Mr. Whittier presented photographs of himself with his autograph to his school-mates, promised to think over the sitting for an oil portrait, and entered with zest into any bit of mirthfulness that sparkled out during the evening, although, as will be seen from the following description of a representative of the Boston Advertiser, he could scarcely understand the situation:—
"In the company was one man who seemed neither to accept nor to comprehend the situation. That man was John G. Whittier. His face and demeanor that day would have afforded study for a psychologist. That it was fifty-seven years since he entered Haverhill Academy he remembered with a certain sweet melancholy. That everybody was vying with everybody else in making love to him he could not help observing. But what it was all about, and why people should persist in talking of him when he wanted other, more congenial topics to be uppermost—these questions evidently puzzled him. A countenance on which was a look of shyness, of surprise, of perplexity; withal, a countenance irradiated by reciprocal affection and pleasure in seeing others pleased—if any one of the present artists could have caught and delineated those features, the painter would have been destined to share the immortality of the poet. On such a subject the temptation to indulge in reminiscence is strong. But space will permit me to mention only two or three characteristic incidents. A gifted vocalist had just sung a composition prepared for that day; and Mr. Whittier, turning to her, said, 'Friend, I wish that I could write a song for thee to sing.' An elocutionist of note read aloud one of the author's poems. He listened eagerly, as if it was wholly new to him; and a little mist gathered in those deep, dreamy eyes at the lines beginning,
'I mourn no more my vanished years,'
but there was an answering gleam at the words,
'The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun.'"Two circumstances made that one of the few red-letter days in the memory of the present writer. I had known in Kansas a lady who belonged to that band of Haverhill Academy pupils whose boast and joy it was to have studied and played with the Quaker poet. On mentioning this lady's name, I found myself instantly accepted as her proxy. For some minutes Mr. Whittier seemed to have no other interest than to learn all possible particulars of her and send to her all possible expressions of regard.
"The other circumstance was the result of my connection with the Advertiser. Taking me into one corner of the room, he asked me to sit beside him on the sofa. Then, drawing from his pocket the manuscript of the poem which he had written for that occasion and on portions of which the ink was not yet dry, the author, in a manner irresistibly winning, seemed to take his humble brother of the pen-craft into confidence, explaining the motive for various lines and passing on to speak of those boyhood days which the poem and the occasion recalled."
December 17 again came round in 1886, and found Whittier receiving friends, presents, and congratulatory telegrams at Oak Knoll. Wendell Phillips, for example, sent him a handsome cane, and some one else sent a great frosted cake and a basket that strained its sides to hold the gift of fruit it contained.
In December, 1887, it occurred to a young lady journalist on the staff of the Boston Advertiser (Miss Minna C. Smith) that it would be a good idea to have a "Whittier number" of that journal. The thought was a fertile one and was put into execution in great haste, but with eminent success. Poems were contributed by Walt Whitman, Dr. Holmes, James Jeffrey Roche, Hezekiah Butterworth, Herbert D. Ward, Minot J. Savage, Margaret Sidney (Mrs. D. Lothrop), Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, and others, and there was a great array of letters from other writers and eminent persons. Edward Everett Hale told the story of Whittier's Kansas "Emigrants' Song," how it was sung en route and in the West by brave pioneers of New England. James Parton, of Newburyport, Whittier's Amesbury neighbor, wrote that Whittier was carrying his burthen of eighty years "with considerable ease and constant cheerfulness." He continued:—
"I am sometimes asked, 'Is the poet Whittier really a Quaker or only one by inheritance?' He is really a Quaker. He wears, it is true, a silk hat of the kind familiarly called the stove-pipe, which gleams in the brilliant sun of winter, and seems to indicate at once the man of Boston and the man of the world. But it is not the broad-brimmed hat that makes the Quaker. The poet does actually keep a Quaker coat for Sundays and other dress occasions, which coat was made by a firm of Orthodox Friends in Philadelphia, the metropolitan city of the gentle sect. He also uses the thee and thou in conversation, although without attaching the least importance to these trifles. But he is also a Friend from heartfelt conviction. A few miles from his home is one of the smallest meeting-houses in New England, standing alone in a land of farms and fields. It is painted white, and looks a little like a small school-house. This edifice will seat perhaps forty persons, but the usual congregation numbers about fourteen, who on winter Sundays dwindle often to seven and sometimes to three. This is the meeting-house which the poet Whittier attends whenever he is at home, unless prevented by the weather.
"What an extraordinary thing is this! The poet who has most deeply felt and most beautifully expressed the sentiment and soul of New England is a member of the sect to which New England was so intolerant and so cruel! When the essential New England has ceased to exist, it will live again, and live long, in Whittier's poems; and he a Quaker! Was there ever before a revenge so complete and so sublime?"
Mr. Charles M. Thompson sent for this octogenarian birthday a fine poetical stanza:—
"A thousand stars swim on through time,
Unknown and unregarded in the skies.
But one, kings followed; one, thy rhyme,
Led on a land of kings in liberty's emprise!"
Mr. James H. Carleton knew Whittier in connection with a circle of intellectual and social people that centred around the family of Judge Pitman in the years just preceding the rise of the abolition movement. "The Pitmans were neighbors of mine," said Mr. Carleton, "and I (I hardly know why) was admitted to the meetings of the people who gathered there. They were the leaders in everything that was progressive. They have since become widely scattered.
"I remember Mr. Whittier as a leader of these leaders. These people formed to a large extent his social world at that time. It was the one place at which Mr. Whittier threw off his natural reserve and took his proper place. He was a good conversationalist on occasion, and when he spoke he was worth listening to. I remember him as intensely interested in whatever subject occupied the attention of the circle. He was never the first to begin a discussion, but rather bided his time for an especial opportunity."
Mr. George C. How wrote of Mr. Whittier's friendliness, his cordiality, and his unassuming manner: "In the few delightful days I spent in his company in the White Mountain region, I saw no signs of formality or reserve. He told me, under the trees, many stories of his life and of his earliest successes. He impresses you strongly as a true and generous friend to everything and every man he believes good and honest. He does not like to be lionized, and refused to be introduced to a man whose only claim to his friendship was that he had read all his works. When, however, Mr. Whittier learned that this same man was an ardent admirer of the poet Hayne, a chord of sympathy was struck that made them firm friends during this stranger's stay."