Mary Baldwin College - Bluestocking Yearbook (Staunton, VA)

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20 The Annual of clear sheets of ice. The wind whistles among the dry weed stalks in the hollows, tossing the brown leav es in air, and threatening to tear away the few that have clung to the oak- trees The drear woods of mid-winter inspire one with an awe which they cannot command when clothed in green and fra- grant with sweet flowers. One of the most popular of his poems is Courtship of Miles Standish. John Alden, the hero of the story, was an ancestor of Longfellow ' s ; the youngest of these whom the Mayflower brought ; the first to set foot on Plymouth Rock. He is young, ' fair-haired, azure-eyed, with delicate Saxon complexion ; we first see him bending over the letters which are to carry his secret back to the dear mother country ; to tell his friends at home of his love for Priscilla, the Puritan maiden, whom he has followed over the seas to the barren shores of New England. She came for the sake of religion; he came that he might be near her. As he writes, his friend. Miles Standish, paces the room uneasily, talking of wars and campaigns, and of the great Julius Caesar, whose commenta- ries lie on the shelf beside the Bible, and whom he admired as only a soldier can. John Alden writes on, scarcely heeding his friend ' s rambling words, when, suddenly, he is startled by hearing the name of Briscilla. Then, he listens indeed ; and stands dazed and confused before the blunt captain, as he tells him to go to Priscilla and say that Miles Standish offers her the hand and the heart of a soldier. After the first dumb surprise, Alden quotes the captain ' s favorite maxim, If you want a thing well done, you must do it yourself; hoping thus to avoid so painful an errand ; but his friend thinks the proverb would not hold good in this instance. Then comes the hard struggle between love and friendship ; but , friendship pre- vailed over love, and Alden went on his errand. He reaches the humble dwelling, and finds Priscilla at her wheel ; he tells her the object of his errand, in a awkward boyish fashion, but fondly imagines all is well, as he talks of the captain ' s triumphs aud praises his valor, until the modest, Priscilla, overcome by her love of fun, forgets she is a puritan maiden, and asks with twinkling eye : Why don ' t you .speak

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The Mary Baldwin Seminary- 19 determined to accept this, hut before doing so, spent a year or two in Enrope, preparing himself more tliort)Ughly for the place. He held this position until 1839, when he resigned it, that he might have more leisure for literary pursuits. When twenty-five years of age, he married Mary Slower Potter, of Portland ; after the death of this lady, which occur- red within a few years, he married Frances Elizabeth Apple- ton, of Boston. Her father gave her, at the time of their mar- riage, the house which Washington had made his headquar- ters, duiing the siege of Boston. This became the poet ' s per- manent home. After eighteen years of happy married life, Mrs. Longfellow was snatched away by a horrible death, that of burning. Her husband never recovered from the shock and the grief caused by this event. He lived chiefly in retire- ment for the remaining years of his life. In the year ' 82, he passed quietly away, an old man full of honors as of years, and loved and reverenced by all who knew him. Especially was he loved and reverenced by the young, and was called the chil- dren ' s poet. When the spreading chestnut tree, which he immortalized in his poem of The Village Blacksmith, was struck by lightning and killed, years after the poem was writ- ten, the children of the neighborhood had a chair made of it for him to whom its fame was due. It was in the spring, the season, that he loved so well, that he left the world budding into new life, fresh with the first green of the meadows and gay with the songs of birds. He wrote many .sonnets and short stories in verse ; in all his lines there is a soft echo of the great voice of nature ; we hear it as we read of rippling brooks, of rustling woods, of the waves washing upon the shore. In many of his poems, there is a touch of sadne.ss, a shadow, as of sorrow which time has softened, but cannot efface. One of his short, descriptive poems is entitled Woods in Winter The winter scene is beautifully described. The trees uprear their leafless branches to the cold, gray sky. Not a bird nor an insect is heard ; the very brooks, that babbled merrily in the gay summer months, are now silent beneath

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Tilt Maiy ya d ' ivin Scininaf y. 21 for yourself, John ? This stops the flow of his eUxjUtiice, ami he rushes madly out iuto the forest. The story is told to Miles Standish ; the captain is an ry, thinks his friend has betrayed his trust, and when he is called suddenly away by war with the indians, he buckles on his sword and goes out into the wilds of the forest, without even a parting word to John Alden. Then came months of fighting and danger ; danger in which the soldier gloried. He gave hardly a thought to Priscilla ; when he did think of her, it was ouly to say : What I thought was a flower, is only a weed and is worthless. Meanwhile Alden was true to his friend : he often talked with Priscilla, as she sat at her wheel, talked with her as with a sister, but never one word of love did he speak. Once as they sat thus, Alden talked of her industry, compairing her to Bertha, the beautiful spinner, who span as she rode on her palfry : told her that some day mothers would tell their daugh- ters of the good old days of Priscilla, the spinner. She re- proved him for the flattering words, saying he must not be idle, that if girls should be told of Priscilla, that boys should hear from their sires of the good old days of John Alden, .so saying she laughingly put a skein of thread over his hands. As she wound her ball, untangling the thread and scold- ing him for his awkwardness, suddenly the door was burst open, breathless, telling the terrible news that Miles Standish was dead, had been killed by the Indians. Forgetting his grief for his friend and feeling only that he was free, free after long months of waiting, John Alden clasped to his heart the maid for whom alone it beat. The barrier was removed and forever ; he exclaimed fervently: Those whom the Lord hath united, let no man put them asunder Now the wedding day is at hand : the friends and neigh- bors have come together to see the simple wedding of the fair young couple whom every one blesses. When the ceremony is ended, a silence falls upon all, for there, on the threshold, stands a figure like that of Miles Standish. For a moment there is doubt and confusion ; then the figure advances and taking the bridegroom ' s hand asks for forgiveness for all that