Whittier-land Part 8

Having naught beside to spare, To my good friend, Mrs. Ayer, And to Mrs. Sturtevant, My last lock of hair I grant.

I make Mr. Currier[13]

Of this will executor; And I leave the debts to be Reckoned as his legal fee.

This is all of the will that was written that evening; but the next morning, at breakfast, I found under my plate a note-sheet, with some penciling on it. As I opened it, Mr. Whittier, with a quizzical look, said, "Thee will notice that the bear-trap man has added a codicil to his will." This is the codicil:--

And this pencil of a sick bard I bequeath to Mr. Pickard; Pledging him to write a very Long and full obituary-- Showing by my sad example, Useful life and virtues ample, Wit and wisdom only tend To bear-traps at one's latter end!

I had to go back to my editorial desk in Portland that day, and immediately received there this note from Mr. Whittier:--

"DEAR MR. P.,--Don't print in thy paper my foolish verses, which thee copied. They are hardly consistent with my years and 'eminent gravity,'

and would make 'the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things.'"

I had no thought at the time of giving to the public this jolly side of Whittier's character, but do it now with little misgiving, as it is realized by every one that "a little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men." Whittier's capacity for serious work is well known, and his love of play never interfered with it. An earnest man without a sense of humor is a machine without a lubricant, worn out before its work is done. There can be no doubt that Whittier owed his length of days to his happy temperament.

Here is a story of Whittier told by Alice Freeman Palmer: One evening they sat in Governor Claflin's library, in Boston, and he was taking his rest telling ghost stories. Mrs. Claflin had given strict orders that no visitor be allowed to intrude on Mr. Whittier when he was resting. Suddenly, at the crisis of a particularly interesting story, there was a commotion in the hall, and the rest of that story was not told. A lady had called to see the poet, and would not be denied. The domestic could not stop her, and she came straight into the library.

She walked up to Whittier and seized both his hands, saying, "Mr.

Whittier, this is the supreme moment of my life!" The poor man in his distress blushed like a school-girl, and s.h.i.+fted from one foot to the other; he managed to get his hands free, and put them behind him for further security. And what do you think he said? All he said was, "Is it?" Miss Freeman thought a third party in the way, and slipped out. As she was going upstairs, she heard a quick step behind her, and Whittier took her by the shoulder and shook her, saying as if angry, "Alice Freeman, I believe thee has been laughing at me!" She could not deny it. "What would thee do, Alice Freeman, if a man thee never saw should come up in that way to thee, take both hands, and tell thee it was the supreme moment of his life?"

Probably the most seriously dangerous position in which he was ever placed was on the occasion of the looting and burning of Pennsylvania Hall, in the spring of 1838. His editorial office was in the building, and for two or three days the mob had been threatening its destruction before they accomplished it. It was not safe for him to go into the street except in disguise. And yet it was at this very time that he wrote the following humorous skit, never before in print. Theodore D.

Weld had the year before made a contract of perpetual bachelorhood with Whittier, and yet he chose this troublous time to marry the eloquent South Carolina Quakeress, Angelina Grimke, who had freed her slaves and come North to rouse the people, and was creating a sensation on the lecture platform. Her burning words in Pennsylvania Hall had helped to make the mob furious. Whittier's humorous arraignment of his friend for breaking his promise of celibacy was written at this critical time, and he was obliged to disguise himself when he carried his epithalamium on the wedding night to the door of the bridegroom. He had been invited to a.s.sist at the wedding service, but as the bride was marrying "out of society," Whittier's orthodoxy compelled him to decline the invitation.

"Alack and alas! that a brother of mine, A bachelor sworn on celibacy's altar, Should leave me to watch by the desolate shrine, And stoop his own neck to the enemy's halter!

Oh the treason of Benedict Arnold was better Than the scoffing at Love, and then _sub rosa_ wooing; This mocking at Beauty, yet wearing her fetter-- Alack and alas for such bachelor doing!

"Oh the weapons of Saul are the Philistine's prey!

Who shall stand when the heart of the champion fails him; Who strive when the mighty his s.h.i.+eld casts away, And yields up his post when a woman a.s.sails him?

Alone and despairing thy brother remains At the desolate shrine where we stood up together, Half tempted to envy thy self-imposed chains, And stoop his own neck for the noose of the tether!

"So firm and yet false! Thou mind'st me in sooth Of St. Anthony's fall when the spirit of evil[14]

Filled the cell of his rest with imp, dragon and devil; But the Saint never lifted his eyes from the Book Till the tempter appeared in the guise of a woman; And her voice was so sweet that he ventured one look, And the devil rejoiced that the Saint had proved human!"

In 1874, Gail Hamilton's niece was married at her house in Hamilton, and she sent a grotesque invitation to Whittier, asking him to come to her wedding, and prescribing a ridiculous costume he might wear. As a postscript she mentioned that it was her niece who was to be married.

Whittier sent this reply, pretending not to have noticed the postscript, but finally waking up to the fact that she was not herself to be the bride:--

AMESBURY, 12th mo. 29th, 1874.

GAIL HAMILTON'S WEDDING

"Come to my wedding," the missive runs, "Come hither and list to the holy vows; If you miss this chance you will wait full long To see another at Gail-a House!"

_Her_ wedding! What can the woman expect?

Does she think her friends can be jolly and glad?

Is it only the child who sighs and grieves For the loss of something he never had?

Yet I say to myself, Is it strange that she Should choose the way that we know is good What right have we to grumble and whine In a pitiful dog-in-the-manger mood?

What boots it to maunder with "if" and "perhaps,"

And "it might have been" when we know it could n't, If she had been willing (a vain surmise), It 's ten to one that Barkis would n't.

'T was pleasant to think (if it _was_ a dream) That our loving homage her need supplied, Humbler and sadder, if wiser, we walk To feel her life from our own lives glide.

Let her go, G.o.d bless her! I fling for luck My old shoe after her. Stay, what 's this?

Is it all a mistake? The letter reads, "My _niece_, you must know, is the happy miss."

All 's right! To grind out a song of cheer I set to the crank my ancient muse.

Will somebody kiss that bride for me?

I fling with my blessing, both boots and shoes!

To the lucky bridegroom I cry all hail!

He is sure of having, let come what may, The sage advice of the wisest aunt That ever her fair charge gave away.

The Hamilton bell, if bell there be, Methinks is ringing its merriest peal; And, shades of John Calvin! I seem to see The hostess treading the wedding reel!

The years are many, the years are long, My dreams are over, my songs are sung, But, out of a heart that has not grown cold, I bid G.o.d-speed to the fair and young.

All joy go with them from year to year; Never by me shall their pledge be blamed Of the perfect love that has cast out fear, And the beautiful hope that is not ashamed!

An aged Quaker friend from England, himself a bachelor, was once visiting Mr. Whittier, and was shown to his room by the poet, when the hour for retiring came. Soon after, he was heard calling to his host in an excited tone, "Thee has made a mistake, friend Whittier; there are female garments in my room!" Whittier replied soothingly, "Thee had better go to bed, Josiah; the female garments won't hurt thee."

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOSIAH BARTLETT STATUE, HUNTINGTON SQUARE, AMESBURY]

Here is a specimen of his frolicsome verse written after he was eighty years of age. It deals largely in personalities, was meant solely for the perusal of a few friends whom it pleasantly satirized, and was never before in print. When the bronze statue of Josiah Bartlett was to be erected in Amesbury, Whittier of course was called upon for the dedicatory ode, and he wrote "One of the Signers" for the occasion. The unveiling of the statue occurred on the Fourth of July, 1888, and as might have been antic.i.p.ated, the poet could not be prevailed upon to be present. The day before the Fourth he went to Oak Knoll, "so as to keep in the quiet," he said. But his thoughts were on the celebration going on at Amesbury, and they took the form of drollery. He imagined himself occupying the seat on the platform which had been reserved for him, and these amusing verses were composed, the satirical allusions in which would be appreciated by his townspeople. The president of the day was Hon. E. Moody Boynton, a descendant of the signer, and the well-known inventor of the bicycle railway, the "lightning saw," etc. He has the reputation of having the limberest tongue in New England, as well as a brain most fertile in invention. The orator of the day was Hon. Robert T. Davis, then member of Congress, a former resident of Amesbury, and like Bartlett a physician. Jacob R. Huntington, to whose liberality the village is indebted for the statue, is a successful pioneer in the carriage-building industry of the place. It was cannily decided to give the statue to the State of Ma.s.sachusetts, so as to have an inducement for the Governor to attend the dedication. Whittier's play on this fact is in the best vein of his drollery. The statue is of dark bronze, and this gave a chance for his amusing reference to the Kingston Democrats, whom he imagined as coming across the state line to attend the celebration. Dr. Bartlett was buried in their town. Professor J. W.

Churchill, of Andover, one of the "heretics" of the Seminary, was to read the poem. The other persons named were eccentric characters well known in Amesbury:--

MY DOUBLE

I 'm in Amesbury, not at Oak Knoll; 'T is my double here you see: _I 'm_ sitting on the platform, Where the programme places me--

Where the women nudge each other, And point me out and say: "That 's the man who makes the verses-- My! how old he is and gray!"

I hear the crackers popping, I hear the ba.s.s drums throb; I sit at Boynton's right hand, And help him boss the job.

And like the great stone giant Dug out of Cardiff mire, We lift our man of metal, And resurrect Josiah!

Around, the Hamps.h.i.+re Democrats Stand looking glum and grim,-- "_That thing_ the Kingston doctor!

Do you call _that critter_ him?

"The pesky Black Republicans Have gone and changed his figure; We buried him a white man-- They've dug him up a n.i.g.g.e.r!"

I hear the wild winds rus.h.i.+ng From Boynton's limber jaws, Swift as his railroad bicycle, And buzzing like his saws!

But Hiram the wise is explaining It 's only an old oration Of Ginger-Pop Emmons, come down By way of undulation!

Then Jacob, the vehicle-maker, Comes forward to inquire If Governor Ames will relieve the town Of the care of old Josiah.