XXXVI

An Agonizing Decision 1876 (LETTERS 2350 TO 2451)

THE TRIBUTE PAID TO BRYANT at the Century Club in 1864 had been an expression of admiration and affection by his fellow writers and artists; that tendered on his eightieth anniversary in 1874 had been national and unique. Early in 1875 a committee of fifty prominent citizens representing communi• ties from Boston to San Francisco had invited designs from silversmiths in an open competition for a commemorative vase to symbolize various aspects of his life and work. Designs came from the country's most prominent firms, including Black Starr and Frost, Gorham, and Tiffany. The winning submis• sion was that of Tiffany. Its creator, James Horton Whitehouse, said that in conceiving it his thoughts "at once flew to the country-to the crossing of boughs of trees, to the plants and flowers, and to a general contemplation of nature," and to a "certain Homeric influence." The Grecian-style urn was further embellished by medallions depicting the youthful Bryant meditating in the woo<;ls, and being instructed in verse by his father. Others suggested several of his poems, such as "To a Waterfowl." The printing press, the lyre, and a bas-relief of the bearded Bryant were prominently displayed. Several of the medallions were the work of a young cameo cutter, Augustus Saint• Gaudens, who would become this country's leading sculptor. On June 20, 1876, one thousand people attended an elaborate affair in Chickering Hall, where the vase was given to Bryant by the presentation committee. After addresses by its chairman, Samuel Osgood, and White• house, Bryant responded with modesty and wit. He would have preferred, he said, to make but a brief expression of thanks, but feared he might be thought to imitate the English militia captain who, when presented with a silver pitcher by his company, with the words, "Captain, here's the jug," replied, "Ay, is that the jug?" after which, Bryant added, "the company were ready for the festivities of the evening." He protested his unworthiness of so great an honor, but thought its donors' generosity more noble because of that fact, for "What merit would be yours if I had fairly earned all that you are bestowing on me? You would be simply doing your duty; you would be paying a debt." The Bryant Vase was shown by Tiffany at the Centennial Celebration of the nation's independence in Philadelphia the following month, and at the Paris Exhibition of 1878. Meanwhile, Bryant had placed it on permanent loan in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. He could justly plead preoccupation with literary projects in refusing some of the invitations which continued to beset him this year, for he spared himself no effort in writing already underway. In January he saw the revised 270 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Library of Poetry and Song through the press. Although he had declined a request from the president of the Centennial Exhibition to read a poem there, he did compose a "Centennial Hymn," and rode down to Philadelphia to see the fair's buildings before it opened in May. That month marked publication of the first volume of Bryant and Gay's Popular History of the United States. This had first been sold in parts, and was noticed warmly here and abroad. One journal termed it "the literary event of the year," noting its timeliness in the centennial year. The Edinburgh Scotsman praised especially Bryant's preface, commenting, "He has the habit of saying that which he thinks, and of reproving what he believes wrong." The volume also drew praise for its three hundred illustrations, many the work of such artists as Albert Bierstadt, Winslow Homer, and Thomas Moran. In July there ap• peared in Scribner's Monthly Magazine Bryant's poem "The Flood of Years," which, although not written specifically to mark the centennial, suggested its theme. And in August he put to press the last edition of his collected poems to bear his scrutiny-and thus the definitive one. A decade later Walt Whitman would remark to Horace Traubel that Bryant, "still a cute, wise old man-would go of an evening from club to club-the Union League, the Goethe Club, what not-being everywhere deferred to--meetings often 'perceiving the great so-and-so present,' inviting him to the platform, and so forth and so forth." This comment held some truth, for Bryant would scarcely have spoken so often as he did had he not enjoyed the experience. Yet in 1876, as in other years, he refused more invitations than he accepted. As was his custom, he addressed the Burns Club in January, as well as the celebration of Shakespeare's birthday in April. In June, as we have seen, he spoke his thanks for the Tiffany vase, and a few days later went to Williams College to preside as president over the annual meeting of its alumni association. On his birthday, when he was feted at the Goethe Club, he again addressed its members. But he refused to travel to Dartmouth and Wellesley colleges to talk to their students, or to Boston for a memorial to Samuel Gridley Howe, befriender of the Greek Revolution, which had been a concern of the youthful Bryant. He evaded requests that he write verses for a Young Women's Christian Association fair; "At my time of life,'' he apologized to Candace Wheeler, "in the frosty months which I have reached-the poetic vein is clogged with ice, and neither flows freely nor makes music with the pebbles." He expressed similar regrets when asked to write a Fourth of July ode for the people of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, which was recovering from a disastrous fire the year before. If he seemed as little inclined as ever toward occasional versifying, Bryant's letters to intimate friends became more fanciful, even playful• especially those to Leo nice Moulton, who had been living in one of his Roslyn houses since her husband had died in 1875. Her letters are unrecovered, but his suggest that their correspondence had quickened in frequency, and that she was sympathetic toward his political concerns as well as his pleasantries. Though he remarked to her in May, "I have nearly done with politics. What need a man of eighty-one concern himself with these strifes?" this was not An Agonizing Decision 271 quite true. The previous month he had joined Carl Schurz and other reformers in a call for a conference to discuss the selection of candidates in the coming presidential election whose character and ability were such as to ensure protection of the "honor of the American name" in the face of "widespread corruption in our public service which has disgraced the Repub• lic in the eyes of the world and threatens to poison the vitality of our institutions." In November he criticized sharply the interference of federal troops with the South Carolina legislature. Early in the year he wrote a British friend, "Our country seems to me to be disgraced by the conduct of both parties"; that there was little danger that Grant would be nominated for a third term, and none that he would be elected. As the campaign progressed and the candidates chosen, Bryant wrote John Gourlie that, though the public seemed as yet little involved, "So far as I have been able to observe it is to be one of the greatest contests for the presidency that we have ever had." Indeed, it would pose for Bryant a dilemma as baffling as any he had faced in public life; for, while the candidate of his own party was the respectable governor of Ohio Rutherford B. Hayes, a liberal Republican, the Democrats had selected Bryant's close friend and political associate for a third of a century, Samuel J. Tilden-the governor who had just the year before honored him at Albany. Bryant's discomfort became even more acute when John Bigelow, Tilden's secretary of state, importuned his former editorial partner, "It has been one of my dreams for several months that your name should head the Tilden Electoral Ticket this fall for the Presidency." Bryant's reply confessed his "great pain" in declining to commit himself publicly to a man "whom I esteem and honor as I do Mr. Tilden," but whose party's principles would probably undercut its candidate. The same day, in a letter to the publisher J. C. Derby, who had written Bryant that many intelligent voters looked to the Evening Post to guide them in acting wisely at the coming election, but weren't sure whether he still controlled its policies, or whether they were in fact determined by his business partner Isaac Henderson through Henderson's son-in-law Watson Sperry, the paper's managing editor, Bryant set forth in detail his journal's rationale in adhering to the Republican ticket. While he thought Tilden the best candidate-"the most of a statesman, the soundest and most enlarged in opinions and, I think, of the firmest character," his party left much to be desired in the matters of sound money, the tariff, and civil service reform. Though Bryant did not squarely answer the question Derby had raised of editorial control, he implied that in the main it was still his. Yet, in truth, though his was still the guiding hand in large, he no longer held a majority of the voting shares in what had long been William C. Bryant and Company, but only one-half. This deficiency was soon made evident. When, late in September, the New York Times attacked Tilden for supposed income tax derelictions, Bryant was indignant at what he termed slanderous accusations and wrote Sperry a letter "with the injunction to publish it entire." But Sperry implored Bryant not to insist on its publication because of the harm it would do Henderson if 272 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT the Times should turn its virulence against him. Bryant yielded, "most unwill• ingly and quite ungraciously," Julia Bryant wrote Tilden in a letter expressing regret that he would not see Bryant's editorial. She implored him to under• stand that her father had "had much to combat in keeping attacks on you out of the papers, and has insisted that you should not be treated in the Evening Post otherwise than with respect." Bryant's prediction that this year's would be one of the "greatest contests for the presidency" in our history proved prescient, for it remained inconclu• sive throughout the months after election day, with bitter charges of fraud on both sides. Not until the eve of inauguration day, then March 4, was the matter resolved, by a special electoral commission established by the Congress under the prompting of Bryant, Cyrus Field, Carl Schurz, and others. Unfortunately for Tilden, on this body the Republicans held a majority of one, and Hayes was chosen by a strictly party vote. As the campaign proceeded, Bryant's letters and comments had indicated a lessening of personal commitment to the Republican ticket for, as he wrote Christiana Gibson, "I have never before felt so lukewarm an interest as now in any previous contest for the presidency." Many persons have wondered how Bryant voted in this contest in which his party's candidate was pitted against a man whom he considered better qualified, and who remained his friend, but John Bigelow later said he had it on the "best authority" that Bryant had abstained. An Agonizing Decision 273

2350. To John Bigelow New York Janr. 1st 1876. Dear Sir. At the desire of professor John Ordronaux, the State Commis• sioner of Lunacy, I give him this letter of introduction.1 He is a scholar of uncommon attainments: his integrity is unblemished, and his char• acter in all respects excellent. He was educated to both professions• law and medicine, and has given lectures on Medical Jurisprudence at Columbia College and in other institutions. Yours faithfully W C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bigelow ADDREss: To the Hon. John Bigelow DOCKETED: Wm. C. Bryant I New York I Jany 1st 1876. I. Bigelow was then New York's secretary of state under his old friend Governor Samuel J. Tilden. For Ordronaux, see 1033.5; Letter 1525.

2351. To George Bancroft1 New York, January 8th. 1876.2 Dear Bancroft. Yes-it is years since we met-how many I am afraid to compute, and I am pining for a sight of your face and that of my excellent friend Mrs. Bancroft. But I am closely occupied at present, hardly knowing how to spare a day, and, besides, I have, as is natural when one gets beyond the eighties, an old man's dislike of travelling in winter. "Pray that your flight be not in the winter."3 I cannot therefore accept your obliging invitation.4 Say to Mrs. Bancroft that I lay myself at her feet. Yours most truly, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: MHS ADDRESS: Hon. Geo. Bancroft. I. In 1868 Bryant had succeeded his early friend George Bancroft (Volume I, 15) as president of the Century. Now, after serving for seven years as American minister to Berlin, Bancroft was living in Washington. 2. Bryant mistakenly dated this letter "1875." 3. Cf. Mt. 24:20. 4. On December 31 Bancroft had written Bryant, "How many years have passed since I have seen you? How many more since you have slept under my roof?" and asked Bryant to visit him in January or February. NYPL-BG. 2352. To Sydney H. Gay New York Jan. 8th 1876. Dear Mr. Gay, I send you a letter for Mr. Beman which you will take your mode of presenting. 274 LETTERS oF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

In the Tenth Chapter there is a phrase which I meant to note. The writer speaks of "Her Majesty," meaning the Queen of England. It is not the business of a historian to speak of His Excellency the Ambassador or Her Majesty the queen-He says-the king, the queen, the governor the ambassador &c. Will you please substitute the proper word if you agree with me. 1 Yrs truly W. C. BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU. 1. Gay made the substitution.

2353. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York Jan. 8th. 1876 No 24 West 16th Street

I got your note this morning, dear Mrs. Moulton, and learn from it that the Lioness has again laid herself down in her lair. "Who shall rouse her up."1 I am not sure whether it would be, in every respect, safe for me to undertake it. Your old friend, who threatened that he "would have her yet," was of a suitable age, and, if he had not been summoned away so prematurely, would, perhaps, have been at your feet by this time. He has left the field to others for whom there is, perhaps, now a better chance. We shall see. I thank you for your good wishes and hope that their rebound will bring to you in the coming year all that you so kindly ask for me. They say that curses come home to roost. Is there nothing like that to be said of blessings? Do not good wishes for others bring with them a blessing to those from whose hearts they come? I think so, certainly. "Give and it shall be given to you."2 If it be kindly wishes and prayers for the welfare of others that you give your reward is within yourself. Every generous feeling towards a fellow creature makes you better and happier. There is a sermon for you, which you are not obliged to read. So, with my own wishes that you may have a happy year through the whole of 1876, and with the hope that you will not forget Sixteenth Street when you next come to town. I am, Dear Mrs. Moulton faithfully yours W. C. BRYANT.3 An Agonizing Decision 275

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters ADDREss: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. Cf. Gen. 49:9. 2. Luke 6:38. 3. Bryant's closing and signature have been cut from this letter, and copied by another hand, presumably by Mrs. Moulton's daughter Josephine Stewart. Mrs. Stewart often cut Bryant's signatures from letters written to her mother and gave (or sold?) them to acquaintances.

2354. To Edward Lillie Pierce1 New York January lOth. 1876. Dear sir. I am sorry that I cannot oblige you in either of the respects mentioned in your letter. I know nothing of the John Wilkes of whom you speak2 and do not remember even having heard of him. Nor have I any of Mr. Sumner's letters. Such very short and very few notes as I have had in my possession have been given away as autographs or lost. This at least is my present impression but my files of old letters are in the country and when I get where they are I will if I can remember your application, look them over to see whether there is any thing which I can send to you. I am, sir, truly yours. W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: HCL ADDREss: Edwd L. Pierce Esq. 1. Pierce (1829-1897), a Massachusetts lawyer, was the author of a Memoir of Charles Sumner (1877). 2. Pierce's letter is unrecovered. But if his question concerned the British politi• cian and pamphleteer who had been associated with the "Mad Monks of Medmenham Abbey" in the eighteenth century, Bryant must have forgotten his reference to Wilkes after he and Edwin Field dined at that abbey on the Thames in 1845. See Letter 545.

2355. To William H. Neilson 1 New York January 11th 1876 My dear Sir. I have received the accompanying letter2 with a request that I would forward it to you, along with a note saying a kind word for the application which it contains. I cannot say that I am acquainted with Professor Fairchild's3 qualifications as a teacher, or with those of Mrs. Fairchild, but I venture to ask your attention to the application and your friendly consideration of what their references may say in their favor. I am sir, truly yours. W C BRYANT. 276 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG (draft) ADDRESS: To Wm H. Neilson Esq. 1. Unidentified. 2. Unrecovered. 3. Unidentified.

2356. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York Jany. 15, 1876. Dear Mrs. Moulton. I do not like Mr. Blaine's speech because it was ill-timed. 1 As to Jefferson Davis I think he is right in charging upon him more than upon any body else, the atrocities committed upon the Union prison• ers. W[i]rz was hanged for them,2 and the man who was W[i]rz's superior, and took no steps to put a stop to the crimes he committed, deserves as richly the rope's end. But Blaine should have proposed his amendment without opening the old wounds by debate, and allowed the Democrats to reject it if they dared. If they did the Senate would have put every thing right. As the matter stands, several days of the session are wasted in a debate which bring up old animosities to the surface which had been buried. As to Hill's speech,3 it seems that he had modified and changed it greatly, before letting it go before the public in the formal report of it. I have often wished that I had remained in Roslyn some three or four weeks longer. You, I suppose, go very soon to Baltimore, so that I shall hardly have a chance to see you unless you call at Sixteenth Street. I have here a great many people after me, whom I do not want to see. Some are simply bores, but the greater number want to make some use of me. It is selfish, I know, not to wish to be useful, but it is doubtful whether what I am sometimes obliged to do for these people results in any benefit to the community at large. Hoping to see you here and to have the pleasure of wishing you a happy new year by word of mouth, I am, dear Mrs. Moulton, faithfully yours, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters ADDREss: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. In early January James Gillespie Blaine (1830-1893) of Maine, then Republi• can leader of the House of Representatives in the national Congress, had charged the former President of the Confederacy with "inhumanity" toward captured Union soldiers during the Civil War. 2. Henry Wirz, commandant of the notorious Confederate prison at Anderson• ville, Georgia, where more than twelve thousand Union soldiers had died, had been tried and convicted of atrocities, and had been executed on November 10, 1865. (Bryant mistakenly wrote "Wurz.") 3. Benjamin Harvey Hill (1823-1882), a former Confederate legislator and An Agonizing Decision 277

spokesman for Davis, was a United States Congressman from 1875 to 1877. He had replied to Blaine in defense of Davis.

2357. To George W. Curtis The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street New York, January 16, 1876 My dear Sir. I take pleasure in giving this note of introduction to Mrs. E. F. Wait, who desires to confer with you on a matter of public interest. She is Secretary of the Irving Monument Fund and I take the liberty of commending what she has to say to your friendly attention.1 I am, dear sir, truly yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Davenport (Iowa) Public Museum ADDRESS: To George William Curtis Esq. ' 1. Mrs. Wait has not been further identified.

2358. To Alfred B. Street New York Jany 18th 1876. Dear Mr. Street. "The Family Library of Poetry and Song" in its new edition about to be put to press will contain your poem of "The Settler"- Another is wanted. Can you spare the time and give yourself the trouble to copy one of your poems, the one most a favorite with you and send it to me? It shall go into the new edition along with the "Settler."1 Your poems are not to be found here. The book is in the Catalogue---at least the name is-of the Society Library or Athenaeum, but the volume is gone. As for Frontenac there is no passage in it which could be detached from the context without loss to its impressiveness.. Yours very truly w c BllYANT. P.S. If you do me the favor to comply with my request please let it be with as little delay as possible. WCB

MANUSCRIPT: Brown University Library ADDRESS: Alfred B. Street Esq. 1. Street (Letter 955) submitted "Nightfall: A Picture," pp. 412-413 in the 1876 edition. 278 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2359. To Leonice M.S. Moulton New York January 26th 1876. My dear Mrs. Moulton.

I send the enclosed 1 to you as the proper person to receive it and to answer it [if?] an answer be required. So, if it be right for you to write, you will obey the rule of courtesy by writing to the writer. We are in the midst of an uncommonly pleasant winter. I often wonder whether it can be the same with you at Roslyn. Here the footing is dry and for a wonder in New York tolerably clean. It frequently occurs to me what pleasant walks I lose by not being at Roslyn-walks which might be made doubly pleasant when I could persuade you to join me in them. Here I take long stretches down to the office of the Evening Post, but always alone, and walking alone in a crowded city is rather a monotonous affair. Sometimes it is disagree• ably diversified by hearing the loud voices of two people who walk behind you so close that they seem shouting into your ears. In that case I mend my pace to get away from them or fall behind them. The worst of it is that if I hasten my steps, there is always some boy who observes it, and straddles along to keep pace with me so that I am forced to fall back again and this brings me within hearing of my tormentors again. In the country you have the sabbath of nature, and only rural sounds of which Cowper says "Nor rural sights alone but rural sounds Exhilarate the spirit, and restore The tone of languid nature. "2 But this is prosing-! did not think when I began of running on in this manner. This is Julia's reception day. Mrs. Cornelius Lawrence3 is below talking as fast as she can to Mr. Bigelow and that you know is as fast as words can be made to follow each other-and gesticulating as fast or as milliners say, to correspond, and I have run up stairs again to put a few sentences into this letter. You pay little respect to Sixteenth Street when you come to town. I hope that we shall yet see you here, before you are off for Baltimore. Thursday morning. Jan. 27th. The affair is over. It was a squeeze, a jam, a crush. Some people I think must like to be squeezed otherwise they would not come in such crowds. I had no idea that Julia had such myriads of acquaintances. I looked around and did not see more than one in ten whom I could name. We had five reverends. Dr. Van Nest of the Dutch Reformed Church,4 Dr. Osgood,5 Dr. Cotton Smith,6 and Mr. Gray7 of the Episcopal, and Mr. Frothingham8-of I do not know what sect-a free religionist I believe. An Agonizing Decision 279

Do you know that Mr. O'Conor9 got well by eating pears. He paid no attention to what the doctors said but followed the calls of nature satisfied its cravings which were for pears and by so doing brought back his stomach to its proper tones. So at least I hear. 10 I have not yet wished you a happy new year by word of mouth but the time will come I hope Yours faithfully W. C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters ADDRESS: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. Unrecovered. 2. William Cowper, The Task, i, "The Sofa," 1. 181. 3. Wife of the one-time mayor of New York. See Letter 314. 4. Abraham Rynier Van Nest (1823-1892) had for several years been establishing American chapels in European capitals. 5. See Letter 1258. 6. John Cotton Smith (1826-1882), rector of the Episcopal Church of the Ascension, New York. 7. Not further identified. 8. Octavius Brooks Frothingham (1822-1895), pastor of the Third Unitarian Society in New York. 9. The prominent New York trial lawyer, Charles O'Conor (1804-1884). 10. This is yet another expression of Bryant's almost mystical faith in the curative properties of fruit and berries.

2360. To Sydney H. Gay · New York Jan. 28th 1876 Dear Mr. Gay. Your eleventh chapter is not "tedious" at all-but you are a terrible image breaker. You have smashed that beautiful image of Pocahontas interposing to save Captain Smith from the murderous savages into fragments so small that they will never be put together again. 1 I do not see, however, that you impugn the veracity of Smith himself. On page 268 I have substituted "rites" for rights-which I suppose is what you meant. Page 270 which for "that" 11 27 4 since for "as" 11 same page-"Whether there was any such arrest" seems to me to want the words "or not" to follow immedi• ately. Page 279 Ratcliff is spelled with the final e once but more without it.2 280 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Page 289 you use colonize as a neuter or intransitive verb. It grates on my ear and I believe there is no good example of this use of the word. Page 289 My old enemy "based" Yours truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESs: S H Gay Esq I who will please I excuse blots. 1. In Volume I, 282, Gay points out that only John Smith, of those who chronicled the settlement of Virginia in 1607, mentions his rescue from execution by the king's daughter-and even he did not include the romantic incident in his first published account of the colony, A True Relation (1608). 2. John Sicklemore, or Ratcliffe (d. 1610), a founder of Jamestown and a governor of Virginia, after quarreling with Smith and imprisoning him, was murdered by Indians.

2361. To F. W. Bird• New York, January 29, 1876. Dear Sir: I cannot attend the meeting held in Boston to honor the memory of the late Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe,2 but I gladly avail myself of the opportunity, in answering the invitation of the committee, to testify to the high estimation in which I hold his character and services. If our grief for the departure of an eminent man is to be measured by the good which he was doing while he lived, the death of Dr. Howe should call forth expressions of the deepest sorrow. He was one whose whole life was dedicated to the service of his fellow men. His detestation of wrong was shown in the part which he took in the successful struggle of the Greeks to throw off the yoke of their barbarian masters. His labors in the education of the blind, which only ceased with his life, will give him an eminent place in the history of what has been done to make amends to that unfortunate class for the deprivation of the sense which brings us the swiftest and most comprehensive notices of the outer world. His place is in that class with which Virgil, by a noble climax, closes his enumeration of the great and good who possess the Elysian fields-a passage which has been thus translated: Patriots were there in freedom's battle slain, Priests whose long lives were closed without a stain, Bards worthy him who breathed the poet's mind, Founders of arts that dignify mankind, An Agonizing Decision 281

And lovers of our race, whose labors gave Their names a memory that defies the grave. 3 I am, sir, faithfully yours, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered ADDRESS: Hon. F. W. Bird, Chairman of Committee, etc. TEXT: Unidentified newspaper clipping. 1. See descriptive note. 2. See 1900.1. Samuel Gridley Howe, husband of Julia Ward Howe (Letter 1494) had died on January 9. At a memorial meeting soon after in the Boston Music Hall, with the governor of Massachusetts in the chair, poems written by Holmes, William Ellery Channing, and others were read, as, presumably, was Bryant's letter, published the next day in the Boston journal. See Julia Ward Howe, Reminiscences, 1819-1899 (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1900), pp. 369-371. 3. This is presumably Bryant's own rendition of lines 660--664 of the sixth book of the Aeneid, the original Latin of which reads His manus ob patriam pugnando vulnera passi, quique sacerdotes casti, dum vita manebat, quique pii vates et Phoebo digna locuti, inventas aut qui vitam excoluere per artis, quique sui memores aliquos fecere merendo ....

2362. To Candace Thurber Wheeler' New York, Jany 31, 1876. Dear Mrs. Wheeler. Will you please answer Miss [Stimson?] that if I can think of any thing worthy of a place in the paper which is to be issued at the approaching fair of the Young Women's Christian Association, I will send it for insertion. But at my time of life-in the frosty months which I have reached-the poetic vein is clogged with ice, and neither flows freely nor makes music with the pebbles, and I must make the promise with this reservation, that if nothing comes to hand nothing is to be expected of me. I am, dear Madam, truly yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: DuU ADDRESS: Mrs. Candace Wheeler, I No. 244 Lexington Avenue, New York. 1. Mrs. Candace Thurber Wheeler (Letter 2020), with her brother Francis B. Thurber, a prosperous New York wholesale grocer, was a founder in 1877 of a cottage colony at Onteora Park in the Catskill Mountains, to which came wealthy friends as well as artists and writers, among them Mark Twain. Alf Evers, The Catskills from Wilderness to Woodstock (Garden City: Doubleday, 1972), pp. 539-543. 282 LETTERS or WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

2363. To Leonice M.S. Moulton New York Feb 7- 1876

... I send back the postscript of Mrs. Smith 1 which you ought to keep as it is a testimonial of the ease with which you acquire the good will of others. You must have had some sort of amulet to acquire so much esteem in so short a time. There is nothing going on here that you do not find chronicled in the newspapers. I dare say there are crimes committed in secret corners and good deeds performed with equal privacy of which only omniscience knows. 2 As for yourself I suppose you are doing good as usual, even if the occupation be so humble as feeding the chickens. To do good in the way that beneficence is wanted is the right thing, however apparently small the service may seem. One of the ways in which good is done in the parched & arid regions of Western Asia, is the establishment of fountains of drinking water which there is esteemed the most welcome thing. "A cup of cold water to one of these little ones." In a little niche on the outside of a Mahomedan tomb, you will often find an earthen vase or a large cup of water replenished every morning for the thirsty traveller .... MANUSCRIPT: Ridgeley Family Collection TEXT: Hoyt, "Bryant Correspondence," II, 200-201. I. Unidentified. 2. Presumably, a portion of this letter has been deleted from the printed text, here as well as in the conclusion. 2364. To Sydney H. Gay New York Feb 8. 1876 Dear Mr. Gay It is true that the manner of writing differs a little in this chapter• perhaps considerably from the others. It seems to me that your narrative has more compression- I have marked on the proof the little alterations that occurred to me. Yours truly W C BRYANT MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: S. H Gay Esq. 2365. To Sydney H. Gay New York February 11th 1876- Dear Mr. Gay- 1 send you the proof of Chapter XII. On page 309 are the words between the main and outer sea- An Agonizing Decision 283

Does this mean mainland [?]-if so it should be printed mainland. On page 311, "styles" is a shopkeeper's expression. Page 319 the same. On page 326-"they" and "them" are used obscurely. On same page• "train along one of the guns"-train I believe is not wrong but unusual in that sense-321, would not beautiful islands be better than "belles isles," which is not so characteristic that it requires to be in French?• The other suggestions I have made require no note here.- y ours very truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: S H Gay Esq.

2366. To [George Harvey?] [New York] February 16. [1876]

... You complain that you do not understand our politics. Neither do I. Our country seems to me to be disgraced by the conduct of both parties. Neither seems to have any other object than to get or keep in power, and keep the other out. There is no longer any contention about measures and policy. Each party is divided in regard to the great questions before the country, and the consequence is that those ques• tions are left to take care of themselves, and no party gives its earnest and steady efforts to bringing them to a right solution. As to President Grant, there is no danger that he will be elected for the third term, even if he should be nominated, which he will not be. It is not impossible that by and by the hard-money men and free-trade men of both parties may come together and form a party, but that may not perhaps be till after another election ....

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT (partial): Life, II, 374.

2367. To George Bancroft New York February 22d 1876. Dear Sir. On behalf of the Century Association, of which you were the Second President, 1 we write to ask you to allow your portrait to be painted for the Rooms of the Association. From our own judgment, and from consultation with leading artists we designate Mr. Thomas LeClear2 as the Painter, whose relation to our Association, and ability to do justice to characters of intellectual eminence, especially fit him for this work. 284 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Trusting that you will do us the favor of granting this request we remam Yours respectfully WM. c. BRYANT. SAML OSGOOD jAMES W. BEEKMAN3

MANUSCRIPT: MHS ADDREss: To the Hon. George Bancroft. 1. Bancroft had filled this office from 1864 to 1867, succeeding Gulian Verplanck and preceding Bryant. 2. Le Clear (1818-1882), a New York portrait and genre artist, did a portrait of Bryant in 1876 which is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 3. This letter, in Bryant's holograph, is also signed by Osgood (Letter 1258) and Beekman (Letter 1624). Bancroft, then living in Washington, wrote a grateful reply on February 29 (MHS).

2368. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York February 22d 1876.- My dear Mrs. Moulton. That you may be certain to see the letter from Baltimore concern• ing which Julia and myself spoke with you the other day, I send it enclosed. 1 It is cut from the Evening Post of the 16th instant, and I find that it was sent for publication from Mr. Godwin's house-one of the daughters, probably, having received it from Mrs. Stewart. I hope you got home on Monday without much further fatigue, after having gone over the whole circuit of the Evening Post, with all its machinery of presses worked by steam, its galleries and elevators and compositors desks arranged like an old fashioned formal flower garden, with alleys and borders, so that you came out, as you re• marked, a little bewildered. What a change from the simple and slow methods of printing in use when I came to the Evening Post, and these swifter processes in which the printed sheets drop from the machinery like nails from one of those Yankee machines that fling them down in a shower! 2 This beautiful weather-is it never to cease? I heard yesterday that letters from England describe the weather there as fearfully stormy and very cold. There have been floods ravaging the land and hurricanes sweeping the coast. I hope that when you get back from Baltimore in April, the fine weather will not be over, and that you and the genial days of Spring will be here together. Yours faithfully w. C. BRYANT. An Agonizing Decision 285

MANUSCRIPT: MdHS ADDREss: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. This letter has not been identified, but it was seemingly of little import. 2. In 1875 the EP had moved into a commodious new ten-storey building costing three-quarters of a million dollars, at the corner of Broadway and Fulton Street.

2369. To an Unidentified Correspondent New York. Feb. 26th. 1876. Dear Madam. I cannot tell you where to find the poem entitled "A hundred years hence," nor who wrote it. I asked several persons this morning but could find nobody who could tell me any thing about it. 1 As to the poem which you have sent me, it has the serious fault-that although it has the look of blank verse to the eye it is not verse at all. I am sure of its rejection if offered on that account-! should not publish it if offered to me by a friend-. It has some elements of merit-it is not without fancy or poetic feeling-but if you continue to write blank verse, I -would counsel you to conform to the rules of measure and rhythm which govern blank verse as practised by the best poets-- What I would advise would be that you send your verses to the Magazines and the literary weeklies-- Send them to one and if not accepted to another. If one rejects them another may not. The daily newspapers never pay for poetry-they have too much offered them gratuitously and cannot print one half of what is sent them. But when you write write with care and conform to the usages of versification ....

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG (draft fragment). 1. The poem in question has not been located under that title. Possibly the reference was to Oliver Wendell Holmes's "The Deacon's Masterpiece: or, The Wonderful 'One-Hoss Shay,'" in which the carriage "was built in such a logical way I It ran a hundred years to a day" and then fell "in a heap or mound I As if it had been to the mill and ground!"

2370. To an Unidentified Correspondent [New York? cFebruary 26, 1876]

... I have had so many applications of the same kind with yours they have formerly taken so much of my time and I have had such bad luck with them that I have been obliged to decline complying with them unless in cases when I was desired by some particular friend. I have been refused admission into the [Atlantic?] Magazine and the Galaxy- 286 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

and cannot apply to them again- Their editors I am not in frequent communication with as my extreme old age has in a measure cut me off. ...

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft fragment).

2371. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York March 9th. 1876. Dear Mrs. Moulton I promised to let you know about Mr. Cline. He is getting on slowly-more so than he expected, and is still quite weak, with occa• sional bad nights. He has had inflammatory rheumatism in his right arm, which has added to his sufferings and made him helpless. He does not leave his room-hardly his bed-but the rheumatism is gradually leaving him. As for the rest of Roslyn I can tell you nothing about them, and as for New York nothing that is not in the newspapers. All the women are zealous for doing something creditable to our city in the Philadel• phia Show.' Julia has been drawn into it head and shoulders and attends the meetings of the Committees almost daily. Now that Lent has come, and there are no kettledrums, the ladies see each other at meetings and have enough to do in driving about, and prompting the newspapers, and begging subscriptions. Last evening Julia and I went to a meeting of the Goethe Club, where more than half the audience were ladies, and the colossal bust of Goethe was delivered into the care of the President of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is of tin bronze and will not endure the weather of the open air-so it goes into the rooms of the Museum. There I saw a very pretty young lady-Miss Parnell from England, who came over to study medicine and will go back to practice by and by.- Kind regards to Mr. and Mrs. Stewart and the younger branches of your posterity ....2

MANUSCRIPT: MdHS ADDRESS: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. The Centennial Celebration of American independence, held between May and November 1876. 2. The closing and signature were detached by Mrs. Stewart, with a notation "Autograph solicited."

2372. To John Hicks 1 New York March 13th. 1876 Dear sir. I acknowledge the compliment paid me in the request that I should compose an ode for the coming celebration of the Fourth of An Agonizing Decision 287

July by the citizens of Oshkosh.2 I have however been applied to with a like request for the centennial anniversary from various other quarters, and have been obliged for two reasons to decline. Reason first. Old Age which has the effect of diminishing the faculty of versifying. Reason Second. Several literary tasks on hand which leave me no leisure for any thing else. On these accounts I have been obliged to answer all such applica• tions in the negative, as I must do in this instance. Very respectfully yours, W. C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Minnesota Historical Society ADDRESS: John Hicks Esq I Ch•. of Com• mittee. I. John Hicks (1847-1917) was a Wisconsin journalist and diplomat. 2. This invitation is unrecovered.

2373. To Joseph Roswell Hawley 1 March 14. [1876] Dear Sir. I am sensible of the compliment paid me in requesting me to compose a poem for the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia.2 It will not be in my power to comply with the request for several reasons. One is old age, which is another form of ill-health, and implies a decline of both the bodily and mental faculties. Another is the diffi• culty of satisfying myself in writing verses for particular public occa• sions, a circumstance which has of late caused me to decline all applications of this nature. If I wanted yet another reason, I should find it in certain tasks [of a literary nature] which leave me no leisure for the composition of a poem on such an important [occasion).3 Yrs truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG (draft): ADDREss: Jos R Hawley Pres of I the Centennial Commission. I. Hawley (1826-1905, Hamilton 1847), was ajournalist, Civil War general, and United States senator. 2. Hawley had written from Philadelphia on March 13 (NYPL-BG) asking Bryant to read a poem there on July 4. In an accompanying personal note he apologized for the lateness of the invitation, explaining that his Centennial Commission's first choice for an orator was William Evarts of New York, and that they wished to have a poet from a different state, but that the New England poets had declined, pleading ill• health (NYPL-BG). 3. In an undated draft "private" note to Hawley (NYPL-BG) Bryant said he'd 288 LETTERS oF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT hoped Longfellow, "as the most popular of all the poets of this country," would "accept the distinction offered him."

2374. To Sydney H. Gay New York, March 15, 1876 Dear Mr. Gay. I send back the fifteenth chapter' of the History. I have marked some little-as it seems to me faults. The other proofs I will send soon. Page 5 "Creek" should be I think stream or small river. " " "Schout"2-which appears several times I think should be explained. " 10 "compelled" twice over, in the same sentence. " 11 "the secretary, the patroon openly defied-Better "as for the secretary the patroon openly defied him"-if that be the meanmg. " 13 "the Domine." Better omitted as not necessary to perspicu• ity. " 20 "began to fill up" Better, "began to be peopled." " 30 "such a fix." this is quoted but it is a translation and it does not become an historian, in translating sober history, to use slang words-"such a state." should I think be the reading. Page 44 "He sent to Hudde" Who is he? I suppose the captain of the vessel. Should not the sentence, to be clear be written thus. The captain of the vessel sent an appeal to Hudde but when that officer came in person to investigate the complaint he was &c Page 45 last line but one, something wrong. In one place I have substituted lenity for the newspaper word leni• ency.- Page 36 "sometimes weekly submitting to a cudgelling"-states no specific fact and is but a sneer-does it mean sometimes submitting to affronts which they had not the power to resist?- The Dutch descendants are thin-skinned in this quarter Page 39. "that Dutch battery a sounding proclamation." I would rather see "that Dutch battery" expunged. Yours truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: Mr S. H. Gay. 1. The sixteenth, as printed. 2. A Dutch administrative officer, or sheriff. An Agonizing Decision 289

2375. To Sydney H. Gay The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street. New York, March 16, 1876 Dear Mr. Gay. Looking over the fourteenth chapter of the History which you shall have back soon I am more struck than ever with the contemptu• ous tone taken in the fifteenth chapter1 towards the Dutch settlers of New York. The manner in which the Pilgrims are treated is reverential and exculpatory-that in which the Dutch are treated is deprecatory and jeering-at all events that is the impression left on the mind of the reader.2 I still think that the phrases I suggested the omission of had better be left out-and as many other modifications made as may occur to you-but they will not need to be many. Yours truly W C BRYANT Galley 14th two thirds of the way from the top--["]those who though not such rigid separatists as those" &c- For the second those I would suggest "the colonists." II II a little lower down "Section of country["]- a clumsy newspaper pen phrase for tract or region-! abominate it and would suggest "tract." Galley 15. ["]Having sold the first lot"-I would suggest "ship load" for lot. II II near the bottom "disapproved of him." We say disap- prove of his conduct-of his doings but it seems to me a harsh construction to say disapprove of a person. Galley 16 near the bottom-"the exigencies of their circum• stances"-would not "condition" be better instead of circumstances.-. ~ ...

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: S H Gay Esq. 1. The sixteenth, as previously noted. 2. Gay seems to have modified such comments, except in recording the inebriety and disarray in the administration of the fourth governor of New Amsterdam, Wouter Van Twiller (1580-1656), and the cruelty and despotism of his successor, Willem Kieft (1597-1647).

2376. To Sydney H. Gay New York, March 17th 1876 Dear Mr. Gay

I send you the fourteenth chapter1 of the History which seems to be written with a great deal of care. I have noted a few things in it. 290 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

On Galley 2d opposite the blue mark Z "Saxon, Yeo man" Probably a fault only in the punctuation. Galley 3d last line but one "grim and grisly face of poverty" I do not like the two adjectives-one is enough unless they are more unlike each other. Galley 5th, near the top-"we spent a good part of the day ** suitable to their present occasion" is "their" right-it is a quota• tion[?] Galley 7. twenty third line from the top "no special blessings to be grateful for." The Christian is grateful for every thing and apparent misfortunes are blessings in disguise. The phrase quoted seems to me discordant with the whole narrative. Galley 8 1/2 near the middle "catching on fire"-is not "taking fire" better? II 11 a little lower "brought to and left in"-a case of split• ting particles- Suppose you strike out the word "to"? Galley 9. I marked "which Winslow2 was sent for and obtained"• near the bottom of the galley-but it only seems a little inele• gant. Perhaps it may not to others. Galley 12 Confession of Lyfords wife. She confessed her husband's guilt3- Is confession the right word-we do not confess the sins of others. Galley 13. "none to make them afraid" Yes-they had the savages always. I would omit this. "Impudence" a little below is a hard word to be applied to Capt. Smith.4 Yrs truly W C BRYANT MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: Mr S. H. Gay. 1. The fifteenth, as printed. 2. Edward Winslow (1595-1655), leading explorer and narrative writer of the Plymouth Colony. 3. John Lyford, a clergyman who was arrested and banished from the Plymouth Colony for trying to subvert its form of worship. 4. This term, applied to Captain John Smith for having taken credit unjustifiably for the discovery of Virginia, Gay softened to "audacity." Vol. I, 417. 2377. To John Bigelow New York. March 22d 1876. Dear Mr Bigelow.

Your letter1 was like a worm eaten nut; it contained nothing. If you will send me the public sentiment of which you speak, it shall be welcome. Yours faithfully W. C. BRYANT An Agonizing Decision 291

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bigelow ADDRESS: Hon John Bigelow DOCKETED: W. C. Bryant I March 22/76. I. Unrecovered.

2378. To Messrs. H. 0. Houghton & Co. New York March 22d 1876. Gentlemen, My friends criticise the lithograph drawing of me which you sent the other day. I thought that the photograph which I sent was a good one'-and perhaps was pretty faithfully copied but these are the objections- First. That the expression is too fierce-in that I think they are right. Second. That the forehead shows too retreating. Third. That the distance is not great enough between the fore• head and the hinder part of the head. These latter objections I cannot judge of but even if the photo• graph be faithfully copied yet if it fails to give what are the character• istics of the original, it is so far imperfect. The first of the faults I have named is apparent to me: of the second and third others can judge better than I. The third may arise from some deficiency in the shading given to the temples and the neighbouring parts. I send another photograph that you may see how a different view of the head shows different peculiarities. The one I send has a defect-a certain indis• tinctness in the outline of the farther cheek. Yours truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: HLH ADDRESS: Messrs Houghton & Co. PUBLISHED: George Monteiro, "The Patriarchal Mr. Bryant: Some New Letters," Notes & Queries, 22:440-441 (October 1975). I. See Letters 2323, 2340.

2379. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York, March 23, 1876. Dear Mrs. Moulton. Of course I am pleased with the nomination of Mr. Dana to post of Minister to the British government, and of course also, I am not pleased with the way in which the Committee of the Senate have treated it. I hope the Senate will snub the committee as it richly deserves to be snubbed, by confirming the nomination by a decisive 292 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT vote. After the whole caravan of camels which the Senate has swal• lowed it would be utterly ridiculous to strain at this very small gnat which Ben Butler has found and brought to Washington.' You have not forgotten I hope that the Spring is nigh and that the saxifrage, and sassafras too, will soon be blooming on the gravelly hillsides at Roslyn, and the blue birds are singing from the locust trees. I was in Roslyn last week to see Mr. Cline and the early violets. He was in bed looking very pale but the violets in the border before my door looked bright and happy-they were the white ones you know which come the earliest of the violet tribe. I am afraid that Mr. Cline has been over doctored. First there was the pain from the wound which was severe2 and made him sleepless and for that they gave him potent opiates which made his mind wander and then came inflammatory rheumatisms in his right arm for which he was drugged with colchicum and I know not what else. He is still I hear very weak and often sleepless. I think it a pity that he did not fall into the hands of some practitioner according to a milder system. Julia went out with me. The season continues fine. The other day a cold snowstorm set in after two o'clock in the afternoon and when I went to bed the streets lay in two inches of compact snow, but when I looked out in the morning every flake of it had been dissolved in rain and a soft west wind was blowing. The southwest winds I suppose will soon blow you to Roslyn. Kind regards to all. Faithfully yours, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters ADDREss: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. 1. Early in March Secretary of State Hamilton Fish had nominated Richard Henry Dana, Jr., to be minister to Great Britain. The appointment was opposed by Senator Ben Butler of Massachusetts (1320.3) and William B. Lawrence, a legal writer who had earlier charged Dana with plagiarizing one of his books. In April 1876 the Senate rejected the nomination by a vote of thirty-one to seventeen. Nevins, Fish, II, 829-830. 2. The nature of George Cline's accident is obscure.

2380. To Messrs. H. 0. Houghton & Co. New York March 29 1876. Gentlemen: I am about to sit for my photograph again-that is, tomorrow. If any thing better is produced than what you have I will send it to you- An Agonizing Decision 293

and if not I will try to look up the best at Saronys or Bogardus' and let you have it, if you can wait. Yours truly W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: HLH ADDREss: To Messrs. H. G. Houghton & Co. PUBLISHED: Monteiro, loc. cit. 1. Probably Abraham Bogardus, a New York daguerrotypist and photographer.

2381. To the Commissioners of State Charities and Correction. The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street New York, March 30, 1876 Gentlemen. I give this letter to Thomas Daly, 1 who desires a place as keeper or assistant in the penitentiary. I hear a good report of his character and capacity, his competency for the post and his habits of sobriety; his honesty and his diligence. These, I understand, he can substantiate to your satisfaction, and I shall be glad if you see reason to give him the appointment. Yours respectfully W. C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG ADDRESS: To the Commissioners of State Charities and Correction. 1. Unidentified.

2382. To Robert C. Winthrop' New York, April 3d 1876. My dear Sir. I thank you for your book relating to Washington Bowdoin and Franklin.2 It is well, from time to time, to speak of the examples of those whose labors have benefitted the human race, and when this is done, as in your volume, in an attractive manner it helps to perpetuate the good they have done. I think that I may infer, that the erection of the statue to Franklin was due to the striking description you gave of the shameful neglect of the humble memorial which marks his last resting place at Philadelphia.3 What relates to James Bowdoin is much less generally known than it deserves to be.4 I am, dear sir, faithfully yours. W. C BRYANT. 294 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: MHS ADDREss: Hon. R. C. Winthrop. 1. President of the Massachusetts Historical Society. See 1189.4. 2. Washington, Bowdoin, and Franklin (1876). 3. Dying in 1790 at the age of eighty-four, Benjamin Franklin had been buried in the Christ Church burial ground in Philadelphia, under a simple stone bearing the brief inscription he had directed, "Benjamin and Deborah Franklin." 4. James Bowdoin (1726-1790, Harvard 1745), Boston merchant and statesman, was the first president in 1780 of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and for long a correspondent with Franklin on scientific matters.

2383. To Mary Howard Schoolcraft1 New York, April 5th 1876. Dear Madam. You will excuse me for not answering your letter earlier, when I tell you that I waited in hopes that I might be able to communicate something to your advantage-which I am sorry to say that I am not able to do. When you reflect that I am a very old man, now in my eighty second year, you will not be surprized when I say that my life notwithstanding what you may see in the newspapers is a very secluded one; that my old companions have dropped away; that with the younger class, the men of middle age, my intercourse is not very familiar nor frequent, and that for the greater part of the year I live in the country away from my few early acquaintances. I have therefore no means of essentially aiding you in your wish to exchange Effingham Place for a farm on the Hudson.2 But I have caused a paragraph to be inserted in the Evening Post, which you will find enclosed and which I hope may meet the eye of some one who desires to possess an agreeable place of residence in Washington. I am madam truly and respectfully yours. WM. c. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: WeCL. 1. Second wife and widow of Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (589.3) whom she had married in 1847; a native of the Beaufort District, North Carolina. 2. It is uncertain whether this exchange was effected.

2384. To Cornelius Rea Agnew1 New York, April6, 1876. Dear Sir: The widespread corruption in our public service which has dis• graced the Republic in the eyes of the world and threatens to poison the vitality of our institutions,-the uncertainty of the public mind and An Agonizing Decision 295

of party-counsels as to grave economical questions involving in a great measure the honor of the government, the morality of our business life and the general wellbeing of the people,-and the danger that an inordinate party spirit may through the organized actions of a com• paratively small number of men who live by politics, succeed in overriding the most patriotic impulses of the people and in monopoliz• ing political power for selfish ends,-seem to render it most desirable that no effort should be spared to secure to the popular desire for genuine reform a decisive influence in the impending national elec• tion. Mindful of the fact that this patriotic desire is honestly struggling for effective expression inside of existing political organizations, as it is also strong outside of them, and believing that by all proper means it should be encouraged and made to prevail, the undersigned invite you to meet them and others of like purpose, who have been invited in the same manner, in a free conference to consider what may be done to prevent the National Election of the Centennial year from becoming a mere choice of evils, and to secure the election of men to the highest offices of the Republic, whose character and ability will satisfy the exigencies of our present situation and protect the honor of the American name. The conference will be held in the City of New York on the 15th of May. You are respectfully and urgently requested to be present, and to communicate your acceptance of this invitation to H. C. Lodge Esq. 2 P. 0. Box 1938, New York City. Very Truly Yours. WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT, New York3

MANUSCRIPT: New York State Library ADDRESS: Dr. C. A. Agnew. 1. Dr. Agnew (1830-1888, Columbia 1849, College of Physicians and Surgeons 1852) was a professor at his medical school from 1869 to 1888, having been an organizer during the Civil War of the United States Sanitary Commission. 2. This was apparently an early sally into public affairs by Henry Cabot Lodge (1850-1924, Harvard 1871, Harvard Law School 1874), then assistant editor of the North American Review, and later, for over thirty years, United States senator from Massachusetts. 3. Attached to this letter, written in an unidentified holograph, was Bryant's name, followed by those of Alexander H. Bullock, governor of Massachusetts; Carl Schurz (1829-1906), then a Missouri journalist; Horace White (1834-1916), lately editor of the Chicago Tribune; and Theodore Dwight Woolsey (1801-1889, Yale 1820), president of Yale from 1846 to 1871, and a political scientist. Copies of this letter were apparently sent to a number of other reform-minded men. At the conference on May 15 Bryant was one of a dozen prominent reformers to sign a "manifesto" calling on "all good citizens" to "support no candidate who, in public 296 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

position, had ever countenanced corrupt practices or combinations, or impeded their exposure and punishment, or opposed necessary measures of reform."

2385. To Sydney H. Gay New York April 6th [1876] Dear Mr. Gay. I send you memorandums of what I have noticed in the proofs recieved yesterday. Galley 1st. not far from the bottom on the right hand "permit of no costly apparel"-should be suffer or tolerate instead of "permit of' Same Galley a little lower, left hand "industries" often repeated• would not "occupations" answer? Galley 2d "cruelty as the nobler part of courage"- Did the Indians really think that? It seems to me not. Endurance was their supreme virtue. Please consider this.- Same Galley-near the middle-"Paralysis * * * overwhelmed the colony"-does not seem to me a well-chosen phrase. Paralysis itself is not so good as "utter discouragement" and the word overwhelm does not seem to me apposite. W.C.B.

MANUSCRIPT: CU.

2386. To Sydney H. Gay New York April lOth 1876. Dear Mr. Gay. I send you back the proof relating to the Virginia and Maryland Colony, which is well told.-I have made these notes. Galley 5 opposite the portrait "those taking" is a phrase of , shopkeepers advertisement. say persons taking. 6 and others. I see Governor is at times spelled with and sometimes without the capital letter-The usage in the , U S. is with the capital. 8 "Beaver" should it not be "beaver skins" [?] and "to com• , pletely absorb"-! always put the particle after the [verb ]. 1 10 "plaza" a Spanish word meaning a public square-is not , , square better-the word is near the top[?] "vetoed" halfway down-say rejected for the process did , , not resemble our veto , "statement" lower down.-admire is not a statement. 12 "the hope these nourished" does this not want the relative "which" [?] An Agonizing Decision 297

II II "bluff of the same character["]-is not form information better? Yours truly W C Bryant

MANUSCRIPT: CU. 1. Bryant inadvertently wrote "adverb." 2387. To Mary H. Schoolcraft New York April 13, 1876 Dear Madam. The error of the Evening Post in regard to the extent of the grounds on which your Washington mansion stands has been cor• rected in the enclosed paragraph. I am very sorry to learn from your last letter1 that the conduct of some who should have been your friends has been so hostile to your interests- Yours very truly W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: WCL ADDRESS: Mrs M H Schoolcraft. 1. Unrecovered. 2388. To Sydney H. Gay New York April 14, 1876 Dear Mr Gay. On the First galley of the accompanying proof I have marked "thither" for there On the second near the bottom. "There was no going back upon the action" is not a clear phrase and I stopped to consider what it meant. It should be I think "There was no reversal of the proceedings" of Endicott" &c On the third near the top "it was no question["]-is not "there" better than "it["]? On the fourth-non conformity to Episcopal forms is a little ill• sounding-say "to the Episcopal ceremonial.["] W.C.B.

MANUSCRIPT: CU. 2389. To John A. Dix The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street. New York, April 15. 1876 Dear General, They have put you and me on a Committee to frame an address 298 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT to Dom Pedro1-with Mr. Evarts-Can you see me this morning and at what time? I will call. Yours truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: Genl John A Dix DOCKETED: Wm. C. Bryant I 15 April 1876. I. Early in 1876 it was anticipated that Emperor Dom Pedro II of Brazil (Letter 1520) would visit New York during a world tour, and a "Citizens Committee" of about forty New Yorkers, including Bryant, was formed to give him a formal reception. However, when it appeared he would be in New York only briefly and at an awkward time, the committee was dissolved and each member was refunded the better part of the one hundred dollars he had contributed. But Dom Pedro did take time to call on Bryant, whom he had long admired, and afterward wrote him from Beirut a letter in French, which reads in translation: To Mr. William Cullen Bryant. When I visited the grotto named after Homer, on the borders of the Meles, near Smyrna, I picked this oak leaf with an acorn which I offer to the translator of Homer as an homage to his talent and a remembrance of the happy hours the reading of the translation procured me during my travel in California, and of the brief moments in which I enjoyed his company. It is only from here that I can send this evidence of the esteem of your very affectionate, D. PEDRO D'ALCANTARA. P.S. I add other leaves from the same grotto. See Life, II, 373-374.

2390. To Henry Romelly 1 New York April 17th 1876. No. 24 West Sixteenth Street. My dear sir.

In his note to me received some days since Mr. Pellew2 intimated that I might be expected to respond to some toast at the St. George Dinner, on the 24th instant.3 If that be so, I should be glad to be informed a little before hand what the toast is to be. Not that I am very anxious to speak at all-but only desire-if I am expected to speak, what the subject is to be. Yours faithfully, w. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: HCL ADDREss: Henry Romelly Esq. I. Apparently an officer of the Saint George Society. 2. Henry E. Pellew; see Letter 2187. 3. April 23, the day of the patron saint of England, Saint George, as well as the birthday in 1564 of William Shakespeare, was usually the occasion of an annual dinner An Agonizing Decision 299

of the New York Saint George Society, at which Bryant was often invited in the 1870s to make an address or to respond to a toast. See Prose, II, 305-309.

2391. To Charles H. Crosby' New York, April21. 1876. Dear Sir. Of the different histories of our late civil war, written as they are with no little ability-some of them at least-the most impartial, probably, is the History of the Civil War in the United States, by the Count de Paris. 2 He was under no temptation to be otherwise than fair. Yours truly, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG ADDRESS: Chas. H. Crosby Esq. 1. Unidentified. 2. Louis Phillipe Albert d'Orleans, comte de Paris (1838-1894), served on the staff of Union General George B. McClellan during the war, and afterward published a History of the Civil War in America (4 vols., 1875-1878), which Allan Nevins called "masterly"; for a summary of some of the count's conclusions, see Allan Nevins, The War for the Union ... 4 vols. (New York: Scribner's [1959-1971], I, 228-231.

2392. To Messrs. H. 0. Houghton & Co. New York April22d 1876. Gentlemen. 1 send you a photograph of my head, which I think the best. If this is faithfully copied it will be satisfactory to my friends. Yours truly, W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: HLH ADDRESS: To Messrs. H. 0. Houghton & Co. PUBLISHED: George Monteiro, "The Patriarchal Mr. Bryant: Some New Letters," Notes and Queries, 22:440-41 (October 1975).

2393. To an Unidentified Correspondent New York, April 25th 1876.

I bear cheerful testimony to the merits of Mrs. Laura S. Webb,' which I have learned to value from the good opinion expressed of her by her many friends and my acquaintance with her which though short has been very satisfactory. She is a southern lady, an adventurer in the field of letters, of an enthusiastic temperament, but directing all 300 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

enthusiasm to the restoration of a good understanding between the North and South,-an undertaking in which she is most correct and sincere. She has already published two small volumes in verse and prose and for two years edited a literary paper in St. Louis entitled The Western Sun, which in consequence of the late panic she was obliged to discontinue. She is about to publish a volume entitled "Seventy Six," with special reference to the hundredth anniversary of the declaration of American Independence and with the object of fixing the attention of readers on the events of our history in which the people of the North and the South acted in harmony. She has also lately given dramatic and other readings, which have been received with great applause. I take pleasure in commending this lady, so warm hearted, patriotic and energetic, to the sympathies of those who desire to see the reign of good will and peace between the different parts of our country restored. WM. c. BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG. 1. See Letter 2413.

2394. To Samuel J. Tilden New York, April 27th 1876. My dear sir. The suggestion that Mrs. Charles Russell Lowell should be ap• pointed on the State Board of Charities meets with great favor here. 1 Mr. Stout himself, in whose behalf I wrote you the other day,2 thinks very well of it, as I am told. Mrs. Lowell has been extremely active and useful in the work of aiding the public charities, and it seems to me that there are some good-and almost imperative reasons why there should be a woman on the Board. A woman knows best what is the proper treatment of her own sex. We are all hoping that Mrs. Lowell will receive the appointment. Yours truly W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG ADDRESS: Hon. S. J Tilden ENDORSED: W. C. Bryant I April 27, 1876 I In favor of Mrs. I Lowell for State I Board of Charities. 1. Josephine Shaw (Russell) Lowell (1843-1905), widow of Charles Russell Low• ell, a nephew of the poet James Russell Lowell, and sister of the late Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, was the first woman appointed to the Board of Charities, and was also an organizer of the Consumer's League. 2. Letter unrecovered. Stout is unidentified. An Agonizing Decision 301

2395. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York, April 18th 1876. Friday morning Dear Mrs. Moulton I hope you got in due time the plan for a bay window to your house, which I sent out to you by John Cline. But do not consider yourself obliged, by any thing you have said to me, to go on with the improvements-on the contrary I would have you postpone it, if in your present state of health it is likely to incommode you in the least, or, if there are any other inconveniences likely to result from it, renounce it altogether. If I had not what Dr. Gray' calls the Epizootic-pronounce both os-I should have come out to Roslyn this week. If I am better I think of coming out the beginning of next week, if I am [not] better, not so early as Monday. I have three bouquets-posies we used to call them-of the May Flower-Epig{l!a repens-one came the other day from Mrs. Olmsted who has taken Miss Dewey's cottage at Plymouth for the summer. The next day I met a gentleman in the street with one in his hand which he was going to leave for me at my house, a little company of flowers freshly gathered at Plymouth. This morning I received another maz• zetto [It. bouquet] of the same kind of flowers from Mrs. Clapham,2 who knows how fond I am of them accompanied with a copy of verses. So you see that I get perhaps as many flowers here as if I were in the country-Cowley in some Latin lines written after his retirement• after he had buried himself in the country-says, I "Bring flowers, they please the living dead; Here roses, ere they wither, strow, And o'er my yet warm ashes shed The sweetest smelling leaves that grow ...." 3

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters. 1. The Bryants' long-time physician, John F. Gray. See 444.1. 2. The wife or mother of a Roslyn neighbor, Thomas Clapham. 3. Bryant later published a slightly different version of his translation of these lines from Abraham Cowley's ode, Epitaphium vivi Auctoris ("Epitaph of a Living Author"), in an essay on Cowley's verse in the North American Review for May 1877. See Bryant, Prose, I, 144. The conclusion and signature have been clipped from this letter. 2396. To Susan Lincoln Tolman Mills' New York May 1st. 1876. Dear Madam. Allow me through you to thank the pupils of the Mills Seminary for the great compliment paid me in giving my name to their Literary 302 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

Society. I hope they will not find in what may remain to me of life any cause to withdraw the honor they have done me. I send by express to your care a copy of my poems-the latest edition and a volume of my Orations and Addresses, which I beg may be placed in the Library of which you speak. I take this occasion also to thank you for the Catalogue of your Institution, and the photograph of its stately building. I am Madam, very truly yours WM. c. BRYANT. P.S. I enclose two slips of paper with my name &c which you can have pasted in the volumes writing the name of the Library in the blank spaces. W C. B.

MANUSCRIPT: MCL ADDREss: To Mrs. C. T. Mills. I. With her husband, Cyrus Taggart Mills (1819-1884), a Presbyterian mission• ary, Mrs. Mills (1826-1912) founded the Mills Seminary at Oakland, California, in 1871. After Mr. Mills's death, she served as president of this institution, renamed Mills College, from 1890 to 1909.

2397. To Asa Dodge Smith1 New York, May 1st 1876.

Your kind words would persuade me, if any thing could, to visit your college and address your students. But I am a very old man, and having, for many years past, declined all such requests as that made in their behalf, it does not become me now to do otherwise when age has made me less able to acquit myself satisfactorily either to those who hear me or to myself. With many thanks, therefore for the honor which the students of Dartmouth have done me and pleased as I must be, at being so kindly thought of, when near the close of my career• such as it is-I am constrained to decline the obliging invitation communicated in your letter.2 I am, sir, with great regard your obt. Servant, WM. c. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR ADDRESS: To the Revd Dr. A. D. Smith. I. Asa Dodge Smith (1804-1877, Dartmouth 1830, Andover Theological Semi• nary 1834), a Presbyterian clergyman, was president of Dartmouth College from 1863 to 1877. 2. Unrecovered. An Agonizing Decision 303

2398. To Calvin Durfee1 New York May 3d 1876. My dear sir. I will come, Deo volente, on the 27th of June to Williamstown, for the purpose mentioned in your letter.2 But please have somebody engaged to supply my place, in case I should not be able to come, for old age is uncertain in carrying its purposes into effect, and after eighty we come upon the decayed and treacherous planks of the bridge. Please say to Mr. Leak3 if you see him that I thank him for his hospitable invitation and shall be glad to see him and his excellent lady agam. I am, dear sir, truly yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: WCL ADDRESS: Revd Dr. C. Durfee I Chairman &c &c. 1. The historian of Williams College; see Letter 1104. 2. As president of the Williams College Alumni Association, Bryant was to preside over its annual meeting, at which the main address would be spoken by Mark Hopkins (Letter 1807), a present professor and the notable former president of the college. See Letter 2409. Durfee's letter is unrecovered. 3. A member of the college faculty whom Bryant had known earlier.

2399. To the Directors of the Long Island Historical Society Tuesday May 16 1876

Mr. Wm. Cullen Bryant regrets that his other engagements are such as to prevent his acceptance of the polite Invitation 1 of the Directors of the Long Island Historical Society to be a guest at their Annual Dinner on Tuesday next.

MANUSCRIPT: Long Island Historical Society ENDORSED: Bryant, Wm Cullen I May 16th 1876. I Dinner Invitations I May 1876. 1. Unrecovered.

2400. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York, May 17 1876. Dear Mrs. Moulton. I hope you have read the Address of the men who met at the Conference the other evening. 1 It seems to me a capital statement of the condition into which we have fallen-so far as regards politics and the administration of public affairs. It was received with great enthu- 304 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

siasm and a storm of applause. The meeting was perfectly satisfactory. Dr. Woolsey presided with great dignity and the speeches were good and to the point. If the public can only be got to read the Address it must make an impression. Reform Leagues are springing up in various parts of the country-there is one in Boston and one in Indiana, and there is a Reform Club here. I expect to hear of others. But I have nearly done with politics. What need a man of eighty one concern himself with these strifes? I long more and more to get away from them. I expect to try Roslyn for a day or two beginning tomorrow morning. Yours very truly W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Johns Hopkins University Library ADDRESS: Mrs. L. M. S. Moulton. ENDORSED: Ans'd I Aug 27/76. 1. See Letter 2384.

2401. To [Amasa/Amos?] Farland, Jr. 1 The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street. New York, May 20, 1876. Dear Sir, I think very well of the verses which you have sent me. They show a good deal of native poetic talent though perhaps the very facility with which the author as you say writes leads him sometimes astray. I cannot charge myself with getting them published in any periodical. I have had, so many applications of that kind to answer that I have been compelled at last to refuse them all. An old man like myself at the age of eighty one occupied with many cares, can hardly find time to knock at the doors of the magazines and literary weeklies, asking admission for a parcel of poems, to be frequently refused. My experience has shown me that they pay very little attention to my recommendations, the editor or critic whoever he is who has the charge of that depart• ment, holding that he understands what poetry is as well as I do.• The only way for your friend is to send his verses directly to the periodical which he wishes it to appear in. If one periodical does not accept it another may for the tastes of the editors differ. I think that your friend might become a favorite contributor with a little more of earnest labor on what he writes. Yours truly W C BRYANT. An Agonizing Decision 305

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Berg ADDREss: [Amasa/Amos?] Farland jr. Esq I Office of the Republic I Portsmouth, Ohio. 1. Identified only as in descriptive note.

2402. To Julia S. Bryant Roslyn, L. 1., May 31, 1876 Dear Julia I got your letter at noon today. I am glad that your time has passed so pleasantly but two or three days I think will tire you out. I took Mr. Cline yesterday and went with him to Mr. Barlow's to see a Cedar of Lebanon and a flowering ash tree of an Oriental species-from Nepaul-the ornus floribunda very beautiful. He tramped over Mrs. Barlow's greenhouse, much interested. He contin• ues to get on well. Mrs. Clapham was here today and took Miss Dewey to the post office. She seems to be doing well also. Mrs. Clapham wants to get up some entertainment for the fourth of July. A man-Mr. Roberts has written to me offering to read my poem for rr1e on the 4th. 1 I shall answer that there is no poem to be read. I am glad for your sake that it continues so cool-Kind regards to all Affectionately yrs. W. C. BRYANT P.S. I send you a letter from Mrs. Bigelow, with one which came in the same envelope for Anna W C B P.S. Miss Dewey sends love to you and Anna.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR ADDREss: Miss Julia Bryant. 1. At the Centennial Celebration in Philadelphia.

2403. To Sydney H. Gay New York June 5. 1876 Dear Mr Gay

I have received the enclosed letter with the stamped envelope.1 You will judge whether you want the lady's narrative and if so will write to her. Yours W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: New York University Library ADDRESS: S. H. Gay Esq. 1. Unrecovered. 306 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2404. To Sydney H. Gay New York June 12, 1876. Dear Mr. Gay.

I have written to Mrs. Welton of Elmira1 asking her to write to you the substance of her letter to me which I cannot find. Mr. C. S. Francis who procures subscribers for the History2 has just called to say that there is a mistake as to the date when Hendrick Hudson began his voyage-the 12th of August put for the 12th of September. This he says was pointed out by Geo. L. Schuyler.3 Yours truly W.C. BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: S. H Gay Esq. 1. Bryant's letter to Mrs. Welton, who is unidentified, is unrecovered. 2. Charles Stephen Francis (1805-1887) was long a New York bookseller. 3. George Lee Schuyler (1811-1890), father of Louisa and Georgina Schuyler, an organizer of Hudson River transportation, was a yachtsman who won the Americas Cup. Walter Donald Kring, Liberals Among the Orthodox: Unitarian Beginnings in New York City, 1819-1839 (Boston: Beacon [1974]), p. 262. Gay seems not to have made this correction.

2405. To the Editor of ScRIBNER's MAGAZINE The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street New York, June 19, 1876 Dear Sir.

I send you a copy of the poem to which my last letter referred, 1 written very lately. I think you should send me a hundred dollars for it. As to the volume in which it is to appear, I will try to let you know as soon as I learn. It has not been given out yet for the compositor, but is to appear with a few others at the end of a new edition. I am not certain that there is any other poem of mine which could be printed as original. Yours truly W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Saint John's Seminary Library ADDREss: To the Editor of Scribner's Magazine. 1. "The Flood of Years," published in Scribner's for July 1876. This was also published separately by Putnam's in 1878, with illustrations by English-born William James Linton (1812-1897), author in 1882 of The History of Wood-Engraving in America. Bryant's earlier letter is unrecovered. An Agonizing Decision 307

2406. To John H. Goudie Roslyn, L.l. June 19th 1876. Dear Gourlie, It was very kind of you to write to me the other day. 1 There are few of my correspondents whose letters I value so much. I have now been here a month in the country, and am all the better for it, in spirits at least-though in health I could hardly ask to be better than I was in town. I think that you in Stockbridge have a drier and more elastic air than we have here, the Long Island atmosphere being sometimes vapory from the exhalations of the sea. This I think is more often the case in September and therefore it is that I generally remain at my place in Cummington till October. In point of dryness of air, therefore, you have the advantage of us here. I am glad to learn from you that you find your country sojourn so conducive to your health and that you are so cheerful and so disposed to "sleep o'nights." Nothing is more favorable to peace of mind, save a good conscience, than regular sleep, prolonged till nature is satisfied. Your remark concerning the ease with which Macaulay2 fell to crying, amused me. But Macaulay was really a man of strong sympa• thies; though he might have indulged them on fitter occasions than that of reading in Homer how poor old Priam rolled in the dirt.3 It is a pity that there was not somebody at his elbow to say to him that perhaps it was not true. I have read parts of Macaulay's Life4 with a good deal of interest. But there is another book of a like character which I have read with still more interest-''The Life Letters and Journals of George Ticknor."5 They are full of anecdotes of distinguished men, and the letters and journals seem to have been written with a view of preserv• ing as much that was peculiar and characteristic about persons of note as he had the opportunity of observing, with the view of their being at some time published. The man, himself, was not I think a perfectly agreeable man-that is to say he had some unpleasant peculiarities. He had his own set of people and seems to have looked down upon everybody else. Every now and then there is a gap in the journal or in some letter-most likely some comment of an unfriendly nature, on the character of somebody, has been omitted by the prudence of Mr. Hillard the editor, or that of Mr. Ticknor's wife and daughter who shared in the task of editing the journal and letters. Tomorrow evening the Bryant Vase is to be presented at Chick• ering Hall. I hope the weather will be cooler or I shall certainly have a sweaty time of it. I shall have a little speech to make and speech making you know is an effectual sudorific.6 308 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

I sometimes wish that you were here to help us get the strawber• ries out of the way, which are the largest and finest that I ever saw growing. Kind regards to the ladies. Julia sends hers. Yours truly W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Collection of Edith C. Gourlie ADDRESS: jno. H. Gourlie Esq. PUBLISHED (in part); Life, II, 372. 1. Letter unrecovered. 2. Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800--1859), British statesman, critic, and his• torian, and author of The History of England in 5 vols. (1848-1861). 3. See Bryant's translation of the Iliad, xxii, 508-510. 4. The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay (1876) by his nephew, George Otto Trevelyan (1838-1928). 5. George Ticknor (1791-1871, Dartmouth 1807), Harvard professor of French and Spanish, and author of a notable History of Spanish Literature (New York, 1849). His Life, Letters, and journals has appeared in nearly a dozen editions since his death. 6. This would be the occasion for Bryant's acceptance of a large silver commem• orative vase, executed by Tiffany and Company (see illustration), which had been promised him by hundreds of admirers on his eightieth birthday in 1874 (see Letter 2242). At the Chickering Hall ceremony Samuel Osgood made the presentation in the names of fifty members throughout the country of a "Bryant Testimonial Committee." His speech, and Bryant's characteristic graceful response, as well as a photograph of the vase, with its intricate fretwork representing various aspects of Bryant's life and writings, were published in To William Cullen Bryant, from His Friends and Countrymen (New York, 1876). The vase, which Bryant later gave to the Metropolitan Museum, was displayed at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, and was recently a feature of an exhibition of Tiffany Silver at the Metropolitan. See the New York Times for September 15, 1987.

2407. To Alfred B. Street Roslyn L. I. June 23, 1876. Dear Mr. Street. I send you the letter with the change of person in the address. If it should be of the least use to you I shall be glad. I do not yet hear from the copy of your poems which I sent to England. I reenclose the printed matter which was enclosed in your letter. 1 The part in manu• script relating to your poems I will publish in the Evening Post. I am str truly & cordially yours W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: WCL ADDREss: Alfred B. Street Esq. 1. Neither letter Bryant mentions has been recovered. An Agonizing Decision 309

2408. To John E. Howard1 New York June 24. 1876. Dear Sir.

I have looked over the little volume2 which you sent me, suffi• ciently to form my own opinion of it which I give without claiming to be a critic, or desiring that others should adopt my judgment. Your poem shows facility in versification which is a good quality, so far as it goes, but it does not seem to me either in poetic spirit or power of expression to indicate that you will be distinguished as a poet-nor could I advise that you should continue to write verse. Yours respectfully WM. c. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Middlebury College Library ADDREss: Mr. John E. Howard I Bridge• water I Massachusetts. 1. Probably a son of Bryant's cousin and friend of early Bridgewater days. See Letter 37. 2. Unidentified.

2409. To John Howard Bryant Sheffield Massachusetts. June 25th 1876. Dear Brother. Yesterday before leaving New York I wrote you a letter in the office of the Evening Post and came away leaving it on my desk without putting it into an envelope. 1 In it I spoke about your coming to Cummington and expressed my fear that Harriet's malady would continue and prevent your coming to the old place. I shall miss you very much of course, but if your wife should recover sufficiently, I shall certainly hope to see you. You will want to see the improvements made in the old homestead and the Snell farm and the neighbor• hood-the pear orchard planted by Dawes, the road on the Snell farm leading out to and over the west pasture and the new road to the West Village on which Tower writes me that he has been at work, to say nothing of the cranberry patch which I am told begins to flourish, and smaller improvements. We are to have Laura [Leupp] with us this summer and Miss Robinson, daughter of the author of the work on the Holy Land2 is to make us a visit at Cummington. The season has been a favorable one for the fruits of the earth at Roslyn and here too, if I may judge by the thick full foliage of the trees, the high grass and the full streams. We never had such large and fine strawberries at Roslyn, and the other fruits promise well. 310 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

I am on my way to Williamstown where I am to preside at a meeting of the Alumni of Williams College, and Mark Hopkins the late president is to deliver an Address. 3 I came from Roslyn yesterday morning and stop here over Sunday. As I suppose that you may find the expense of a journey to Massachusetts inconvenient to you-I would have you-if you can come, put down a charge of sixty dollars against me on your account with me Yours affectionately W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BFP ADDRESS: John H. Bryant Esq. l. Letter unrecovered. 2. Edward Robinson (399.2). 3. Excerpted from the MS diary of Oscar A. Archer of Blackinton, Massachusetts (quoted by permission of Carol Morse): "june 27-Tuesday. Over to College this A. M. where a rather notable gathering of the old Alumni. Wm. Cullen Bryant is Pres. of the Soc. and presided. He is over 80 and a venerable patriarch in appearance. I was glad to see him. Then we had the Fields, Dr. Bascom and all the old regular attendants whose faces have become familiar. Dr. Hopkins gave a grand Centennial address in his best style, hopeful of the republic and religion." John Bascom ( 1827-1911, Williams 1849) was professor of philosophy at Williams, 1852-1874, and president of the University of Wisconsin, 1874-1887.

2410. To Julia S. Bryant Sheffield June 26th 1876. Dear Julia. This is Monday morning-a fresh dewy morning after a hot Sunday, closing with a thunder-shower. I got here before dark on Saturday, after a dusty and sweltering journey from New York and found that I had been expected by an earlier train. A sound sleep prepared me for a dull sermon in the Congregational church the next morning from an old gentleman with a faint voice during whose holding forth I had three separate small naps. They are all well here and seem in good spirits. Dr. Dewey is quite lively and disposed to talk. I see no difference between his conversation now and what it was ten or twenty years back. Miss Laura Russell is here and her brother Andrew RusselP of the army but he goes this morning to West Point. Judge Day2 is here also but he is quartered at Charles's.3 Mrs. Dewey is very gracious as indeed she always is, and seems in quite her usual health and spirits. The country is in great beauty-the foliage of the trees dense and full as with us-the strawberries are just getting ripe. Today at two o'clock I set out for Williamstown-a short jour- An Agonizing Decision 311 ney-but I fear I shall have to pass an hour or so at Pittsfield. I hear that Judge Charles F. Sedgwick who was of my class in college4 is to be at Williamstown and like myself a guest at Mr. Leak's.- Now that I have made the most disagreeable part of my journey and what I have no doubt is the most agreeable part of my visit you will not be surprized if you do not hear from me till I return. Kind regards to Miss Dewey- Yours affectionately W C. BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR ADDRESS: Miss Julia Bryant. I. Unidentified. 2. Orville Dewey's cousin (1441.3). 3. Probably Dewey's son; see 1348.1. 4. See 1104.4; Letter 1360.

2411. To Alfred Henry Love1 Roslyn, July 5th [1876] .

. . . I cannot attend the Peace Convention soon to be held in Philadel• phia, but I hope that it will not be wanting in a large attendance, and that its proceedings will be worthy of its great object. It is well, upon an occasion which brings together representatives from every part of the civilized world, that the friends of peace should discuss in their presence the duty of the nations to put an end to the custom of war. Besides the great Fair, which displays the products of the arts of peace, by which life is dignified and adorned, and even prolonged, an opportunity is given to show how fearfully labor is wasted and ingen• iously misemployed, and resolution and endurance misdirected in the work of mutual destruction. The hopes and prayers of good men in all parts of the globe are with those whQ seek to confine the arts of life to their proper peaceful and beneficial purposes, and to reclaim man from practices which he inherits from the savage state ....

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT (partial): Life, II, 380-381 ADDREss: A. H. Love, Secy Universal Peace Convention. I. Alfred Henry Love (1830-1913) was a Philadelphia merchant who was presi• dent from 1866 until 1913 of the Universal Peace Union. His invitation to Bryant is unrecovered. 2412. To Sydney H. Gay The Evening Post Broadway and Fulton Street. New York, July 25 1876. Dear Mr. Gay. I lost the letter concerning which I once wrote to you, from a lady who knew about the treatment of the Union prisoners at Anderson- 312 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT ville, 1 and now it has unexpectedly turned up at this office. I enclose it, that if you think the opportunity worth availing yourself of, you may write to her.2- Yours truly W C BRYANT MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: Sydney H Gay Esq. 1. The Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia, where, in the words of Bryant's Popular History (IV, 588-589), "the prison discipline ... was a rigidly observed policy of delivering to death the greatest number, in the briefest time, by any means short of acknowledged murder." 2. The letter referred to is unrecovered. 2413. To Laura S. Webb' Roslyn L.l. July 26th 1876 Dear Madam. I have read the poem on the Death of General Custer whose loss is so universally lamented. You have given voice to a sadness which was in all men's hearts and have fervently expressed the general sorrow. It is a favorable sign of returning friendship between the North and the South that the widow of a brave officer in the Confed• erate Army should lament so passionately the death of one who gained renown in the Army of the Union.2 I am, madam, Faithfully yours. WM. c. BRYANT. MANUSCRIPT: HCL ADDRESS: To Mrs. Laura S. Webb. 1. Identified as in Note 2 below. 2. Mrs. Webb's poem was Custer's Immortality, a Poem, with Biographical Sketches of the Chief Actors in the Late Tragedy of the Wilderness (n.p., n.d.). Accompanying a copy of this work advertised for sale some years ago was a letter from the author to "Genl. [James G.?] Wilson" stating that the poem "is one that the late Mr. William Cullen Bryant published for me, just before his death." The poem has not been found in the EP, but it was published in 1876 as a separate title on the Evening Post steam presses. (At the battle of Little Big Horn, in what is now Montana, on June 25, 1876, United States General George Armstrong Custer and his entire command were wiped out by a large body of Cheyenne and Sioux Indians.) Others of Mrs. Webb's writings were Heart Leaves (Mobile, 1868) and A Requiem for Lee (New Orleans, n.d.). 2414. To C. D. Robertson' Cummington, Massachusetts August 1st, 1876. Dear Madam. I thank you for your obliging letter. It is one of the highest satisfactions that an author can have, to know that what he has written An Agonizing Decision 313

has had a consoling influence on those who are in sorrow. The thoughts which I have put into verse have been my consolation in calamity, and I shall regard myself as having written at a fortunate moment if they effectually suggest the same consolation to others. Yours very truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): ADDRESS: Mrs. C. D. Robertson I Cincinnati. 1. Unidentified. No communication from her to Bryant has been found.

2415. To H. C. Hines1 Cummington, Massachusetts August 8th 1876. Dear Sir I am here for a pretty long sojourn and have no photographic likeness of myself within reach. So I send only my autograph. If I were to delay sending it till I get to town, I should certainly forget to send it at ,all. Yours respectfully W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Lincoln National Life Foundation ADDREss: Mr. H. C. Hines. 1. Unidentified.

2416. To an Unidentified Correspondent Cummington, August 10, 1876 Dear Sir: Certainly I believe all that is said in the lines you have quoted: 1 otherwise I could not have written them. I believe in the everlasting life of the soul; and it seems to me that immortality would be but an imperfect gift without the recognition in life to come of those who are dear to us here ....

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT (partial): Bryant, Poetical Works, II, 367. 1. Identified in ibid. as unspecified verses from "The Flood of Years." Bryant was responding to a man "sorely bereaved" who asked whether the lines he quoted, presumably the concluding ones in the poem, represented his "real convictions."

2417. To John H. Goudie Cummington Massachusetts, August 17th. 1876. Dear Mr. Gourlie. Do you not mean to make your usual visit to us at this place? The fields are languishing for the want of you and rain. My brother is here 314 LETTERS oF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

and the two elder Miss Leupps, and we all want to see you. Can you not come next week? If you come by the way of Hinsdale perhaps there may be a carriage there from my house.-please inquire, and if so, let it bring you-probably there will, however, be none there-on reflection. But at all events, let me know when we may expect you. And let us have, if it depends on you a good shower before you come to refresh the parched earth, and help the cauliflowers to grow. Do you know that we are in the midst of a great contest for the presidency? 1 I should not, if it were not for the newspapers. The bitterness of the journals does not extend very far into the community at large, nor is there much zeal shown in supporting the rival candi• dates. So far as I have been able to observe it is to be one of the greatest contests for the presidency that we have ever had. But come and we will talk the matter over, for it is an interesting topic after all. I hear that Mr. Tilden is very confident of his own success. So far as concerns the city of New York, I think that the vote he will receive there is likely to surprize most people. Kind regards to the Misses Gourlie. Julia sends hers to all. Yours truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: Collection of Edith C. Gourlie ADDREss: John H. Gourlie Esq. 1. That between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. See Letter 2419.

2418. To Leonice M.S. Moulton Cummington Massachusetts. August 24th 1876. Dear Mrs. Moulton. I begin to be uneasy at not hearing any thing from Roslyn. I said uneasy but that is not the word. No news it is said is good news-! am not uneasy but curious to know what is going on-how the excessive heats have been borne, what has been the village gossip-in a good natured way I mean for I abominate malicious tattle; what has been going on at the Hall; how the two Reverends are getting on, and what you are doing yourself and what you are reading. Here we are getting on very well, although we have had for the most part very hot weather-so hot that I have made up my mind not to go down to Roslyn until the end of September. With the heat there is very great drought which has parched the fields and dried up the springs and turned the brooks into long beds of black stones and An Agonizing Decision 315

pebbles. This afternoon the region to the east of us lies in a veil of whitish haze the product of the heat and dryness, and the clouds which at one time seemed to foretell a thunderstorm have all passed away. Julia went this morning to Dalton on her way to Great Barrington. The Miss Leupps are yet with us and so is my brother and now Mr. Goudie is here on a little visit. He is as you know quite entertaining. At the Snell farm is Mr. Godwin and three of his daughters with two Miss Van Dorans who came yesterday. My own health if you care to hear about it is very good. When I came I was quite well but had little appetite, which has since increased as much as it ought. I cannot praise the look of the country as I could wish but we are always hoping for rain from day to day-a good steady shower for several hours or a long easterly storm that shall wash and freshen the face of the whole region from the seacoast to the western lakes .... 1

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bryant-Moulton Letters. 1. A note on the Ms reads "Closing sentence and autograph given away I L[eonice] J[osephine] S[tewart]." 2419. To John Bigelow Cummington. Massachusetts August 28th 1876. My dear Mr. Bigelow. Your letter of yesterday which has just been put into my hands, was an utter surprize to me. 1 There are many reasons why I must decline allowing my name to be placed on the Tilden Electoral Ticket, some of which you will, I think, understand without my referring to them. Others relate to the character and composition of the two political parties in the field and to the letters of acceptance written by the two candidates for the Presidency. Such as they are, they constrain me with a force which I cannot resist, to decline acting on the suggestions made in your letter. It gives me great pain to refuse any thing to the friends of a man whom I esteem and honor as I do Mr. Tilden, whom I know to be so highly accomplished for the most eminent political stations, whose opinions of the proper province and objects of legislation and government have been formed in the same school as my own, and who, so far as he is not obstructed by the party to which he belongs, will, I am sure, act not only with ability and integrity but with wisdom, in any post to which the voice of his countrymen may call him. 2 I am, dear sir, faithfully yours. W. C. BRYANT 316 LETTERS oF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-Bigelow (final); NYPL-BG (draft) ADDREss: Hon. john Bigelow DOCKETED: Bryant I to I Bigelow I Aug. 28, 187[6] PUBLISHED: Bigelow, Bryant, pp. 244-245. 1. The day before Bigelow had written Bryant from Albany, where he was a member of Governor Tilden's administration, "It has been one of my dreams for several months that your name should head the Tilden Electoral Ticket this fall for the Presidency .... You need not be told how gratifying such a nomination would be to Governor Tilden, nor need I recapitulate to you the many obvious reasons why you should desire to oblige his friends, a large proportion of whom are your pupils, with the use of your name." Bigelow, Bryant, pp. 243-244. 2. In the letter cited, Bigelow had remarked, "The course of the 'Evening Post,' of course, somewhat disappoints me and others who like me embarked in this effort at administrative reform for no mere personal ends." (Bigelow had recently served as chairman of a committee of investigation which had substantiated Tilden's charges against Tammany corruption.) The attitude taken toward Tilden's candidacy by the EP, over whose editorial policies Bryant no longer exerted complete control, troubled the old publisher, as is made evident in a letter Julia Bryant wrote Tilden a month later (September 30, 1876, in Letters and Literary Memorials of Samuel]. Tilden, ed. john Bigelow [New York and London: Harper, 1908], II, 446.)

2420. To Richard H. Dana, Jr. Cummington, August 28 [1876] Dear Mr. Dana: I am obliged to you for sending me the memorandum in the handwriting of Lady Russell, and I pray you to convey my thanks to her for having written it in the expectation that it would be seen by me. It is a very great satisfaction to me to learn that anything which I have written could make such an impression on the mind of a young man as to be remembered, by way of consolation, in the hour of death. 1 I am, dear Mr. Dana, faithfully yours, w. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT: Life, II, 373. I. Dana had sent Bryant a note from the wife of the former British prime minister, Lord John, first Earl Russell (1792-1878), dated at Pembroke Lodge, june 25, 1876 (lac. cit.): "In a beautiful farewell letter to me from my son, written in the prospect of death, January 5, 1876, the following passage [from "Thanatopsis"] occurs: 'I look forward to death calmly and unmovedly, like "One who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."' He died january 9th. Fanny Russell." Her son had been John Russell, Viscount Amberley (1842-1876), a former member of parliament. An Agonizing Decision 317

2421. To J. C. Derby' Cummington Massachusetts. August 28th. 1876.- Dear sir. I do not wonder that many thoughtful persons are undecided as to which candidate they shall support in the coming election of President. Both parties profess to aim at the same ends. Which has the best candidate, and which party can be most depended upon to adopt and enforce the necessary measures? are the questions which people are asking. If you look only to the candidate Mr. Tilden is the best• the most of a statesman, the soundest and most enlarged in opinions and, I think, of the firmest character. If you look at the parties by which the candidates are brought forward the republican party is the most to be relied on-although both parties judged by the proceedings of their representatives in Congress are greatly degenerate, and which• ever of them obtains the ascendancy, those who look for a complete, radical, thorough reform, will be disappointed. Some changes will doubtlesS be made for the better, but those who expect all abuses in the administration of the government to be done away, will find their mistake. As to the hard money question it seems to me that it is safest with the republicans. The democratic party of the west are deeply infected with the inflation heresy. It is now smothered temporarily, but as soon as the election is over it will break out again with violence. The republican party is most free from its influence. As to the civil service reform, which both parties profess to desire, Mr. Tilden has not pledged himself to abstain from the vicious practice of turning out indiscriminately all whom he shall find in office, in case he is elected. He only promises to look carefully into their characters and qualifications. I infer that all whom he finds in office must go out. Who will answer for him that all whom he appoints will be worthy of their places? Thousands, tens of thousands will flock to Washington for these places, all of them good democrats, and it will be absolutely astonishing if a large number of those who are appointed do not turn out to be rogues. Hayes, who only promises to send adrift the unwor• thy, will have an easier task and leisure to exercise a just discrimina• tion. As to the revenue laws, which are without doubt, one cause of the hard times, neither Mr. Tilden nor Mr. Hayes have spoken of any reform to be made. Perhaps the chance of an enlightened revision of these laws is best in case the democrats obtain the ascendancy, but how slight the prospect of such a revision is, I leave to be inferred from the late proceedings of the democratic House of Representatives. 318 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

You see therefore that when we come to compare the prospect of reform under one of the two parties with that under the other a man who is slow in forming conclusions might be forgiven for hesitating. Yet the greater number of those dissatisfied republicans who came to the Fifth Avenue Conference,2 including most of the wisest heads among them, have acquiesced in the nomination of Hayes. The Cincin• nati Convention did not give them all they wanted but came so near to it that they thought it the wisest course to be content, and not to separate from the party with which they had hitherto acted. I thought the same thing in regard to the Evening Post-namely that it would not be well to detach itself from the party which had carried the country through the Civil War, until it was forced to do so by the signs of a hopeless degeneracy. There may have been some things in the Evening Post which I have not agreed with altogether, being at so great a distance from it that I could not be expected to influence it in every thing, but in the main it has treated Mr. Tilden with marked respect. Yours truly w. C. BRYANT P.S. I want the Appleton's Journal here. The Art Journal keep for me. WCB

MANUSCRIPT: NYHS ADDREss: To J. C. Derby Esq. PUBLISHED: Bigelow, Bryant, pp. 246-249. 1. Derby had written Bryant from New York on August 23 that he was uncertain whether Bryant or his business partner Henderson were now in control of editorial policies at the EP, and commented, "There are a good many intelligent and indepen• dent voters who depend somewhat on the coming of the 'Post' to lead them to act wisely at the coming election, but they want to know if Mr. Bryant and the 'Post' are still as of yore one and the same." Loc. cit. 2. See Letter 2384.

2422. To an Unidentified Correspondent Cummington, Massachusetts August 28th. 1876.

You are in the right. The musician should have been remembered in my poem, as well as the sculptor, but, I find that I have omitted others also-the architect-swept away while his edifice is rising from the foundation stones, and the astronomer, in the act of gazing at the stars. I will see whether I can give them a place hereafter. 1 Yours respectfully W. C BRYANT. An Agonizing Decision 319

MANUSCRIPT: DuU. 1. Bryant's reference is to these lines in "The Flood of Years": ... A sculptor wields The chisel, and the stricken marble grows To beauty; at his easel, eager-eyed, A painter stands, and sunshine at his touch Gathers upon his canvas, and life glows; A poet, as he paces to and fro, Murmurs his sounding lines. Awhile they ride The advancing billow, till its tossing crest Strikes them and flings them under, while their tasks Are yet unfinished. Poems (1876), p. 482.

2423. To J. C. Derby Cummington Mass September 4th 1876 Dear Mr. Derby

I did not write my previous letter1 for publication and beg that you will not [let?] the press get hold of it. I have a fear that I may have done iftiustice to Mr. Tilden in regard to the reformation of the Civil Service. If so his letter of acceptance was the cause. I looked it over for some condemnation of the bad practice, so long followed, of turning out of office all the men of the beaten party after an election. I found no such condemnation, and inferred that he meant to leave himself at liberty to follow the practice. I have since learned that he has in many instances appointed men of the republican party to offices in his gift, solely on account of their competency. This was nobly done but he will have great difficulty in resisting the pressure which will be brought to bear upon him in order to force him to make a clean sweep of the public offices, and fill them with men of his own party. I am willing, however to take this as a proof of Mr. Tilden's present disposition, and hope that it will not be overcome by the force which will assuredly be brought against it. Yours very truly W. C. BRYANT2

MANUSCRIPT: Union College Library ADDRESS: J. C. Derby Esq. ENDORSED: Wm C Bryant I Sept 4176 I (Copy). 1. Letter 2421. 2. The Ms is not in Bryant's holograph. 320 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2424. To Richard H. Dana Cummington, Massachusetts. September 13th, 1876. Dear Dana. I did not know that the heat of this summer came so near to withering the life out of you as you say, for I had heard from time to time a favorable report of your health. I shall think the better of the sea, or rather of the sea-shore, for having revived you and put you in spirits to write me a letter. 1 There was not much need of the caution you give me to refrain [from] altering my published poems. I remember an anecdote which suits the case. [Samuel F. B.] Morse the painter-it was while he was yet a painter-once said to me. "When the artist, West,2 was in his extreme old age, a new light broke in upon him. He saw how he could improve his pictures painted years before, and taking his brush re• touched and altered them, going over them all and spoiling them. His friends employed an expert hand to follow him, and take off the paint as fast as he laid it on, and so the pictures were preserved." It is lucky for me, perhaps, that after I have done my best on a "copy of verses," as they used to call it, I give up further work on it, and am not much disposed to alter. I am glad that your grandson is turning out so well. It seems to me that there are few sorrows in life sharper than that of having profligate children-and few disappointments greater than that of having merely good-for-nothing ones. How do you employ your time? Are not some part of your mornings passed in writing "autographs," as they call your signature? What do you do when young beginners apply to you for literary advice and for help in getting their productions before the public? Here is a letter before me, written in red ink from Virgie S. De La Mar, of No. 603, Lombard Street, Baltimore,-Jewish probably--complaining that she cannot get her writings published, for want of a literary reputation already acquired, and begging me to speak to Mr. Bonner, who publishes the New York Ledger, and ask him to let her "contribute to the paper as a beginning." The lady encloses a stamp and asks for an answer. Shall I burn the stamp? You are now back to town. It is delightful to pass from the sultry ill-smelling town into the country, in the spring season; and there is a certain sense of comfort in getting back to the town as the weather grows cooler. I stay however as long at my place in Roslyn as I can persuade Julia to remain contentedly, and go back to the place as early as I can coax her to go. When, however, the roads are all snow and An Agonizing Decision 321

ice, I like better to be in town, and then, winter is a season when you cannot expect that your friends will come out to you in the country. And then you find that your old friends hang back from the trouble of visiting you in the country at any time and if you want to see them you must come to town. Julia has proposed to me this summer to go eastward, to pass a day at Boston and look in upon you in your sea• shore retreat, but seems a great way off and Manchester at an indefi• nite distance and, the older I grow, the more do distances seem to lengthen. I have written a pretty long letter-long for me the writer-but there is scarce any thing in it. Ask your daughter and whoever else of the Dana family is with you to remember me kindly. Julia is away, with two of her women-friends on a visit to Williamstown. Yours very cordially, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR ADDREss: Richard H. Dana Esq. 1. Unrecovered. 2. Benjamin West (1738-1820), an American historical and religious painter who settled in England in 1763. From 1792 until his death he was president of the Royal Academy.

2425. To Henry Fowle Durant' Cummington, Massachusetts. September 13th. 1876. Dear Sir. I send you a copy in my hand-writing of the poem entitled "The Return of Youth"2 which is to be honored by being put into a frame for your Library-that of Wellesley College. I think it is so transcribed that it may be conveniently framed. The half sheets may be separated, and then the second page may be put below the other, or they may be placed side by side. If I have not copied them in a manner to suit your purpose, I will send another copy. I congratulate you on the success which has attended your project of a college and on the reputation which the institution founded by your liberality has already acquired. I am sir, faithfully yours, W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: WeCL ADDRESS: To Henry F. Durant Esq. 1. Henry Fowle Durant (1822-1881), a prosperous Boston lawyer who had become a revivalist preacher about 1864, gave his fortune to found Wellesley College for women, which he guided through its early years after its opening in 1875. 2. See Poems (1876), pp. 291-292. 322 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2426. To Henry F. Durant Cummington, Massachusetts. September 20th. 1876. Dear Sir. Your invitation 1 is most obliging, and I am sure that I should be exceedingly interested in observing more nearly the institution which your wise liberality has founded. But I have so arranged my prepara• tions for a return to New York, and some affairs here, that I cannot make the visit. My daughter and Miss Fairchild join me in thanks for the kindness which prompted the invitation. I am, sir, very truly yours. W. C. BRYANT. MANUSCRIPT: WeCL. 1. Unrecovered.

2427. To William H. Guilford 1 Cummington Sept. 21st 1876 My dear sir, It seems to me that I ought to express in writing the thanks I owe you for the box of honey which I have received from you. It was excellent. I have tasted the famed honey of Narbonne in France, and the no less celebrated honey of Mount Hymettus in Athens, and I cannot say that they were finer than this sample of yours, which deserved the distinction of being presented to some better man. Yet though another might be more worthy of it than I, it could hardly have fallen into the hands of one who would have enjoyed it more. I am, Sir, truly yours. W. C. BRYANT MANUSCRIPT: Andrew B. Myers ADDRESs: William Guilford Esq. 1. William H. Guilford (cl817-1877), a manufacturer of whetstones, operated a mill in the Swift River section of Cummington which had once been a church standing on Cummington Hill, having been moved down into the valley and several miles to the eastward. Only One Cummington, p. 289; Vital Records of Cummington, pp. 119, 124, 195. 2428. To The Commissioners of Parks of New York City Summer 1876.

. . . It is very much desired by the committee appointed to see to the erection of a statue of the late Fitz-Greene Halleck, that it should not An Agonizing Decision 323

be placed in the Mall, where it would be scarcely observed among the more showy and imposing statues already there. Halleck was a New York poet in a special manner: his reputation was local, his poetry related mostly to local topics, and a place by itself would, it seems to me, agree better with such a reputation than one among the foreign celebrities, of which there is a considerable number on the Mall. It would also have a pleasant effect if the visitor to the Park should be surprised in some picturesque nook of the grounds with the statue of the poet of the New York Social Life. I believe that under the present regulations the statue cannot be placed in any other part of the Central Park than the Mall. I would respectfully suggest that an exception be made by the Commissioners for this single statue, assured as they must be that the same reasons for such a disposition of it are not likely to be urged in any other case. 1 •••

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT (partial): James Grant Wilson, Bryant and His Friends (New York, 1886), p. 90. 1. Despite Bryant's request this statue of his late friend the poet Fitz-Greene Halleck (1790-1867), at the dedication of which he presided in May 1877, was placed at the south end of Central Park's Mall.

2429. To James A. Morgan1 Cummington, Massachusetts. September 25th 1876. Dear Sir.

Your obliging note2 was not written too late. I send it today to Mr. Gay on Staten Island, my associate in the work to which you refer, that he may communicate with you. I am, sir, faithfully yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: ACL ADDRESS: James A. Morgan Esq. 1. Unidentified. 2. Unrecovered.

2430. To John Meredith Read1 Sept. 30, 1876 My dear sir I avail myself of the liberty you allow me to send my answer through you to Mons. Phillipe Jean Prest. of the Archaeological Society of Athens thanking the Council of the Society for the honor done me 324 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

in making me one of its honorary members. I have to thank you for procuring me that honor. Your letter to the president proposing me as a member has one fault-that of being too liberal of its commenda• tions. Perhaps the Council would not have adopted me as a member if it had been less so. I am not however the less obliged to you for having good naturedly estimated me beyond my proper value.2 I am sir very truly yours [unsigned] MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): ADDRESS: To His Excy John Meredith Read Minister to Greece. 1. John Meredith Read (1837-1896), a Pennsylvania lawyer and diplomat, was United States Minister Resident in Greece from 1873 to 1879. 2. The correspondence to which Bryant refers has not been recovered, but see Letter 2435. On February 12, 1877, Read wrote Bryant (NYPL-BG) enclosing an Athens newspaper which contained a copy of that letter. 2431. To Miss Bates' Roslyn, Long Island, N.Y. October 2d 1876. Dear Miss Bates.

It seems to me almost certain that I answered your inquiry2 concerning the author of the little poem which I translated from the Spanish. His name is Rosas, Jose Rosas, a Mexican, whose little volume entitled "Fabulas" is adopted as a leading book in the schools of the Mexican capital. 3 From the preface by his friend Ignacio Altamirano, a literary gentleman of note-and of the pure aboriginal race-I learn that he was known as a poet before the "Fabulas" were pt;blished in 1872 ....4 MANUSCRIPT: YCAL. 1. Unidentified. 2. Unrecovered. 3. Jose Rosas Moreno, Fabulas (Mexico, 1872). Bryant's translations of nine of these fables, some of which appeared in magazines, were collected in Poetical Works II, 353-359. 4. Closing and signature have been cut from the Ms.

2432. To Thomas S. Holman 1 Roslyn, Long Island N.Y. October 5th 1876 Dear Sir. The lines you quote were not written by me, nor do I know the author of them. I think I never saw them till I read them in your letter.2 Yours respectfully, WM. c. BRYANT. An Agonizing Decision 325

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESs: Thos. S. Holman Esq. DOCKETED: rec'd Monday I Oct. 9 1[876] I T. S. [H]. 1. Unidentified. 2. Unrecovered.

2433. To Sydney H. Gay [Roslyn?] October 9, 1876 Dear Mr. Gay. A correspondent of mine Dr. T. Apoleon Cheney whose post office address is Starkey Yates County N.Y. is very anxious that in the Popular History, credit should be given him for having called the first meeting of the "Republican Party" held in the United States. His desire is harmless and I think should be gratified if he makes out his case.' He has put into my hands the enclosed, a Yates County news• paper which tells the story and gives Dr. Cheney's speech made at the meeting. 2 Of the paper he has no other copy and values it much, and entreats that it may not be lost. I take the liberty of suggesting that if you think proper you take such notes of it as may seem to you of importance and send it back to him-according to the address which I have given. His claim seems to me plausible at least-and he is not mistaken in his idea of the importance of the event. Yours truly W. C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDRESS: S. H. Gay Esq. 1. In an account of the formation of a national Republican Party at Pittsburgh on February 22, 1856, Bryant's Popular History (II, 421) makes no mention of Cheney's claim. 2. The newspaper is unrecovered.

2434. To H. C. Elder' Roslyn, Oct. 13, 1876 Dear Sir You and your associates have only done me too much honor in giving your association a name so little worthy as mine when there are so many names illustrious both for genius and virtue from which to choose. I thank the members of the association in whose behalf you wrote for thinking so kindly of me as to take upon themselves the appellation of which you speak, but in practice it is my sincere hope that you will all look to far more perfect examples than I can present them in my life and career. I hope that you and your friends will content themselves with imitating no pattern of literary excellence, and no model of private and public virtue short of the highest and most perfect which the present or any previous age can show you. The 326 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT good wishes of one whose own career, considering the age at which I have arrived must soon close, for your [individual and collective good?] will attend you. Yrs truly W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): ADDRESS: H. C Elder, President of the I Bryant Literary Club. 1. lndentifed only as in descriptive note. His letter is unrecovered.

2435. To Philippe Jean Roslyn, Long Island United States of America, October 23d 1876. Sir Allow me through you to express my thanks to the Council of the Archaeological Society of Athens for the distinction conferred on me in adopting me as one of its honorary members, a distinction which I am proud and happy to accept. 1 I must also thank you personally for the flattering terms in which you have communicated the fact of my election. I have from an early period of my life taken much interest in the affairs of Greece, in the recovery of its national liberties and the revival of its intellectual renown. The honor now conferred upon me by your illustrious society I shall cherish as an additional source of interest since it associates me to a certain extent with your people.- ! am sir with high consideration Your obedient Servant W C BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): ADDREss: To Monsieur Philippe jean, President I of the Archeological Society of Athens &c. &c. 1. See Letter 2430.

2436. To Sydney H. Gay October 30th 1876. Dear Sir. As you have the materials all before you for answering Mr. Latimer's inquiry, and I have none of them I send you his letter. 1 Yours truly W C BRYANT An Agonizing Decision 327

MANUSCRIPT: CU ADDREss: To S. H. Gay Esq. 1. Latimer was perhaps a descendant of Connecticut Revolutionary War Colonel John Latimer; see Bryant's Popular History, III, 584. His letter is unrecovered.

2437. ToM. Neal Sherwood1 New York October 31, 1876 Dear Madam, I came to town this morning bringing with me an editorial note relating to your plan of taking a party of young ladies to Europe. I found that your advertisement had been renewed, and therefore had to change a little the phraseology of what I had written, so as to refer the readers of the Evening Post to its language. I hope that you will find no difficulty, notwithstanding the hardness of the times, in obtain• ing the number of pupils which you desire. I am Madam truly yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: Boston College Library ADDREss: Mrs. M. Neal Sherwood. 1. Unidentified.

2438. To Edward Seymour1 Oct 1876 Dear Sir It is a delicate and somewhat irksome duty that is sometimes put upon me-that of attempting to befriend a brother poet by getting his verses published. A Montreal Correspondent Mr. John Reade2 has sent me several poems which seem to me to possess merit and com• plains that he cannot get them published. I am aware how much poetry is produced in this country and that it cannot all of it-all I mean of a fine quality be published. But if you find in Mr. Reade's verses sufficient merit and have sufficient space, to allow them to be accepted for publication, it will be a gratification to him to see them in print. I need not say that I sympathize with his desire to secure a favorable reception for them. W C B

MANUSCRIPT: PUL. 1. A partner in the firm of Scribner and Armstrong, publishers of Scribner's Magazine. 2. Not further identified. The verses are unrecovered. 328 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2439. To Alice C. Townsend Barlow1 Cedar Mere, Roslyn, November 3d 1876. Dear Mrs. Barlow. I thank you for the choice and beautiful flowers which you were so kind as to send me on my eighty second birthday, and for the grapes hidden under them, like a wholesome moral under the disguise of a pleasant story. The poet Cowley, in some dainty Latin verses, written after his retirement into the country, and styled "A Living Author's Epitaph", says that the living dead delight in flowers. 2 You have acted, by instinct, in a like presumption-namely that an old man, already as good as dead, by reason of his age, must be fond of flowers, and you are right. A thousand thanks to you for those which you have sent me-and may you see the like of them renewed in your greenhouse through a long long series of years. I am, dear Madam, truly yours W. C. BRYANT P.S. I should have included Miss Barlow in my acknowledgements. W.C.B.

MANUSCRIPT: HEHL ADDRESS: Mrs. S. L. M. Barlow. 1. Wife of Samuel L. M. Barlow; see Letter 2170. 2. For Bryant's English version of Abraham Cowley's Latin verses, see Letter 2395.

2440. To Samuel L. M. Barlow Roslyn, November 6th 1876. Dear Mr. Barlow. I send you as I promised, a basket of date plums or persimmons. The Diospyros Virginiana, which produces them is a congener of the Drospyros lotus-which is said to be the fruit that nourished the Lotophagi. 1-though there is a dispute about it. Be careful to eat only those that are perfectly ripe and soft-if you do [not?F you may afterward for a little while find it difficult to speak the truth-as the saying goes. I can give a nice young tree next spring, of this variety• or earlier if you want it. Yours very truly WM. c. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: HEHL ADDRESS: S. L. M. Barlow Esq. 1. Visiting the "land where dwell I the Lotus-eaters, men whose food is flowers," Ulysses had to drag away his weeping sailors, who had eaten "that sweet food" and lost their desire to reach home. Bryant, Odyssey, IX, 104-129. Alfred Lord Tennyson based his poem, 'The Lotus-Eaters" (1832) on this passage. 2. Word omitted. An Agonizing Decision 329

2441. To the Editor of the INTERNATIONAL REVIEW Roslyn Long Island N.Y. November 13, 1876. Dear Sir. I think that the title-''The Dangers of Manhood" [is] better than A Sonnet-It gives the subject of the verses-and everybody will see that it is a Sonnet-But you will do as you please about the change. Yours truly W C BRYANT

[The first contribution of Wm Cullen Bryant to the Interna[tional Review] January-February 1876 [1877]

The Dangers of Manhood. First copy.]! Youth, whose ingenuous spirit, just and kind, ' Looks from that gentle eye and open brow, Wilt thou be ever thus, in heart and mind,- As true and pure and merciful as now? Behold this streamlet, whose sweet waters wind Among green knolls unbroken by the plough, When wild flowers woo the bee and wild birds find Safe nests and secret in the cedar bough; This sweet stream, meeting with the sea, no more Its peaceful flow and purity shall keep, But turn to bitter brine and madly roar Among the restless breakers, and shall leap On the frail bark and fling it to the shore, And draw the drowning seamen to the deep.

The Dangers of Manhood. 2nd copy If the Sonnet sent the other day by Mr. Bryant be accepted for the International Review, will the Editor be so kind as to cause it to be printed from the copy below.

Youth, whose ingenuous nature, just and kind, Looks from that gentle eye, that open brow, Wilt thou be ever thus in heart and mind, As guileless and as merciful as now? 330 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Behold this streamlet, whose sweet waters wind Among green knolls unbroken by the plough, Where wild flowers woo the bee, and wild birds find Safe nests and secret in the cedar bough. This stream must reach the sea and then no more Its purity and peaceful mood shall keep, But change to bitter brine and madly roar Among the breakers there, and toss and leap, And dash the helpless bark against the shore, And whelm the drowning seamen in the deep. 2 WM c. BRYANT3

MANUSCRIPT: YCAL ADDRESS: To the Editor of the International Review. I. Matter between square brackets is not in Bryant's holograph. 2. This poem, first published in the International Review, was later collected in Bryant's Poetical Works, II, 346. 3. Only the signature is in Bryant's holograph.

2442. To Orville Dewey Roslyn November 19, 1876. My dear friend. I wrote to Miss Jerusha Dewey on learning of the death of Mrs. Ensign 1 and directed my letter to her at Sheffield desiring her to assure you and the other members of your household of our sympa• thy-Julia's and mine-in the calamity which has befallen you. I have since learned that she was at Bridg[e]port when I wrote. I write now simply to repeat to you what I said to her that we know well what a dreary vacancy the loss of one so amiable and so well and long loved must make in your family circle and how sincerely we take part in the sorrow of you all. The utmost that a friend can do in such a case is to give his sympathy--consolation he cannot give. It is a beautiful incident in the history of the Man of Uz and illustrative of the simple and sincere humanity of that ancient time that when his friends heard of all the evil that was come upon him they came every one from his own place and rending their mantles and sprinkling dust upon their heads sat down with him upon the ground in silence.2 Kind regards to all.- Yours faithfully W C BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): ADDREss: To Dr Orville Dewey. I. Apparently Dewey's sister-in-law. Letter unrecovered. 2. Cf. Job, 2:12-13. An Agonizing Decision 331

2443. To 0. C. Gardiner, Esq. 1 Roslyn Long Island N.Y. November 20th, 1876. My dear Sir.

I have read your memoir of Mr. Tilden2 with much interest. It relates to a very remarkable man, whose intellectual and moral quali• ties and whose public services have won him a deserved distinction among his countrymen. You have done your part in relating the principal events of his life and setting forth the main features of his character not only with a laudable conciseness, but with a clearness worthy of the subject. I am, sir, truly yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: UVa ADDREss: To 0. C. Gardiner, Esq. 1. A miscellaneous writer and editor. See 642.1. 2. Not identified.

2444. To C. S. Baldwin1 Roslyn, Long Island, N.Y. November 23d, 1876. Dear Sir,

I have often looked into your Monthly2 and have found many clever things in it-both prose and verse. I am obliged to you for thinking of me as a contributor, and the circle of readers you offer me is tempting; but I am so much occupied with engagements already on my hands, that I do not perceive how I can do what you request of me-especially as at my advanced age I become less and less inventive and less apt for literary tasks. I am, sir, respectfully yours w. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: UVa ADDRESS: C. S. Baldwin Esq. 1. Unidentified. 2. No periodical of this period edited or published by a C. S. Baldwin has been identified.

2445. To Joseph P. Thompson1 Roslyn Long Island N.Y. November 23d 1876. My dear sir. I did not get your letter in time for the answer to reach you before the 1Oth of this month. It is proper however that I should reply to 332 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT your request in regard to the International Copyright Association-! think it was called by that name- It had a short life and brought nothing to pass.2 As to documents I do not know of any that it ever had. Mr. [George Palmer] Putnam, who died several years since took much interest in the matter and had some interviews, I believe with members of Congress but could effect nothing. If the association had but a small part of the vitality and energy of either of our political parties, it would at least have kept agitation for its object, up to the present time, but it died silently. You have done a good work in speaking for your country before public assemblies in Europe and enlightening us also in regard to certain matters of Prussian policy. I am glad that your health allows so much since you always take the side of freedom and justice. You are now the only man whom we have in the Old World to maintain our cause with the voice as well as the pen. In this way you indulge your desire to be useful, and make your sojourn in Europe as fruitful perhaps of good as your residence in the country of your birth. Please to present my kind remembrances to Mrs. Thompson and to the younger branch of your family. I am, dear sir, faithfully yours. W. C. BRYANT.

MANUSCRIPT: YCAL ADDRESs: Revd. Dr. Joseph P. Thompson. I. A New York clergyman. See 1890.1. 2. Bryant had been president of this short-lived organization in 1868. See 1770.2.

2446. To Christiana Gibson Nov 25 1876. Dear Miss Gibson. It made me quite proud to think that you were wondering why I did not write to you. Your letter I got yesterday and here is the answer. I sometimes envy you the bright sunny days which you have at Nice, which have had so friendly an influence on your health. But I do not envy you today- This is Evacuation Day as it used to be called, when not long since New York rejoiced in the memory of getting rid of the British troops in our revolutionary war and when we saw the backs of the very last of the red coats. But we have other things to think of now- We have chosen a President of the United States and do not yet know who it is- We are to be gainers any how-we are to have a better administration than the present one whether it be Hayes or Tilden that is chosen. I have never before felt so lukewarm an interest An Agonizing Decision 333

as now in any previous contest for the Presidency. Both parties profess to aim at nearly the same objects-both have honest and well inten• tioned men candidates. Tilden is the ablest and most thoroughly a statesman and probably the most persistent in the course he has marked out-but his party has suffered in character by the late rebellion which forced some of its best men into the republican party. Let us hope for the best- We shall not, however, get every thing into a right train under the administration of either of the candidates. Abuses will survive-enough to give plausible ground for an opposi• tion. To go back to the weather, we had a most beautiful "Summer of All Saints" to usher in the month of November-the sweetest sunshine lying on our bright green fields and our party colored woods, keeping their brilliant foliage later than usual, and now we have it back again upon our bare woods and the leaf strown walks about our dwellings. Julia and I have just been to the post office and wished that you were here to take the walk with us on this glorious day. If we had primroses here we might say with Southey The solitary primrose on the bank Seemed now as though it had not cause to rue Its bleak autumnal birth-1 But we have dandelions and they are opening on our lawn in this golden sunshine- For solitary primrose read "lonely dandelion" Our Centennial Exhibition has come to an end. I did not go to look at it except that I ran down to Philadelphia just to look at the buildings and grounds a few days before the show began-and found them strikingly fine and commodious. But I am not curious about any thing-almost-in my old age- I expect soon to see things better worth looking at than any World's Fair-this world I mean, can show me. Your sister's recovery of her sight must relieve you very much of the anxiety on her account....

MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-GR (draft): PUBLISHED (in part): Life, II, 379-380. 1. These lines have not been located among the verses of Robert Southey.

2447. To "A Friend"1 December 5, 1876

... Your uncle Eliphalet Packard2 was quite right in designating my birthplace. As the tradition of my family goes, I was born in a house which then stood at the northwest corner of a road leading north of 334 LETTERS oF WILLIAM CuLLEN BRYANT

the burying-ground on the hill, and directly opposite to the burying• ground. 3 The house was afterwards removed and placed near that occupied then by Daniel Dawes. I suppose there is nothing left of it now ....4

MANUSCRIPT: Unrecovered TEXT (partial): James Grant Wilson, "Memoir of William Cullen Bryant," in Bryant, Family Library (1880), p. 8. I. The recipient was probably a member of the extensive Packard family of Cummington, to which Bryant was related through his maternal grandmother. See Life, I, 10, 48. 2. Of several Eliphalet Packards, this was probably he, born c 1784, who had been a member of the state legislature in 1825-1826. Only One Cummington, p. 393. 3. This site, now on the property of the Cummington Community of the Arts, is marked by a granite shaft. See photograph in ibid., pp. 342-343. 4. It is stated in ibid., pp. 349-350, however, that a portion of this birthplace was incorporated in a house still standing on Dodwell's Road, Cummington Hill, a few hundred yards from its original location.

2448. To Thomas Powell 1 New York Dec. 23d. 1876. Dear Sir. I am not sure that there is any work in which the governments of Great Britain and the United States are considered together. I believe there is not. Van [Holst's?] Constitutional History of the United States is perhaps as near to it as any thing that you can find, and this is to be had at almost any book store.2 Yours respectfully W. C. BRYANT. P.S. I think I have the name of the work right- I certainly have the author's. W.C.B.

MANUSCRIPT: YCAL ADDRESs: Thomas Powell Esq. I. In all likelihood English-born Thomas Powell (1809-1887), a poet and dram• atist employed in New York by the Frank Leslie publications. 2. This work has not been identified.

2449. To Leonice M. S. Moulton New York Xmas Morning, 10 o'clock A.M. 1876.- My dear Mrs. Moulton. I wish you a Merry Christmas. The festival will be over with you long before you read this, but there is no harm in wishing that it may An Agonizing Decision 335

pass pleasantly-or more than that, happily. It is a very unpleasant morning out of doors here, a gloomy sky, and a chilly wind, which searches one to the bones but we have a bright fire and cheerful faces within. I hope you are by this time entirely rid of your indisposition, which was becoming less troublesome when I saw you last. The great topic of discussion here is the question of the Presidency. Yesterday as I was going to the office of the Evening Post I met Cyrus W. Field who was looking for me with a paper to which he had obtained a few signatures calling on the Senate and the House of Representatives to lay aside all party prejudices and wishes and unite upon some common method of ascertaining which candidate is elected-with as little delay as possible-assuring them of the acquiescence of the people whichso• ever the successful candidate might be. He had got a few names of men of both parties and meant to get but a few more. I gave mine, of course. 1 There is a man under my window, singing in a deep bass voice, what I suppose he would call a Christmas carol, and the street is full of people thronging to the Catholic church nearby. I suppose the snow is, by this time, well trodden in front of the Catholic church opposite your abode. What a change has taken place in the political condition of Turkey.-A constitution promulgated by its Sultan divesting him of the absolute power exercised from the very beginning of the Ottoman empire-a constitution modelled after those of the liberal monarchies of Europe, with two chambers, liberty of the press, liberty of speech, liberty of worship and their concomitants. 2 Will the Orientals know what to do with such a constitution? Will they not have as much trouble in wearing it as they would in exchanging their wide breeks for our pantaloons! How long will it be before they will bring them• selves to take the trouble of electing members to their new Chamber of Deputies and subscribe to the newspapers? I sent out the other day a portrait of Longfellow in crayon for the Hall. One of myself went with it-a lady gave them to me-they were made from photographs aided by a look at the originals. I hope the cold weather has not frozen up your harbor, so that they cannot reach their destination. Kind regards to Miss Holmes and the Commissioner ofLunacy.3 Yours faithfully W. C. BRYANT

MANUSCRIPT: Cornell University Libraries ADDRESS: Mrs. L. M.S. Moulton. I. The result of the disputed presidential contest of 1876 between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel J. Tilden was not settled until the very eve of the inauguration of Hayes on March 4, 1877. Nevins, Fish, II, 856--857. 336 LETTERS OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

2. On December 23, 1876, the leader of a reforming Turkish ministry, Midhat Pasha (1822-1883), promulgated Turkey's first constitution, introducing parliamen• tary government and proclaiming civil rights. 3. Mrs. Moulton's adopted son Dr. John Ordronaux (1033.5), who, among his many remarkable achievements, served as the first New York State Commissioner of Lunacy from 1874 to 1882.

2450. To Samuel Hegeman 1 New York December 27th. 1876.- Dear Sir.

Your friend, Mr. George W. Bungay,2 who has, as he tells me, read your poem on Silence with a "pleasure and admiration" which he "cannot express," has sent me a copy of it desiring me to give you my opinion of it. My opinion is not of much value, but I will say that I have been impressed by the fertility of fancy and the affluence of illustration which you have brought to the treatment of a subject which in other hands would have yielded but meagre results. The qualities which I have mentioned are accompanied by a fine poetic enthusiasm which is felt in every stanza. Yours truly W. C. BRYANT. MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG (draft): ADDRESS: Revd Samuel Hegeman. 1. Unidentified. 2. An occasional contributor to the Evening Post; see 1444.2. 2451. To Frederic Huidekoper New York December 30th 1876. My dear sir. I thank you for the volume, Judaism at Rome, which you have been so obliging as to send me. 1 It is a work of very great research and erudition and sheds what to me is a new light on the history of the times which immediately preceded and followed the appearance of Christ on the stage of the world. I am greatly obliged to you and I think many others must be for having written it, and for having shown how the Monotheism of the Jews undermined the religion of paganism and prepared the civilized world for silently receiving and adopting Christianity with a readiness which to many has seemed miraculous. I am sir faithfully yours W. C. BRYANT. MANUSCRIPT: NYPL-BG ADDREss: Frederic Huidekoper Esq. DOCKETED: W. C. Bry• ant, I Dec. 30, 1876. 1. See Letter 2122.