University of Virginia Library

IV.

The poetry of Mrs. Jackson unquestionably takes rank above that of any American woman, and in the opinion of many above that of any Englishwoman but Mrs. Browning. Emerson, as is well known, rated it above that of almost all American men. Her works include, first, the simple poetry of domestic life; secondly, love-poems of extraordinary intensity and imaginative fullness; thirdly, verses showing most intimate sympathy with external nature; and lastly, a few poems of the highest dignity and melody in the nature of odes, such as "A Christmas Symphony" and "A Funeral March." The poem which combines the most of depth and the most of popular sympathy is that called "Spinning," where a symbol drawn from common life assumes the sort of solemn expressiveness that belongs to the humble actions of peasants in the pictures of the French Millet. Emerson's favorite was her sonnet called "Thought"; and other critics have given the palm for exquisiteness of musical structure to her "Gondolieds." But her poetry was only a small portion of her literary work; and of the range and value of this product, a good conception will be given when we say that a plan was at one time seriously formed by the late Dr. Holland and his associate in charge of this magazine, to let Mrs. Jackson's contributions accumulate sufficiently to fill one number of the periodical — poetry, fiction, travels, criticism, and all — and then send it all forth as the product of one person. The plan was finally dismissed, as I am assured, not from the slightest doubt of its practicability, but only because it might be viewed as sensational. It is probably the greatest compliment ever yet paid by editors, in the whole history of magazine literature, to the resources of a single contributor.

There is in her prose writings an even excellence of execution which is not always to be found in her poetry, and which is surpassed by hardly any American writer. It is always clear, strong, accurate, spirited, and forcible; she had a natural instinct for literary structure, as well as style, and a positive genius for giving characteristic and piquant titles to what she wrote. It was her delight not merely to explore the new, but to throw novel and unexpected freshness around the old. Before she had become so wide a traveler she used to plan a book, to be called "Explorations" or some such title, in which all the most familiar scenery was to be described under fictitious names; and only the map appended would gradually reveal, through its new local phraseology, that "Hide and Seek Town"[*] was Princeton, Massachusetts, and so on indefinitely. Her poetry sometimes offered deeper enigmas than these superficial ones, and some of the best of it will never be fully comprehended but by the few who had the key to the events or emotions that called it forth. So ardent were her sympathies that everything took color from her personal ties; and her readiness to form these ties with persons of all ages, both sexes, and every condition not only afforded some of her greatest joys, but also brought the greatest perils of her life; often involving misconception, perplexity, and keen disappointment to herself and others. Her friendships with men had the frankness and openness that most women show only to one another; and her friendships with women had the romance and ideal atmosphere that her sex usually reserves for men. There was an utterly exotic and even tropical side of her nature, strangely mingled with the traits that came from her New England blood. Where her sympathy went, even in the least degree, there she was ready to give all she had, — attention, time, trouble, money, popularity, reputation, — and this with only too little thought of the morrow. The result was found not merely in many unreasonable requests, but in inconvenient and unlooked-for expectations. During the middle period of her life there was never any security that the morning postman might not bring an impassioned letter from some enamored young girl, proposing to come and spend her life with her benefactress; or a proffer of hand and heart from some worthy man, with whom she had mistakenly supposed herself to be on a footing of the plainest good-fellowship. It sometimes taxed all her great resources of kindness and ready wit to extract herself from such entanglements; and she never could be made to understand how they had come about or why others succeeded them.

She had great virtues, marked inconsistencies, and plenty of fascinating faults that came near to virtues. She was never selfishly ungenerous, but she was impulsive in her scorn of mean actions, and was sometimes cruelly unjust to those whom she simply did not understand; this misconception very often occurring, however, in the too Quixotic defense of a friend or a principle. To those

who knew her best she was a person quite unique and utterly inexhaustible; and though her remoteness of residence during the last ten years had separated her from the society of many of her earlier friends, there is not one of them who does not feel the world deeply impoverished by her going out of it. She did not belong to a class; she left behind her no second; and neither memory nor fancy can restore her as she was, or fully reproduce, even for those who knew her best, that ardent and joyous personality. And those who recall her chiefly in gayer moods will find their remembrance chastened by the thought that she could write, when finally face to face with death, such poems as "Habeas Corpus," "Acquainted with Grief," and "A Last Prayer," — poems which are here first published, and which add a new dignity to the falling away of the flesh and a new nobleness to human nature.