writers to passionate outbursts, but could not draw them from their literary pursuits. At a later period, the civil war left a more lasting impression on their characters and work, yet when it had passed, the survivors made still nobler contributions to literature. Whittier, the Quaker poet and anti-slavery lyrist, wrote the most popular ballad of the war, and afterwards showed his best art in peaceful themes. So also Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe was able to present the wrongs of slavery in a popular romance, and thus urge on the war, yet later contented herself with mild pictures of domestic life. Apart from most of the foregoing, and by a method peculiarly his own, Hawthorne studied the spiritual facts of New England life, and unveiled its mysteries and romance. Others more quickly won recognition; his subtler genius required longer time for correct appreciation. Gradually his true worth has been discerned, and now he is acknowledged to be the chief representative of American romance.

In remarkable contrast with Hawthorne in life and character and work stands the brilliantly gifted, but miserably unfortunate, Edgar A. Poe. He not only proved himself the greatest metrical artist of the English language, weaving words into music at his pleasure, but he was the skillful producer of weird romances and cunningly devised tales, usually gloomy and terrible, sometimes extravagant. His erratic course and untimely death have drawn the pity of the world. His melodious verses have been models for Tennyson and Swinburne, as well as French poets. W. G. Simms was the prolific romancist of the South, seeking to rival Cooper in the delineation of the Indians, and in reproducing the Revolutionary scenes of his native State. John P. Kennedy wrote also a novel of the Revolution, and sketched country life in Virginia.

Of American poets Longfellow has been the most popular, partly from his choice of subjects easily understood by all, and partly from his artistic treatment of them. His sympathetic heart and his generous culture have enabled him to give adequate expression to the common human emotions.

Lowell is distinctly the most cultured of American poets, and has excelled as essayist and critic. Yet he has not

reached the popularity of Longfellow or Whittier, and is perhaps most widely known as a humorist and writer of Yankee dialect. In his later years he was a noble representative of America in foreign courts.

Dr. O. W. Holmes was noted as a skillful writer of occasional verses before his peculiar merits as a prose-writer were displayed in the Atlantic Monthly. Here his "Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table" was a brilliant combination of humor, satire and scholarship, and interspersed were some of his best poems. He was devoted to Boston, which he celebrated as "the hub of the solar system."

The size of the present work has not afforded sufficient. room for the adequate treatment of history and historians. But the work of Americans in this department must at least be mentioned, as they have attained special fame and are truly representative of the country. William H. Prescott (1796-1859), in spite of the affliction of blindness, devoted his life to historical studies, and produced standard works on the history of Spain, Mexico, and Peru. Written in a stately and dignified style, they have stood the test of time and the investigation of later students. George Bancroft (1800-1891), after studying in German universities and teaching a classical school in Massachusetts, undertook to prepare an exhaustive history of the United States down to the adoption of the Constitution. The many public positions, which he held, partly helped and partly hindered the completion of his great work. Almost fifty years elapsed before the twelfth and final volume appeared. While the whole forms a lasting monument to the author's industry, its very length has prevented it from attaining the highest success.

Most successful in securing popular attention and applause was John Lothrop Motley (1814-77), who, after ten years of patient research, published in 1856, "The Rise and Fall of the Dutch Republic." Other works connected with the history of the Netherlands occupied his later years, except so far as he was engaged in diplomatic service. His thorough mastery of his subject and his power of pictorial presentation of the past make vivid the men and events of a critical period in European history.

WASHINGTON IRVING was born in New York city in 1783 and died in 1859, at the age of seventy-six. His books are still so popular, and in feeling so modern, that it is hard to realize that his birth immediately followed the close of the Revolution, and that he did not see even the beginnings of the present generation. To read some of his stories, one might think they were written yesterday-were there any one competent to write them.

He was the son of a rigid Scotch Presbyterian and of a gentle English woman; his childhood and youth were delicate, but his enjoyment of life was unfailing, and the indulgence which he always received never hurt him. His aspect

and manners were refined, graceful and charming; by organization he was an aristocrat, though he was democratic in intention. At the outset of his career he amused himself in society, and satirized it in good-natured sketches in the Spectator vein, as the pages of the brilliant but short-lived Salmagundi still bear witness. His first important work was the famous "Knickerbocker's History of New York," a permanent piece of humor, the fairy godchild, so to say, of Rabelais and Swift. The author went to Europe for a pleasure trip. In the midst of his social successes in London the firm with which he was connected failed, and he turned to literature, which hitherto had been the diversion of his leisure, as the means of livelihood. In 1819, Washington, then six-andthirty, sat seriously down and produced the book of tales called "The Sketch Book," containing that "primal story" -"Rip Van Winkle." His success was immediate, great and

lasting; but he was too modest to admit that it could be fully deserved. He remained alone in that opinion; his work was like himself, and, like himself, was nearly perfect in its degree. During the forty remaining years of his life he continued to delight his contemporaries and build up his fortunes with imaginative and historical work, much of it with a Spanish background. From 1826 to 1829 he lived in Spain writing "The Alahambra," the "Life of Columbus," and other books. In the latter year he returned to London as secretary of legation; but two years later homesickness brought him back to New York and he fixed his residence at Sunnyside. During the next ten years he wrote five volumes on American and English subjects, of which the collection of tales, "Wolfert's Roost," is the best known. In 1842 he was appointed American Minister to Spain, and the duties of his office chiefly occupied him during his four years' sojourn at Madrid. On his return home he began the "Life of Washington," which was the chief work of his declining life, the last volume appearing in the year of his death.

Irving's personal character and history were as delightful as are his works. His mental constitution was serene and harmonious; nothing was in excess; he was at peace with himself and optimistic towards the world; he had no theories to ventilate, and was averse to contentions and strife of every kind. The easy amiability of his nature and his strong social tendencies might have formed an element of weakness, had he not been assailed and strengthened by bereavement and misfortune, which developed the man in him. The girl to whom he was betrothed died, and he lived a bachelor all his life. Irving was manly with men; with women, refined and chivalrous; and sincere and sane in literature. He regarded his species with a humorous tenderness; saw the good and slighted the evil in life; hence sunshine, abiding, but not intense, radiates from all he wrote.

Altogether nearly a third of Irving's life was passed abroad, where he was as much loved and appreciated as here. But no more patriotic American lived than he. In him the human and the literary instincts made a rounded whole. His style is clear, easy and flexible; his standpoint,

tranquil; his humor, ever smiling; his pathos, true; his sentiment, sometimes thin, but never sickly. The generous impulses and moral beauty of his character warm and vitalize his work. So long as taste, repose, and simplicity please the mind, Irving's contribution to our literature will be remembered and valued.

DEATH OF PETER STUYVESANT.

(From "Knickerbocker's History of New York.")

IN process of time, the old governor, like all other children of mortality, began to exhibit tokens of decay. Like an aged oak, which, though it long has braved the fury of the elements, and still retains its gigantic proportions, yet begins to shake and groan with every blast-so was it with the gallant Peter; for, though he still bore the port and semblance of what he was in the days of his hardihood and chivalry, yet did age and infirmity begin to sap the vigor of his frame-but his heart, that most unconquerable citadel, still triumphed unsubdued. With matchless avidity would he listen to every article of intelligence concerning the battles between the English and Dutch-still would his pulse beat high whenever he heard of the victories of De Ruyterand his countenance lower, and his eyebrows knit, when fortune turned in favor of the English. At length, as on a certain day he had just smoked his fifth pipe, and was napping after dinner in his arm-chair, conquering the whole British nation in his dreams, he was suddenly aroused by a fearful ringing of bells, rattling of drums, and roaring of cannon, that put all his blood in a ferment. But when he learnt that these rejoicings were in honor of a great victory obtained by the combined English and French fleets over the brave De Ruyter and the younger Von Tromp, it went so much to his heart that he took to his bed, and in less than three days was brought to death's door by a violent cholera morbus! But, even in this extremity, he still displayed the unconquerable spirit of Peter the Headstrong; holding out to the last gasp with the most inflexible obstinacy against a whole army of old women, who were bent upon driving the enemy out of his