University of Virginia Library

PROFESSORS AGASSIZ AND LONGFELLOW.

CALL ON A NEW ENGLAND POET FOR HIS FRENCH
VERSES.

A distinguished poet of New England—whose
modesty in this matter, we regret to say, will not
allow us to disclose his name or give his verses in
their original tongue—sent a present of six bottles
of choice wines last Christmas Eve to his friend
Professor Agassiz, accompanying the donation,
good and acceptable in itself, with a copy of original
French verses amusingly descriptive of the
various liquors. These verses, in French, by a
poet, and a very high one, of New England, accidentally
fell some few months ago under the notice
of our disorderly ex-Orderly Private Miles
O'Reilly, who immediately proposed that all the
literary gentlemen who were present at the weekly
rêunion whereat the copy was shown (for they
had then never been published, though printed for
private circulation), should take home a copy with
him; and that each should bring a translation of
the same to the next weekly meeting. This was
at once agreed to, apparently with enthusiasm, by

all present; but the Boy Himself was the only
one who finally complied with the general stipulation,
and he now asks us to give notice that,
unless the gentlemen then present who agreed to
the bargain, and “whose names are omitted by
particular request,” send in within a week from
date their several translations of said French
verses to Agassiz by a poet of New England,
said Boy will find himself compelled to commence
actions against each and every one of them for
having obtained from him “a translation under
false pretences.” Meantime, to give each and all
of them courage—as the rashest, foolishest, and
most good-natured youngster is always first to
jump in and try the coldness of the water at the
commencement of each bathing-season—we here
append Private O'Reilly's English version of the
really excellent and graceful French lines of the
New England poet, who shall be nameless,—any
further than to remark that he is not a Short-fellow:[1]

From the foregoing it will be seen that our
New England poet has not a bad taste in selecting
a wine-bouquet for a friend, as, indeed, in
what matter (save in not allowing us to publish
his original French in company with this translation),
is his taste not excellent? Commencing
with Œil de Perdrix, or Partridge-eye, as a foundation
beverage; next introducing the bubbling
deliciousness of Verzenay from the vintage of
Avize—Verzenay “that never saw New York,”
and to which the apple-orchards and cider-presses
of New Jersey are but vague traditions of no
application; then after that, solemnly bringing
in the old, rubicund, full-bodied, and stately-ported
hidalgo from Spain as a counterpoise to
the frivolity and effervescence of the previous
visitor; next warming up and rather illuminating
the too serious gravity and weight of the hidalgo's
character by a dash of the perfumed fop, gallant,
and gasconading braggart from Bordeaux, whose
tendency to extravagant merriment and freedom,
however, is soon checked and chilled by the
appearance on the scene of action of that sour,

stern, and yellow-hued “cynic lord, Sauterne.”
Lastly, to wind up with and to harmonize the
whole—to put the finishing stroke on the ultimate
delights and blisses of perfect digestion, and to
guard the cuticle from cold as the guests oscillate
home from the glowing dinner-party through the
keen bright frosts of that Christmas night—why,
to accomplish all these blessings, what agent better
than “un pauvre Chartreux”—that “poor Carthusian
friar”—could he have possibly selected? We
think the distinguished New England poet in
question, on whose French verses and taste in
wines we have thus commented, does himself and
the public a wrong in not allowing us to lay
before our readers and the rest of the world this
rarely excellent jeu d'esprit of his muse in a
foreign tongue. It would take something more
than an inelegancy, or even inaccuracy—supposing
there were any perceivable by Parisian ears—in
a few French lines written for such a social occasion
as this, to cost their respected author any leaf
from the wreath he has so nobly earned in his
native tongue.