The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1889-09-07
DIR. HOLMES.
The Autocrat OF the Breakfast Table Joins
the Ranks OF the Oct0-
ysnarians.
Something About the Busy Life of the
WeM.KnOWn Physician
aud Poet.
tCourier-Journal..l ]

fCourier-Journal.
Eogland has heen celebrating. Tenny-l
sons passing into his eishty-first year.
America is about To congratulate Oliver
Wendell Holmes on the same vital
achievement. AT fourscare the bril-. |
liant ssautocsat' is as fresh and as the
youngest wit Of them a!!.
To-day, August 20, the doctor Will
celebrate the eightieth ianniversary OF
his birth. For half ii century he has
been the delight of all who love bon
mot or comic Or humorous bit OF
verse sprinkled with pathos, and only
year ago he published an account OF
trip abroad which he made at AN age
when men prefer to he dcz'ng by the
fireside.
DIR. Holmes was born in Cam bridge,
Mass, and breathed Il literary aimos-
phere from the day of his birth. Whep
old enough TO go away to school he
was sent to the Phillips Andover Acau-
envy. Here he began TO make verses
by transla:ins the first book of V:'gips
l"Aeneid" into heroic couplets. 10
1925 he entered Harvard. There ne
was frequent contributor to the col
lege periodicals, and when the appoints
ments for commencement were given
out Holmes was made the poet. That
his standing in scholarship was excel
lent is manifest from the fact that he
was chosen a member of the Phi Beta
Kappa Society, which selects Is men,
bers from those who stand among the
| highest.
The young graduate found himself
famous within year after his gradaa-
ton. Many literary man has at
tracted his first notice in literary way
by few verses hitting off some topic
at the time uppermost in the popular
mind. In 1880 it was. proposed 10
break up the old frigate Constitution.
One day there appeared in the Boston
Advertiser a protest against such a
dissertation, begisning:
| Ay, tear her tatte-ed ensign down.
| Long has it waved on high.
The author was o. w. Holmes. The
piece took at once, was copied widely
in the newspapers, circulated in hand
bills, and saved the ship.
Holmes studied law for year ct the
Cambridge Law School, but if be did
not learn more Of literature than he
did of law he at least produced more
in the literary field, for he wrote q
number of humorous pieces which
added to his reputation as writer. Ii
was destined that he should be ply.
sician, however, and having changed
his mind as to the law he sstudied
medicine under DIR. James jackson,
and then spent three years studying
abroad.
But while medicine furnished him
with work, literature presented helc
for amusement. The year nc received
his medical degree Ns36) he published
book containing his poems TO tina
date. This volume contained one o
the best known as well as the mos
delicate mixtures of the comic and th'
pathetic in ell his pieces, "The Las
Leaf"
DR.. Holmes served for while
professor of anatomy and physiology a
Dartmouth, aud in 1S49 filed the sam
chair in the medical school at Harvard
While he is not known to tho publi
as writer on medical topics, he gaine'
three of the Boylston prizes for medi
cal dissertations. They were puhlssbe
together in 1898. Besides these he ha
published half dozen books on nledi
cal science.
: When in 1857 James Russell Lowe
began his work as editor OF ne'
, magazine called the Atlantic Monthly
DIR. Holmes was called upon 10 put
shoulder TO the wheel and start tE
new enterprise on the road to populs
favor. He began with series OF p'
pers called the "Autocrat OF the Breai
, fast Table" Twenty-Five years befol
% he had begun series of art!c Q wit
that title for the New England Mag'
zinc. The papers not only successful
=. launched the magazine but when pu
r lished in book form. became The mo
popular piece o! literary work hearli
the author's name, not only then b
ever afterwards. Indeed th'
were so fascinating that the pub
n eagerly absorbed everybody sat |
\ breakfast table, that DIR. Holm
", would write about. "The Professor
the Breakfast Table, and "The Pe
F.. at the Breakfast Table followed t
., .Autocrat' and are still regard
among the doctors best works.
In verse DR.. Holmes has touch
. very little that is not especially not
a for the sparkling rather than t
III poetic. He has written some p!ec
~ however. in which there is the Il
\ poetic ring. Perhaps the best spe
a men of this kind Of verse in his wor
is 1.-The Chambered Nautilus" I
osT most marvellous feature, howev
ARD about him, is the work which he