New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1880-07-25
THE RECORD OF FIFTY YEARS
"REMINISCENCES OF A JOURNALIST.
BY CHARLES t. CoNGDON.
XXXIlI.
A GOSSIP OF WRITING.

A GOSSlP VI WklllNG
fHE BEGINNINGS OF AMERICAN LIrBRATURE-TIIE
AUTHOR OF "oLD GRIMES" Mr.. KETTELLs
"sprcIMENs THE ASPIRATIONS OF BoYHooD
Mr. \. p. wILIIs-EARLY AMERICAN BOOK
MANUFACTURED STORY WITH MORAL
There are people whom one has just seen
tantum Virgiiiun Cidi--and who glance athwart
the memory in no very imposing way zen
into kind of dream, as ! took my pen IN my
hand for this paper, and | could not neip
thinking of those who were the foremost iigh's
of American literature so many years ago;
Does the reader remember what O NUMBER OF
poets we had in those times NOBODY neeu
be afraid that intend TO make out aiIecl1Iiyi
catalogue raisOnRe of them. for that would DC
too bad altogether. II is depressing TO CONSIDER
how they came zip, and twttered and cblrped as
confidently as the city spai10ws VINO spon our
supplementary daylight slumbers. saw some
of these characters in my morning days ; but,
upon my word, am quite ashamed to intro
fuce them to the present company. Possibly
they were as original and clever, as harmonious
ami inspired as many whom we now take
apprOvngly to our hearts but rear tnat tney
would seem dreadfully old-fashioned to the
dcvotees of our modern magazine Tyres. rms
will say for them, that they were sadiy mlsiea
by superiority of appreciation We were
then so willing to be pleased: Wenever mlndea
that it was. all a faint echo of this English
poet or the Other-of Pope OF C0wper or OF
Byron. Long before we were rid OF the
encumbrance of his Majesty George the Third,
our bards began to verslty. say frankly that AL
before the beginning of the nineteenth century
seems TO be nearly worthless. But for two
or three Names ii was worthless afterwards.
ought to know, because among the fOlDles WIN
which have sought TO divert the tedlum or he
has been that of making collection or
American poets. Upon my shelves to-day,
there is q disheartening lot OF literary lumber
which anybody may take down and carry on
without protest from my self. 1t Is an at .he
service of the paper maker who thDks tnat IL
is worth carriage. There was nothing IN the
least original in this notion OF mine OF picking
up metrical nobodes. Another gentleman with
Oh equally soft heart had done II before me- us
was Mr.. Albert g. Green, an amlable man or
letters in Providence, Rhode Island, who
swooped in an enormous amount OF the same
sort of trash, including "a thin volume OF THINNER
poems which | was enough To PRINT III my
infancy. Pray what should man write rem
iniscences for, unless it be to confess his sins
and juvenile lyrical iniauiiies Let the reader
make note that, thanks to benevolent destiny,
which has taken better care OF me than
] have taken of myself this vOl ume OF mine
is among the very scarcest books IN the Engilsn
language. My excellent friend, Nj. Phyle, has
copy, which have put him upon oath not TO sell
unless he sells it to me, when most assufediy
it will be destroyed by fire, or by fragmentary
disintegratOn.
AS we are gossiping IN this number without
much restraint and with rather liberal cuTTente-
calamO sity-this phrase belongs to Mr.. n. T.
Willis, OF whom shall have something to say
presenly-thero can be no harm IN speaking OF
Mr. Albert 6. Green aforementioned; what
did he do 7 l hear the til-intormed reader
asking That question, which at once answer
tIiumphantly. He wrote Old Grimes that
little felicity of a poem which got grip upon
the memories of generation Children reclted
of the good old man and how be wore not
rights and let's for shoes, but changed his
every day. School boys acclaimed the piece,
and waved their bands IL front OF their Waist
coats when they announced that his coat was
"ail buttoned down before" There was moth
ing specially original in this small epic (; but
somehow it had an immense success. nat
kind of verse was devised long before AT the
French Court and was copied by Goldsmith In
his Elegy on the Death of Madame Blaise, and
that other little piece ending with =" the DOG 1t
was that died" | had the pleasure oil meeting
Mr. Green occasionally and this later pleasure
of remembering him as pleasant talker ana
most amiable man. Can anybody tell me why
such clever persons as he was do not get on
They throw out fine thing or two, and then
they subside into silence. have struggled
through all this series against the temptation OF
Duttng people into them VINO were never near
of at ali. | know nothing like the fine genius
which writes no books, which challenges no
observation, which cares not 1mthlng TOT
fame but which still goes on dreaming much
and doing nothing, taking Gown the LONGS anu
putting them back in a listless way, ana while
fame is within its grasp not caring to gasp
it, The verdict of the w0rl is lalness," put
the world knows nothing of that other verdict
taste OF delightful thought passes upon itself.
Doubtless Mr. Green might have written a
long poem or fifty short ones, only he did not
please to do 1t. To inquire INTO bis reasons or
those of any man who sees NJ 10 keep nIniseIl
to himself, m ght be something like impertinence.
Sometimes | have great mind to write a
book about the nObOdies only this passion Tor
writing books which could not possibly hnd a
publisher, ought to be kept well under ihere
was no end of nObOdies, | recOllect, In tDe
catalogue of Mr.. Green's library when 1t came
TO the hammer. 1t seems to have been kind
of American Founding Hospital OF Wit. But
forty or fifty years ago, Mr. ketteil had GOT
together three thick volumes of Specimens.
This editor was understood to be a most
fastidious person. In my own time, he was
still managing The Boston Courier, and as L
did not happen to agree with him III pOnUlcs, ne
was accustomed to comment rather saVageiy
unon nv own newspaper productions. | might
have retorted most unanswerably by pointing
to his own compilation Ill three volumes, ana
by reminding him that poor w lIiam d, .,
Smelling had dubbed him Ounce keteiI in
that satire called Truth New Years Gift
for Scribblers." which made some NOISE Ill us
time. Smelling fell atOu OF everybody, anu
everybody of whom he fell afonl is by tins time
fOrcotten-Mellen and Mcclellan, Dawes ana
Smith, Jones and Thompson. And so, for that
matter. is poor MI. Smelling, who could take care
of everything except his own affairs, ana OF
all mankind except himself. He was an excellent
specimen of the literary workman VINO mas
brains and hand, exceeding cleVernesS ana
power of application everything to make the
voyage of life prosperous, except Iudder; lie
died long before he was fifty, and all his West
Point education and all his writing by day and
by night for twenty yeals gave him, was toal
teen lines in the encyclopaedia.
permitted myself in my last paper to. say a
word to those who yearn for a position ~
journalism. | ought 10 have remembered all
those others whO while the dews Of youth are
upon their heads, aspire TO write books. think
with great tenderness OF the many TO whom, as
their sun rises, the field of literature seems d
fresh one where nobody has been before them,
and where they have nothing to do but to SOW,
TO water and 10 reap-or where so many me
sniTits have preceded them whom they think to
equal or even to surpass. From eighteen To
twenty-one what dreams are dreamed, and what