The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1890-08-10
Special to THE SUNDAY CALL.

almost endless pleasures within and near
the ancient burgh, in the constant, and, to
the stranger, unexpected, Identification of
place with personality. Indeed l do not
know OF another spot in the whole world
where the place itself and the whole cOun-
try roundabout seem TO have taken on such
an individuality and permanent colOring
from the brief presence of one man. We
place beloved. sanity Whittier at Dan
vers town. But bis werk and personality
are intenseSt in our minds along in
the dark days before the great conflict, and
in though We see the man Whittier
plainest when and where his burning
words had their most aggressive power.
Good old DR.. Holmes shines along in a
beaten path upon which he has cheerfully
trundled for more than a quarter of a CEN
fury between Cambridge and Beacon street.
and on to the Atlantic Monthly office.
Where shall We find locale for Lowell,
sweet and stately bard ana man? Those who
in secret have wept and smiled over the
tender pages of "Dream Life" and" Reveries
of a Bachelor only know in dim way that
somewhere between the rugged Connecticut
hills there is still q doughty old farmer,
six Marvel" pOthering among his stumps,
stone walls and early vegetables. Who can
save in the brief hours by ''The Bridge" in
the little backwoods cabin; and his noble
sister, Fanny Fern" died, Parton tell US,
without being able to find the house in which
she was born, and which she so bitterly
lOnged to know? Where is most left the
seal of the personal presence of Hawthorne
at Dingley's, at Concord, or at Salem?
There is but one spot where we can put our
loving hands ON Poe: at the Fordham cot
tage where the poet, his dying wife. Vir-
giDia, and her devoted mother starved in
gloom aud obscurity. lrying's personal
presence remains fixed at just three places
Sunnyside, at the old Dutch Church, Terry
town, and among the mist-crowned Cats
kills.
THE TWO ALcoTTs,
Great-souled father and drudging, tender
hearted daughter, made Concord more
famous than did Emerson, whom we feel
we can only find behind the prim, white
walls of the prim, white house on the Lex
ington road and beneath the great Scotch
granite bowlder upon the grave in Sleepy
Hollow Cemetery. The spirit of Thcreau,
intangible and tieeting of communion and
cOmpanlOnship as his own wanderings,
seems but now aud then to hover about and
haunt the reeds of sedgy Maiden Pond as
if finding vanishing embodiment in the
lonely bittern's mourntul cry. Even the
master-singer, Longfelow, left but four
songs by which we may trace his identifi-
cation with the first twenty years of his
own life at old Portland town; ard for
nearly all the remainder of his time and
work our mind picture of the man is with
his calm face bent over his library desk
! in Cragie House, Cambridge. Shall we
| look for Carlyle at Ecclelechan, Craigen-
| puttock or at Chelsea? Where is the
one shrine at which we shall find
Byron? The whole of old England and
The tiny brass plate sunk in the pave OF
Westminster Abbey confuse the mind and
heart concentration upon Dickens. Where
are we to finally find Tennysonic shrine
at dear old Somersby, in Lincolnshire, at
Aldworth, or at Farrlngford House, Isle Of
Wight? Edwin Arnold fits between
London editorial sanctum and an oriental
pagoda. Ruskin, dmmed AID voiceless
behind the veil of 4 mental sleep from
which the wakeless sleep must be entered,
looks, ghostlike, from the windows of Con-
iston Hall, upon fair COniSt0n Water. and,
in all lie has done and written, how many
have discovered his Lancashire environ
ment? Even the shrine of Shakes
peare is in meager church beside
pinched theater, In an Insignificant
town that knows only his ashes and the
gratuitieS they bring. Burns and Scott of
all the luminous host of the great and good
in prose and verse, living and dead had
their actual everyday being in, and gave
the palpable and imperishable hfe-throD of
their personalities 10, an environment of
PLACE AND PEOPLE,
Which thus became mausoeum Infinitely
greater and grander than the loftiest column
or cenOtaph that ever pierced the clouds.
But come with me in and out of old Dum-
fries, and up and down the songful Nth, or
if your legs are not "braw and Weel |
eneuch," climb with me to the ancient OBJ |
servatory, over here in MaxweltOwn, the |
MaXweltown whose "braes are bonnie
where early fa'S the dew" and we can from |
this one place see and feel the tenderness |
of the Identification. From this point the eve |
east fai
Annandae; across Kirkcudbrightshire, to
the west, to the noble hills skirting Ayr; to
the north, up the dreamland Nithsdale to
the far grim turrets OF Drumlanrig Castle,
and TO the south, TO the vast expanse of Sol |
way Firth, where, to the right of Niths- |
mouth, looms gray-br0wed Criffei, and. to |
The left, is caught CLEAN OF the sands by |
BroSss-ANell, at whose waters Burns too late |
struggled TO -sss "a LIS life. Thus at glance
not only does the bey9isclilg cyclorama
give the beholder the entire field of the !.
everyday scenes OF The poets life during
his last eight memorable years, but Mt the |
same instant comprehension OF the three
most impressive epOehS in his career Of
which we can have memory-the home
heaven of Ellisland farm-life, the wretched |
fight against poverty in the gray old border |
town beneath us, and that last unayailing |
struggle at Brow Well, by Solway's shift |
ing sands-all made inexpressibly more |
impressive by the lofty dome of the silent |
mausoleum over there in that shad0wy |
kirk-yard, looming before us wherever we
may look for the recognition of his old
time presence within the fair region round
about.
In Dumfries itself one cannot look upon
a single olden structure, or follow with the |
eve any close, wynd. vennell or street, With |
out knowing that at some time 1t was more |
familiar to Burns that any portion OF the |
old city is to any one of its inhabitants to- |
day. In the ancient Bank-street house, |
where he first lived
IN DUMFRIEs
In the three tiny apartments, more than |
third of the more than 100 poems he pro-
duced in Dumfries were composed. Then |
was his last the remainder were given |
birth. Among these were Aud Lang |
Syne," my Wife's Winsome Wee
Thing, The Soldiers Return" Willie |
WastIe." .Contented WI Little and Cantie
Jamie, Ye Banks and Braes O. Bonnie
Doom" "My Love Is Like Red, Red
Rose" My Heart Is Sair. Daurna TELL
"Oh, Vert Thou in the Cauld Blast"
Duncan Gray Flow 9IynS Gently Sweet wee
aBruce's Address" The old, though still
spruce, "King's Arms Inn" could never
have so long stood the assaults Of time and
tourists had not Burns, in a forgivably ir-
reverent and delicious mood, scratched
its window-pane.
We men of wilt and wealth. why all this sneering
'Gainst poor exclsemen? 6fve the cause hearing.
What are your landlords rentros? Taxing |
What Premiers, what even monarchs' mighty
gaugers!
Nay, what are priests, those seeming gody wise
men?
What are they, pray, but spiritual exclsemens
Set sauarely in the middle of High street
is one of the oldest old structures to be
found in all Scotland. IL is now called the
Mid-Steeple When built, 200 years ago, it
was known as the Iron Steeple. At that
time. on the sale at auction of the Customs
and Excise of Scotland, the Dumfries Town
Council took a large share in the plumber;
in turn sold it to q fellow-burgher, one
Sharpe, so by name aud fine in dealing.
The citizens reyOlted, and, on compromise,
Burgher Sharp was permitted to retain his
tack on payment of 10000 merks, Scots,
with which the outlandish structure was
erected. In its upper uncouthness it con-
tains the town clock and peal OF bells, and