The literary remains of the late Willis Gaylord Clark including the Ollapodiana papers, the Spirit of life, and a selection from his various prose and poetical writings |
MEMOIR
OF
WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK. |
 | The literary remains of the late Willis Gaylord Clark |  |
MEMOIR
OF
WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.
It was my purpose, in introducing the ensuing pages to the public, to
have accompanied them with a more elaborate Memoir of the life of their author
than had hitherto appeared; the chief additional attraction of which,
however, I had hoped to present in extracts from his familiar correspondence.
I say `chief attraction,' because in the able Memoir from the pen
of his eminent friend, Hon. Judge Conrad, of Philadelphia, published in
`Graham's Magazine' for 1840, and in the excellent and authentic sketch
which prefaces the selections from his verse in Mr. Griswold's `Poets
and Poetry of America'—of the former of which the Departed often expressed
his approbation—all that is essential for the information of the reader
was felicitously and succinctly embodied. But, as I have said, something
more than this I had contemplated; something which, under his own hand,
and in the easy play of unstudied correspondence with his most intimate
friend on earth, should be an exponent of his `inner life,' his every-day
thoughts, impulses, and affections. Why I have not been able to do this, I
shall now briefly explain.
For many many months previous to the death of my twin-brother, that
event was constantly in my mind, and tinged the whole current of my
thoughts. Each sun that rose and set upon us, I `counted toward his last
resting-place;' and the slow-swinging pendulum of a clock, accidentally encountered,
appeared to me to have but one purpose; it was notching his resistless
progress to an early grave. When the last bitter hour came; when
all that was mortal of my `severed half' had ceased to live; nothing it seemed
could add to the poignant sense of present bereavement. I was told indeed
that Time, the great Healer, would soften the bitterness of my regret; that
even the memory of a past sorrow might yet become `pleasant, though
mournful to the soul.' Among many letters which I received soon after
Willis's death, was one which I can not resist the inclination to quote
here:
`I have not sooner replied to your letter of the eighteenth of June, communicating
the intelligence of the untimely death of your brother, because in
attempts at consolation are apt to appear trite and cold, and can never reach
the deep-seated affliction. In such cases, it always appears to me better
to leave the heart to struggle with its own sorrows, and medicine its own ills;
and indeed, in healthful minds, as in healthful bodies, Providence has beneficently
implanted self-healing qualities, that in time close up and almost obliterate
the deepest wounds.
`I do not recollect to have met your brother more than once,[1]
but our
interview left a most favorable impression, which was confirmed and strengthened
by all I afterward knew of him. His career, though brief, has been
useful, honorable, popular, and I trust generally happy; and he has left behind
him writing which will make men love his memory and lament his loss.
Under such circumstances, a man has not lived in vain; and though his
death be premature, there is consolation to his survivors springing from
his very grave.
`Yours very truly,
Replete with characteristic feeling and beauty as is this most kind note,
which is cited as one of many kindred letters of condolence that reached me
at this period, I can not let it pass to the reader without saying, even at the
risk of exposing a mind bereft of self-healing qualities, and unhealthful, that
the deep wound which I have received only yawns the wider with the lapse
of time. Although `it is only dust that descends to dust;' although it was
`not the brother, the friend, the cherished being,' that went down into the
grave, to sleep in cold obstruction; yet it is to that grave that Memory still
points the unmoving finger. There every phase of nature is earliest marked.
There springs the first tender green of the early spring-time; there upon
the long grass shimmers down the sun-light through the heavy foliage of
thick-leaved June; there wails the November wind; there rustle the withered
leaves and fall the `sorrowing rains' of melancholy autumn; and there, in
the howling midnight storm, over the walls of St. Peter's church-yard, Winter
`weaves his frolic architecture of snow.' There, features once radiant
with intellectual light have faded into indistinctness; there the eye that loved
to look upon all the glorious works of God, is closed to color, and the ear to
sound; there the warm hand, whose cordial grasp of fraternal affection can
never be forgotten, moulders at the crumbling side. And upon the correspondence
traced through many years by that now wasted hand, I can not yet
look. Since the announcement, by the publishers, of the immediate issue
of the present work, I have tried repeatedly to overcome this reluctance, but
I can not. It may be a morbid feeling—doubtless it is; but it is not less certain
that with me it is irresistible. `There is some latent, some mysterious
of departed friends) `between those lifeless manuscripts and the
beings whose affections seem even yet to haunt and hover round them; and
the pulse beats, and the blood gushes through the loyal heart, as it vibrates
again to the well-remembered words, and half listens for the voice that might
have uttered them.' It is this ordeal which I can not yet brave.
Let me hope, therefore, that the reader will receive my apology for omitting
what I had hoped to be able to present; and accept the following brief
Memoir, as embracing all the essential facts in the history of its subject.
We quote from the article in `Graham's Magazine' to which we have alluded:
`Of the several excellent writers whose names we have placed upon our
catalogue as worthy of the honor we intend to do them (a series of portraits
of popular Philadelphia authors, accompanied by suitable notices of their
lives and works,) the first we select is that of Willis Gaylord Clark, whose
rare abilities as a poet, and whose qualities as a man, justify this distinction.
The life of a student is usually, almost necessarily, indeed, uneventful. Disinclined
by habit and association, and generally unfitted by temperament, to
mingle in the ruder scenes, the shocks and conflicts that mark the periods
of sterner existence, his biography furnishes but few salient points upon
which an inquirer can take hold. In the little circle which his affections
have gathered around him, he finds abundant sources of enjoyment and interest;
and though the world without may ring with his name, he pursues his
quiet and peaceful way, undisturbed by, if not insensible to, its praises. Such
has been eminently the case with the subject of this notice. With feelings
peculiarly fitted for social and domestic intercourse, and a heart overflowing
with the warmest and most generous impulses; and a shrinking sensitiveness
to obtrusive public regard, Mr. Clark has always sought those scenes in
which, while his talents found free scope, his native modesty was unwounded,
and he could exercise without restraint the Joftier charities of his nature.
`Mr. Clark was born in Otisco, a rich agricultural town in the county of
Onondaga, in the State of New York. His father was a soldier in the days of
the revolution, whose valor and services won for him tributes of acknowledgment
from the delegates of a grateful nation. He was, moreover, a man of
reading and talent, fond of collecting and studying useful books, and much
given to philosophical pursuits and inquiries. In his son Willis he found
an apt and anxious pupil; and the judicious teachings of the father, aided by
the classic inculcations of the Rev. George Colton, a maternal relative, laid
a broad and solid foundation for those acquirements which have since added
grace and vigor to the outpourings of genius. At a very early age, Mr. Clark
manifested poetic inclinations. Amid the glorious scenery that was outspread
on every side of him, he soon began to feel the yearnings of his Divine nature.
The spirit that was within him, stimulated by the magnificence of these external
objects, could not be repressed; and he painted the beauties of plain
and mountain; of the flower-clad valley and the forest-crowned hill; of the
gorgeous going down of the sun amid a profusion of dazzling tints and hues
such as nowhere else accompanied his setting; of the rich and vari-colored
whose unruffled bosom was placid as the soul of peace; in terms so glowing,
and with a distinctness and force, that showed an eye so quick to perceive,
and a mind so capable to appreciate, the loveliness of creation, that
it at once secured to him praise and admiration. As he grew older, there was
mingled with this exquisite power of description a tone of gentle solemnity,
a delicate sadness of thought; a strain of seriousness such as showed a paramount
desire to gather from the scenes and images reflected through his poetical
faculties, useful lessons of morality. We remember very well when
our attention was first drawn to his productions, and he was then but a boy,
that we were impressed with the fact just mentioned; and we admired that
one so young, should thus address himself directly to the hearts of his readers,
and stir up within them founts of tenderness and piety.
`After completing his scholastic course, Mr. Clark repaired to Philadelphia,
whither his reputation as a poet of much skill and a high degree of
promise, had already preceded him. Soon after his arrival, under the auspices
of the Rev. Dr. Ely, his patron and friend, he started a literary journal,
similar in its design and character to the `Mirror' of New York. Young,
inexperienced, and therefore incapable of managing the business details of
this undertaking with the necessary regard to its economy, he found that the
profits were disproportioned to the labor, and was soon induced to abandon
it. He conducted it, however, long enough to show that his powers of writing
were not confined to poetry alone, but that in various departments of prose
literature, previously unattempted by him, he possessed great aptitude; and
his criticisms on books and the arts indicated a vigorous and well-disciplined
taste, considerable power of analysis, just discrimination, and above all, a
generous forbearance toward all who were the subjects of his commentaries.
About the time this project failed, the Rev. Dr. Brantley, a Baptist clergyman
of great eminence, then in the pastoral charge of a church in this
city, and now President of the College of South Carolina[2]
assumed the care
of the `Columbian Star,' a religious and literary periodical, and associated
Mr. Clark with him in its conduct. From this connection Mr. Clark derived
many advantages. To an intellect of the very highest order; a copious
supply of various and rare learning; an eloquence which illuminated whatever
it was applied to; a remarkable purity and clearness of style, and the
most vigorous habits of thought, Dr. Brantley united a spirit touched with
the finest impulses of humanity, and an affability of demeanor, which, while
it imparted grace to his manner, made him in all circumstances, easy and
accessible. Upon his young friend and associate, these qualities acting with
a sympathetic influence, produced a lasting and most salutary impression.
The counsels of the divine pointed him to the path in which he ought to
tread; the example of the scholar inspired him with a generous emulation
and the mild benevolence of the Christian gentleman taught him the importance
of cultivating benignity of temper, and of subduing all untoward
published numerous fugitive pieces of a high grade of merit. Most of these
he suffered to remain uncollected, though many of them were stamped with
all the marks of genius. A few were afterward published in a duodecimo
volume, along with a poem of considerable length, called the `Spirit of Life,'
originally prepared as an exercise for a collegiate exhibition.
`Mr. Clark, after an agreeable and instructive association with the reverend
editor of the `Columbian Star,' was solicited to take charge of the
`Philadelphia Gazette,' the oldest and one of the most respectable daily journals
published in this city. With this solicitation he saw proper to comply,
and from the grateful cultivation of polite literature, he turned to the dry
and fatiguing duty of superintending the multifarious concerns of a political,
commercial, and advertising newspaper. In his new vocation, he acquitted
himself with credit and honor, and ultimately became the proprietor of the
establishment, which he continued to manage and direct until within a few
days of his death. Though avowedly partisan in his predilections, and doing
battle in good earnest for the cause which he espoused, Mr. Clark never
sacrificed his own opinions to any question or suggestion of expediency.
Never slavish, never even submissive to the dictates of self-assumed authority,
he upon all occasions preserved a fair, free, and upright policy, which deservedly
placed him high in the estimation of all honest and independent men.
`In 1836, Mr. Clark was married to Anne Poyntell Caldcleugh, the
daughter of one of our most wealthy and respectable citizens. In this lady
great personal beauty and varied accomplishments were joined to a most
tender and affectionate disposition, a meekness and serenity of mind, that
nothing could disturb. With such qualities in his bride, qualities that found
an answering echo in his own bosom, the married career of Mr. Clark was
for a time one of unclouded sunshine. Unhappily, his wife, whose constitution
was naturally delicate, was seized with that most terrible disease of
our climate, consumption, and after a long period of protracted suffering,
which she bore with a meekness and gentleness that endeared her infinitely
to her friends, she was taken away in the very prime of her youth
and happiness. A blow like this fell with a crushing weight upon the hopes
and enjoyments of her surviving partner; and in various tributes to her
memory, he evinced the deep grief of his afflicted spirit.
`Of Mr. Clark's general merits as a poet but one opinion can be entertained.
In the sweetness of his numbers, the elegance of his diction, the
propriety of his sentiments, and the chasteness of his imagery, he is scarcely
surpassed by any living writer. His earlier productions, as we have already
said, are all tinged by a hue of sadness, but it is a sadness without gloom;
and while they vividly portray the chances and changes of life, and the shifting
aspects of nature, they inculcate the important truth that there is a higher
and a better world, for which our affections are chastened, and our desires
made perfect by suffering. In an extended notice of Mr. Clark's
writings, published in the `American Quarterly Review,' we find a concise
and forcible delineation of his peculiarities and style. After some general
remarks, the reviewer says:
`With the exception of a small volume published some years since, we believe that
Mr. Clark's effusions have not been collected. They have appeared at irregular and
often remote intervals; and though their beauty and pathos have won the applause of
the first writers of this country and England, they have not made that impression
which if united they could not fail to produce. Mr. Clark's distinguishing traits are
tenderness, pathos, and melody. In style and sentiment he is wholly original, but if
he resemble any writer, it is Mr. Bryant. The same lofty tone of sentiment, the
same touches of melting pathos, the same refined sympathies with the beauties and
harmonies of nature, and the same melody of style, characterise, in an almost equal
degree, these delightful poets. The ordinary tone of Mr. Clark's poetry is gentle,
solemn, and tender. Ilis effusions flow in melody from a heart full of the sweetest affections,
and upon their surface is mirrored all that is gentle and beautiful in nature,
rendered more beautiful by the light of a lofty and religious imagination. He is one
of the few writers who have succeeded in making the poetry of religion attractive.
Young is sad, and austere, Cowper is at times constrained, and Wordsworth is much
too dreamy for the mass; but with Clark religion is unaffectedly blended with the
simplest and sweetest affections of the heart. His poetry glitters with the dew, not
of Castaly, but of heaven. No man, however cold, can resist the winning and natural
sweetness and melody of the tone of piety that pervades his poems. All the voices
of nature speak to him of religion; he
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.'
with this spirit. The entire absence of affectation or artifice in Mr. Clark's poetry
also deserves the highest commendation. Though always poetical he is always natural;
he sacrifices nothing for effect, and does not seek his subjects or his figures from
the startling or the extravagant. There is an uniform and uninterrupted propriety in
his writings. His taste is not merely cultivated and refined, but sensitively fastidious,
and shrinks, with instinctive delicacy, from anything that could distort the tranquil
and tender beauty of his lines. His diction is neither quaint nor common-place, bloated
nor tame, but is natural, classic, and expressive. In the art of versification, he appears
to be nearly perfect; we know no poet in the language who is more regular, animated,
and euphonious.
`The Spirit of Life' is one of the most labored, though certainly not the most successful
of Mr. Clark's poems. It occupies the larger portion of the only volume
which he has given to the public. The dedication, though we confess it is not precisely
to our taste, is euthusiastic and fervid. It is excused, however, by the general
admiration at that time manifested for the author of Pelham, and was perhaps due as
a grateful tribute to a distinguished author, who had previously spoken of his poems
in high terms, and of himself as a gentlemen, `who has an enviable genius, to be excited
in a new and unexhausted country, and a glorious career before him, where, in
manners, scenery, and morals, hitherto undescribed and unexhausted, he can find
wells where he himself may be the first to drink.'
`As a prose writer, Mr. Clark possesses a rare combination of dissimilar qualities.
At times eloquent, vehement, and impussioned, pouring out his thoughts in a fervent
tide of strong and stirring language, he sweeps the feelings of his readers along with
him, and at others playful, jocular, and buoyant, he dallies with his subject, and mingles
mirth and argument, drollery and gravity, so oddly, yet so aptly, that the effect
is irresistible. Few men have a more acute perception of the ludicrous; few understand
better how to move the strings of laughter, and when he chooses to indulge in
strains of humor, his good-natured jests, and `quips and cranks and wanton wiles,' show
the fullness of his powers, and the benevolent strain of his feelings. In kindness and
pathos, when such is the bent of his inclination, his prose essays are not inferior to
his poetical compositions.'
`Mr. Clark was for many years a liberal contributor to the periodical and
annual literature of this country. He was also a frequent correspondent of
the leading English magazines. `The tales and essays,' says the author of
`The Poets and Poetry of America,' `which he found leisure to write for
the New York Knickerbocker Magazine, and especially a series of amusing
papers under the quaint title of `Ollapodiana,' will long be remembered
for their heart-moving and mirth-provoking qualities.'
A portrait accompanied the sketch to which we have referred; but it
person Mr. Clark was of the middle height; his form was erect and manly,
and his countenance pleasing and expressive. In ordinary intercourse he
was cheerful and animated, and he was studious to conform to the conventional
usages of society. Warm-hearted, confiding, and generous, he was
a true friend; and by those who knew him intimately, he was much beloved.'
The following account of the last hours of the subject of this Memoir
was written by the undersigned for the `Editor's Table' of the Knickerbocker
Magazine for July, 1841:
`Our brother is no more!' Death, the pale messenger, has beckoned
him silently away; and the spirit which kindled with so many elevated
thoughts; which explored the chambers of human affection, and awakened
so many warm sympathies; which rejoiced with the glad, and grieved with
the sorrowing, has ascended to mansions of eternal repose. And there is
one, reader, who above all others feels how much gentleness of soul, how
much fraternal affection and sincere friendship; how much joyous bilarity,
goodness, poetry, have gone out of the world; and he will be pardoned for
dwelling in these pages, so often enriched by the genius of the Departed,
upon the closing scenes of his earthly career. Since nearly a twelve-month
the deceased has `died daily' in the eyes of the writer of this feeble tribute.
He saw that Disease sat at his heart, and was gnawing at its cruel leisure;
that in the maturity of every power, in the earthly perfection of every faculty;
`when experience had given facility to action and success to endeavor,'
he was fast going down to darkness and the worm. Thenceforth were treasured
up every soul-fraught epistle and the recollection of each recurring
interview, growing more and more frequent, until at length Life like a spent
steed `panted to its goal,' and Death sealed up the glazing eye and stilled
the faltering tongue. Leaving these, however, with many other treasured
remains and biographical facts for future reference and preservation in this
Magazine, we pass to the following passages of a letter recently received
from a late but true friend of the lamented deceased, Rev. Dr. Ducachet,
Rector of St. Stephen's Church, Philadelphia; premising merely, that the
reverend gentleman had previously called upon him at his special instance,
in the last note he ever penned; that `his religious faith was manifested in
a manner so solemn, so frank, and so cordial,' as to convince the affectionate
pastor that the failing invalid, aware that he must die of the illness under
which he was suffering, had long been seeking divine assistance to prepare
him for the issue so near at hand:
`At four o'clock on Friday p. m. the day before his death, I saw him
again, he himself having selected the time, thinking that he was strongest
in the afternoon. But there was an evident change for the worse; and he
was laboring under fever. His religious feelings were however even more
satisfactory, and his views more clear, than the day before. He assured me
that he enjoyed a sweet peace in his mind, and that he had no apprehension
about death. He was `ready to depart' at any moment. I was unwilling
to disturb him by much talking, or a very long visit, and made several
not to be resisted, he urged me to remain. His heart seemed full of joy and
peace; overflowing with gratitude to God for his goodness, and with kindness
to me. Leaving him, after an hour's interview, I promised to return
on Saturday a.m., at ten o'clock, and to administer baptism to him then. This
was done accordingly, in the presence of his father-in-law, and three or four
other friends and connexions, whom he had summoned to his bed, as he
told me, for the express purpose of letting them see his determination to
profess the faith of the gospel which in life he had so long neglected. It
was a solemn, moving sight; one of the most interesting and affecting I ever
saw. More devotion, humility, and placid confidence in God, I never saw
in any sick man. I mentioned to him that as his strength was evidently declining,
it would be well for him to say every thing he desired to say to me
then, as his voice and his faculties might fail. He then affectionately placed
his arms around my neck; gently drew my ear near to his lips, that I might
hear his whispers; and after thanking me over and over again for my small
attentions to him, which his gratitude magnified into very high services, he
proceeded to tell me what he wished done with his `poor body.' He expressed
very great anxiety to see you, and he very much feared that he should
die before your expected arrival at midnight. But he said he left that matter
and every other to God's disposal. As I was leaving him, he said, `Call
again to-day,' which I promised to do in the evening. He told me he felt a
happy persuasion that when he passed from this miserable world and that
enfeebled body, he should enter upon `the inheritance incorruptible, undefiled,
and that fadeth not away.' He asked: `Do you observe how these
words labor to convey the idea of Heaven's blessedness to our feeble minds?
`The inheritance incorruptible!' Beautiful thought! `Undefiled'—more
beautiful still! `That fadeth not away'—most beautiful of all! I think I
understand something of the peace and glory these redoubled words were
designed to express.' And then, raising his wasted hand, with great emphasis
he said, `I shall soon know all about it, I trust!'
`In the evening, about seven o'clock, I received a message from him to
come immediately to him. I was there by eight. I was surprised to find
that he had rallied so much. There was a strength I had not seen before;
and his fine open features were lighted up with unusual brilliancy. In every
way he seemed better; and I flattered myself that he would live to see you,
and even hold out for a day or two more. I had much charming conversation
with him about his state of feeling, his views of himself as a sinner,
and of God, and of Jesus Christ as a precious Saviour, and of heaven, etc.
He then handed me a prayer-book, adding, `That was my Anne's,' meaning
his wife's. `Now read me the office for the sick in this book. I want
the whole of it. I have read it myself over and over, since you pointed it
out to me, and it is delightful.' He then repeated the sentence, `I know
that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand in the latter day upon the
earth,' and asked if that was not a part of it. I told him that that belonged
to the burial service. `Then,' said he, `it is quite suitable for me, for it will
soon be read by you over my grave.' I sat by his bed, and found the place.
in secret prayer, and was unwilling to interrupt him. But he remained silent
so long, seeming to take no notice of me, that I spoke to him. I found
that his mind was wandering, and that speech had failed. He muttered indistinctly
only. From that moment, he sank gradually away. His emaciated
limbs were retracted and cold; his pulse failed; the shadow of death
gathered fast and dark upon his countenance; his respiration became feebler
and feebler; and at last, at precisely five minutes past ten, he died. So imperceptibly
and gently did his happy spirit flee away, that it was some time
before we could ascertain that he had gone. I never saw a gentler death.
There was no pain, no distress, no shuddering, no violent disruption of the
ties of life. Both as to the mind's peace and the body's composure, it was
a beautiful instance of ευθανασια. The change which indicated the approach
of his last moment, took place about half an hour only before he died.
Such, my dear Sir, are all the chief particulars I can remember, and which
I have thought you would desire to know.'
A few summary `Reflections' upon the character of the lamented deceased
succeed, which although intended, as was the foregoing, only for a
brother's eye, we cannot resist the desire to cite in this connexion:
`He was, so far as his character revealed itself to me, a man of a most
noble, frank, and generous nature. He was as humble as a little child. He
exhibited throughout most remarkable patience. He never complained.
But once, while I was on bended knees, praying with him for patience to be
given him, and acknowledging that all he had suffered was for the best, he
clasped his hands together, and exclaimed, `Yes! right, right—all right!'
... He was one of the most affectionate-hearted men I ever saw. Every
moment I spent with him, he was doing or saying something to express to me
his attachment. He would take my hand, or put his arm around my neck,
or say something tender, to tell me that he loved me. He showed the same
kind feeling to his attendants, his faithful nurse, Rebecca, and to the humblest
of the servants.... He was of course, with such a heart, grateful
for the smallest attentions. He received the most trifling office with thanks.
I observed this most remarkably on the evening of his death. I had taken
my son with me, that he might sit up with him on Saturday night, if occasion
should require. When I mentioned that the youth was in the room, he
called for him; welcomed him most kindly, thanked him over and over for
his friendly intentions; and in fact, broke out into the warmest expressions of
gratitude for what his sensitive and generous heart took to be a high act of
favor. All this was within an hour and a half of his death.... Finally,
I believe he was a truly religious man. I have no doubt that he was fully
prepared for his end; and that through the sacrifice of the cross, and the
Saviour who died there for sinners, he was pardoned and accepted. He has
gone, I feel persuaded, to the abodes of peace, where the souls of those who
sleep in the Lord Jesus enjoy perpetual felicity and rest.'
Surely all who peruse the foregoing affecting record, may exclaim with
the poet whom we lament:
Grow passionless and cold—
To feel those longings to depart,
That cheered the saints of old;
To clasp the faith which looks on high,
Which fires the Christian's dying eye,
And makes the curtain-fold
That falls upon his wasting breast
The door that leads to endless rest.
On that triumphant bed,
Till the free spirit mounts on high,
By white-winged seraphs led;
Where glories earth may never know,
O'er `many mansions' lingering, glow,
In peerless lustre shed;
It were not lonely thus to soar
Where sin and grief can sting no more!'
One of the Philadelphia journals, in announcing his demise observes:
`Mr. Clark was a scholar, a poet, and a gentleman. `None knew him but
to love him.' His health had for a long time been failing. The death of
his accomplished and lovely wife, a few years ago, upon whom he doated
with a passionate and rapturous fondness, had shaken his constitution, and
eaten his strength. None but intimate friends knew the influence of that
sad affiction upon his physical frame. To the last his heart yearned over
the dust of that lovely woman. In his death-chamber, her portrait stood
always before him on his table, and his loving eye turned to it even in extremest
pain, as though it were his living and only friend.' This is literally
true. Beyond question, moreover, the seeds of the disease which finally
removed him from the world, were `sown in sorrow' for the death of the
cherished companion of his bosom. His letters, his gradually-declining
health, his daily life, his published writings, all evince this. The rose on
the cheek and the canker at the heart do not flourish at the same time
The ms. of the `Dirge in Autumn' came to us literally sprinkled with
spreading tear-drops; and the familiar correspondence of the writer is replete
with kindred emotion. To the last moment of his life, he kept a collection
the letters of `his Anne' under his pillow, which he as regularly perused
every morning as his Bible and prayer-book. Her portrait, draped in
black, crossed the angle of the apartment, above his table, where it might
gaze ever upon him with its `large, bright, spiritual eyes.' Never shall we
forget his apostrophe to that beautiful picture, when his `flesh and his heart
failed him,' and he knew that he must soon go hence, to be here no more:
`Sleep on, my love!' said he, in the beautiful and touching words of the
Bishop of Chichester's `Exequy on the Death of a Beloved Wife,' and in a
voice scareely audible through his frequent sobs:
Never to be disquicted:
My last `good night'!—thou wilt not wake
Till I thy fate shall overtake:
Marry my body to that dust
It so much loves; and fill the room
My heart keeps vacant in thy tomb.
To meet thee in that hollow vale;
And think not much of my delay,
I am already on the way;
And follow thee with all the speed
Desire can make, or sorrows breed.
Each minute is a short degree,
And every hour a step toward thee;
At night, when I betake to rest,
Next morn I rise nearer my West
Of life, almost by eight hours' sail,
Than when Sleep breathed his drowsy gale.'
Most just the tribute we have seen paid to the affection and patience and
grateful spirit of the deceased. To the last, his heart was full-fraught with
all tender reminiscences and associations. In the first stages of his illness,
when as yet it was scarcely known to affect his general routine of life, he
thus replies to a remonstrance from the writer against the growing infrequency
of his familiar letters: `In these spring days, Lewis, all my old
feelings come freshly up, and assure me that I am unchanged. I shall be
the same always; so do you be. `Twinn'd, both at a birth,' the only
pledges of our parents' union, we should be all the world to each other:
Be faithful till we die;
Shoulder to shoulder let us stand,
Till side by side we lie!'
As he gradually grew weaker and weaker, the `childhood of the soul'
seemed to be renewed; the intellectual light to burn brighter and brighter,
and the chastened fancy to become more vivid and refined. He was for some
months aware that he had not long to live. `I shall die,' said he, a few
weeks since, `in the leafy month of June; beautiful season!' And turning
his head to gaze upon the trees in the adjoining cemetery-grove, whose
heavy foliage was swaying in the summer wind, he murmured to himself the
touching lines of Bryant:
The season's glorious show,
Nor will its brightness shine for me,
Nor its wild music flow;
But if around my place of sleep
The friends I love shall come to weep,
They may not haste to go:
Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom,
Will keep them lingering by my tomb:
These to their softened hearts will bear
The thought of what has been,
And speak of one who cannot share
The gladness of the scene.'
How forcibly were the recollections of this scene borne in upon the
mind, as the long procession, following the friend for whom they mourned,
defiled into the gates of St. Peter's, on that brightest morning of the month
of his heart; the officiating divine from whom we have quoted chaunting elo
he has gone! leaving behind him a name to live, as we trust, in the
heart of the nation. As a moral poet, we know not a line which dying he
could have wished to blot. He was an American, in all his heart, and loved
to dwell upon the future destiny of his beloved country. He was a sincere,
unvarying, unflinching Friend; and although in his long career as editor
of an influential daily journal, and in his enlarged intercourse in society, it were
not strange were it otherwise, yet it has been truly remarked by one of his
contemporaries—all of whom, let us gratefully add, have borne the warmest
testimony to his genius and his worth—that `it may be said Mr. Clark
had no enemy, and only encountered attacks from one or two coarse and
unworthy sources, against which no character, however gentle and deserving,
could have immunity.' Another observes, that `it was in the character of
an editor that he won upon the feelings and affections of so many, and entitled
himself to the regard of his brethren of the press, toward whom he always
acted with courtesy; positive, when invited by kindred propriety;
negative, when he believed unkindness or inability to appreciate courtesy
existed.' So to live among his fellow men as did the deceased, and at last,
`with heart-felt confidence in God, and the sacramental seal almost fresh
upon his brow, gently to fall asleep in Jesus, looking with a Christian's hope
for a Christian's reward,'[3] surely thus `to die is gain!' And in view of
such a hope and such an end, well may we who, left behind to drag a
maimed life, exclaim with the poet:
Emancipates—the rest is bliss—
I would I were away!'
It may not be amiss to explain, in closing, that `Ollapodiana' is intended
to designate the familiar chat or gossip, of a personage like Dr. Ollapod
in the play, upon all such themes as may chance to enlist the fancy or touch
the heart. The different chapters, although originally separated by intervals
of a month, and sometimes by a longer period, it is believed will be
found to lose none of their interest from being presented in consecutive order.
The great variety of style and theme by which they are characterized
will save them from any charge of monotony. As many of the author's
best poems were introduced into this series of prose papers, I have not
thought it advisable to separate them from their original connection. In
one word, I have made the best arrangement of the materials I possessed
which I could, with the leisure left me from the cares of a never-ending
still-beginning literary avocation; and I leave the result with the public,
anxious mainly to be acquitted of doing injustice to one whose ear is `deaf
forever to the voice of praise,' but whose memory I would fain hope his
country will not willingly let die.'
| The literary remains of the late Willis Gaylord Clark | |