Part 3

When in the days of his later fame he had that well-known meeting with the Emperor of Brazil, where Dom Pedro in the fashion of his country had embraced the poet, the company present after the Emperor’s departure began to rally the poet upon this form of greeting. But Whittier turned to his hostess with that gleam of fun in his eyes which his friends knew so well, and retorted, “That was meant for thee!”

Unlike many persons, themselves apt, he enjoyed other people’s wit. It was worth a thousand miles’ journey to hear him say, “Capital! Capital!” accompanying the words and his laugh with that light blow of his hand upon his knee which was an exclamation point in pantomime. Such a gesture must have come into play when he learned Harriet Livermore’s reception of his description of herself in the “not unfeared, half welcome guest” of “Snow Bound.” She is said to have retorted, “He always was a saucy boy!”

* * * * *

There never came to him an episode more rich in the humor in which his soul delighted than came through an invitation which he once received.

Sitting on the sofa in the garden room where so many in distinguished walks of life had paid honor to the poet, a young man from a neighboring town, a self-made man--so far as his creation had progressed, and, as the saying is, proud of his maker--discoursed with insistence concerning a Republican Convention to be held in the West, and urged the poet to accompany him there. In vain Whittier opposed his want of strength to meet such a strain, and gave other reasons also. As if the poet had not spoken, the other reiterated his arguments, and wound up with this climax:

“I know, Mr. Whittier,” urged this self-making young person to the man who as one of the founders of the Republican party was held by its leaders in especial honor, “that you are a very shy man and shrink from meeting strangers. But I shall be there to introduce you.”

As the poet told of this episode, his eyes shone with fun and his tone had an unction which he would not allow his words to express.

* * * * *

Whittier’s delight in fun was to him the sunshine of his many dreary winter days. It is told of him that, in his thirties, he one day walked into the old Rocky Hill school house at Salisbury Point while the school was in session, and to the astonishment of the children and the amusement of the teacher who afterward explained to them that this was John Greenleaf Whittier, he sat himself down on the little low seat in front--the dunce’s seat, or the rogue’s seat as it was then called--a bench which in his boyhood he could never have occupied.

Who knows that the poem, “In School Days,” which he wrote so long afterward did not come into his heart at that time?

IX

When after Whittier’s morning writing at the desk by the French window in the garden room, the desk on which were written “Snow-Bound,” “The Tent on the Beach,” and other well-loved poems, the poet rested, did he go to the woods, to the fields, to the streams he loved so well? Undoubtedly, he did sometimes. But his walks afield were more frequently afternoon strolls. He lived before the days of the postman. His morning mail was waiting for him at the office, and although sometimes he sent for it, he more frequently went himself, and rested from his poems by neighborly chats. On poetry? Hardly--in the post office, or the grocery store!

He liked the local news of the day; he liked social intercourse--especially when he could jump up from his chair, or his sugar barrel, or wherever he might have been seated and take his departure when he felt so disposed.

But there was more than this. He also had a purpose.

* * * * *

Three years previous to the moving of Whittier’s family to Amesbury had been held the Anti-Slavery Convention in Philadelphia, in which Garrison, Whittier, Wright, Samuel J. May, and so many others whose names are familiar in the cause of freedom for the slave, had taken part.

But Whittier’s hopes of more active co-operation had been ended by his delicate health, his want of power to endure the fatigues of such a life as that to which scenes like the Boston mob, the Philadelphia mob, and convention work would have subjected him. Yet he still had work in abundance as Secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society, as an earnest and most important advocate of that political party which some of the anti-slavery reformers had determined to build up, the principle of which was inserted in the Albany Anti-Slavery Convention of 1839.

Whittier was one of the business committee of this National Convention of Abolitionists in which the formation of a political anti-slavery party was inaugurated. The opinion of the abolitionist, Abraham L. Pennock of Pennsylvania, made in the January of 1840, six months after the Convention, Whittier publicly endorsed the following year as his own opinion also.

“What an absurdity is moral action apart from political,” declared both these men who with others determined to use the legitimate weapon of their vote in the cause of freedom--not as a right only, but a duty, since it was in their hands.

Together with Sumner, Henry Wilson, and many others at the East, Whittier was working toward the growth of a political party, eventually to become one with the great party at the West where Abraham Lincoln’s “Lincoln-Stone protest” against the encroachment of the Slave Power had developed into his famous debates with Douglas upon slavery, under the guise of the Kansas-Nebraska bill and other measures. There had arisen in the country many forces which in different ways and places, but with the same object, had come to stand for opposition to the spread of slavery, and were assimilating. Forces moral, spiritual, political were uniting--unconsciously at first--for the great conflict under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln.

* * * * *

To Whittier’s insight political measures were to be the salvation of the country he loved and eventual destruction to the slavery he hated. To him therefore each man’s vote counted.

While he was in the grocery store, or the post-office, or in some shop, that especial place became by power of the poet’s character and purpose the rendezvous of a political force that had for its object the turning of politics from chicanery and bribery into the might that dwells in an honest man’s vote wisely given.

If the poet accepted men as he found them, it was because in them he found good. He never accepted evil in men or passed it by with indifference, but strove in some way to speak the word, or do the act which should turn the man to good. Politics led by Whittier in Amesbury was under that same leadership which by personal counsel as well as by published poem and word was so helpful in organizing the Republican party. None recognized more quickly than did Whittier that men all over the country were like men in Amesbury, no more intelligent, no more honest, no more progressive. And his poems to

“Rouse the sleeping citizen; Summon out the might of men!”

his written pleas for the right and appeals against oppression were made to just such men as those he daily met and talked with.

None knew better than he did that suggestions and inspirations are in the air and hit one in the way of them. Whittier had a quality also accredited to Roosevelt--he went where things were. How he always managed to get there in his life of a recluse it is difficult to explain, except upon the principle that electricity travels a thousand miles as readily as one, and the poet’s perceptions were charged with spiritual electricity.

Therefore these men whom he was daily meeting had something to say to him also, although often unconsciously; and his knowledge of their powers and possibilities, of how they looked at things, and how to reach their hearts gave to his “Songs of Freedom” a note of power that sent them ringing over the land.

As leader and inspirer he stood--not autocrat. He cared to know all men’s opinions, and his weapons were argument and persuasion, and that keen rapier of retort which pierced many a false theory.

* * * * *

Yet, as it has been said, in these morning hours politics were not all. The poet had been writing; he needed recreation. Everything that was going on around him was of interest to him; the local story, the fun, the jest, the laugh were not wanting; nor was any situation with the possibility of humor in it lost upon this politician and poet. He appreciated broadcloth, he delighted in cultured phrase; both he could find in his own town. But where these were lacking,

“A man’s a man for a’ that.”

For Whittier lived so much in the realities that he held men as they stood in the ranks of character, and in reading them he was wonderfully keen.

So, he talked and listened and joked and laughed with his fellow-townsmen, and reckoned among them many a true friend.

* * * * *

In a letter to Mrs. F---- written in the November of 1876, he says:

“What does the Colonel think of the election? I staid to vote in Amesbury and have been here for ten days or more. The dismal and misty weather seems to correspond with the doubtful and wearisome political condition of the country. For myself, I would prefer to see Tilden president than to elect Hayes by fraud. Yet there seems a possibility of his fair election.”

* * * * *

After giving some Amesbury news to a correspondent, he adds:

“Do thee ever think of our sojourn at the Bearcamp House? I always recall it with pleasure. H---- C---- [a young friend of whom Whittier was fond] is now in Amesbury. He is still, I hope, improving.”

X

Sometimes the poet did not see his friends and acquaintances upon the street, or he was too absorbed in a poem--or, alas it may have been with a headache--to give sign of recognition. Yet to a neighbor who one day laughingly accused him of “cutting” her, he spoke of the two persons whom he never failed to recognize, whatever his preoccupation--one an old cooper, the other an old lame man, both of whom through their poverty found many persons blind to them.

But, again, sometimes Whittier’s eyes served him well. One morning coming out of the post-office, he saw the doctor driving past and the two stopped to greet one another. Then, as the interview seemed finished and the doctor was about to drive on again, the poet said in an undertone:

“Don’t thee go yet. There’s So-and-So,” naming a bore, “waiting for me. Let him get by first.”

So the poet and the doctor’s carriage stood in the road until Mr. “So-and-So” grew tired of waiting and took himself off.

* * * * *

Occasionally, a visitor who happened to be in the garden room when the poet returned from the post-office was treated to tidbits from his mail. One day he read aloud a letter from a woman of brilliant literary fame and brilliant personality. She announced that she was coming to visit him.

“She is one of the most easily entertained visitors I ever have,” he commented, “for I don’t have to answer her; I don’t get a chance!” And as he laughed, he knew well that, had the writer of the letter heard him, she would have had her retort ready. For when did Gail Hamilton ever fail of a good retort? “Now, what does she send that to an old fellow like me for?” he went on, holding out a snip of her new gown which for his edification she had inclosed in her letter.

She told him also where she was about to visit and added her request for a letter from him, or for a few words, or for merely his name, so that in a moment of abstraction she could draw the envelope from her pocket as by accident, and drop it back again with the remark, “Ah, a letter from Whittier!”

* * * * *

The poet in speaking to a friend about his comprehension of character, told how he sometimes regretted this ability. She responded that at times she also read people better than she liked.

“So do I, Mrs. S----,” he answered eagerly. “I read them too well.” His sensitive organization which vibrated to the least change in the winds of heaven, vibrated also to human emotions and passions in others.

And yet here his kindness did not fail him; nor when face to face with evil, did he rebuke the evil-doer with any consciousness of superior personal merit. Instead, he appealed from the evil in evidence to the good in reserve.

As when one morning in the garden room he listened to an amazing proposition, namely--that his visitor should write the poetry, which the poet was assured by the speaker the latter could do fluently, and that Whittier should put his name to it, which would make it sell, and that the two should share the profits!

The poet showed no anger at the suggestion of linking his name with doggerel, or contempt for the other’s stupendous conceit. It was the deceit which he attacked.

“Thee is a minister of the Gospel,” he answered the man. “Now, does thee think it would be right to do a thing like that?”

XI

Whittier was not one of the philanthropists whose affections are all for the world in general with home left out in the cold. On the contrary, his home affections were very strong; and his thought of his sister Elizabeth in her invalidism was constant, his care and anxiety for her unremitting. Whatever suited Elizabeth best was what he desired; wherever she would be most benefitted was where he wished to go. Although he preferred the mountains, yet for his sister’s sake he would go to the seaside; as for his sake she would choose the mountains when the ocean breezes suited her better.

On entering his home after an absence, his first question always was, “Well, Elizabeth, how has thee been since I’ve been away?”

His publication of her poems and what he says of them prove his estimation of her as a poet. Her judgment, her sympathy, her affection, her criticism, her inspiration were all in all to him.

To the outside world she was a brilliant talker, a cordial hostess, a devoted friend. To her brother she was home itself.

Slender and delicate as Miss Whittier had always been, she had known in her own person somewhat of the lawlessness and violence invoked against the cause she championed. For she, then a girl of twenty, had been present as a member of the Women’s Anti-Slavery Society, in the October of 1835, when the Boston mob surrounded the building in which the meeting was held and attacked Garrison who was to address it.

She was one of the brave women who, two by two, arm in arm, one woman white, one black, the former to protect the latter as far as possible, marched through the mob to the house of Mrs. Chapman, where the adjourned meeting was held, and the officers duly elected.

Devoted, brave, indomitable, resolute in purpose, Elizabeth Whittier’s intense interest in all that concerned the freedom of the slave, as well as her great literary ability, made her her brother’s companion and coadjutor. For to Whittier himself this cause was dearest; it was the cause which to his latest day he was more glad and proud to have championed than he was of all the fame his writings had brought him.

* * * * *

Even when Whittier’s fame was still identified with a cause which for the time kept him from the wider knowledge of the public, many guests were attracted by his name and personality. Not a few of these came from homes of much greater elaboration than the poet’s. Elizabeth felt this; yet never in her inmost heart was she untrue to the cause for which the poet had chosen poverty--almost obloquy.

Yet once when guests were coming who lived in a style far beyond the simplicity of the Whittier home, she spoke out her dread of the inward comments which she knew would be made by the strangers.

But her brother had his consolation ready--who ever saw him when he was not ready?

“Why, Elizabeth,” the poet made answer, “it’s all upholstery. What does thee care for upholstery?”

* * * * *

To one with so little physical strength as Miss Whittier had, the frequent and sudden influx of guests was often a trial.

Never was it more so than when at noon one washing day the stage coach drove up to the house, and, unannounced, two ladies descended from it, the driver following with a trunk which he deposited in the hall and departed. Miss Whittier faced the strangers with the trepidation of a housekeeper who conjures up visions of dust where none should be and who--still worse--takes counsel with herself concerning the state of the larder. Her welcome of her visitors, although kindly, was not wholly free from embarrassment.

But these were housekeepers also; and they understood, it may be far more than it was desired that they should do. For, the next moment one of them sat down upon her trunk and burst into tears of mortification at their having in this way imposed themselves upon strangers.

With the first tear, however, the distress of their hostess fled. She no longer cared a jot for household disarray--which had been chiefly a matter of her own imagination--and her welcome of her guests was the beginning of a life-long friendship with Alice and Phoebe Cary.

* * * * *

Elizabeth Whittier, this very dainty Quaker lady, was exquisite in her hues of drab when occasion demanded; yet with all her feminine nature she loved the colors most becoming to her dark complexion and hair and her beautiful dark eyes. When the summer sun shone hot, a visitor might find her charmingly, although most simply gowned in a pink cambric, or even a buff one which was quite as much to her taste, her white linen cuffs turned up over the wristbands and her collar of linen in the fashion of the day.

Yet it was artistic instinct and not vanity which made these selections. For Miss Whittier’s estimate of herself was always most humble. She never appreciated her own brilliance of face and conversation and her own great charm of manner. Herself dark, she delighted in fairness of skin and could not picture angels other than blue-eyed and golden-haired.

She was very fond of music, well nigh forbidden to Quakers in those days; and a young neighbor with a very sweet voice would often go to her home and sing to her, to Miss Whittier’s great delight. So sensitive to sound was she that voices took shapes to her; they were round, and square, and of different shapes, some of them, no doubt, angular enough!

A little girl visiting relatives in Amesbury went one day with these to the poet’s home. She had never seen either the poet or his sister, and Miss Whittier’s prominent nose, indicative of her literary taste, but to a child exceedingly pronounced, caught her attention. She stared at it steadily, until Whittier who had been watching her covered her with confusion by saying to her:

“Well, and how does thee like Quaker noses?”

What hospitality, what cordiality in Miss Whittier’s way of leading along a guest by the hand given in greeting, until she had placed her in the most comfortable seat!

Like her brother she had that keenness of retort often at once brilliant and yet full of kindly consolation. A young friend came to her one day overwhelmed by the many troubles and sorrows of her lot and in a mood which found life altogether too hard to be borne. Miss Whittier with many a word of sympathy for her griefs said to her at last:

“But what would thee have? Thee would not be an oyster, would thee?”

And before the eyes of her listener there rose in consolation that antithesis of pain, a radiant vision of the joy of life.

* * * * *

A letter from Miss Whittier gives glimpses of the home life and proves her loyalty to home and friends. She writes:

“I was away more than four weeks. It is now nearly four since I came back. No, Mary, Greenleaf has not been out in his old coat and hat hunting asters and gentians. I wish he could. He has been home a few days. He seemed to have had a pleasant tour all about; but for more than a fortnight he has been quite sick, has had a visit from the doctor every day He seems _somewhat_ better now, but has hardly _faith_ enough himself. He says the war is waiting while he is ill.

“I have missed thee, Mary, sadly; but I know how delightful it must be in Rehoboth home, so I am patient. Greenleaf has not wanted to see anyone; but I am sure he would be rejoiced to see thee.

“My little journey was _very_ pleasant, in Lynn among dear old friends and Aunt Phoebe so glad to have me--and then in Reading, of course, nothing could be better. I think the Reading sunshine and moonlight more wonderful than anything I had known before. I do not feel _quite_ as much stronger as I did when I first came home, but am sure it did me good. I was only one day with dear Hattie Sewall at Melrose.... M---- dear, if I don’t go so much among the glorious woods, I know how beautiful these warm, bright days must be to you, gypsying as you are. I did not go to the Fair, but ’twas all very nice and Lucy Larcom sent me a great bunch of fringed gentians the _day after_. How do you all feel about the war? For my part, I will keep faith in Frémont! What does it all mean--the murmurs against Frémont?...

“Only think! Theodore Winthrop’s brother has sent me a photograph of Major Winthrop, a very pure young spiritual face it is--just such a one as I seemed to see in the moonlight on the banks of the Potomac--for thee knows he said, ‘It is full moon always at Camp Camison.’ I will enclose a notice of thy friend F----’s regiment. I think poor A---- must miss thee. I have seen her once. I love A----, the little I know of her--she is so calm and good....

“The doctor has just taken Greenleaf to ride a little way. The morning is perfect after the storm. I wonder where thee are just now--out in the sunshine, no doubt.... The dear little kitten went in a basket to L---- M---- who wrote a note of thanks and welcome to kitty. Greenleaf joins me in love to thee and thy friends. Aunt Dolly sends her love. We shall expect thee by and by. When shall thee look homewards?”

* * * * *

In another letter from Boston to the same friend, Miss Whittier speaks of Fredrika Bremer, who was at that time in America.

“Miss Bremer doesn’t seem a great light after all,” she says; “she is far more like a good, social hearth-fire making one comfortable. I want you, my dear, good friend, to see her in Amesbury. Tell Annie, Miss Bremer is especially drawn to soft, light curls like hers; they remind her of London. I know she would fall in love with Annie and her blue eyes. A brother of Mr. J----, the wonderful, drank tea with us on seventh day evening. He looked happy, and we thought he was a good, commonplace body.”

* * * * *

Whittier in the note to his poem, “To Fredrika Bremer,” writes: “It is proper to say that these lines are the joint impromptu of my sister and myself. They are inserted here as an expression of our admiration of the gifted stranger whom we have since learned to love as a friend.”

The poem begins:

“Seeress of the misty Norland, Daughter of the Vikings bold, Welcome to the sunny Vineland, Which thy fathers sought of old.”

To this friend to whom Miss Whittier writes so lovingly, the poet also says in a letter: