In this same Phi Beta Kappa poem may be found that beautiful pastoral, The Cambridge Churchyard, and
Since the lyric dress
Relieves the statelier with its sprightliness,
the stirring verses on Old Ironsides are here repeated. Said one who heard young Holmes deliver this poem in the college church:
"Extremely youthful in his appearance, bubbling over with the mingled humor and pathos that have always marked his poetry, and sparkling with the coruscations of his peculiar genius, he delivered the poem with a clear, ringing enunciation which imparted to the hearers his own enjoyment of his thoughts and expressions."
CHAPTER VI.
CHANGE IN THE HOME.
IN 1836, Oliver Wendell Holmes took his degree of M.D. The following year was made sadly memorable to the happy family at the parsonage by the death of the beloved father. He had reached his threescore years and ten, but still seemed so vigorous in mind and body that neither his family nor the parish were prepared for the sad event. Mary and Ann, the two eldest daughters, were already married; the one to Usher Parson, M.D., the other to Honorable Charles Wentworth Upham. Sarah, the youngest, had died in early childhood, and only Oliver Wendell and his brother John remained of the once large family at the parsonage. Mrs. Holmes still continued to reside with her two sons in the old gambrel-roofed house which her father, Judge Oliver Wendell, had bought for her at the time of her marriage.
The Poet at the Breakfast-Table thus describes the delightful old dwelling now used as one of the College buildings: