I've seen a sack upon his back

As thick as the miller, and quite as long.

Always busy, and always merry,

Always doing his very best,
A notable wag was Little Jerry,
Who uttered well his standing jest.

How Jerry lived is known to fame,
But how he died there's none may know;
One autumn day the rumor came,
"The brook and Jerry are very low."

And then 'twas whispered, mournfully,
The leech had come, and he was dead;
And all the neighbors flocked to see;

"Poor Little Jerry!" was all they said.

They laid him in his earthy bed,His miller's coat his only shroud; “Dust to dust," the parson said,

And all the people wept aloud.

For he had shunned the deadly sin,
And not a grain of over-toll
Had ever dropped into his bin,
To weigh upon his parting soul.

Beneath the hill there stands the mill,
Of wasting wood and crumbling stone;
The wheel is dripping and clattering still,
But Jerry, the miller, is dead and gone.

The foregoing extracts, we think, will serve as tolerably fair specimens of Saxe's ability in the several spheres of satire, humor, sentiment, and pathos. It will be seen his satire bites on the grin. He attacks abuses by ingeniously disclosing any possible comicalities or ludicrous absurdities they may possess, and rests satisfied when he has provoked the laugh against them.

Saxe, however, finds his truest and happiest employ in poems where humor, wit, and a prevailing bonhomie consti

tute the ingredients. This class of composition comprises by far the majority of his poems. In a few instances, however, he has ventured beyond the immediate influence of Momus into the realm of fantasy and of earnest and tender sentiments, and has here proven himself so appreciative and eloquent that it is to be regretted he has not oftener indulged in this vein.

แ

"Like our best humorists, he shows that the founts of tears and laughter lie close together; for his power of pathos is almost as marked as that of fun."*

"His verse is nervous and generally highly finished, and in almost all cases it is admirably calculated for the production of the desired effects."+

* Atlantic Monthly, July, '66.

† R. W. Griswold.

LOWELL.

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL was born, February 22, 1819, at the country-seat of Elmwood, Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1838 he graduated at Harvard. Three years later he gave to the public his first literary offering-a volume of poems entitled A Year's Life. This was followed in 1844 by a second volume, styled Legend of Brittany, Miscellaneous Poems and Sonnets. These, while they lacked not the sensibility and poetic tenderness of the first series, were more artistic, and evinced a power in the elements of intense feeling also.

A volume of prose essays, displaying a critical familiarity with English literature, was issued in 1845, by title, Conversations on Some of the Old Poets. The year 1848 was one prolific in works from our author's pen, no less than four volumes appearing. They were a new series of Poems,. The Vision of Sir Launfal, A Fable for Critics, and The Biglow Papers.

The last named production "purports to be written by Homer Wilbur, A. M., Pastor of the First Church in Jaalam and (prospective) member of many literary, learned, and scientific societies. It is cast in the Yankee dialect, and is quite an artistic production in that peculiar lingo. The subject is an exposure of the political pretences and shifts which accompanied the war with Mexico, the satire being directed against war and slavery. It is original in style and pungent in effect."*

In the winter of 1854-5, Lowell delivered in Boston a series of twelve lectures on the British poets. The favorable opinion created by these, it is surmised, helped our author into the chair of modern languages and belles-lettres just being vacated by Longfellow, at Harvard. In 1857, upon

*Duyckinck's Cyclopedia of American Literature.

the establishment of the Atlantic Monthly, Lowell was made its editor, and exercised the functions of this office for ́about five years. Again, after a brief interval, he was called to a participation in the editorial management of the North American Review, which position he continues to hold.

His works, not already mentioned, are Fireside Travels (1864), a new instalment of the Biglow Papers, abounding in wit, humor, and practical wisdom touching the topics of the times, Under the Willows, and other Poems (1869), The Cathedral (1870), Among my Books (1870), and My Study Windows (1871).

Among the poets of America, Lowell is distinguished by the great range, (if we may use the expression,) as well as by the versatility, of his powers. He seems equally at home in the playful, the pathetic, or the meditative realms of poetry. And we always rise from the perusal of his productions with the impression that he has not put forth all his strength, but that, had he aspired to something still higher, it would not have been beyond the reach of his genius."*

“The music of his verse seems the unsought charm of the words that could most clearly give his sense; and the sincerity and originality of his genius are in nothing more manifest than in a diction as distinctively his own as it is inartificial and unmannered. . . . There is as fresh and racy a flavor in his phrase as if he had newly plucked it from the fields, and it were part of the great life of skies and woods and seas on which, in its relation to that of man, he dwells with so true a love." †

"Lowell's prose-writings are as remarkable as his poetry: the copiousness of his illustrations, the richness of his imagery, the easy flow of his sentences, the keenness of his wit, and the force and clearness of his reasoning, give to his reviews and essays a fascinating charm that would * Lippincott's Pronouncing Dictionary of Biography. † Atlantic Monthly, Feb., '69.

place him in the front rank of our prose-writers, if he did not occupy a similar position among our poets."

A LETTER

From Mr. Ezekiel Biglow of Jaalam to the Hon. Joseph T. Buckingham, Editor of the Boston Courier, inclosing a poem of his son, Mr. Hosea Biglow.

JAYLEM, june, 1846.

MISTER EDDYTER: Our Hosea wuz down to Boston last week, and he see a cruetin sarjunt a struttin round as popler as a hen with 1 chicking, with 2 fellers a drummin and fifin arter him like all nater. the sarjunt he thout Hosea hedn't gut his i teeth cut cos he looked a kindo's though he'd jist come down, so he cal'lated to hook him in, but Hosy woodn't take none o' his sarse for all he hed much as 20 Rooster's tales stuck onto his hat and eenamost enuf brass a bobbin up and down on his shoulders and figured onto his coat and trousis, let alone wut nater hed sot in his featers, to make a 6 pounder out on.

wal, Hosea he com home considerabal riled, and arter I'd gone to bed I heern Him a thrashin round like a short-tailed Bull in fli-time. The old Woman ses she to me ses she, Zekle, ses she, our Hosee's gut the chollery or suthin anuther ses she, don't you Bee skeered, ses I, he's oney amakin pottery ses i, he's ollers on hand at that ere busynes like Da & martin, and shure enuf, cum mornin, Hosy he cum down stares full chizzle, hare on eend and cote tales flyin, and sot rite of to go reed his varses to Parson Wilbur, bein he haint aney grat a shows o' book larnin himself, bimeby he cum back and sed the parson wuz dreffle tickled with 'em as i hoop you will Be, and said they wuz True grit.

Hosea ses taint hardly fair to call 'em hisn now, cos the parson kind o' slicked off sum o' the last varses, but he told Hosee he didn't want to put his ore in to tetch to the Rest on 'em, bein they wuz verry well As they wuz, and then Hosy ses he sed suthin a nuther about Simplex Mundishes or sum sech feller, but I guess Hosea kind o' didn't hear him, for I never hearn o' nobody o'that name in the villadge, and I've lived here man and boy 76 year cum next tater diggin, and thair aint no wheres a kitting spryer 'n I be.

If you print 'em I wish you'd jest let folks know who hosy's father is, cos my ant Keziah used to say it's nater to be curus ses she, she aint livin though and he's a likely kind o' lad.

EZEKIEL BIGLOW.

*The Homes of American Authors.