Henrietta Christian Wright

“ We follow the Moors as they rush from their walls in one of their splendid but hopeless sallies, to return discomfited, and hear the wail of the women and old men—"Woe! woe! to Granada, for its strong men shall fall by the sword and its maidens be led into captivity." We watch the Spaniards, tireless in endeavor, building the fortified city of Santa Fé, the city of holy faith, to take the place of the camp destroyed by fire, and which has remained famous as the place where Columbus received from Isabella his commission to sail westward until India was reached. ”

“ Once upon a time there was an old man who had found life so fair a thing that he wished to live forever, and to be forever young. He was born in Spain, and his childhood and youth and early manhood were so happy that when he grew old he was sad and wanted to bring the lost years back. Of course he could not do that; new summers may come and new winters, but the years themselves never come back any more than do the same clouds, or the same sunset, or the same rainbow. ”

“ The description of the great primeval forests, stretching down to the sea; of the villages and farms scattered over the land as unprotected as the nests of the meadow lark; of the sowing and harvesting of the peasant folk, with their fêtes and churchgoing, their weddings and festivals, and the pathetic search of Evangeline for her lost lover Gabriel among the plains of Louisiana, all show Longfellow in his finest mood as a poet whom the sorrows of mankind touched always with reverent pity, as well as a writer of noble verse. ”

“ The riches of this country were beyond description; mountains of turquoises reached to the clouds; the lakes were full of pearls; everywhere were gold and silver mines; the rivers sparkled with gold, and the valleys were rich in diamonds. And everywhere, too, there was an abundance of choice fruits and nuts, and rare spices which grew in the gardens all the year round, so there was no lack of them summer or winter. And the people dressed in the richest stuffs, silk and velvet, and cloth of gold, embroidered with pearls and turquoises and diamonds. ”

“ Like Coleridge in English literature, he had the power of presenting the visions which came to him in sleep or in his waking dreams, surrounded by their own atmosphere of mystery and unreality, thus producing an effect which awed as well as fascinated. No other American writer has ever brought from the dream-world such beautiful creations, which charm and mystify at the same time, and force the most unimaginative reader to believe for the time in the existence of this elusive realm of faery. ”

“ Caxamalca was built near a beautiful river that flowed through the valley below, and its great stone fortresses and lofty temples, its palaces and towers, its beautiful gardens and wide, well-paved streets, and its large public square with its fountains and flowers, all showed Pizarro, on his arrival there, that he had come into a land whose people knew well how to be comfortable in peace as well as to defend themselves in war. He at once marched his soldiers into the great square, where he pitched his tents as if resolved to stay. ”

“ Motley was born in Dorchester, a suburb of Boston, April 15, 1814. As a child he was delicate, a condition which fostered his great natural love for reading. He devoured books of every kind, history, poetry, plays, orations, and particularly the novels of Cooper and Scott. Not satisfied with reading about heroes, he must be a hero himself, and when scarcely eight he bribed a younger brother with sweetmeats to lie quiet, wrapped in a shawl, while he, mounted upon a stool, delivered Mark Antony's oration over the dead body of Cæsar. ”

“ If the brave sailor and his friends really are living there yet, why, we must admit they could not have chosen a lovelier place, for nowhere in the world is a fairer spot than where the Hudson goes down to the sea, passing on its way the misty blue Catskills, rich with stories of fairies and legends of the old Dutch sailors, and the beautiful Highlands, which stand strong and firm, as if protecting the bright river that sweeps around their base. ”

“ But although the life was severe in its simplicity, it was most sweet and wholesome for the children who grew up in the home nest, guarded by the love that was felt rather than expressed, and guided into noble conceptions of the beauty and dignity of living. This home atmosphere impressed itself upon Longfellow unconsciously, as did the poetic influences of nature, and had just as lasting and inspiring an effect upon his character, so that truth, duty, fine courage were always associated with the freshness of spring, the early dawn, the summer sunshine, and the lingering sadness of twilight. ”

“ Then twelve men were sent on ahead to find the shortest path to the shore, and Balboa, cruel as ever, gave orders that all the natives they should meet should be tortured and killed unless they would tell them where their stores of gold were hidden. The twelve men went on, and reaching the shore, saw two Indian canoes that had been washed up on the beach by the waves, and as the tide crept up and floated them off, two of the men—Alonzo Martin and Blaze de Atienza—stepped into them, thus being the first Spaniards to sail upon the new ocean which Balboa had named the South Sea. ”

“ Never any thought of the real world enters this place, whose visitors see but one thing, a vision of the soul as it journeys through life. To Bunyan this seemed but a journey over dangerous roads, through lonely valleys, and over steep mountain sides; to Milton it seemed a war between good and evil; to this little New-England boy it seemed but a vision of duty bravely accomplished, and in this he was true to the instincts of that Puritan race to which he belonged. ”

“ The name of the king was Montezuma, and all his people loved and worshipped him as a god, and when he looked over the city and saw the turrets and spires of the palaces and temples glittering in the sunlight, and the floating gardens, filling the lakes with beauty and fragrance, and the fields rich with harvest, and the green forests, stretching away to the base of the great volcano whose snowy peak shone in the golden light of the sun, he felt that his was, indeed, a great and fair kingdom, beautiful and strong and happy. ”

“ To the Old World, whose beginnings of history were lost in the mists of the past, this vision of the New World, with its beauty of mountains, river, and forest, with its inexhaustible wealth and its races yet living in the primitive conditions of remote antiquity, was indeed a wonder hardly to be believed. ”

“ Imagine these little English boys and girls going to bed in a room where the snow could drift in through the cracks, and where they could hear the wolves howling in the forests. How afraid they must have been, and how they must have snuggled under the covers and covered up their faces.
Imagine going to a little church built of logs and having a flag waving from it, and cannon in front of it to protect it from the Indians. Sometimes the people were called to church by the beating of a drum, and every man carried his musket with him, as no one knew when the Indians might come. ”

“ CHAPTER XI RALPH WALDO EMERSON 1803-1882
Walking the streets of Boston, in the days when old-fashioned gambrel-roofed houses and gardens filled the space now occupied by dingy warehouses, might be seen a serious-eyed boy who, whether at work or at play, seemed always to his companions to live in a world a little different from their own. This was not the dream-world so familiar to childhood, but another which few children enter, and those only who seem destined to be teachers of their race. ”

“ But sometimes, in war, men forget that they are men, and act cruelly and wrongly; and that is what the English did when they drove the Acadians from their homes to wander homeless and poor and sad all over the country.
If you should go to Nova Scotia to-day you would not find the Acadia of that far-off time. The country is English now, and the only memories of Acadia are those that linger in the lonely mountain echoes, in the sad sighing of the pines, in the wild flowers of the meadow, which make you think of the children that once played there ”

“ One may read here the nature of the man who could thus step back into the realm of childhood, appreciate the delicate grace of girlhood, enjoy the robust enthusiasm of young manhood, and pause with reverent sympathy before the afflicted. Behind each character portrayed one feels the healthful, generous throb of a humanity to which no ambition of soul could seem foreign or no defect appeal in vain. Scattered throughout the volumes are many charming verses, to some of which Holmes owes his fame as a poet. ”

“ The king was very kind and condescending and generous, and told them that it would be his greatest pleasure to send over some of his subjects, and make all the Indians Christians. And the two boys, Taignoagny and Domagaia, looked at the silk and velvet robes of the French nobles, and at the diamonds and rubies that glittered in their sword-hilts, and at the king's beautiful palaces, and the marble cathedrals and splendid mansions of Paris, and decided that to be a Christian must be indeed a happy lot, and expressed their willingness to have their whole tribe converted as speedily as possible. ”

“ These poems, collected under the title Poems of the Class of '29, show Holmes in his most charming [pg 246] mood of reminiscence. Through all his poetry shines here and there an intense sympathy with nature, for running side by side with his appreciation of human interests we see ever that deep love of nature which is the mark of the true poet. Trees and flowers, the seasons, the meadows, rivers, clouds, and the enchanting mysteries of twilight touch his heart to sympathetic vibrations, and their beauty enters into and becomes a part of himself. ”

“ And so Cortez conquered Mexico, and all its vast wealth passed into the hands of the Spaniards; its fertile valleys and rich plains, its beautiful capital and prosperous villages, its great mines of gold and silver, its thousands and thousands of inhabitants, all became the property of the King of Spain, a man who cared nothing for the conquered people, but thought only of the great wealth that had so unjustly become his. ”

“ For eight hundred years the Moors held Spain. They built beautiful cities and palaces, the remains of which are marvels to this day; they made the plain of Granada a garden of flowers; they preserved classical literature when the rest of Europe was sunk in ignorance; they studied the sciences, and had great and famous schools, which were attended by the youth of all nations; they rescued the Jewish people from the oppression of the Spaniards, and made them honorable citizens ”

“ Riding across a desert is much like sailing across the sea. There is very little variety. You see the same thing day after day. In sailing, you see the sea and sky, and occasionally a ship's sail; in journeying across a desert you see the sand and sky, sometimes an Arab or two looking wonderingly at the caravan before darting off to their hidden retreats, and more often only the bones of camels and elephants scattered on either side of the route, and dazzling the sight with their white gleam. ”

“ Nature, who appealed so strongly to his heart, had made him a poet, and she took her own way of teaching him the mysteries of his art.
Lowell enjoyed his singularly fortunate and happy boyhood as only one gifted with a poetic mind could. To him New England village life revealed a charm that enabled him in after-days to paint a picture of it as lovingly faithful as one of Shakespeare's scenes. In his charming reminiscence, Cambridge Thirty Years Ago, he has preserved one of the dearest memories of his boyhood. ”

“ The Mexicans of to-day are partly Indians and partly Spanish in race, but there are some who remember with pride that they are the descendants of the ancient Aztecs, and they point to the ruins of the great temples, which may still be seen in the new Capital, as an instance of the wealth and power of their nation when the Aztecs ruled from ocean to gulf, and when from mountain peak to lowest valley every heart beat with pride in thinking of the glory of the kingdom which Montezuma called his own. ”

“ And crystal fountains kept the air pure and fresh, and great birds with gold and silver wings flew lazily from tree to tree, and one could not tell whether the city was more beautiful by day, when the sun shone down upon it and brightened the marble roofs and charming gardens, or by night, when the moon and stars were reflected in the lakes and rivers, and when the fountains glistened white in the moonlight, and the great squares and lofty palaces were illumined with a million crystal lamps. ”

“ In these pages old Diedrich [pg 50] walks as a real person and Irving follows him with faithful step through the region that he loved so fondly all his life.
Everything here is dwelt upon with lingering touch; the brooks and streams, the meadows and cornfields, the orchards and gardens, and the groves of beech and chestnut have each their tribute from the pen of one who found their charms ever fresh, who sought in them rest and happiness, and who came back to them lovingly to spend the last days of his life in their familiar companionship. ”

“ The ships reached Nova Scotia without any mishaps, and Poutrincourt, who was delighted with the country, got permission to settle here, and began the foundation of his new home. He had chosen a delightful spot, and for many years lived there peacefully and happily, cultivating the rich soil, and showing the Indians how to improve their own way of farming. And although Poutrincourt was a loyal Frenchman, still he never looked back regretfully to France, for he found, amid the pleasant meadows and blossoming orchards of Acadia, a greater peace than he had ever known in his old home. ”

“ Season after season, from the Gulf to Canada and back again, these winged creatures of the air wended their way, stopping to hatch and breed their young, becoming acquainted with Louisiana orange-groves and New England apple-orchards, now fluttering with kindly sociability round the dwellings of men and again seeking lonely eeries among inaccessible mountain tops, pursuing their course at all times almost without the thought and cognizance of man. ”

“ Very wonderful stories were told of the countries in the East—of Cathay, and Mangi, and Cipango—which had been visited by the great traveller, Marco Polo, and the man who could find the shortest way thither, would, of all men, receive the highest honor from the King of Spain. And so every one who sailed from Spain looked first toward America and then beyond it to the East. And no wonder, for these countries were richer than Mexico and Peru, more fertile than Florida, and more beautiful than Fairyland itself. ”

“ The famous plain of Granada, adorned with groves and gardens and winding streams, and guarded by the famous Mountains of the Sun and Air, forms the foreground to the picture, while in the distance we see the gloomy mountain passes, the fortified rocks and castles, and the great walled cities, through which the Moors passed, always victorious and never pausing until their banners floated from every cliff and tower. ”

“ One day the son of an Indian chief came to Balboa and told him that some days' journey away there lay a great sea, and on the other side of it a country so rich that the people ate and drank out of gold and silver dishes. The Spaniards in those days were ready to believe anything that the Indians said, and if Balboa had heard that the new sea was full of golden islands, and that the clouds rained diamonds and rubies into its depths, and that its waves threw pearls and corals on its beach, he would almost have believed it all ”

“ From this time Irving's life was one of constant literary labor for many years, all of which were spent abroad. His works on the companions of Columbus, and the Alhambra, were written during his residence in Spain, where he had access to the national archives and where he became as familiar with the life of the people as it was possible for a stranger to become. He was at home both in the dignified circles of higher life and among the picturesque and simple peasantry, whose characteristics he draws with such loving grace. ”

“ Pontiac had hated the English ever since he could remember, not because they were of a different race and strangers, for the French were of a different race and strangers too, but because, in all their dealings with the Indians, the English had always been cruel, treacherous, and ready to take advantage, while the French had always been kind, trustworthy, and ready to be the red man's friend. And as the boy grew into manhood the hatred still continued, for the English still continued to steal the Indians' land and oppress them by unjust laws ”

“ When he was born the United States consisted of a strip of land lying between the [pg 79] Atlantic and the Alleghany Mountains, of which more than half was unbroken wilderness. At his death the Republic extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from the Gulf to Canada. His life-time corresponded with the growth of his country, and his own work was a noble contribution to the nation's prosperity. In all times of national trouble the Evening Post championed the cause of justice, and Bryant was everywhere respected as a man devoted above all to the "cause of America and of human nature." ”

“ One by one the faithful soldiers knelt by his bed, and weeping, bade him farewell. He asked them to live as brothers, loving and helping one another, and urged them to convert the natives to the Christian religion. And so the brave soldier died, far from home and that sunny Spain which he loved so well, and the whole army wept for him, for they loved him, and grieved to think that they should see him no more.
It was thought best not to let the Indians know of De Soto's death, as they might attack the Spaniards at once if they knew their great leader was gone. ”

“ All around the rocky, frozen shores break the white waves of the Northern Ocean, and in the summer one may see the great icebergs sailing past, and hear the voices of the birds that have come northward for a little visit.
In the winter the days are so short and the cold is so intense that the children are almost shut off from out-door life, and are glad to take up with in-door games and plays. But they are very happy in spite of this, for they are a healthy, sturdy race, and like the ice and cold and snow. ”