NOTES AND DOCUMENTS Five J^etters from George Henry Boker to William Gilmore Simms

In the long process of reconciliation which followed the Civil War American writers played a much more admirable role than did the politicians in the Reconstruction Congress. The attitude of Emerson, Lowell, Whittier, and Boker toward the defeated South was far more kindly and intelligent than that of Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner. This period witnessed the beginning of a notable friendship between Bayard Taylor and Sidney Lanier. Although his part in the process of reconciliation is not so well known, Taylor's friend, George Henry Boker, the distinguished Philadelphia poet and dramatist, befriended at least two poverty-stricken Southern authors, William Gilmore Simms and Paul Hamilton Hayne.1 Simms's situation at the close of the Civil War was a sad one. During Sherman's march through the Carolinas he had lost his house and his library of ten thousand volumes. A still greater misfortune was that the war had practically destroyed the market for his literary wares. Even in the late sixties few Northern magazines would accept contributions from Southern writers. Eventually, through the assist- ance of Boker and a few others, Simms did manage to find those who would publish his work; and his death in 1870 was due largely to the effect of overwork upon his enfeebled constitution. Although Simms had been a frequent visitor to New York since the early 1830^, Boker was not among the Northern writers whom he had known. He had, however, published in the Southern Quarterly Review in 18 50 two favorable reviews of Boker's plays.2 Soon after the publication in 1867 °f S. Adams Lee's The "Book of the Sonnet > Boker saw in a Southern journal a review by Simms: who treated Boker's contributions with generous and unstinting praise. Boker wrote the Southerner a letter of thanks. The ensuing correspondence in- 1 See my article, "George Henry Boker, Paul Hamilton Hayne, and Charles Warren Stoddard: Some Unpublished Letters," American Literature, IV, 146-165 (May, 1933). 2 The review of Boker's Anne Boleyn, which appeared in Sept., 1850, is signed "J. L./ Philadelphia." The same hand was apparently responsible for the review of Calaynos which had appeared in January of the same year. 66 1939 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS 67 augurated a friendship between the two. Learning of Simms' financial distress, Boker offered him at least temporary relief by securing him a generous share of space in the new Lippincott's Magazine? y The first number of J^ifpncott sy edited by John Foster Kirk, ap- peared in January, 1868. In March of that year appeared Simms's "The Story of Chastelard." With the possible exception of Scribner's Monthly, founded in the year of Simms's death, Jfifpncott's Maga- zine was more hospitable to Southern writers than any other Northern magazine of the period.4 In the year 1869, when all the five letters here given were written, Boker was in an unhappy situation. His native city had never really recognized his literary importance. The war had taken him largely away from literature. His plays had never received either the critical recognition due them or suitable theatrical performance. He was still engaged in a protracted lawsuit undertaken to remove the cloud from his dead father's reputation. He was beginning to hope for a diplo- matic appointment, but it was not until November, 1871, that he was made Minister to Turkey. The five letters are published, by permission of the Columbia Uni- versity Library, from the originals in the Ferris Collection. Simms's friend, W. Hawkins Ferris, who lived in Brooklyn, held a position in the U. S. Sub-Treasury in Wall Street. In this period he was collect- ing autographs, and Simms sent him many of the letters he received— many more apparently than are now in the Ferris Collection. The five letters here published are probably not all that Boker wrote to Simms. Simms's letters to Boker are not among the Boker manuscripts now in the Princeton University Library.5 The five letters given below throw some light upon Boker's own literary work. The last two, for example, make clear his conception of the duty of the historical dramatist to follow closely his sources. EDITOR, ^American J^iterature JAY B. HUBBELL

Philadelphia, January 5, 1869. My dear Sir, There is no truth in the report that I am, ever was, or ever shall be the Editor of "Lippincott's Magazine." I prize my liberty too dearly, and I have so 3 Edward Sculley Bradley, George Henry Boker: Poet and Patriot (Philadelphia, 1927), p. 245. 4 Frank Luther Mott, A History of American Magazines, 1865-1885 (Cambridge, Mass., 1938), p. 397. 5 Information from Professor Bradley. 68 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS January thorough a contempt for mere work, that I should not think of entering upon what dunces call a "useful employment" unless I were driven to it by dire neces- sity. So whatever may be the future history of the Magazine, I shall not be responsible for it. The magazine will henceforth be sent to your new address. By the way, the real Editor begged me to say to you that he will be happy to have another prose article from you as soon as possible. Mark you! prose: our finer ware seems to be getting of no use to publishers, and to command no remunerative price in the literary market. "Poetry," the publishers say to me, "is a drug." I therefore have naturally concluded that I am a druggist; and I am carefully bottling up and labelling my wares, and waiting until this prose becomes a pestilence, when perhaps I may uncork, and be thought "of use" again—and be damned to them! O Simms, Simms, Simms, William Gilmore Sirnms! what an age we live in for such fellows as we are! If we had lived two hundred years ago, we might have been comfortably immortal for the last century, laurel-crowned and all that; and we might now be standing together in some cool corner of hell, throwing stones at the angels, in our contempt for their imperfect kind of immortality. But—Well, you know all about it—you have suffered and are wise; so I shall hold my tongue. My eyes still plague me—that is the precise word to describe that which they do—and before long I shall go to Europe for rest and advice. To crown my sor- rows, my wife is again ill and confined to her bed. But, Lord, Lord, what is the use of growling at miseries, while our growls neither mitigate the present griefs nor keep of [f] the coming ones? Yours sincerely, W. Gilmore Simms, Esqr. Geo. H. Boker

Philadelphia, September 9th, 1869 My dear Sir, I have just returned from a stay of two months in the northern part of Penn- sylvania, whither your note was sent to me. Have you or have you not been in the North, according to the design expressed in your letter? I have inquired of Mr. Lippincott concerning you, and he has not heard that you paid your intended visit to New York. I cannot but feel anxious lest your health broke down, or some accident to you or yours occurred that prevented your trip. Let me know about this. I addressed a copy of my new volume, "Konigsmark" &c, to you a few days ago. I hope the thing may please you better than it does me. I am really alarmed at the slight interest which I feel in this venture. I fear that I shall never again experience those emotions which I once felt on issuing a set of poems; or, what is worse, never be able to pump up sufficient enthusiasm to induce me to write enough to fill another volume. There was a deal said at Washington about sending me on a mission, but as none has been offered to me so far, I judge that I have been left out in the cold. So be it! I should have received the offer, and considered it. Now such an offer would come too late to be regarded as a compliment, and I should probably de- cline it. My friends abroad advise me not to accept any mission, to come abroad 1939 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS 69 untrammeled if I come at all. They say a minister's position is most perplexing, the duties most burdensome and disagreeable, and in addition that three times the allowed pay will not support the office anywhere, save only in Belgium. But I long ago dismissed the whole subject from my mind, as not worth a care. I regret to know that you have been suffering from a confined life. Do you feel justified in wasting life thus for the accomplishment of any literary work? Could you not make as much out of Magazines &c, by lighter labor within the same space of time? I often hear Mr. Lippincott regret that you send him no more of your able critical articles, and I am sure that his Magazine needs precisely that which you withhold from it. My present intention is to go abroad as soon as I can get my house in proper order to do so. I have been kept here for years by various causes chiefly matters of business; but I begin to see my way clear for a flight, and it will be a long one, I assure you. With my best wishes, I remain, my dear Sir, Sincerely yours, Geo. H. Boker Wm Gilmore Simms, Esqr Philadelphia, September 22nd, 1869. My dear Sir, I handed "The Peace of Elis"6 to Mr. Lippincott this morning with my recommendation and benediction. It will amuse you to know how he received it, before he had read a line: "More poetry! my God!" I could not but laugh aloud, although I was trying to preserve a serious aspect. I know that he wishes to receive prose from you, but I suspect that he does not care to receive poetry from anybody. However, your classical poem will take its chance under the tender eyes of the Editor. I begin to fear that this same editor is a little jealous of my position with friend Lippincott, because I perceive that my opinions have little weight with him, and that on two or three occasions of late, he has gone precisely counter to my advice. On the receipt of your former note I ordered a copy of "Konigsmark" to be sent to you, care of Mr. Widdleton. I hope that you have received it, and that you do not think the worse of me for having written the volume. I read to Mr. Lippincott that part of your last letter about the remuneration for your poems. As he made no objection, he will doubtless please you in that particular. Shall we not see the light of your presence in Philadelphia before you return to Charleston ? I am sure that it might be to your advantage to run on and see Mr. Lippincott. I need not tell you that I should be delighted to see you, and talk over with you the many topics on which we have written to each other. Next week, I shall leave home for about a week, but I shall return long before the day which you have set for your departure. With my best wishes, I remain, dear Sir, Yours sincerely, Geo. H. Boker Wm. Gilmore Simms, Esqr. 6 Lippincotfs Magazine did not publish this poem. 70 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS January

Philadelphia, November 11th, 1869. I thank you for your generous recognition contained in your critique on "Konigsmark"7 in the "Charleston Courier." It makes me sad to think that the writing of this article may have cost you a pang, or stood in the way of the recovery of your health even in a slight degree. Knowing your condition as I do, I cannot but value the critique the more, and discover in it your warm heart as well as your wise head. I shall think over what you say about putting more color and fancy into my poems. Perhaps I fear too much both color and fancy. I know that I have a perpetual dread of becoming extravagant or weak by the use of these qualities which are so much the fashion in our day. If I have erred in the opposite direction, and become pale and hard, I must look to it. If you will examine the life of Sophia Dorothea, you will find that the incident 7 In the Charleston Courier for Nov. 6, 1869, Simms devoted the whole of his unsigned column, "Our Book Table," to a review of Konigsmark, I give those passages which serve to explain Boker's letter: "Mr. GEORGE H. BOKER, of Philadelphia, is not one of the popular poets of Amer- ica, and perhaps there is good reason why he should not become so in our day. He is not sufficiently transparent to be read patiently by people forever in a hurry; and he is not sufficiently flexible to accommodate his paces to theirs. Yet Mr. BOKER has writ- ten some of the most vigorous sonnets ever published in this country, and is the author of some of the very best specimens of our American drama—that drama which claims to be legitimate—which is built upon classical British standards, and which aims at producing its effects by a stern adherence to the proprieties of art and nature, without drawing any of its aids from the sensational and the mechanical. He thus rejects all the meretricious agencies of the stage, such as are familiar to the dextrous [sic] hands of such dramatists as BOURCICAULT [sic] and other playwrights, who employ the arts of the scene painter rather than of the poet, and manufacture a play as a Japanese manu- factures a card castle for children. Added to this scornful rejection by Mr. BOKER, of the agencies which might secure popularity, his muse, it must be admitted, carries herself with a staid and sober gravity, uniform and inflexible, which makes her seem more solicitous of authority than of attraction. In her dignity she loses something of that softness and tenderness which we look for in all of the feminine gender, and her dignity sometimes hardens into sternness, and there is not a sufficient degree of sweetness in her counsels, to relieve them of their severity. "Her [the 'she-demon's in the play] trick, by the way, of a stolen glove, is too much like that of 'Iago's' in Othello, not to occasion us some surprise that Mr. BOKER should have been content to use it. "The style of Mr. BOKER is peculiarly compact, and this, too, is somewhat at the cost of flexibility and grace. It is pure, but cold, and too stately for the ordinary human mood. He rarely errs in measure or proper cadence; still more rarely in the use of lan- guage, yet we have been forced to wonder that he should fall into the vulgarism of say- ing 'jeopardize/ instead of jeopard. We may excuse this in a Yankee, but not in a poet. "We have no room to speak of the supplementary poems; nor indeed is this necessary; nor would our speech be favorable. There is nothing grateful to us in the 'Legend of the Hounds,' and their brutal masters, and the so-called 'Patriotic Poems' are in such bad taste, and so false in sentiment as well as fact, that we regret, for Mr. BOKER'S own sake, that he ever published them. We do him the justice to believe that he never felt them " 1939 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS 71

of the glove is a historical one, and one that played so striking a part in her story that I felt myself bound to introduce it. I too noticed its resemblance to the handkerchief affair in Othello; but if any one stole the incident from Shake- speare, it must have been Countess Von Platen herself, and she, as you know, was capable of almost anything. See Dr. Doran's Life of Sophia Dorothea, and you will find that my play is strictly historical from end to end. I write this long story to justify myself to you: I care little about public opinion. My eyes are in no very good condition to-night; so I shall once more thank you, wish you well, and drop my stylus. Sincerely yours, Geo. H. Boker Wm Gilmore Simms, Esqr

Philadelphia, Wm. Gilmore Simms, Esqr December 24th 1869. My dear Sir, I have been set to thinking, although I am not quite convinced, by what you say of the historical drama. I have written, as you may know, a half dozen dramas which are either historical or legendary. In all of them, I have endeavored to stick as closely to the facts as was consistant [sic] with the requirements of art. I have therefore always looked upon a historical drama, or rather upon the writ- ing of it, as art bounded and working within the limits of history. If I had ever overstepped this limit, I should have despised my own work, and I should have had no heart to prosecute it. No man knows better than yourself, that each of us has a literary conscience by which his work is judged. My conscience confines me in the historical drama in the way which I have just mentioned, and it would be in vain for me to attempt to escape it. I would like very much to read your "Randolph Peyton," which I am sure that I never saw. Nothing is more interesting to me than to read a poet's specula- tions regarding his own art, and to trace the self-imposed laws within which he worked. I have in vain asked Mr. Lippincott to republish it. He says that in the present depressed state of the book trade, he will publish nothing but books of whose sale he is assured in advance. What, under heaven, induced you to think that plain old David Farragut pronounces his name "Farragoo" ? I am acquainted with a gentleman who knew Farragut as a brother may, and he has told me that he never heard of such a thing. The origin of the name is Spanish; but even in that language the word would be pronounced Farragoot, with as strong a stress upon the t as we lay. I fear that you are more prejudiced against our rhymes than I am against yours— the rhymes of the late war, I mean. I can enjoy everything good that was written on your side of the question, as I do your "Sweet South" and "Stonewall Jack- son's Way" for example. I never can think of that terrible war with bitter blood in my heart: the thing was too solemn and awful to move my smaller passions. The thought of the thing stuns me, and sends me grovelling at the feet of God. I trust that you and your family may have a merry Christmas among you, and that the whole South is now so lifted up as to be able to enjoy the cheer of the Season. With my best wishes, I remain, my dear Sir, Sincerely yours, Geo. H. Boker