The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1869-05-27
The Story Of a Song,

Hoo Lucy LQrc0D1 acdS accused 81 Stedtan
Her Oaoaa Poem.
The following history of the chilling
welcome first accorded to a poem who's
: quaint and homely beauty has since en-
deared it to every heart is copied from
late number of the Boston EUsning Trims
i : POEMS like their authors, are some
.Rtimes the footballs of fortune. Here is
case in point - t'Ha "oa stA
g Hannah Binding Shoes was writer
some fifteen or more years since It's ail
thor had just returned to her native town
Beverly, Massachusetts,, from long so
journ on the lprairies of Illinois, and was
1-strongly reimpressed with the picturesque
| brokenness ofthe sea coast, familiar to hel
tearly years, in contrast with the level re
gions just left behind. 9r4r.
l. Riding with her sister and otherfriends
one summer afternoon through Marble
| head and Swampscott, a face at a window
in a lonely house arrested her attention
and haunted her fforweeks, linkingit.
self, meanwhile, with the irregular line
which forms the refrain of Hannah Bind
ing Shoes. The metre and the face were
continually chasing each other through
her head. To get rid of them, she one day
sat down and imprisoned them together
in the song which bears the above title.
{" She set no great value upon her work
after it was done; but she was just then
looking about for some way of earning
money, and friends suggested that people
were sometimes paid for writing verses no
better than hers. Having no one to con-
suit, she sent the song to the first paper
that fell in her way,--a weekly Flag of
some kind, then published in Boston,
signifying her wish to be, paid, if it were
accepted. In day or two 1t was politely
returned, with the answer Rather quaint,
but we do not pay for anything but
prose. ~PA gsr p vr w
/" An old number of the IlRnickerbocaer
Magazsne Glanced to be lying near. why
not send itthere? she asked herself land
lat once wrote to the editor, of that maya
zine, inclosing the song, signed with a
nom de plume and preferring the request
which she had before made to the Boston
editor. $3.50 fitu fadl sa.9f5a.g r +.
"Thc uail was closely watched for weeks,
but noanswer came, and she supposed that
her letters andYerses iwefellost amid the
rubbish of the Dead Letter Office. Con
Guiding that the fates were against her,
she made no furthur pen7and ink ventures,
and soon after took a situation as teacher
in a boarding school for young girls. Here
she had been some three or four years,
when the publication of the New York
Crayons awakened in her an aim to do
something that would come up to its artis-
tic. standard. IN leisure moments she fire.
quently wrote verses which were sent to
that periodical, and were always received
by It's, gentlemanly editors with the kind
asst appreciation. r9Yo 9u9Gtu5-9TQ adt
+" Looking over her papers, one day, a
copysot Hannah Binding Shoes met her
eye. Would not that do to send tothe
Crayon At al events, the editors
could decline it, if they chose 1t was re-
vised and offered, and appeared in the
next months issue fa4Ea4 s4t III see
But she was soon after startled By let
tiers from different friends, asking, What
does this mean ?oand inclosing slip
from the New York Tribune In which the
editor of the K5sscker6ocksr publicly de.
nounced Lucy sLarcom as a literary
theifess, saying. that Hannah Binding
OuOcS udu UCcu pIluGCu Ill ILdG LldSd-
zine some years before, ,,o~
"This was her, first intimation, that her
verses had ever reached their early desti-
nation. The above uncourteous appella-
ton was her only acknowledgment of
their reception, Such appellations cling,
however, and nothing remained but to
request the Tribune to make the matter
right by a brief explanation, which would
naturally sh1ftthennpieasant epithet, from
author to editor.
This was done, and attention being
thus called to the, poem, it was widely
copied from the revised version of the
Oragona About this time it was also prin-
ted in Folk-Songs, from an autograph
requested of the author by Doctor
80 Theecopy of this song,in the, GALAXY
Aczusrtiser for May of the preseut year lis
from the III, perfect first draft sent to the
Knickef6ockst, neAer seen orqcorrected by
the author. It contains many weak, school
glrlish lines, which careful proofreading
would not have allowed to pass inio print.
It was probably never copied at all until
it appeared in the Cr0yon and in Folks
Songs, where it stands. with the excep-
ton Of a word or two, as it does in the re-
centlY-published volume of Miss Larcom's
Poems. n s. 6HMh nnA eaBEFe.
81 Why Z Hannah Binding Shoes be-
came so general a favorite was always a
mystery to its author,who is known not to
be overload of hearing it praised. But
it needs only glance to see which is the
song and which the Imperfect sketch.
L q. : ! z u 80
accomplishing oblivion the. latter, should
be dragged to light as the true copy Of a
familiar poem 1T WA AnGR asI
General Jackson's Use Of Cotton Bales
agl5a A Contribution to His .ory..4 ! I. s.; +
Our venerable fellow-citizen, Chas