l,
There he was starin' no wiser than me where the shadow stands like
a wall.

Authorized American Edition, Dodd, Mead and Company.

JOEL BARLOW

(1754-1812)

One morning late in the July of 1778, a select company gathered in the
little chapel of Yale College to listen to orations and other exercises
by a picked number of students of the Senior class, one of whom, named
Barlow, had been given the coveted honor of delivering what was termed
the 'Commencement Poem.' Those of the audience who came from a distance
carried back to their homes in elm-shaded Norwich, or Stratford, or
Litchfield, high on its hills, lively recollections of a handsome young
man and of his 'Prospect of Peace,' whose cheerful prophecies in heroic
verse so greatly "improved the occasion." They had heard that he was a
farmer's son from Redding, Connecticut, who had been to school at
Hanover, New Hampshire, and had entered Dartmouth College, but soon
removed to Yale on account of its superior advantages; that he had twice
seen active service in the Continental army, and that he was engaged to
marry a beautiful New Haven girl.

[Illustration: Joel Barlow]

The brilliant career predicted for Barlow did not begin immediately.
Distaste for war, hope of securing a tutorship in college, and--we may
well believe--Miss Ruth's entreaties, kept him in New Haven two years
longer, engaged in teaching and in various courses of study. 'The
Prospect of Peace' had been issued in pamphlet form, and the compliments
paid the author incited him to plan a poem of a philosophic character on
the subject of America at large, bearing the title 'The Vision of
Columbus.' The appointment as tutor never came, and instead of
cultivating the Muse in peaceful New Haven, he was forced to evoke her
aid in a tent on the banks of the Hudson, whither after a hurried course
in theology, he proceeded as an army chaplain in 1780. During his
connection with the army, which lasted until its disbandment in 1783, he
won repute by lyrics written to encourage the soldiers, and by "a
flaming political sermon," as he termed it, on the treason of Arnold.

Army life ended, Barlow removed to Hartford, where he studied law,
edited the American Mercury,--a weekly paper he had helped to found,---
and with John Trumbull, Lemuel Hopkins, and David Humphreys formed a
literary club which became widely known as the "Hartford Wits." Its
chief publication, a series of