Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1907-02-28

falling on his silver hair, in deep mel
| low tones, uttered these words:
! 20 We familiar scenes, We groves of pine
That once We're mine and are no ionge,
mine
/ Thou river widening thro' the meadows
To the vast sea, 50 near and yet I'M
We halls, in whose seclusion and repose
IhantomS of fame. like civilizations rose
And varished,-We who are about to die
Salute you.
| On the next day after the poem was
delivered, that little band of II gray
haired men, who had had several class
meetings during the week. met in one
! of the dormitory rooms, talked togeth-
er as of old. and for half an hour were
| college boys again. Before they left
! the room. prayer was offered they
went out together under the Thorndike
oak; the benediction was pronounced;
and Longfcllow and his classmates sep
arated to meet no more in this world.
| Such were the associations of Bow
doin's greatest poet with his college.
/ What his place in the hearts of Bow
. dom men is-indeed in the hearts Of
the American people-We all know.
What his ultimate place in English
| literature may be is a question about
| which we all like to speculate. but it is
qestlon when only the great tester,
me can answer.
| 1ie undoubtedly nad ms limitations.
| His verse sometimes SmackS over
much OF the library; frequently he
J deals with battles in books rather than
| with the real warfare Of life. Although
not an irtimator, he is more often the
artistic r.-teller of beautiful tales than
| the originator of great thouehts ,ra
did not tLinl, so deenIv as did Brown.
| ire. he had NOT the rbilosonbica1 m
sight of Emerson. He did not much
concern himself with the great nuss-
tions OF doubt and faith which have
often stirred the souls of great poets.
He was an artist first and rea3oner
afterwards. He did not try to prove
| that the Holy Mother once lived upon
earth; he was willing to point to IA
dOna as his .nlaaiaation saw her. There
were also peaks Of emotion reached by
other poets that he never scaled. lie 81
lacked the ardenc temper Of the re-
former that he sometimes disp.easei
his anti-slavery friends. He was the
! ps:lrnist rather than the prophet. Ha
! was in life very fond of the music Of
the flute. And it is the soothing not,
. of the flute rather than the blast of tn,
! clarion that va hear most oftan in hi
l,,oa.rv Orion tho booLn,ata IL III II
! hrarv was his vr,ttan motto. No,
! clam NOR sod amor',-no+ violence nv
| noise but love" That was tho b,r5c-,
Of his MANY sonrs
! He has been called "the chiIaro,,s
laurnate.', for in his verso he cn1nh~,+-
/ ed their elemental sir,nlicity and ell
carity In has hoai, caJjad .tha ~,
i PIE f"et' lof ne sang the Joys ami
! SOrroWS OF common men. He sang the
: miracles of birth. of noarriaca and Of
j-otr &C 49,. 49,, ,,.,o,,a,. -;
| - ~ e "to"eH' ~ tle coil-
| ION HOUSEHOLDS. He was able by thu
! o.,.1 -, ..
CIV oi'c.i az MS 'oucii even
UfucSrfy ana SulicflngS nave taken on
q new meaning and become divine.
! Nav force. ana 1a,,. r,o4ho3c .,-
a: Ill, Il"
-ntSic ana new truthS VIII come mo
| Ems iiSh poetry in the changing wears
o,,d I onrf,l;o,,. ,,,.,, COMO A., 49,,
SURRENDER Ills position as Americas
Laureate. But if is HiffIpll1t "a tbiDl-