Perth Amboy evening news., 1907-03-01
LONCFELLOW
CENTENNIAL
is OBSERVED

February q marks the passing of
one hundred years since Henry Wads-
worth Longfellow was born In the
large, rambling house overlooking the
sea at Portland, Me. The poets fame
has undergone sharp vicissitudes dur
ing this century. He rose speedily
to be the most popular and best be-
Vowed of American poets; when he
died, in 1882, 1t was considered an ir-
reparable national calamity; today
literary mogulsA exalt Whitman and
Poe and sneer that Longfellow is
good enough for children.
But the enthusiasm with which
preparations have been made to cele-
brate the centenar not only In Port
land and Cambridge, but at many
other places, seems to indicate that
the pendulum of opinion is about to
swing backward again, and people
will realize. despite supercilious crit
les, that what is good enough for chill
dren is none too good for their elders.
There is one story about Longfel-
low, told by William Dean Howells. in
ance," which bodies forth better than
columns of eulogy the charm and
loveliness of the man and his song
1t was at Longfellow's funeral. Emer-
son had come from Concord and
stood beside the bier, looking upon
the white face of the white poet, as
dead he lay among his books" En-
erson's memory was but a Pickering
lamp at that time, and as he gazed
upon Longfeliow's peaceful sleep he
seemed to be pathetically struggling
to recall something. A little later he
said: The gentleman we have just
been burying was sweet and beauti-
full soul, but l forget his name"
All of Longfellow's life and all his
literary work are summed up In that
simple tribute. He was a "sweet and
beautiful soul" The rude Norsemen,
after their conversion to Christianity,
used to speak of ''the white Christ
and Bjornson, in a letter to an Amer
ican friend. wrote of "the white Mr.
Longfellow. Though literary critics
may forget his name" the great
American people will always remem-
Der him as "a sweet and beautiful
SOUL"
Descended From Pilgrim Fathers.
No life was ever freer from the
taint of anything mean or vile. He
! disproved the notion that genius must
be unhealthy and erratic. The sprees
of Bobbie Burns, the liaisons of Lord
Byron had nothing to do with their
greater pots had they lived decent
and orderly lives like Wordsworth,
Tennyson and our good New England
bards.s No wonder that Longfellow
was one of Natures noblemen; he
was descended from the stern old Pill
grim stockton his mothers side
from four Mayfiower families, includ-
| ing that of John Alden and Priscilla
Mullins, whom he has immortalized
in "The Courtship of Miles Standish +"
His grandfather's grandfather, anoth-
er coincidence between poetry and
genealogy, was 'IVillage Black
smith,"
The name of Longfellow was orig
inally written Langfellay, and the
maternal surname of Wadsworth first
appeared as Wordsworth, so that
there may have been distant link of
relationship with the English poet
Wordsworth. who was also descended
from an ancient Yorkshire family.
Perhaps there Is no better proof of
Longfellow's real poetic power than
the fact that he became a1poet in
spite of his rather ludicrous name.
Names like Shakespeare and Spencer
have fine flourish and dignity to
them, but people would be inclined to
laugh If poet by the name of Short
boy put In a bid for fame. There is a
great deal in name-as Lowell has
said in his essay on Keat the adjec-
tive "Keatsy' implies something
contemptuous. But Longfellow has
made his name the synonym for poet
ry--no one thinks any longer of lu-