Whittier-land Part 7

Some stories ill.u.s.trating his keen sense of humor, and specimens of verse written in rollicking vein for special occasions, which might not properly find place in a serious attempt at biography, I have thought might be allowed in such an informal work as this. Few of the lines I shall here give have ever appeared in any of his collected works, and some of them were never before in print. I am sure I do no wrong to his memory in thus bringing out a phase of his character which could not be fully treated in biography.

I never heard him laugh aloud, but a merrier face and an eye that twinkled with livelier glee when thoroughly amused are not often seen.

He would double up with mirth without uttering a sound,--his chuckle being visible instead of audible,--but this peculiar expression of jollity was irresistibly infectious. The faculty of seeing the humorous side of things he considered a blessing to be coveted, and he had a special pity for that cla.s.s of philanthropists who cannot find a laugh in the midst of the miseries they would alleviate. A laugh rested him, and any teller of good stories, any writer of lively adventures, received a hearty greeting from him. He told d.i.c.kens that his "Pickwick Papers" had for years been his remedy for insomnia, and Sam Weller had helped him to many an hour of rested nerves. He loved and admired Longfellow and Lowell, and they were his most cherished friends, but the lively wit of Holmes had a special charm for him, and jolly times they had whenever they met. The witty talk and merry letters of Gail Hamilton, full as they were of a mad revelry of nonsense, were a great delight to him. It was not in praise of but in pity for Charles Sumner that he wrote:--

"No sense of humor dropped its oil On the hard ways his purpose went; Small play of fancy lightened toil; He spake alone the thing he meant."

As an ill.u.s.tration of his own way of speaking the thing he did _not_ mean, just for fun, take the following: More than thirty years ago, a Division of the Sons of Temperance was organized in Amesbury, and his niece, one of his household, joined it. Her turn came to edit a paper for the Division, and she asked her uncle to contribute something. He had often complained in a laughing way in regard to the late hours of the club, and had threatened to lock her out. This accounts for the tone of the following remarkable contribution to temperance literature from one of the oldest friends of the cause:--

THE DIVISION

"Dogs take it! Still the girls are out,"

Said Muggins, bedward groping, "'T is twelve o'clock, or thereabout, And all the doors are open!

I'll lock the doors another night, And give to none admission; Better to be abed and tight Than sober at Division!"

Next night at ten o'clock, or more Or less, by Muggins's guessing, He went to bolt the outside door, And lo! the key was missing.

He muttered, scratched his head, and quick He came to this decision: "Here 's something new in 'rithmetic, Subtraction by Division!

"And then," said he, "it puzzles me, I cannot get the right on 't, Why temperance talk and whiskey spree Alike should make a night on 't.

D 'ye give it up?" In Muggins's voice Was something like derision-- "It 's just because between the boys And girls there 's no Division!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: BEARCAMP HOUSE, WEST OSSIPEE, N. H.]

Whittier's favorite way of enjoying his annual vacation among the mountains was to go with a party of his relatives and neighbors, and take possession of a little inn at West Ossipee, known as the "Bearcamp House." Sturtevant's, at Centre Harbor, was another of his resorts. At these places his party filled nearly every room. It was made up largely of young people, full of frolic and love of adventure. The aged poet could not climb with them to the tops of the mountains; but he watched their going and coming with lively interest, and of an evening listened to their reports and laughed over the effervescence of their enthusiasm. Two young farmers of West Ossipee, brothers named Knox, acted as guides to Chocorua. They had some success as bear hunters, and supplied the inn with bear steaks. One day in September, 1876, the Knox brothers took a party of seven of Whittier's friends to the top of Chocorua, where they camped for the night among the traps that had been set for the bears. They heard the growling of the bears in the night, so the young ladies reported, with other blood-curdling incidents. Soon after the Knox brothers gave a husking at their barn,[7] and the whole Bearcamp party was invited. Whittier wrote a poem for the occasion, and induced Lucy Larcom to read it for him as from an unknown author, although he sat among the huskers. It was ent.i.tled:--

HOW THEY CLIMBED CHOCORUA

Unto gallant deeds belong Poet's rhyme and singer's song; Nor for lack of pen or tongue Should their praises be unsung, Who climbed Chocorua!

O full long shall they remember That wild nightfall of September, When aweary of their tramp They set up their canvas camp In the hemlocks of Chocorua.

There the mountain winds were howling, There the mountain bears were prowling, And through rain showers falling drizzly Glared upon them, grim and grisly, The ghost of old Chocorua!

On the rocks with night mist wetted, Keen his scalping knife he whetted, For the ruddy firelight dancing On the brown locks of Miss Lansing, Tempted old Chocorua.

But he swore--(if ghosts can swear)-- "No, I cannot lift the hair Of that pale face, tall and fair, And for _her_ sake, I will spare The sleepers on Chocorua."

Up they rose at blush of dawning, Off they marched in gray of morning, Following where the brothers Knox Went like wild goats up the rocks Of vast Chocorua.

Where the mountain shadow bald fell, Merry faced went Addie Caldwell; And Miss Ford, as gay of manner, As if thrumming her piano, Sang along Chocorua.

Light of foot, of kirtle scant, Tripped brave Miss Sturtevant; While as free as Sherman's b.u.mmer, In the rations foraged Plummer, On thy slope, Chocorua!

Panting, straining up the rock ridge, How they followed Tip and Stockbridge, Till at last, all sore with bruises, Up they stood like the nine Muses, On thy crown, Chocorua!

At their shout, so wild and rousing, Every dun deer stopped his browsing, And the black bear's small eyes glistened, As with watery mouth he listened To the climbers on Chocorua.

All the heavens were close above them, But below were friends who loved them,-- And at thought of Bearcamp's worry, Down they clambered in a hurry,-- Scurry down Chocorua.

Sore we miss the steaks and bear roast-- But withal for friends we care most;-- Give the brothers Knox three cheers, Who to bring us back our _dears_, Left bears on old Chocorua!

[Ill.u.s.tration: GROUP AT STURTEVANT'S, CENTRE HARBOR

Gertrude Cartland at Whittier's left, Mrs. Wade and Joseph Cartland at his right. Mrs. Caldwell, wife of Whittier's nephew, at his left shoulder.]

The next day after the husking, Lucy Larcom and some others of the party prepared a burlesque literary exercise for the evening at the inn. She wrote a frolicsome poem, and others devised telegrams, etc., all of which were to surprise Whittier, who was to know nothing of the affair until it came off. When the evening came, the venerable poet took his usual place next the tongs, and the rest of the party formed a semicircle around the great fireplace. On such occasions Whittier always insisted on taking charge of the fire, as he did in his own home. He even took upon himself the duty of filling the wood-box. No one in his presence dared to touch the tongs. By and by telegrams began to be brought in by the landlord from ridiculous people in ridiculous situations. Some purported to come from an old poet who had the misfortune to be caught by his coat-tails in one of the Knox bear-traps on Chocorua. It was suggested that he might be the author of the poem read at the husking. Lucy Larcom, who, by the way, was another of the writers popularly supposed to be very serious minded, but who really was known among her friends as full of fun, read a poem addressed to the man in the bear-trap, ent.i.tled:--

TO THE UNKNOWN AND ABSENT AUTHOR OF "HOW THEY CLIMBED CHOCORUA"

O man in the trap, O thou poet-man!

What on airth are you doin'?-- We haste to the husking as fast as we can, --But where 's Mr. Bruin?

We listen, we wait for his sweet howl in vain, Like the far storm resounding.

Brothers Knox ne'er will see Mr. Bruin again, Through the dim moonlight bounding.

For, thou man in the trap, O thou poet-y-man, Scared to flight by thy singing, Away through the mountainous forest he ran, Like a hurricane winging.

Aye, the bear fled away, and his traps left behind, For the use of the poet; If an echo unearthly is borne on the wind-- 'T is the man's--you may know it

By its tones of dismay, melancholy and loss, O'er his coat-tails' sad ruin; There 's a moan in the pine, and a howl o'er the moss-- But it 's he--'t is n't Bruin!

And the fire you see on the cliff in the air[8]

Is his eye-b.a.l.l.s a-glarin'!

And the form that you call old Chocorua there Is the poet up-rarin'!

And whenever the trees on the mountain-tops thrill And the fierce winds they blow 'em, In most awful pause every bear shall stand still-- He 's writing a poem!

Whittier evidently enjoyed the fun, and after the rest had had their say, he remarked, "That old fellow in the bear-trap must be _in extremis_. He ought to make his will. Suppose we help him out!" He asked one of us to get pencil and paper and jot down the items of the will, each to make suggestions. It ended, of course, in his making the whole will himself, and doing it in verse. It is perhaps the only poem of his which he never wrote with his own hand. It came as rapidly as the scribe could take it. Every one at that fireside was remembered in this queer will--even the "boots" of the inn, the stage-driver, and others who were looking upon the sport from the doorway.

THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF THE MAN IN THE BEAR-TRAP

Here I am at last a goner, Held in hungry jaws like Jonah; What the trap has left of me Eaten by the bears will be.

So I make, on duty bent, My last will and testament, Giving to my Bearcamp friends All my traps and odds and ends.

First, on Mr. Whittier, That old bedstead I confer, Whereupon, to vex his life, Adam dreamed himself a wife.

I give Miss Ford the copyright Of these verses I indite, To be sung, when I am gone, To the tune the cow died on.

On Miss Lansing I bestow Tall Diana's hunting bow; Where it is I cannot tell-- But if found 't will suit her well.

I bequeath to Mary Bailey Yarn to knit a stocking daily.[9]

To Lizzie Pickard from my hat A ribbon for her yellow cat.

And I give to Mr. Pickard That old tallow dip that flickered, Flowed and sputtered more or less Over Franklin's printing press.

I give Belle Hume a wing Of the bird that wouldn't sing;[10]

To Jettie for her dancing nights Slippers dropped from Northern Lights.

And I give my very best Beaver stove-pipe to Celeste-- Solely for her husband's wear, On the day they're made a pair.

If a tear for me is shed, And Miss Larcom's eyes are red-- Give her for her prompt relief My last pocket-handkerchief![11]

My cottage at the Shoals I give To all who at the Bearcamp live-- Provided that a steamer plays Down that river in dog-days-- Linking daily heated highlands With the cool sea-scented islands-- With Tip her engineer, her skipper Peter Hines, the old stage-whipper.[12]

To Addie Caldwell, who has mended My torn coat, and trousers rended, I bequeath, in lack of payment, All that 's left me of my raiment.