Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1873-07-12
INCOMES OF TIE INhSTAND.

years will cover the time in which
writer's have had any hope of subsisting
by their pen and also that the authors
in this country who have made any
money worth speaking of are distin
guished by their paucity. Those who
are most eminent, and unqucstionably
the best, have earned the least.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, universally
acknowledged to be the most original,
if not the profoundcst, thinker in
America or on the globc-ono of the in
tcllcctual kings of the country-has not
made, directly, by his books (and he
has been studying and toiling ceasclcss-
ly for seventy years., Mt the most
liberal estimate, over $4,000. If he
had worked one-fifth as hard and
zcalously ut almost anything else, he
would be in far better circumstances to-
day.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, one of the finest
admired and loved wherever our Ian
guage is read-and where is it not p
was poor all his life; would have come
to positive want, had nothing save his
peerless books stood between him and
his daily needs. He deemed himself
fortunate when such creation as the
House of the Seven Cables" or the
"Scarlet Letter." or the Marble
Faun," yielded him 1000 or $3, 600.
He gave the thought, the suffering, the
experience, the culture of many years to
each of his works, and behold his none
tary reward! A single commercial
transaction would have carried more
dollars to his purse.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is in
dependent in circumstances, for his
poems are extremely popular on both
sides of the sea. But he owes more to
careful management of his affairs than
to his muse, who has never brought to
his cxchequer much beyond $50, 200.
English tongue, a strong and lofty
singer, second to none as Il brilliant
essayist, is indebted to other sources
than his genius for the comfortable in
come he enjoys. He is aware literature
keeps devotees on crusts, therefore he
has long spaces in his wooing, and
munches pate dc toic gros instead.
William Cullen Bryant is often placed
at the head of American barls, but his
inspiration costs him unwcaried pains,
and Fortune has been too kind to de-
mand sacrifice of time and peace to the
tuneful Nine. His wealth comes from a
prosaic source, the Ercniny Post, of
which he is one of the principal own
ers. There are no hcxamctcrs in the
Post, no Homcric SMILES, no idyllic
pictures but its dividends are under
stood to be regular and emincntly salts
factory.
Oliver Wendell Holmes is Il clever
poet, 4 delicate humorist, Il charming
philosopher and the poetry and humor
and philosophy of his literary career lie
in the fact that he need not look for
bread in his ink-stand. Poverty may be
the nurse of genius but she is dry
nurse ut best
John q. Whittier, lover of freedom
and nature, expresses his ideals in the
sweetest of verse, and pays for his ac-
complisllmcnt in surroundings modest
as his dcmcanor. 1t is well for II poet
to be alone in the world, for poetry is IL
wrctched provider for othcrs-oftcn for
ones self. Bards are presumed to be
the favored of the gods, but the gods
neglect them sadly. Whittier has stirred
thousands but the thousands he has
stirred from the pockets of his publish
crs are precious few.
William d. Howclls, though one of
our daintiest and most graceful writer's,
does not seek to live by his pen alone.
He has SIS, 600 as editor of the 1Uantic,
and, as he does not abide in New York,
the meager sum preserves him from
starvation.
George William Curtis, the Henry
Mackenzie of the republic, is one of the
most elegant scholars and writer's of the
day. If he trusted to fugitive literature,
however, he would doubtless find him.
self in arrears.
Bayard Taylor has been luckier than
most authors; but, after travelling all
over the world, and speaking score of
tongues, he has found his best invest
mcnt at the corner of Nassauand Spruce
streets, and the plain English of T'ib-
INC dividends the most forciblc and
agreeable of languages.
DIR. Holland, neither above nor below
the average appreciation, and, there
fore, popular, is very comfortable in
worldly goods. But he has not filed
his Golfers by Bitter Sweets" or
Kathrinas," or Ebay Paths" He
first clinkcd his coin while he was part
owner of the Springfield (Mass.) Re
publican. He has large interest in
Scri6ner's Monthy, and $4,000 salary
us Superintendent of Public Schools
Consequently his ducats come from
business, and his deniers from his bu-
COLES.
Thomas Wentworth Hippinson. n