122. Who was the author of “Curfew must not Ring To-night”?
This exquisite poem was written in April, 1867, by Miss Rosa Hartwick, now Mrs. Edward C. Thorpe. She resides at Litchfield, Michigan. She was in her seventeenth year when she wrote the poem. She has written others, but none so fine or so famous as this. It is founded on an incident in English history. Basil Underwood was a young man in the time of the Protectorate, and his only crime seems to have been unswerving loyalty to the king. The maiden pleaded in vain for a reprieve from the judges. They would not delay the execution even until Cromwell should arrive. After her fruitless appeal to the judges, she returns to the old sexton, and it is at this point that the poem takes up the story.
123. Who was “Mother Goose”?
“Mother Goose,” from whom the popular nursery rhymes were named, was not an imaginary personage. She belonged to a wealthy family in Boston, Mass., where she was born and resided for many years. Her eldest daughter, Elizabeth Goose, was married to a printer named Fleet, and when a son was born to them, the grandmother spent all her time nursing him and singing the songs and ditties she had heard in her younger days. This greatly annoyed her son-in-law, who vainly tried in every way to make her desist. He then conceived and carried out the idea of collecting these ditties and publishing them in book form, giving the edition the title of “Songs for the Nursery; or, Mother Goose’s Melodies for Children.” The adoption of this title was originally in derision of his mother-in-law; but it became so well known and liked, that now there are few boys or girls who do not revel in the delights of the old lady’s melodies and rhymes.
124. What king said “I am the state”?
This was the famous saying of Louis XIV. (1638–1715), king of France, and it expresses the principle to which everything was accommodated. In the zenith of his career all Europe feared him; and his own nation had been brought by tyranny, skilful management, and military glory to regard him with Asiatic humility. Under his absolute sway all remnants of political independence were swept away. Even the courts of justice yielded to the absolute sway of the monarch, who interfered at pleasure with the ordinary course of law.
125. What was the origin of the word “Mississippi”?
“Its original spelling,” says the “Magazine of American History,” “and the nearest approach to the Algonquin word, ‘the father of waters,’ is Meche Sepe, a spelling still commonly used by the Louisiana Creoles. Tonti suggested Miche Sepe, which is somewhat nearer the present spelling. Father Laval still further modernized it into Michispi, which another father, Labatt, softened into Misisipi. The only changes since have been to overload the word with consonants. Marquette added the first and some other explorer the second s, making it Mississipi, and so it remains in France to this day, with only one p. The man who added the other has never been discovered, but he must have been an American, for at the time of the Louisiana purchase the name was generally spelled in the colony with a single p.”
126. What was the “O Grab Me Act”?
The Embargo Act passed by Congress, Dec. 21, 1807. By its provisions all American vessels were detained in the ports of the United States. The object was, by cutting off commercial intercourse with France and Great Britain, to compel them to recognize the rights of American neutrality. The act was the subject of much ridicule. The opponents of the measure, spelling the word backward, called it the “O Grab Me Act”. The measure was of little avail; and after fourteen months it was repealed.