THE GOVE HOUSE, HAMPTON FALLS, N. H., IN WHICH WHITTIER DIED.
At ten o'clock the public was admitted to the house, passing in a continuous line (as at the funeral of dear old Walt Whitman, his brother poet of Democracy, a few months before in Camden) through the humble little parlor of the Amesbury home. It was originally intended to hold the services in the Friends' meeting-house near by; but the dense fog clearing up and the bright sun coming out—as one beautifully said, "the mystery of death typified by the shifting and elusive shadows of the fog, and the glory and hopefulness of the resurrection by the bright rays of the sun"—it was decided to let the body rest in the house, and hold memorial services in the quiet garden in the rear of the house. The funeral arrangements were in charge of William Lloyd Garrison, Jr., S. T. Pickard and Judge G. W. Cate, the tenant of the house. The atmosphere was one of peace and restfulness, and the simplicity of the life of the Friends was seen in all the arrangements. In the quaint parlor of the homestead lay all that was mortal of the poet, on whose face was an expression of supreme peace; his form was encircled by a delicate fringe of trailing fern. A most beautiful wreath from Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes—eighty-four white roses, fringed with carnations and maidenhair ferns, one for each year of the poet's life,—was laid around the name-plate on the coffin. It was a touching tribute by the last one of that remarkable galaxy of poets that marked such a distinguished era in our American literature. Two crossed palms, with the Japan lilies Whittier loved so well, encircled by a broad white satin ribbon, were from Mrs. Daniel Lothrop. The fronds of the long palms encircled the face of the dead poet as it looked out from the large engraving between the windows of the parlor. Upon the end of the ribbon was delicately painted six lines from Whittier's "Andrew Rykman's Prayer:"
"Some sweet morning yet in God's
Dim æonian periods,
Joyful I shall wake to see
Those I love who rest in Thee,
And to them in Thee allied
Shall my soul be satisfied."
Upon the accompanying card was this: "In memory of my husband's dear friend. This verse of 'Andrew Rykman's Prayer' was consolation in the hour of death to both him who wrote it, and to him who loved it.—Mrs. Daniel Lothrop."
Another exquisite floral offering came with these lines:
"I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care."
On the back of the card were the words "Oak Knoll."
The alcove behind the casket was filled with floral tributes. Here was a large St. Andrew's cross of exquisite white roses upon a bed of ivy, from a very near and dear friend of Mr. Whittier's at Lexington, whose name is withheld. There was a ladder of hydrangeas, gladioli, carnations and snow-balls from Mrs. Albert Clarke of Amesbury, an ivy wreath from Sarah Orne Jewett, a sheaf of wheat from Mrs. Lizzie Cheney and the Misses Coffin of Lynn, a broken shaft of white carnations from Mr. and Mrs. J. Henry Hall of Amesbury. A massive wreath of Whittier's own much-loved pine tassels was hung above the portrait of his sister Elizabeth, the tribute of Mrs. Joseph A. Purington; the heavy green was relieved by a spray of bright, contrasting goldenrod. Mrs. Samuel Rowell, Jr., sent a basket of white roses and maidenhair. There was a beautiful spray of the passion flower from L. Kelcher, Hotel Winthrop, Boston, and an hour-glass of white carnations from Mr. J. R. Fogg. Many touching little clusters of flowers came from the children; and his neighbors sent a beautiful wreath of fringed gentian—Whittier's favorite flower. This came from the far Pacific Slope: "Lay one flower for me upon the bier of the beloved friend who rests. No purer soul ever passed from earth to Heaven, or bore with it greater love and blessing than does his.—Ina D. Coolbrith, Oakland, Cal."
In the garden, and overlooked by the windows of the study where Mr. Whittier wrote and thought for so many years, was gathered to pay the last tributes of love and reverence to the dead poet, a large and notable assemblage: Gen. O. O. Howard, E. C. Stedman, Mrs. Alice Freeman Palmer, Mrs. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps-Ward, Gail Hamilton, Lucy Larcom, Edna Dean Proctor, Horace E. Scudder, T. W. Higginson, ex-Governor Claflin, Parker Pillsbury, Francis H. Underwood, Edward L. Pierce, Robert S. Rantoul, Mrs. C. A. Dall, "Margaret Sidney," Harriet Prescott Spofford, Mrs. Endicott, Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Jr., Frank J. Garrison, etc.
And the sight was one never to be forgotten. Under the soft September sky, blue and cloudless, in the shade of pear and apple trees which Whittier himself had planted and tended and loved, were his relatives, friends, neighbors and men and women whose names are known wherever the English language is spoken.
It scarcely seemed like a funeral, so unaffectedly natural and sincere was every spoken word and every act. And the entire absence of formality and stiffness deprived the occasion of that artificial gloom which is so often characteristic of funerals.
Perhaps, too, the subtle influence of the balmy air and the beauties of the place helped to lift the pall that must have hung over many a heart. It was as if the friends of some dearly beloved man, who was going on a journey, had gathered to bid him God-speed—not as if they had come to bid him farewell.
A hollow square was formed around a low platform, and near by was a table with a Bible upon it. Gentians, one of Whittier's favorite flowers, and goldenrod formed the only floral ornaments. Back of the seats stood a dense crowd that must have numbered thousands, almost filling the garden. Children climbed the trees and looked with open-eyed wonder on the scene. On an apple bough, his naked legs dangling in the air almost over the head of Edmund Clarence Stedman, was an urchin who might have inspired the "Barefoot Boy;" faces peered from many a tree, from the vine-clad arbor and from the window of a neighboring barn, down upon the crowd.
The poet's relatives, and members of the Society of Friends from various places, occupied the seats forming the hollow square, an easy-chair being reserved for Oliver Wendell Holmes, but he was unable to be present.
The Friends gave the exercises their peculiar complexion; first one and then another rising to eulogize their friend as the "Spirit moved them." Verses of Whittier were recited by "that lovely Quaker lady," Mrs. Gertrude Cartland, and by Mrs. James H. Chace. Mr. E. C. Stedman was the last speaker.
He spoke of the personal loss he felt in the poet's death. "To know him was a consecration, to have his sympathy a benediction. His passing away was not so much a death as a translation. He is gone, and has not left his mantle! How could he? Why should he? No one can overestimate his artless art, his power, vigor and effect in his polemic efforts. No one put so much heart or so much religion into his writings. He was one of the great trio of New England poets, of whom there is only one now left. They are the vanishers of whom he spoke. He was a believer in the inward life, as a poet should be. He will be his own successor, and belongs to our time as well as to that earlier time to which he is linked by his work. We may say of him that the chariot swung low and he was translated, dividing the waters of truth, beauty, and religion, with his mantle. The last time I spoke at a memorial service was at Bayard Taylor's funeral. Taylor was Whittier's friend, and like Whittier he had a firm belief in immortality."
It is to Mr. Stedman that Whittier dedicated in a few choice lines his latest volume of verse, "At Sundown," which the poet, as if prescient of his coming death, had had privately printed and circulated among a few friends a year before his fatal illness.
The most picturesque and striking figure at Whittier's funeral was that of the venerable John W. Hutchinson, whose long gray hair fell over a broad white Rembrandt collar. He and his sister, Abby Hutchinson Patton, were life-long friends of Whittier, and their voices in the song they sang—"Close his eyes, his work is done"—were, "like the echoes of sweet bells from the far-away time of their youth, when they and Whittier were one in endeavor."
And then the long procession was formed. In the family lot, in the Friends' section of the Union Cemetery, where are buried his father, mother, sisters and brother, John Greenleaf Whittier was laid to rest.
The Boston Journal, in writing of Whittier's obsequies, gathered up this tender reminiscence:—
"We recall the incident of some ten years since, when Mr. Daniel Lothrop, the late publisher, while visiting in California, used Whittier's poem, 'Andrew Rykman's Prayer' to comfort the bereaved. Mr. Lothrop had, as it were, been brought up on Mr. Whittier's poems, there being in many ways a great similarity of tastes and characteristics between them. Of late years there was a strong friendship. The clergyman of a prominent Oakland church had died suddenly in the pulpit some few weeks before, and at the large memorial meeting Mr. Lothrop was asked without warning by the chairman to recite this poem, as he had heard him repeat a few lines from it during a consecration meeting. Mr. Lothrop ascended the platform and gave the poem entire. There was a profound hush throughout the vast assembly, like that following the instant when the beloved pastor had suddenly fallen before their eyes. Many were in tears, all agreeing that Whittier's strong, uplifting words comforted them more than anything else that had been said. Rev. Dr. Gordon, in the address at Mr. Lothrop's funeral in the Old South Church, appropriately recited this poem for the late publisher, who on his death-bed used this poem, as he had in health and strength."
James G. Blaine telegraphed that he had "long regarded Whittier with affectionate veneration," and over the wire came from Frederick Douglas the words, "Emancipated millions will hold his memory sacred." Speaking of Mr. Blaine, a writer, "S. F. M.," in the Boston Journal, December 18, 1891, tells of Mr. Blaine's presenting his, "S. F. M.'s," brother with a morocco-bound copy of the beautiful Mussey edition, and of Mr. Blaine's reading and re-reading aloud, one Sunday at their house in Charlestown, Mass., the poem "Among the Hills," which had then just been issued.
Memorial services on the afternoon of the funeral were held in Danvers, Haverhill, Salem, Mass., and Vassalboro, Maine. The old Whittier grange at the cross roads in Haverhill was draped in mourning. The present owner of the birthplace is Mr. George E. Elliott, a retired wealthy gentleman of Haverhill; and it is hoped that at no distant day he may be induced to sell it to the town of Haverhill, who would sacredly keep this cherished spot marking the nativity of her distinguished son, so that all lovers of John G. Whittier's poetry may have an opportunity to see his early home.
The day after the funeral between seventeen and eighteen hundred people visited the grave. And, as in the case of Walt Whitman's grave, each one wanted a leaf or flower as a memento, so that it was necessary in both cases to have the place of sepulture guarded by special watchmen, in order that anything green be left.
The funeral of the poet was conducted as he himself wished. For in his will he wrote, "It is my wish that my funeral may be conducted in the plain and quiet way of the Society of Friends, with which I am connected not only by birthright, but also by a settled conviction of the truth of its principles and the importance of its testimonies." Mr. Whittier, by the way, in his will requests all who have letters of his to refrain from publishing them unless with the consent of his literary executor, Mr. S. T. Pickard.
So beautifully ended a most beautiful life—beautiful because just and heroic in the defense of justice. As says of him James Herbert Morse:—
"Such was the man—no more than simple man,
Plain Quaker, with the Norman-Saxon glow;
But seeing beauty so, and justice so,
We love to think him the American."
And as Lowell says:—
"Peaceful by birthright as a virgin lake,
The lily's anchorage, which no eyes behold
Save those of stars, yet for thy brother's sake
That lay in bonds thou blew'st a blast as bold
As that wherewith the heart of Roland brake,
Far heard through Pyrenean valleys cold!"
The lines strong and resonant, of Stedman's "Ad Vatem," addressed to Whittier while living, might well have been uttered over his bier:—
"Whittier, the land that loves thee, she whose child
Thou art, and whose uplifted hands thou long
Hast staid with song availing like a prayer—
She feels a sudden pang who gave thee birth,
And gave to thee the lineaments supreme
Of her own freedom, that she could not make
Thy tissues all immortal, or, if to change,
To bloom through years coeval with her own;
So that no touch of age nor frost of time
Should wither thee, nor furrow thy dear face,
Nor fleck thy hair with silver. Ay, she feels
A double pang that thee, with each new year
Glad youth may not revisit, like the spring
That routs her northern winter and anew
Melts off the hoar snow from her puissant hills."
Many pleasant anecdotes of the Quaker poet appeared shortly after his death. Col. T. W. Higginson, writing of the Amesbury home, said of Whittier's mother:—
"On one point only this blameless soul seemed to have a shadow of solicitude, this being the new wonder of Spiritualism just dawning on the world. I never went to the house that there did not come from the gentle lady very soon a placid inquiry from behind her knitting needles, 'Has thee any further information to give in regard to the spiritual communications, as they call them?' But if I attempted to treat seriously a matter which then, as now, puzzled most inquirers by its perplexing details, there would come some keen thrust from Elizabeth Whittier which would throw all serious solution further off than ever.
"She was indeed a brilliant person, unsurpassed in my memory for the light cavalry charges of wit; as unlike her mother and brother as if she had been born into a different race. Instead of his regular features, she had a wild, bird-like look, with prominent nose and large liquid dark eyes, whose expression vibrated every instant between melting softness and impetuous wit. There was nothing about her that was not sweet and kindly, but you were constantly taxed to keep up with her sallies and hold your own; while her graver brother listened with delighted admiration and rubbed his hands over bits of merry sarcasm which were utterly alien to his own vein. His manifold visitors were touched off in living colors; two plump and rosy Western girls among them, who had lately descended upon the household beaming with eagerness to see the poet.
"They had announced themselves as the Cary sisters, who had lately sent him their joint poems—verses, it will be remembered, crowded with deaths and melodious dirges that seemed ludicrously inconsistent with the blooming faces at the door. Mrs. Whittier met them rather guardedly and explained that her son was out. 'But we will come in and wait for him,' they smilingly replied. 'But he is in Boston, and may not be home for a week,' said the prudent mother. 'No matter,' they said, in the true spirit of Western hospitality; 'we can stay till he returns.' There was no resource but to admit them; and happily the poet came back next day, and there ensued a life-long friendship, in which the mother fully shared."
And another reminiscence appeared in the press, touching the poet's residence in Boston.
When Mrs. Celia Thaxter was boarding at the little English-like inn on the sunny slope of Beacon Hill called Hotel Winthrop, Mr. Whittier went there one day to see her. Mrs. Thaxter liked the quiet place, with its ivied window and its glimpse of the strong, short, green-draped tower of St. John the Evangelist's, and she praised it to her old friend. That was some time in 1881, and in November of that year he joined his Oak Knoll cousins, Mrs. Woodman and her daughter and the Misses Johnson, at the Winthrop. The ladies of the family came in September, but Mr. Whittier did not join them until November. He said that he did not want to lose his vote in Amesbury.
It was a winter full of pleasure to the poet. He was then not too feeble to go out evenings, and he spent many pleasant hours with friends like the Claflins and others. But the hours in the parlor of the hotel make the place historic, and give it a special interest and meaning for his future biographer. Mr. Whittier had room fourteen (the number of a sonnet's lines, twice seven, with luck for a poet), and the fire-escape made a little balcony for him on a corner toward St. John's. The landlord had a door cut through the thick old wall to the rooms adjoining, and these were the rooms of Mrs. Woodman and the rest. It is old Boston decidedly in that quarter. The brick of the houses is mellow old red, and there is nothing newfangled anywhere about. Mr. Whittier said he preferred coming here rather than to one of the big hotels, because there he was "overwhelmed with the service," and here it seemed "more like Amesbury," where people "are neighborly and drop in without knocking." He had "always been used to waiting upon himself," and he "liked being in a place where they would let him."
It was his custom, mornings, to come down into the little reception-room on the street floor, and "sitting right in that chair where you're sitting," as the writer was told, he "used to read his letters and throw all the papers in a pile on the floor and go off and leave them." That little room was a great place of congregation for "the family," as the boarders who were there with Mr. Whittier liked to call themselves.
The poet would sit on the sofa with a favored one on each side of him and the rest in a group about, "often on footstools or on the floor, as like as not," while he "told stories of war times." Gen. Stevens was there during one of the poet's long stays; he had been a classmate of Gen. Lee and of Jefferson Davis at West Point, and he and the abolition poet discussed these men and their times from the broader view of later days.
"Once a friend, a lady who had some property in Virginia, wrote Mr. Whittier of having named a street in a new town for him, and of having set aside a portion of ground in his name. He replied with thanks, saying that he had that week received news of no less than three towns or streets being named for him with a gift of town lots, adding, 'If this sort of thing goes on much longer, I shall be land poor.'
"During the winters he was at the Winthrop, Mr. Whittier's favorite way of getting about was in a herdic. They were 'not pretty,' but they 'knew the way to places.' Politicians used to go there to see him and try to get him to banquets. But his life-long avoidance of politics in the minor sense made him easily resist their wiles. 'I have seen Mr. —— (a well-known name) come here and just about go down on his knees to get Mr. Whittier to speak or even to come to a banquet,' says the landlord (who is, by the way, an old-time character worthy of a novelist's pen), 'but Mr. Whittier would just sit here—right in that chair you're in—and kind of smile to himself as if to say, "Oh! your talk don't amount to anything." Well, once Mr. —— came here and staid and staid a-talking and persuading, and gave Mr. Whittier an earache if ever a man had one. But he didn't make anything by it, although he finally had to take a bed and stay all night.'"
Mr. Charles Brainard visited Whittier soon after the publication of "Snow-Bound." Finding his house painted and improved, he remarked to him, "It is evident that poetry has ceased to be a drug in the market."
"The next morning Mr. Whittier's answer came. It was in the winter, and, as the poet went up to the fire to warm his boots preparatory to putting them on, he said, 'Thee will have to excuse me, for I must go down to the office of the Collector.' Then, with a humorous gleam in his eye, he added, 'Since "Snow-Bound" was published, I have risen to the dignity of an income tax.'"
To an Englishman who visited him not long before his death, Mr. Whittier expressed his surprise that his guest should know so much of his poetry by heart. "I wonder," he said, "thou shouldst burden thy memory with all that rhyme. It is not well to have too much of it: better get rid of it as soon as possible. Why, I can't remember any of it. I once went to hear a wonderful orator, and he wound up his speech with a poetical quotation, and I clapped with all my might. Some one touched me on the shoulder, and said. 'Do you know who wrote that?' I said, 'No, I don't; but it's good.' It seems I had written it myself. The fault is I have written far too much."
Here is a story illustrating Whittier's kind-heartedness: A young lady, a neighbor, was asked to take tea at his house. "He had no servant at the moment, and, with the assistance of his guest, prepared the simple meal with his own hand. She contributed to the press for her support, and prepared a minute account of the affair, of which Mr. Whittier chanced to be advised, and sent off a remonstrance post haste. But when the young author pleaded the real need of the money which the little story was to bring her, and the harmlessness to its subject of its effective details, the former reason (for the latter would never have overcome his abhorrence of what he must have felt a vivisection) actually prevailed, and he permitted the publication with a benignant forbearance."
The Hon. Nathan Crosby, LL. D., writes in the Essex Institute Collections for 1880.
"James F. Otis, nephew of the Hon. H. G. Otis, while reading law in my office, found in some newspaper a piece of poetry which he said he was told had been written by a shoemaker boy in Haverhill, and he wished to go and find him. Upon his return he told me he found the young man by the name of Whittier at work in his shoe shop, and, making himself known to him, they spent the day together in wandering over the hills on the shore of the Merrimack, and in conversation upon literary matters. The next year he became an editor. Mr. Whittier is not only a poet, but is himself a poem."
Mr. Whittier, when interviewed some time ago as to his favorite works, replied: "Oh! really, I have none. Much that I have written I wish was as deep in the Red Sea as Pharaoh's chariot wheels. Much of the bread cast on the waters I wish had never returned. It is not fair to revive writings composed in the shadow of conditions that make every acceptable work impossible. In my early life I was not favored with good opportunities. Limited chances for education and a lack of books always stood in my way. When I began to write I had seen nothing, and virtually knew nothing of the world. Of course, things written then could not be worth much. In my father's house there were not a dozen books, and they were of a severe type. The only one that approached poetry was a rhymed history of King David, written by a contemporary of George Fox, the Quaker. There was one poor novel in the family. It belonged to an aunt. This I secured one day, but when I had read it about half through I was discovered and it was taken away from me."
This was about the time when Judge Pickering, of Salem, and a party of ladies called at the farm-house to see him. "He was then an awkward boy of seventeen—as he used to tell the story—and was just then under the barn, looking for eggs. Hearing his name called, he came up with his hat full and found himself suddenly in the presence of people more elegant in appearance than any he had ever met. In telling the story, he added naïvely, 'They came to see the Quaker poet—and they saw him!' This must have been about the year 1824."
Mr. T. W. Ball (in the Boston Journal, Dec. 18, 1891, weekly edition), the journalist, wrote of his sole interview in 1848 with Whittier, in a little editorial den at the junction of Spring Lane and Water Street with Devonshire Street (the building recently torn down), where Henry Wilson was then editing the Free-Soil paper (owned by him as well). "I was busy," says Mr. Ball, "getting up some local items one morning, when a gentleman of staid appearance, with a beaming countenance, a broad-brimmed fur hat—the old-fashioned fur hat, so different from the silk tile—and a brownish coat of formal cut, entered the room, and, after the usual courtesies of salutation, fell into a close chat with the 'Natick cobbler,' by which popular title the future Vice-President was then known. It was the summer season, and Wilson was resplendent in a brown linen coat and a flaming red-checked velvet waistcoat, which was much affected in those days. As the conversation between the two waxed interesting, I noticed that the visitor unbuttoned his vest for comfort, and possessed himself of an exchange paper which he converted into a fan. The interview closed, and the visitor, buttoning up his vest and donning his hat, turned to depart, when for the first time he appeared to take notice of my presence. With a rapid glance at Wilson, he said, 'Henry, who is thy young friend?'
"'Oh, that's William, my local reporter,' was the reply. 'Here, William, this is Mr. Whittier, the Quaker poet, that you have heard about; shake hands with him.' I timidly extended my hand, and the great man not only grasped it with a cordial grasp, but, patting me on the head with his other hand, said, 'My young friend, thee has chosen a noble calling.'"
Mr. Whittier, in speaking of Longfellow's works a few years ago, said, "'Evangeline' is a favorite with me. I think it is one of the most beautiful of poems. Longfellow had an easy life and superior advantages of association and education, and so did Emerson. It was widely different with me, and I am very thankful for the kind esteem that people have given my writings. Before 'Evangeline' was written I had hunted up the history of the banishment of the Acadians, and had intended to write upon it myself, but I put it off, and Hawthorne got hold of the story and gave it to Longfellow. I am very glad he did, for he was just the one to write it. If I had attempted it I should have spoiled the artistic effect of the poem by my indignation at the treatment of the exiles by the Colonial Government, who had a very hard lot after coming to this country. Families were separated and scattered about, only a few of them being permitted to remain in any given locality. The children were bound out to the families in the localities in which they resided, and I wrote a poem upon finding in the records of Haverhill the indenture that bound an Acadian girl as a servant in one of the families in that neighborhood. Gathering the story of her death, I wrote 'Marguerite.'"
In addition to what has been stated in this volume and elsewhere by me on the Barbara Frietchie ballad, are to be finally appended a few words, suggested by the one who sent the raw material of the ballad to Whittier, namely, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, who, soon after the poet's death, at her pretty home in Georgetown, D. C., recalled the circumstances as they occurred back in 1863. It seems that the story was told her by a neighbor of hers who was also a relative of Barbara—Mr. C. S. Ramsburg. Mrs. Southworth's son, who was present, remarked, "What a grand subject for a poem by Whittier, mother!"
She thereupon sat down, and with tears in her eyes, wrote the incident out and sent it to Amesbury. Mr. Whittier replied as follows:—
"Amesbury, 9mo. 8, 1863.
"My Dear Mrs. Southworth:—I heartily thank thee for thy very kind letter and its inclosed "message." It ought to have fallen into better hands, but I have just written out a little ballad of "Barbara Frietchie," which will appear in the next Atlantic. If it is good for anything thee deserves all the credit of it.
"With best wishes for thy health and happiness, I am most truly thy friend,
"John G. Whittier."
It is said that Mr. Whittier expressed regret for having made a bonfire of nearly all the letters he had received from his correspondents for over half a century. It is to be hoped that his literary executor will be liberal-minded in allowing the publication of the most interesting of Whittier's own letters, for he put a good bit of his sister Elizabeth's wit and vivacity into his letters; and scarcely a day passed that one or more of these was not written, overflowing with kindly words and good humor, though these, it is true, could give no hint of that lambent gleam of the marvelous eyes, nor of that sudden compression of the upper lip with which he repressed a smile when he had flashed out a bit of humor.
Whittier was not only quick in repartee, but quick and lithe in all his movements, and quick in his mental processes. His friend, Judge G. W. Cate, says he latterly read books very rapidly by inspection, turning the leaves and seizing the contents by intuition. The poet's imagination, continues Judge Cate, was wonderful. Years ago he may have read an accurate description of some remote place—Malta, Jerusalem, or some smaller town in the far East. He would then converse at any time as readily about such a place as if he had been there. It was this vivid remembrance of places, Whittier himself said, which made him not care so much to visit them in person. He was never a traveler, not having been farther from home than Philadelphia (half a century ago), and Washington somewhat later. He said that he should like to be in California or Florida for a winter, but the getting there appalled him, and so he sat contentedly in his Northern study, with its bright open fire, finding in its crumbling embers a compensatory dream of the Morgenland with its palms, mirages and luxuriant blossomry. He followed with deep interest the toils and adventures of his friend Greely in the arctic regions, and rejoiced with all his neighbors when word came of his rescue. And at another time he said he "would rather shake hands with Stanley than with any other man in the world just then."
The sincerest mourners at Whittier's funeral were women. One of the peculiarities of his life was the devotion and loving care given to him by noble women—sisters, mother, nieces, cousins and such poet friends as Lucy Larcom, Mrs. Spofford, Rose Terry Cooke, Sarah Orne Jewett, Celia Thaxter, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps and Mrs. Annie Fields. He was always an ardent defender of woman suffrage, and such advocates of that noble cause as Adelaide A. Claflin publicly expressed their sorrow on the death of their coadjutor and friend.
He was not only liberal in politics, but also in religion, and while remaining from choice in the creedless church of his fathers, yet he had sympathies that allied him with the broad humanitarian movements of the times in religion. There was no shred of bigotry in his nature. Who ever heard of a persecuting Quaker? It is they who have always patiently suffered persecution. Whittier, indeed, belonged with the advance guard of the Friends, in spirit at least, and he said in a letter written shortly before his death, "For years I have been desirous of a movement for uniting all Christians, with no other creed or pledge than a simple recognition of Christ as our leader."
The Whittier Club of Haverhill, an organization the poet had thoroughly enjoyed, not only because it represented the feeling of his native town toward him, but also from the constant attentions paid him by it, held a memorial service in Haverhill, October 7. It was a rare day of tribute and thanksgiving, and all who participated in it felt grateful for the honor allowed them. It was just a month from the day when the loved poet and former citizen passed from earth. Mr. George E. Elliott, the owner of Whittier's birthplace, very generously allowed the club to hold its meeting in the old homestead, and he furthered in every way their well-conceived plan by which the several rooms presented an appearance as near as possible to that of the poet's boyhood. The partition in the old kitchen, that had been put up of late years, was taken down, disclosing the array of ancient cupboards and queer little window; there was the kettle hanging on the crane in the wide fireplace, along whose hearth one almost expected to see "the apples sputtering in a row," as of yore. There were the iron fire-dogs and the antiquated chairs, the wainscoting untouched by the hand of Time, save to grow mellower of tint, and there was "the sagging beam," the uneven floor and the quaint staircase, all just as Whittier, the boy, saw and touched and lived amongst, all those impressible years of his life.
It was a notable company gathered in that old homestead that beautiful October day—bidden there by the Whittier Club—not large in numbers, as the invitations were of necessity limited to the capacity of the old homestead. But they were mostly the poet's dear friends who came to do honor to his name. There was Lucy Larcom, William Lloyd Garrison, Jr., Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney and "Margaret Sidney" (Mrs. D. Lothrop); there was Charles Carleton Coffin and Mr. and Mrs. Frank Garrison and Miss Sparhawk, whose father, Dr. Thomas Sparhawk of Amesbury, was one of the poet's life-long friends. There was the dear Quaker presence of Mrs. Purington, Mr. Whittier's cousin, and the members of his family at Oak Knoll, Mrs. Woodman, her daughter, Miss Phebe, and the Misses Johnson; there was Mr. S. T. Pickard of Portland, Maine, who married the poet's niece Lizzie, and who is Mr. Whittier's literary executor. And there were other relatives and friends and Haverhill citizens thronging the house, and listening outside the little many-paned windows to catch the echoes of the words being uttered within.
The day was all that one could desire who looked for sympathy in Nature toward this her favorite child who has so interpreted her woods and fields, her autumn skies and the trembling line of river and coast. The old kitchen was filled with chairs, and on them, and crowded in the doorways and peeping in the windows, were the interested and reverent listeners. Mr. Charles Howe, the president of the club, presided with great grace and dignity; with rare tact culling from the large amount of what waited to be read and said, just such choice extracts and bits of reminiscence as would best serve the purpose of the hour. Selections from "Snow-Bound" were read by a member of the club in that room where "Snow-Bound" was lived, if one may so express it. And to the listeners there came a vision of wintry fields and whirling storm; of the little knot of friends drawn close to the friendly comforting fire on the hearth; in the midst the thoughtful sensitive boy who was to awaken the love and veneration of future generations all over his country.
There were reminiscences of a visit to his birthplace paid by the poet some ten years since with Mr. S. T. Pickard, who told to the assembled company many amusing stories related by Mr. Whittier on that occasion. There was the quaint staircase down which the poet, when a baby, wrapped in a blanket, was rolled by his sister only two years older, who probably thought it the greatest kindness in the world to thus project her infant brother into space. There was the queer old cupboard where Mr. Whittier when a boy was dragged by his jacket collar by a tramp who had forcibly entered the house; and there he was compelled to stand while the unwelcome visitor searched high and low for any chance jug or bottle that would yield another supply to his already over-weighted condition. Seizing a jug from a dark corner, he ejected the cork without a glance at the contents, and took a long deep draught of whale oil used for filling lamps. The embryo poet took advantage of the confused spluttering that ensued, to make good his escape. Mr. Will Carleton recited with dramatic vigor "Barbara Frietchie," till the walls and rafters rang. Lucy Larcom read from the poet's writings, and Mr. William Lloyd Garrison, Jr. recited an original poem. A young English lady, who was visiting friends of Mr. Whittier's, read by request Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar," the Poet Laureate's death having just occurred.
There were reminiscences by Dr. Fiske of Newburyport, who told several characteristic stories connected with Joshua Coffin, the "Yankee Schoolmaster," and life-long friend of the poet; and Charles Carleton Coffin, the historian, gave the account of his capture of the big key of the last slave prison in Richmond, and of his giving it to Mr. Whittier who returned it to him a year or so ago. At the close of his remarks, Mr. Carleton hung the key on the nail above the fireplace where, in Whittier's boyhood, the big bull's-eye watch used to hang. Fitting place was it for the silent symbol of agony and shame to the slave brother; and all who witnessed it hanging there, felt the heart beat to a newer and a keener sense of the debt we owe to him whose songs (as one who gave a reminiscence that day told us) influenced Abraham Lincoln to project the Emancipation Proclamation upon the American people. The beautiful poem of Mr. Whittier's, "My Psalm," was rendered with deep feeling by Mrs. Julia Houston West for whom, several years ago, the verses had been set to music. And to bring to a fitting close these memorial exercises, the assembled company of relatives and friends rose and sang one stanza of of "Auld Lang Syne."
