And lady, when this cake you press, Of life an emblem true; Man's but a bubble on the leaf, That breaks e'en at the view. His muse is ready to greet all comers, from the "Mouse which took lodgings with the author in a public house, near the Park, New York," Fly not, poor trembler, from my bed, For here no murderous snare is spread, up to General La Fayette. Christmas and the Fourth of July are of course celebrated, nor is the "First of May in New York" neglected, as a stanza or two of a comic song, "sung with applause at Chatham Garden," rattles off like the heterogeneous laden carts in active motion on that day. First of May-clear the way! Pots and kettles, broken victuals, "A Large Nose and an Old Coat" show that the writer did not disdain familiar themes, while an "Ode to Genius, suggested by the present unhappy condition of the BOSTON BARD, an eminent poet of this country," stands in evidence that the bard held the poetaster's usual estimate of his powers. Coffin was at one period of his life a sailor, or, to use his own expression, a Marine Bachelor.' He died at Rowley, Mass., in May, 1827, at the early age of thirty. The following song would do honor to a poet of far higher pretensions. SONG. Love, the leaves are falling round thee; Then say with me, Love, wilt thou flee, Nor wait to hear sad autumn's prayer; For winter rude Will soon intrude, Nor aught of summer's blushing beauties spare. Love, wilt thou flee, NATHANIEL LANGDON FROTHINGHAM was born at Boston July 23, 1793. After a preparation for college at the public schools of that city, he entered Harvard, where he completed his course in 1811. He next became an assistant teacher in the Boston Latin school, and afterwards a private tutor in the family of Mr. Lyman of Waltham. In 1812, when only nineteen, he was appointed instructor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard, being the first incumbent of the office. He pursued theological studies at the same time, and on the 15th of March, 1815, was ordained pastor of the First Church in Boston; a charge which he retained until 1850, when he resigned in consequence of ill health. Dr. Frothingham is the author of from forty to fifty sermons and addresses, published in separate forms,* and of a volume, Sermons in the order of a Twelvemonth, none of which had previously appeared. He has also contributed numerous prose articles to various religious periodicals. His poetical career was commenced by the delivery of a poem in the junior year of his col * The following list includes most of these productions:--On the Death of Dr. Joseph McKean: 1818. Artillery Election Sermon: 1825. On the Death of President John Adams: 1826. Plea against Religious Controversy: 1829. Terms of Acceptance with God: 1829. Centennial Sermon on Two Hundred Years Ago: 1830. Signs in the Sun; On the great Eclipse of February 12: 1881. Barabbas preferred: 1832. Centennial Sermon of the Thursday Lecture: 1833. On the Death of Lafayette: 1834. Twentieth Anniversary of my Ordination: 1835. On the Death of J. G. Stevenson, M.D.: 1835. At the Installation of Rev. Wm. P. Lunt, at Quincy: 1835. At the Ordination of Mr. Edgar Buckingham: 1836. The Ruffian Released: 1836. The Chamber of Imagery: 1836. Duties of Hard Times: 1837. On the Death of Joseph P. Bradlee: 1838. All Saints' Day: 1840. The New Idolatry: 1840. The Solemn Week: 1841. Death of Dr. T. M. Harris, and of Hon. Daniel Sargent 1842. The Believer's Rest: 1843. On the Death of Rev. Dr. Greenwood: 1843. The Duty of the Citizen to the Law: 1844. Address to the Alumni of the Theological School: 1844. Deism or Christianity? Four Discourses: 1845. Ordination of O. Frothingham: 1847. Funeral of Rev. Dr. Thomas Gray: 1847. A Fast Sermon-National Sins: 1847. Paradoxes in the Lord's Supper: 1848. A Fast Sermon; God among the Nations: 1848. Water into the City of Boston: 1848. Salvation through the Jews: 1850. Death of Hon. P. C. Brooks: 1849. Gold: 1849. Sermon on resigning my Ministry: 1850. Great Men; Washington's Birth-Day: 1852. Days of Mourning must end: 1853. lege course, at the inauguration of President Kirkland, which has never been published, but is still remembered with favor by its auditors. He has since contributed several occasional poems of great beauty to the magazines, written numerous hymus, which hold a place in the collections, and translated various specimens of the modern German poets. A collection of these, with the title Metrical Pieces, Translated and Original, appeared in 1855, and Part Second in 1870. He died in Boston, April 3, 1870. HYMN. O God, whose presence glows in all Whose word is Truth, whose name is Love. That truth be with the heart believed Of all who seek this sacred place; To keep us meek and make us free, Send in its calm upon the breast; THE MO LEAN ASYLUM, SOMERVILLE, MASS, O House of Sorrows! How thy domes A rich gay mansion once wert thou; On that hill's proud but gentle brow, Years, pains, and cost have reared it high, But all its fireside pleasures-where are they? A stranger might suppose the spot Some seat of learning, shrine of thought Ah! here alone Mind ripens not, And nothing reasons, nothing can be taught. Or he might deem thee a retreat For the poor body's need and ail; When sudden injuries stab and beat, Or in slow waste its inward forces fail. O House of Sorrows! Sorer shocks The mental, moral, bodily parts, So nicely separate, strangely blent, Or sink together, wildered all and spent. Of grief and wonder for the musing soul! Brought to that last resort,--the last, the last. O House of Mercy! Refuge kind For Nature's most unnatural state! Place for the absent, wandering mind, Its healing helper and its sheltering gate! What woes did man's own cruel fear Once add to his crazed brother's doom! Neglect, aversion, tones severe, The chain, the lash, the fetid, living tomb! He lays on that crazed brother's head! Yes, Love has planned thee, Love endowed;-- Or bears in thee each day its healthful part: Than when the wretch no force could bindThe roving, raving Gadarene Sat at his blessed feet, and in his perfect mind ? ** RICHARD FROTHINGHAM, JR. MR. RICHARD FROTHINGHAM, JR., the author of the thorough and valuable History of the Siege of Boston, is a relative of Dr. Frothingham. He was born at Charlestown, January 31, 1812. Many years of his life were devoted to the public service, and to the editorship of the Boston Post, of which he is one of the proprietors. He served five terms in the legislature of Massachusetts, and was mayor of his native city for two years. In 1853 he was a delegate to the convention to revise the State constitution, and of late years treasurer to the Massachusetts Historical Society. His chief labors and reputation, however, are connected with his admirable contributions to historic literature. These are warmly commended by such scholars as the late Edward Everett and George Bancroft, as accurate, impartial, and judicious monographs. His works embrace: History of Charlestown (1848); History of the Siege of Boston, and of the Battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill: Also an Account of the Bunker Hill Monument, with Illustrative Documents (1849); Life and Times of Gen. Joseph Warren (1865); Tribute to Thomas Starr King (1865); and The Rise of the Republic of the United States (1872). The writing of such elaborate works con amore fitly introduced the author to the last the crowning work of his life. In his prefatory words to the Rise of the Republic, Mr. Frothingham states he was led "to historical research having in view the one clear and distinct object of tracing the development of the national life; a theme separate from the ordinary course of civil and military transactions, and requiring events to be selected from their principles, and to be traced to their causes. The theme, as I went on, seemed to grow beyond my reach. I well knew that it was only by patient labor that I could hope to justify the attempt to deal with it. I tried to form in my mind a picture of the many streams that met and united in the current which terminated in the broad expanse of a nation. I also endeavored to form an idea of the spirit of the men of the past, from their own words uttered in the midst of their labors, and wet as it were with the sweat of their brows, of the conservatives who tried to stay the current, as well as of the men of progress who recognized it and were borne onward by it. Yet the attainment of the ideal is but the commencement of the work. The difficulty is to make the page alive with the moving waters." THE IDEA OF NATIONAL UNION FROM THE RISE OF An early American writer and pioneer states, that the people saw, by daily experience in the beginnings of their work, that they could not succeed in their undertaking without an agreement with one another for mutual assistance; and that they thought the colonies would one day be "joined together in one common bond of unity and peace."* The appreciation of a great and vital want will account for the origin of the idea of a common union. A study of its embodiment reveals the feature of growth. It is so original and peculiar, that it may be termed American. As the main object of these pages is to trace this development, it would anticipate the narrative to enlarge, in this place, on details. The first conception of an American Union entertained by the founders of New England was to join in political bonds only those colonies in which the people were of a similar way of thinking in theology, when, in the spirit of a theocracy, they aimed to form a Christian State in the bosom of the Church. This was embodied in the New England Confederacy (1643 to 1684). Its basis was not broad enough to embrace the whole of this territory, or sufficiently just to include all its population. The next tendencies to a union are seen after New-Netherland was added to the dominions of the British Crown, and was called New York. In the inter-colonial correspondence that took place, growing out of the Revolution of 1689 in the colonies, and in the call of a congress, in 1690, for the safety of the whole land, there appears the conception of a union as comprehensive as the colonies. Union was continuously suggested during the succeeding seventy years (1690 to 1760). The class who urged it from an American point of view, and for objects in harmony with the free institutions that had taken root, aimed mainly at removing the obstructions that rival communities threw in the way of progress, and at providing for the common defence. It was urged, that the people who were occupying this portion of North America were naturally linked together by material interests; sympathized instinctively with free institutions; and had before them a common destiny, and hence ought to be united in a common polity. But circumstances prevented the formation of a public opinion in favor of the adoption of any of the schemes that were presented. The Plan of Union, recommended by a Convention held at Albany in 1754, was rejected by all the colonies. The idea of union received a great impetus when the policy was adopted by the cabinet of George III. to govern and tax America. This policy involved aggression on the old right of self-government. Union was then enjoined upon the colonies by the popular leaders, as the sum of American politics; the demand of the hour, to promote * Hubbard's History of New England, 465. He wrote before 1682. social, political, and national well-being; the path of duty and of honor; the way pointed out by Providence to successfully resist aggression, and to obtain a redress of grievances. The sentiment deepened into conviction, and this ripened into faith in its practicability. It was the religion of politics. Union became a fact, and had the moral force of unwritten law. Under its rule and inspiration, a rare and rich public life rose into great political action, through an efficient party organization. At length thirteen United Colonies stood (1774) in the attitude of armed resistance to the measures of the ministry; and, in the spirit in which the Great Charter was wrung from King John, they demanded their liberties under the British Constitution. In this situation, American society, imbued with the germinal spirit and influence of the doctrine of freedom and equality, claimed the right to hold on to what it had gained and the right of progress for the future. Union had been urged up to this time, by the colonies, not merely in the spirit of allegiance to the crown, but with feelings of pride in being parts of a great empire; but their attitude was pronounced from the throne to be rebellion, and the force of the nation was summoned to suppress it. This was an assertion, based upon the Past of Absolutism and Privilege, of a right to give the local law to America. This forced the popular party to accept the situation of revolution, and to aim at the object of separation. There was then grafted on and blended with the conception of union, the sentiment of nationality. This found proud embodiment in the Declaration of Independence. When the people passed from the status of subjects, exercising powers of government under the crown as dependent colonies, to that of sovereigns in a nation composed of independent States, they had a deeply rooted conviction, that one general government, or one American constitution, was a necessity. They kept in view, in their utterances, distinctly and steadily, the aim of framing a system that should protect individuals, municipalities, and States, in their several spheres of action, while it should provide for an efficient discharge of national offices. The first result reached in “The Articles of Confederation" recognized the historic local self-government, but failed to adequately embody the idea of national union, and this form proved incompetent to secure the blessings that had been attained by the Revolution; but both ideas, as they had been applied in institutions, were reorganized in the next great result of "The More Perfect Union" of the Constitution of the United States, which was ordained as the supreme law of the land. The Republic thus established rose, as the fulfilment of a logical sequence, from a state of society in which rank and privilege did not exist. The principles on which it was founded were brought over by the emigrants; so that the last finish in the Constitution, after the achievement of independence, was but the fulfilment of the first thought. The form of government was designed for the welfare of a free people and a great nation, by providing for them just and equal laws. The ancient republics, based on the inequality of men, were, in reality, oppressive aristocracies: the republics of the Middle Ages had free institutions within their walls; but outside of them the divine right of kings or nobles remained unshaken: the Republic of the United States was founded on the American theory announced in the Declaration of Independence, and this was embodied in the rules of law for the conduct of its citizens in the Constitution. This republic presents the rare and difficult system of one general government, the action of which extends over the whole nation, but which possesses certain enumerated powers, and of numerous State governments, which retain and exercise all powers not delegated to the union. Under this protection and organization, the two elements of the national life, embodied into institutions adapted to their respective spheres, unfolded their blessings in harmony, and, through the great modern instrumentality of representation, are extending over the continent. A narrative of the rise of this system will show how instinctively the people appreciated and valued the grandest traditionary influence in all history, Local Self-Government, and that providential product, American Union. "DEATH OF JOSEPH WARREN FROM LIFE AND TIMES OF JOSEPH WARREN. sun. It was a very hot summer's day, with a burning Warren was suffering from a nervous headache, and threw himself on a bed; but, after the alarm was given, he rose, and, saying that his headache was gone, started for the scene of action. It is said that one of his students, Dr. Townsend, accompanied him a part of the way on foot, but that, a short distance from the College, Warren was on horseback. He overtook two friends who were walking to the battle-field, and, exchanging with them the usual salutations, he passed along towards Charlestown. He came within range of the British batteries at the low, flat ground which marks the entrance to that portion of the town nearest to Boston, which is a peninsula; and the firing, at the time he passed, between two and three o'clock, must have been severe. He went up Bunker Hill, where another of his students, William Eustis, served on this day as a surgeon. Here Warren had a view of the whole situation. On his left was Mystic River, where there were no floating-batteries. The line of fire from the British began on a point a little inclined to the left, where the ships of war "Lively and the Falcon" lay; and it continued round by Charles River, from Copp's Hill, the "Sumerset," the "Cerberus," the "Glasgow," the 'Symmetry" transport, and two floating-batteries, quite to his right. He could see, on the side of Bunker Hill towards Boston, the protection which Captain Knowlton began to construct of the rail-fences, when Colonel Prescott ordered him from the redoubt to oppose the enemy's right wing, and which the New Hampshire forces, under Colonels Stark and Reed, were extending. Directly in front of the rail-fence, on a small hill at Moulton's Point, he could see the same British regiments which he had beheld so long in Boston, - among them, doubtless. the officers before whom he delivered his Fifth-of-March oration, - now awaiting the order for an assault. A furious cannonade, about this time, was directed upon Roxbury, to occupy the attention of the Provincials in that quarter, while the fire of three ships, three batteries, several field-pieces, and a battery on Copp's Hill, from six different directions, centred on the intrenchments. Warren went to the rail-fence: here he was on foot. He met General Putnam, who, it is said, offered to receive orders from Warren, who replied, "I am here only as a volunteer. I know nothing of your dispositions; nor will I interfere with them. Tell me where I can be most useful." Putnam directed him to the redoubt, with the remark, "There you will be covered;" when Warren said, "Don't think I came to seek a place of safety, but tell me where the onset will be most furious? General Putnam again named the redoubt. Warren then went forward to Breed's Hill, and into the redoubt. There was a feeling at this time, in the ranks at this post, so manifest was the peril, that, through the oversight, presumption, or treachery of the officers, the men would be all slain. They needed encouragement. Warren was enthusiastically received; "all the men huzzaed.” He said that he came to encourage a good cause, and that a reinforcement of two thousand men was on its way to their support. Colonel Prescott asked the general if he had any orders to give. Warren replied that he had none, and exercised no command, saying, "The command is yours." This is the relation by General Heath. Judge Prescott, who heard the fact from his father the colonel, is more circumstantial in relating the incident. "General Warren," Judge Prescott says, "came to the redoubt, a short time before the action commenced, with a musket in his hand. Colonel Prescott went to him, and proposed that he should take the command; observing that he (Prescott) understood he (Warren) had been appointed a major-general, à day or two before, by the Provincial Congress. General Warren replied, "I shall take no command here. I have not yet received my commission. I came as a volunteer, with my musket, to serve under you, and shall be happy to learn from a soldier of your experience. Warren undoubtedly served as a volunteer in the battle that began soon after he arrived. It continued, including the two intermissions, about an hour and a half. The town of Charlestown was set on fire in several places by order of the British general, and it was "one great blaze; the roofs of Boston, and the hills round the country, were covered with spectators; and these features, with the work of the battle, " made the whole a picture and a complication of horror and importance." On such a field, Warren fought a good fight. He was applied to for orders, and gave them. "Regardless of himself, his whole soul seemed to be filled with the greatness of the cause he was engaged in; and, while his friends were dropping away all around him, he gave his orders with a surprising coolness. His character and conduct and presence greatly animated and encouraged his countrymen. His heroic soul elicited a kindred fire from the troops. His lofty spirit gave them confidence. He performed many feats of bravery, and exhibited a coolness and conduct which did honor to the judgment of his country in appointing him a major-general." The British general was baffled in his flanking design of forcing the rail-fence, and of surrounding the redoubt. His troops met gallantly the line of fire poured upon them; but they were twice compelled to fall back. On the third advance, they stormed the redoubt, and the breastwork connected with it, when the ammunition of their defenders had failed. As the regulars, showing "a forest of bayonets," came over one side of the redoubt, the militia fell back to the other side, and there was a brief but fierce handto-hand struggle, when the butts of the muskets were used; and Warren was now seen for the last time by Colonel Prescott, who was not among those who ran out of the redoubt, "but stepped long, with his sword up," as he parried the thrusts that were made at his person. So great was the dust arising now from the dry, loose soil, that the outlet was hardly visible. Warren was among the last to go out. Just outside of it, there was much mingling of the British and Provincials, and great confusion, when the firing for a few moments was checked. At this time, Warren endeavored to rally the militia, a contemporary account says, "sword in hand." He was recognized by a British officer, who wrested a musket out of a soldier's hand, and shot him. He fell about sixty yards from the redoubt, being struck by a bullet in the back part of his head, on the right side. Having mechanically clapped his hand to the wound, he dropped down dead. The retreating and the pursuing throng passed on by his body. The rail-fence had not been forced, and its brave defenders protected their brethren of the redoubt as they retreated from the peninsula. The victors did not continue their pursuit beyond Bunker Hill. JACOB BIGELOW. Dr. Jacob Bigelow, an eminent physician and medical writer, was born in Sudbury, Mass., in 1787. He was educated at Harvard, a graduate of the class of 1806, when he applied himself to the profession of medicine, and entered upon that career of successful practice at Boston which he has pursued to the present day. He early attached himself to the study of botany, and in 1814 published his Florula Bostoniensis; a Collection of Plants of Boston and its vicinity, with their Generic and Specific Characters, Principal Synonyms, Descriptions, Places of Growth and Time of Flowering, and Occasional Remarks, a work which has passed through two subsequent editions, with numerous additions, in 1824 and 1840. In 1815 he was appointed Professor of Materia Medica and Medical Chemistry at Harvard, and retained the chair for forty years. In 1816 he was also appointed first Rumford Professor, an endowment founded in Harvard by the will of Count Rumford, to teach the uses of science to the arts and to the welfare of men, and held the office till 1827. His lectures delivered in the institution, in this capacity, on the relations of science to the arts, were published, under the title of The Elements of Technology, in Boston, in 1829, a work subsequently enlarged by the author in his publication in 1840, entitled The Useful Arts Considered in Connection with the Applications of Science. Between the years 1819 and 1820 he published in three volumes his work on American Medical Botany; being a Collection of the Native Medicinal Plants of the United States, containing their History and Chemical Analysis and Properties and Uses in Medicine, Diet, and the Arts. This production is highly spoken of for its accuracy and perspicuity. Dr. Bigelow's latest and best-known professional publication is a volume published in 1854, entitled Nature in Disease, illustrated in various Discourses and Essays, to which are added Miscellaneous Writings, chiefly on Medical Subjects. It contains his Discourse "On Self-Limited Diseases," read before the Massachusetts Medical Society, of which he was president; his lecture on "The Treatment of Disease," before the students of the Massachusetts Medical College; an introductory lecture "On the Medical Profession and Quackery," in the same institution; an elaborate paper on "The Pharmacopoeia of the United States of America," contributed to the American Journal of Medical Sciences in 1831; and an address before the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1852, of which society he has long held the presidency. In 1858, Dr. Bigelow published a little work entitled Brief Exposition of Rational Medicine, to which is prefixed the Paradise of Doctors, a Fable. It was introduced to the public by a very happy notice in the Atlantic Monthly, which has been attributed to Dr. Holmes.* A volume of humorous poems, imitating various authors, entitled Eolopoesis, American Rejected Addresses, now first published from the original manuscripts, which appeared in New York in 1855, is attributed to him. ** In 1870 appeared his Modern Inquiries, Classical, Professional, and Miscellaneous; also a pamphlet, Remarks on Classical Studies. ROBERT WALN. ROBERT WALN was born in Philadelphia in 1797. He received a liberal education, but never engaged in professional pursuits. He published in 1819 The Hermit in America on a visit to Philadelphia, one of several imitations of an English work then popular, the Hermit in London. It contains a series of sketches on the fashionable pursuits and topics of city life, pleasantly written, but without any features of mark. In the following year he made a similar essay in verse by the publication of American Bards, a Satire. In this poem of nearly one thousand lines he reviews the leading aspirants of the day, praising Cliffton and Dwight and condemning Barlow and Humphreys. Lucius M. Sargent and Knight receive severe treatment, and the Backwoodsman is dealt with in like manner. In the course of the piece a number of minor writers of the ever renewed race of poetasters are mentioned, most of whom have long since been forgotten. A description of a newspaper with the approaches of a youthful bard is one of its best passages. How oft, when seated in our elbow-chairs, The Politician roams through every clime: And humming all the advertisements o'er, *The Atlantic Monthly, November, 1858. |