect something of his Puritan training and of his personal experience while threatened with consumption; they are also indicative of the poetic fashion of his age, which was abnormally given to funereal subjects and greatly influenced by such melancholy poems as Gray's "Elegy" and Young's "Night Thoughts." He began his career with "Thanatopsis" (or "View of Death"), a boyhood piece which astonished America when it was published in 1817, and which has ever since been a favorite with readers. The idea of the poem, that the earth is a vast sepulcher of human life, was borrowed from other poets; but the stately blank verse and the noble appreciation of nature are Bryant's own. They mark, moreover, a new era in American poetry, an original era to replace the long imitative period which had endured since Colonial times. Other and perhaps better poems in the same group are "The Death of the Flowers," "The Return of Youth" and "Tree Burial," in which Bryant goes beyond the pagan view of death presented in his first work.

That death had a strange fascination for Bryant is evident from his returning again and again to a subject which most young poets avoid. Its somber shadow and unanswered question intrude upon nearly all of his nature pieces; so much so that even his "June" portrays that blithe, inspiring month of sunshine and bird song as an excellent time to die. It is from such poems that one gets the curious idea that Bryant never was a boy, that he was a graybeard at sixteen and never grew any younger.

[Sidenote: POEMS OF NATURE]

It is in his poems of nature that Bryant is at his best. Even here he is never youthful, never the happy singer whose heart overflows to the call of the winds; he is rather the priest of nature, who offers a prayer or hymn of praise at her altar. And it may be that his noble "Forest Hymn" is nearer to a true expression of human feeling, certainly of primitive or elemental feeling, than Shelley's "Skylark" or Burns's "Mountain Daisy." Thoreau in one of his critical epigrams declared it was not important that a poet should say any particular thing, but that he should speak in harmony with nature; that "the tone of his voice is the main thing." If that be true, Bryant is one of our best poets. He is always in harmony with nature in her prevailing quiet mood; his voice is invariably gentle, subdued, merging into the murmur of trees or the flow of water,--much like Indian voices, but as unlike as possible to the voices of those who go to nature for a picnic or a camping excursion.

Among the best of his nature poems are "To a Waterfowl" (his most perfect single work), "Forest Hymn," "Hymn to the Sea," "Summer Wind," "Night Journey of a River," "Autumn Woods," "To a Fringed Gentian," "Among the Trees," "The Fountain" and "A Rain Dream." To read such poems is to understand the fact, mentioned in our biography, that Bryant's poetry was a thing apart from his daily life. His friends all speak of him as a companionable man, receptive, responsive, abounding in cheerful anecdote, and with a certain "overflowing of strength" in mirth or kindly humor; but one finds absolutely nothing of this genial temper in his verse. There he seems to regard all such bubblings and overflowings as unseemly levity (lo! the Puritan), which he must lay aside in poetry as on entering a church. He is, as we have said, the priest of nature, in whom reverence is uppermost; and he who reads aloud the "Forest Hymn," with its solemn organ tone, has an impression that it must be followed by the sublime invitation, "O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker."

[Sidenote: IN LIGHTER MOOD]

Though Bryant is always serious, it is worthy of note that he is never gloomy, that he entirely escapes the pessimism or despair which seizes upon most poets in times of trouble. Moreover, he has a lighter mood, not gay but serenely happy, which finds expression in such poems as "Evening Wind," "Gladness of Nature" and especially "Robert of Lincoln." The exuberance of the last-named, so unlike anything else in Bryant's book of verse, may be explained on the assumption that not even a Puritan could pull a long face in presence of a bobolink. The intense Americanism of the poet appears in nearly all his verse; and occasionally his patriotism rises to a prophetic strain, as in "The Prairie," for example, written when he first saw what was then called "the great American desert." It is said that the honeybee crossed the Mississippi with the first settlers, and Bryant looks with kindled imagination on this little pioneer who

Fills the savannas with his murmurings,
And hides his sweets, as in the golden age,
Within the hollow oak. I listen long
To his domestic hum, and think I hear
The sound of that advancing multitude
Which soon shall fill these deserts. From the ground
Comes up the laugh of children, the soft voice
Of maidens, and the sweet and solemn hymn
Of Sabbath worshippers. The low of herds
Blends with the rustling of the heavy grain
Over the dark brown furrows. All at once
A fresher wind sweeps by, and breaks my dream,
And I am in the wilderness alone.

OUR PIONEER POET. From one point of view our first national poet is a summary of all preceding American verse and a prophecy of better things to come. To be specific, practically all our early poetry shows the inclination to moralize, to sing a song and then add a lesson to it. This is commonly attributed to Puritan influence; but in truth it is a universal poetic impulse, a tribute to the early office of the bard, who was the tribal historian and teacher as well as singer. This ancient didactic or moralizing tendency is very strong in Bryant. To his first notable poem, "Thanatopsis," he must add a final "So live"; and to his "Waterfowl" must be appended a verse which tells what steadfast lesson may be learned from the mutable phenomena of nature.

Again, most of our Colonial and Revolutionary poetry was strongly (or weakly) imitative, and Bryant shows the habit of his American predecessors. The spiritual conception of nature revealed in some of his early poems is a New World echo of Wordsworth; his somber poems of death indicate that he was familiar with Gray and Young; his "Evening Wind" has some suggestion of Shelley; we suspect the influence of Scott's narrative poems in the neglected "Stella" and "Little People of the Snow." But though influenced by English writers, the author of "Thanatopsis" was too independent to imitate them; and in his independence, with the hearty welcome which it received from the American public, we have a prophecy of the new poetry.

[Sidenote: HIS ORIGINALITY]

The originality and sturdy independence of Bryant are clearly shown in his choice of subjects. In his early days poetry was formal and artificial, after the manner of the eighteenth century; the romantic movement had hardly gained recognition in England; Burns was known only to his own countrymen; Wordsworth was ridiculed or barely tolerated by the critics; and poets on both sides of the Atlantic were still writing of larks and nightingales, of moonlight in the vale, of love in a rose-covered cottage, of ivy-mantled towers, weeping willows, neglected graves,--a medley of tears and sentimentality. You will find all these and little else in _The Garland_, _The Token_ and many other popular collections of the period; but you will find none of them in Bryant's first or last volume. From the beginning he wrote of Death and Nature; somewhat coldly, to be sure, but with manly sincerity. Then he wrote of Freedom, the watchword of America, not as other singers had written of it but as a Puritan who had learned in bitter conflict the price of his heritage:

O Freedom! thou art not, as poets dream,
A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs,
And wavy tresses gushing from the cap
With which the Roman master crowned his slave
When he took off the gyves. A bearded man,
Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailéd hand
Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow,
Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred
With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs
Are strong with struggling.

He wrote without affectation of the Past, of Winter, of the North Star, of the Crowded Street, of the Yellow Violet and the Fringed Gentian. If the last-named poems now appear too simple for our poetic taste, remember that simplicity is the hardest to acquire of all literary virtues, and that it was the dominant quality of Bryant. Remember also that these modest flowers of which he wrote so modestly had for two hundred years brightened our spring woods and autumn meadows, waiting patiently for the poet who should speak our appreciation of their beauty. Another century has gone, and no other American poet has spoken so simply or so well of other neglected treasures: of the twin flower, for example, most fragrant of all blooms; or of that other welcome-nodding blossom, beloved of bumblebees, which some call "wild columbine" and others "whippoorwill's shoes."

In a word, Bryant was and is our pioneer poet in the realm of native American poetry. As Emerson said, he was our first original poet, and was original because he dared to be sincere.

* * * * *

JAMES FENIMORE COOPER (1789-1851)

In point of time Cooper is the first notable American novelist. Judging by the booksellers, no other has yet approached him in the sustained interest of his work or the number of his readers.

[Sidenote: THE MAN]

On first analysis we shall find little in Cooper to account for his abiding popularity. The man himself was not exactly lovable; indeed, he had almost a genius for stirring up antagonism. As a writer he began without study or literary training, and was stilted or slovenly in most of his work. He was prone to moralize in the midst of an exciting narrative; he filled countless pages with "wooden" dialogue; he could not portray a child or a woman or a gentleman, though he was confident that he had often done so to perfection. He did not even know Indians or woodcraft, though Indians and woodcraft account for a large part of our interest in his forest romances.

[Sidenote: THE STORYTELLER]

One may enjoy a good story, however, without knowing or caring for its author's peculiarities, and the vast majority of readers are happily not critical but receptive. Hence if we separate the man from the author, and if we read _The Red Rover_ or _The Last of the Mohicans_ "just for the story," we shall discover the source of Cooper's power as a writer. First of all, he has a tale to tell, an epic tale of heroism and manly virtue. Then he appeals strongly to the pioneer spirit, which survives in all great nations, and he is a master at portraying wild nature as the background of human life. The vigor of elemental manhood, the call of adventure, the lure of primeval forests, the surge and mystery of the sea,--these are written large in Cooper's best books. They make us forget his faults of temper or of style, and they account in large measure for his popularity with young readers of all nations; for he is one of the few American writers who belong not to any country but to humanity. At present he is read chiefly by boys; but half a century or more ago he had more readers of all classes and climes than any other writer in the world.

LIFE. The youthful experiences of Cooper furnished him with the
material for his best romances. He was born (1789) in New Jersey;
but while he was yet a child the family removed to central New
York, where his father had acquired an immense tract of wild land,
on which he founded the village that is still called Cooperstown.
There on the frontier of civilization, where stood the primeval
forest that had witnessed many a wild Indian raid, the novelist
passed his boyhood amid the picturesque scenes which he was to
immortalize in _The Pioneers_ and _The Deerslayer_.

[Sidenote: HIS TRAINING]

Cooper picked up a little "book learning" in a backwoods school and
a little more in a minister's study at Albany. At thirteen he
entered Yale; but he was a self-willed lad and was presently
dismissed from college. A little later, after receiving some scant
nautical training on a merchantman, he entered the navy as
midshipman; but after a brief experience in the service he married
and resigned his commission. That was in 1811, and the date is
significant. It was just before the second war with Great Britain.
The author who wrote so much and so vividly of battles, Indian
raids and naval engagements never was within sight of such affairs,
though the opportunity was present. In his romances we have the
product of a vigorous imagination rather than of observation or
experience.

His literary work seems now like the result of whim or accident.
One day he flung down a novel that he was reading, declaring to his
wife that he could write a better story himself. "Try it,"
challenged his wife. "I will," said Cooper; and the result was
_Precaution_, a romance of English society. He was then a
farmer in the Hudson valley, and his knowledge of foreign society
was picked up, one must think, from silly novels on the subject.

Strange to say, the story was so well received that the gratified
author wrote another. This was _The Spy_ (1821), dealing with
a Revolutionary hero who had once followed his dangerous calling in
the very region in which Cooper was now living. The immense success
of this book fairly drove its author into a career. He moved to New
York City, and there quickly produced two more successful romances.
Thus in four years an unknown man without literary training had
become a famous writer, and had moreover produced four different
types of fiction: the novel of society in _Precaution_, the
historical romance in _The Spy_, and the adventurous romance
of forest and of ocean in _The Pioneers_ and _The Pilot_.

[Sidenote: YEARS OF STRIFE]

Cooper now went abroad, as most famous authors do. His books,
already translated into several European languages, had made him
known, and he was welcomed in literary circles; but almost
immediately he was drawn into squabbles, being naturally inclined
that way. He began to write political tirades; and even his
romances of the period (_The Bravo_, _The Heidenmauer_,
_The Headsman_) were devoted to proclaiming the glories of
democracy. Then he returned home and proceeded to set his
countrymen by the ears (in such books as _Home as Found_) by
writing too frankly of their crudity in contrast with the culture
of Europe. Then followed long years of controversy and lawsuits,
during which our newspapers used Cooper scandalously, and Cooper
prosecuted and fined the newspapers. It is a sorry spectacle, of no
interest except to those who would understand the bulk of Cooper's
neglected works. He was an honest man, vigorous, straightforward,
absolutely sincere; but he was prone to waste his strength and
embitter his temper by trying to force his opinion on those who
were well satisfied with their own. He had no humor, and had never
pondered the wisdom of "Who drives fat oxen should himself be fat."

The last years of his life were spent mostly at the old home at
Cooperstown, no longer a frontier settlement but a thriving
village, from which Natty Bumppo and Chingachgook had long since
departed. Before his death (1851) the fires of controversy had sunk
to ashes; but Cooper never got over his resentment at the public,
and with the idea of keeping forever aloof he commanded that none
of his private papers be given to biographers. It is for lack of
such personal letters and documents that no adequate life of Cooper
has yet been written.

COOPER'S WORKS. There are over sixty volumes of Cooper, but to read them all would savor of penance rather than of pleasure. Of his miscellaneous writings only the _History of the Navy_ and _Lives of Distinguished Naval Officers_ are worthy of remembrance. Of his thirty-two romances the half, at least, may be ignored; though critics may differ as to whether certain books (_The Bravo_ and _Lionel Lincoln_, for example) should be placed in one half or the other. There remain as the measure of Cooper's genius some sixteen works of fiction, which fall naturally into three groups: the historical novels, the tales of pioneer life, and the romances of the sea.

[Sidenote: THE SPY]