parson wuz dreffle tickled with 'em as I hoop you will Be, and said they wuz True grit. Hosy ses he sed suthin a nuther about Simplex Mundishes or sum sech feller, but I guess Hosea kind o' didn't hear him, for I never hearn o' nobody o' that name in this villadge, and I've lived here man and boy 76 year cum next tatur digging, and thar aint nowheres a kitting spryer'n I be.' But the work of which we are now speaking is the lustiest product of the national humour; it is Yankee through and through; indigenous as the flowers of the soil, native as the note of the bob-a-link. The author is a poet of considerable repute, who has written much beautiful verse. But he has never fulfilled his early promise in serious poetry. In this book alone has he reached his full stature, and written with the utmost pith and power. Doubtless because in this he relies more on the national life, his work is more en rapport with the national character, and thus the book is one of those that could only be written in one country, and at one period of history. The enduring elements of art, of poetry, of humour, must be found at home or nowhere. And the crowning quality of Lowell's humour is, that it was found at home, his book is a national birth. The Biglow Papers' include most of the aspects of American humour upon which we have touched, the racy and hilarious yet matter-of-fact hyperbole, that is, audible and full of vent ;' the boundless exaggeration uttered most demurely, the knowing unconsciousness, and other characteristic clues. They have also that infusion of poetry which is necessary to humour at its best. 6 The two great characters of the book are the 'Rev. Homer Wilbur,' to whom Hosea Biglow, the young poet, takes his verses, and 'Birdofredum Sawin,' But there are various smaller sketches of character admirably drawn with the fewest strokes. We have not room for the Newspaper Editor, one of the base 'mutton-loving shepherds,' of which, says the Rev. Homer Wilbur, there are two thousand in the United States. The life and glory of the Biglow Papers is Mr. Birdofredum Sawin.' His experiences are as delightful as his character is disreputable and true to nature. He has been through the Mexican war, and this is his description of his losses. Among other things he has lost a leg; however, he has gained a new wooden one. This was what he got, instead of making his fortune as he had anticipated. Dilapidated and maimed as he is, useless for anything else, he proposes to canvas for the Presidency, and his instructions for agents show genuine insight, a fine sagacity:— Q 2 C • Ef, Ef, wile you're 'lectioneerin' round, some curus chaps should beg Then you can call me "Timbertoes,"-thet's wut the people likes; Thet valooable class o' men who look thru brandy-toddy; Lowell tried during the late war to continue his 'Biglow Papers.' It is proverbially difficult to continue a work like this, as difficult, we should say, as it is to continue a first child in the person and character of a second. But he succeeded in writing one or two papers worthy of being included in the design. It is interesting, on looking back now, to observe how much national character there is in the book. The theme on which he wrote is obsolete, but the human nature remains the same. 'Birdofredum Sawin' is vital and superior to circumstance, and impudent as ever. Neither Lowell nor any other American poet has ever before painted the coming of the New England spring with the native beauty and new-world truth of these lines: 'Fust come the blackbirds clatt'rin' in tall trees, Then saffern swarms swing off from all the willers Then seems to come a hitch,-things lag behind, Then Then all the waters bow themselves an' come, Runs down, a brook o' laughter, thru the air.' Lowell has fought long and strenuously against negro slavery, and lashed the vices of American politics. But his ballad of 'The Courtin' is on quite a different theme, and causes a regret that he has not written more rustic poetry : 'Zekle crep' up, quite unbeknown, An' peeked in thru the winder, An' there sot Huldy all alone, Agin' the chimbly, crooknecks hung, An' in amongst 'em rusted The ole Queen's arm thet gran'ther Young The wannut logs shot sparkles out The very room, coz she wur in, Looked warm frum floor to ceilin', An' she looked full ez rosy agin Ez th' apples she wuz peelin'. Ho He kin' o' l'itered on the mat, But hern went pity Zekle. An' yet she gin her cheer a jerk "You want to see my Pa, I spose?" 66 Wal, no; I come designin "To see my Ma? She's sprinklin' clo'es Agin tomorrow's i'nin'." He stood a spell on one foot fust, An' on which one he felt the wust He was six foot o' man A 1, Clean grit an' human natur; None couldn't quicker pitch a ton Nor dror o furrer straighter. He'd sparked it with full twenty gals, He'd squired 'em, danced 'em, druv 'em, Fust this one and then thet by spells,All is, he couldn't love 'em. But long o' her his veins 'ould run, She thought no v'ice hed such a swing My! when he made Ole Hundred ring, Sez he, "I'd better call agin;" Sez she, "Think likely, Mister;" All kind o' smily round the lips, Her blood riz quick, though, like the tide Down to the Bay o' Fundy, An' all I know is they wuz cried In this we see humour at play with sentiment, and should like to have had more such interiors pictured with the same vividness and delightful ease. In the other poems we meet with humour -Yankee humour-in a working mood. Hosea Biglow means 'business' when he enters the arena, and he strikes his blows with the most sinewy strength; they go right home with the utmost directness. The scorn that is concentrated in a local phrase, the satire that is conveyed in the homeliest imagery, are hurled with double force; the irony often reaches a Swift-like intensity. The amount of hard truth here flung in a humorous guise at humbugs political and literary is positively overwhelming. And to enhance the effect there is that Yankee dialect, with its aggravating drawl. Therefore we look upon the Biglow Papers' as the most characteristic and complete expression of American humour. We do not purpose including the humour of Irving in this sketch. It does not smack strongly of the American soil; its characteristics are old English rather than modern Yankee. In its own mild way it is akin to the best humour, that which gives forth the fragrance of feeling, and is a pervasive influence, elusive and ethereal, sweet and shy; the loving effluence of a kindly nature whose still smiles are often more significant, and come from a deeper source, than the loudest laughter. This is the quality likewise of Hawthorne's humour. But his has more piquancy and new-world flavour. To do it justice, however, would demand a close psychological study, so curious and complex were the nature and genius of the man; the nature was a singular growth for such a soil, the genius out of keeping with the environment, or, as the Americans would say, the fixings,' -a new-world man who shrank like a sensitive plant from the heat, and haste, and loudness of his countrymen, and whose brooding mind was haunted by shadows from the past. There was a sombre background to his mind or temperament, against which the humour plays more brightly. In the piece entitled the 'Celestial Railroad,' a modern version of the Pilgrim's Progress,' which shows how easy it is to do the journey now-a-days by the new and improved passage to the Celestial City, where stood the wicket-gate of old we now find a station. Here you take your ticket, and there is no need of carrying your burthen on your back, as did poor Christian; that goes in the luggage-van. A bridge has been thrown across the Slough of Despond. There is no longer any feud betwixt Beelzebub and the wicket-gate keeper. They are now partners in the same concern, with all the ancient difficulties amicably arranged. A tunnel passes through the hill Difficulty, with the débris |