large!"

Then rises the orator Robert,
Recounting with grave precision
The tale of the great Declaration,
And the claims of his brother physician.

Both doctors, and both Congressmen,
Tall and straight, you 'd scarce know which is
The live man, and which is the image,
Except by their trousers and breeches!

Then when the Andover "heretic"
Reads the rhymes I dared not utter,
I fancy Josiah is scowling,
And his bronze lips seem to mutter:

"Dry up! and stop your nonsense!
The Lord who in His mercies
Once saved me from the Tories,
Preserve me now from verses!"

Bad taste in the old Continental!
Whose knowledge of verse was at best
John Rogers' farewell to his wife and
Nine children and one at the breast!

He 's treating me worse than the Hessians
He shot in the Bennington scrimmage--
Have I outlived the newspaper critic,
To be scalped by a graven image!

Perhaps, after all, I deserve it,
Since I, who was born a Quaker,
Sit here an image worshiper,
Instead of an image breaker!

In giving this picture of a poet at play, I have presented a side of
Whittier's character heretofore overlooked, although to his intimate
friends it was ever in evidence. I think there are few of the lovers of
his verse who, if they are surprised by these revelations, will not
also be pleased to become acquainted with one of his methods of
recreation.

* * * * *

When Edmund Gosse visited this country in 1884, he called upon Mr.
Whittier, and this is the impression he received of his personality:
"The peculiarity of his face rested in the extraordinarily large and
luminous black eyes, set in black eyebrows, and fringed with thick
black eyelashes curiously curved inward. This bar of vivid black across
the countenance was startlingly contrasted with the bushy snow-white
beard and hair, offering a sort of contradiction which was surprising
and presently pleasing. He struck me as very gay and cheerful, in spite
of his occasional references to the passage of time and the vanishing
of beloved faces. He even laughed frequently and with a childlike
suddenness, but without a sound. His face had none of the immobility so
frequent with very aged persons; on the contrary, waves of mood were
always sparkling across his features, and leaving nothing stationary
there except