Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1890-12-11
IN A POETS YOUTH.
William Cullen Bryant's Early Lyrical
Aspirations and Performances.

The poet Bryant was an exception
to the rule which ordains that preco-
cious children shall either die while
young or become ordinary men, says
the Youths Companion. On his first
birthday che could walk alone, and
when but a few days more than 16
months old knew ali the letters of the
alphabet" In his sixth year he was,
as he himself tells us, IAN excellent,
almost infalible speller, and ready in
geography" In his sixteenth year he
entered college. having mastered in
less than year all the Greek and
Latin required for admission to the
sophomore class at Williams college.
The boy was as precocious in rhyming
as in studying. Before he was 10 years
old his grandfather gave him a pence
for rymed version of the first chapter
of Job, and the country paper pub
lished q rhymed description of the
school he attended, which he wrote and
acclaimed.
John Bigelow, in his life of Bryant,
says that Though these early verses
gave no particular poetical promise,
they were remarkable for two char
acteristics by which all his poetry was
destined to be MISUNDERSTANDING cor
rectness both of the measure and the
| rhyme.h
to be a poet that he not only read what
poetry fell in his way, but in his priv
ate devotions often prayed with fervor
that he mi ght receive the gift of poet
ic genius, and write verses that might
endure
"Thanatopsis. the poem which gave
him national fame, was written in
1911, before he had attained his eight
zenith year, though it was not published
until 1917. The story of its publication,
as told by Mr.. Bigelow, is a unique
literary anecdote.
One day DR.. Bryant, the youth s
father, while looking through the
drawers in his sons desk. came upon
some manuscript verses. He read them.
and was so impressed that he hurried
TO the house of Il friend and. thrusting
the verses into her hand, exclaimed,
while tears ran down his cheeks,
Read them! They are Culen's."
In a few days the doctor went to
Boston, without communicating his in
to his friend William Phillips. who was
one of the editors of the North american
ReyjeaO, then two years old. He left the
verses ut the office of the ReUjcaU with
out their authors name or any intima-
| ton of their parentage.
Mr.. Philips read them and went to
Cambridge to submit them to Richard
II. Dana and Edward L. Claiming, his
editorial colleagues. They listened
while Mr.. Phillips read the manuscript
and heard the little he had to tell about
| its history.
"Ah, Phillips said Dana, with a
skeptical smile. you have been i'm
posed upon. No one on this side of
the Atlantic is capable of writing such
| verse"
Inquiries, however. showed that Mr..
Phillips instead of being imposed upon,
| had read to them the poems written by
an American boy who had not yet at
tanned his eighteenth year. One of the
poems was entitled .'Thanatopsis. -
and appeared in the September num-
| Der of the ReUieaO for 1917. The poem
which accompanied it also appeared in
the same number under the title of
''Fragment." 1t is now known as AN
Inscription for the Entrance to a
! Wood"
A significant fact associated with the
two poems is that "Thanatopsisn was
six years old when it was printed and
the 'Fragmentn two years. Such
patient waiting' is rare with young
| authors.