JAMES OTIS ROCKWELL was born in Lebanon, an agricultural town in Connecticut, in 1807. At an early age he was apprenticed to a printer, in Utica, and in his sixteenth year he began to write verses for the newspapers. Two years afterward he went to New York, and subsequently to Boston, in each of which cities he laboured as a journeyman compositor. He had now acquired considerable reputation by his poetical writings, and was engaged as associate editor of the "Statesman," an old and influential journal published in Boston, with which, I believe, he continued until 1829, when he became the conductor of the Providence "Patriot," with which he was connected at the time of his death.

He was poor, and in his youth he had been left nearly to his own direction. He chose to learn the business of printing, because he thought it would afford him opportunities to improve his mind; and his education was acquired by diligent study during the leisure hours of his apprenticeship. When he removed to Providence, it became necessary for him to take an active part in the discussion of political questions. He felt but little interest in public affairs, and shrank instinctively from the strife of partisanship; but it seemed the only avenue to competence and reputation, and he embarked in it with apparent ardour. Journalism, in the hands of able and honourable men, is the noblest of callings; in the hands of the ignorant and mercenary, it is among the meanest. There are at all times connected with the press, persons of the baser sort, who derive their support and chief enjoyment from ministering to the worst passions; and by some of this class ROCKWELL'S private character was assailed, and he was taunted with his obscure parentage, defective education, and former vocation, as if to have elevated his position in society, by perseverance and the force of mind, were a ground of accusation. He had too little energy in his nature to regard such assaults with the indifference they merited; and complained in some of his letters that they "robbed him of rest and of all pleasure." With constantly increasing reputation, however, he continued his editorial labours until the summer of 1831, when, at the early age of twenty-four years, he was suddenly called to a better world. He felt unwell, one morning, and, in a brief paragraph, apologized for the apparent neglect of his gazette. The next number of it wore the signs of mourning for his death. A friend of ROCKWELL'S,* in a notice of him published in the "Southern Literary Messenger," mentions as the immediate cause of his death, that

tion which, from not receiving money then due to him, he was unable to meet, and shrank from the prospect of a debtor's prison." That it was in some way a result of his extreme sensitiveness, was generally believed among his friends at the time. WHITTIER, who was then editor of the "New England Weekly Review,” soon after wrote the following lines to his memory:

"The turf is smooth above him! and this rain
Will moisten the rent roots, and summon back
The perishing life of its green-bladed grass,
And the crush'd flower will lift its head again
Smilingly unto heaven, as if it kept

No vigil with the dead. Well-it is meet
That the green grass should tremble, and the flowers
Blow wild about his resting place. His mind
Was in itself a flower but half-disclosed--
A bud of blessed promise which the storm
Visited rudely, and the passer by

Smote down in wantonness. But we may trust
That it hath found a dwelling, where the sun
Of a more holy clime will visit it,

And the pure dews of mercy will descend,
Through Heaven's own atmosphere, upon its head.
"His form is now before me, with no trace
Of death in its fine lineaments, and there
Is a faint crimson on his youthful cheek,
And his free lip is softening with the smile
Which in his eye is kindling. I can feel
The parting pressure of his hand, and hear
His last 'GOD bless you! Strange-that he is there
Distinct before me like a breathing thing,
Even when I know that he is with the dead,
And that the damp earth hides him. I would not
Think of him otherwise-his image lives
Within my memory as he seem'd before
The curse of blighted feeling, and the toil
And fever of an uncongenial strife, had left
Their traces on his aspect. Peace to him!
He wrestled nobly with the weariness
And trials of our being-smiling on,
While poison mingled with his springs of life,
And wearing a calm brow, while on his heart
Anguish was resting like a hand of fire-
Until at last the agony of thought
Grew insupportable, and madness came
Darkly upon him,-and the sufferer died!

"Nor died he unlamented! To his grave
The beautiful and gifted shall go up,
And muse upon the sleeper. And young lips
Shall murmur in the broken tones of grief-
His own sweet melodies--and if the ear
Of the freed spirit heedeth aught beneath
The brightness of its new inheritance,
It may be joyful to the parted one

To feel that earth remembers him in love!"

The specimens of ROCKWELL'S poetry which have fallen under my notice show him to have possessed considerable fancy and deep feeling His imagery is not always well chosen, and his versification is sometimes defective; but his thoughts are often original, and the general effect of his

*Reverend CHARLES W. EVEREST, of Meriden, Connecticut.

and probably he would have produced works of much merit had he lived to a maturer age.

THE SUM OF LIFE.

SEARCHER of gold, whose days and nights
All waste away in anxious care,
Estranged from all of life's delights,
Unlearn'd in all that is most fair-
Who sailest not with easy glide,
But delvest in the depths of tide,

And strugglest in the foam;

O! come and view this land of graves,
Death's northern sea of frozen waves,

And mark thee out thy home.

Lover of woman, whose sad heart

Wastes like a fountain in the sun,
Clings most, where most its pain does start,
Dies by the light it lives upon;
Come to the land of graves; for here
Are beauty's smile, and beauty's tear,
Gather'd in holy trust;

Here slumber forms as fair as those
Whose cheeks, now living, shame the rose,
Their glory turn'd to dust.

Lover of fame, whose foolish thought

Steals onward o'er the wave of time,
Tell me, what goodness hath it brought,
Atoning for that restless crime?

The spirit-mansion desolate,
And open to the storms of fate,

The absent soul in fear;

Bring home thy thoughts and come with me,
And see where all thy pride must be:
Searcher of fame, look here!

And, warrior, thou with snowy plume,
That goest to the bugle's call,
Come and look down; this lonely tomb
Shall hold thee and thy glories all:
The haughty brow, the manly frame,
The daring deeds, the sounding fame,
Are trophies but for death!
And millions who have toil'd like thee,
Are stay'd, and here they sleep; and see,
Does glory lend them breath?

TO ANN.

THOU wert as a lake that lieth
In a bright and sunny way;

I was as a bird that flieth

O'er it on a pleasant day;

When I look'd upon thy features

Presence then some feeling lent;

But thou knowest, most false of creatures,
With thy form thy image went.

With a kiss my vow was greeted,
As I knelt before thy shrine;

But I saw that kiss repeated
On another lip than mine;
And a solemn vow was spoken

That thy heart should not be changed;
But that binding vow was broken,
And thy spirit was estranged.

I could blame thee for awaking

Thoughts the world will but deride; Calling out, and then forsaking

Flowers the winter wind will chide Guiling to the midway ocean Barks that tremble by the shore; But I hush the sad emotion, And will punish thee no more.

THE LOST AT SEA.

WIFE, who in thy deep devotion
Puttest up a prayer for one
Sailing on the stormy ocean,

Hope no more-his course is done. Dream not, when upon thy pillow,

That he slumbers by thy side; For his corse beneath the billow Heaveth with the restless tide.

Children, who, as sweet flowers growing,
Laugh amid the sorrowing rains,
Know ye many clouds are throwing
Shadows on your sire's remains?
Where the hoarse, gray surge is rolling
With a mountain's motion on,
Dream ye that its voice is tolling

For your father lost and gone?

When the sun look'd on the water,
As a hero on his grave,
Tinging with the hue of slaughter
Every blue and leaping wave,
Under the majestic ocean,

Where the giant current roll'd,
Slept thy sire, without emotion,
Sweetly by a beam of gold;

And the silent sunbeams slanted,

Wavering through the crystal deep, Till their wonted splendours haunted Those shut eyelids in their sleep. Sands, like crumbled silver gleaming, Sparkled through his raven hair; But the sleep that knows no dreaming Bound him in its silence there.

So we left him; and to tell thee

Of our sorrow and thine own, Of the wo that then befell thee, Come we weary and alone. That thine eye is quickly shaded,

That thy heart-blood wildly flows, That thy cheek's clear hue is faded, Are the fruits of these new woes.

Children, whose meek eyes, inquiring, Linger on your mother's faceKnow ye that she is expiring,

That ye are an orphan race? Gon be with you on the morrow, Father, mother,-both no more; One within a grave of sorrow,

One upon the ocean's floor!

THE DEATH-BED OF BEAUTY.

SHE sleeps in beauty, like the dying rose

By the warm skies and winds of June forsaken; Or like the sun, when dimm'd with clouds it goes To its clear ocean-bed, by light winds shaken: Or like the moon, when through its robes of snow It smiles with angel meekness-or like sorrow When it is soothed by resignation's glow,

Or like herself,-she will be dead to-morrow.

How still she sleeps! The young and sinless girl! And the faint breath upon her red lips trembles! Waving, almost in death, the raven curl

That floats around her; and she most resembles The fall of night upon the ocean foam,

Wherefrom the sun-light hath not yet departed; And where the winds are faint. She stealeth home, Unsullied girl! an angel broken-hearted!

O, bitter world! that hadst so cold an eye
To look upon so fair a type of heaven;
She could not dwell beneath a winter sky,

And her heart-strings were frozen here and riven, And now she lies in ruins-look and weep!

How lightly leans her cheek upon the pillow! And how the bloom of her fair face doth keep Changed, like a stricken dolphin on the billow.

TO THE ICE-MOUNTAIN.

GRAVE of waters gone to rest!
Jewel, dazzling all the main!
Father of the silver crest!

Wandering on the trackless plain,
Sleeping mid the wavy roar,

Sailing mid the angry storm, Ploughing ocean's oozy floor,

Piling to the clouds thy form! Wandering monument of rain,

Prison'd by the sullen north!
But to melt thy hated chain,

Is it that thou comest forth?
Wend thee to the sunny south,
To the glassy summer sea,
And the breathings of her mouth
Shall unchain and gladden thee!

Roamer in the hidden path,

'Neath the green and clouded wave! Trampling in thy reckless wrath,

On the lost, but cherish'd brave; Parting love's death-link'd embraceCrushing beauty's skeletonTell us what the hidden race

With our mourned lost have done!

Floating isle, which in the sun

Art an icy coronal;
And beneath the viewless dun,
Throw'st o'er barks a wavy pall;
Shining death upon the sea!

Wend thee to the southern main;
Warm skies wait to welcome thee!
Mingle with the wave again!

THE PRISONER FOR DEBT.

WHEN the summer sun was in the west,
Its crimson radiance fell,

Some on the blue and changeful sea,

And some in the prisoner's cell. And then his eye with a smile would beam, And the blood would leave his brain, And the verdure of his soul return,

Like sere grass after rain!

But when the tempest wreathed and spread A mantle o'er the sun,

He gather'd back his woes again,

And brooded thereupon;

And thus he lived, till Time one day
Led Death to break his chain :
And then the prisoner went away,
And he was free again!

TO A WAVE.

LIST! thou child of wind and sea,
Tell me of the far-off deep,
Where the tempest's breath is free,
And the waters never sleep!
Thou perchance the storm hast aided,
In its work of stern despair,
Or perchance thy hand hath braided,
In deep caves, the mermaid's hair.

Wave! now on the golden sands,
Silent as thou art, and broken,
Bear'st thou not from distant strands
To my heart some pleasant token?
Tales of mountains of the south,
Spangles of the ore of silver;
Which, with playful singing mouth,

Thou hast leap'd on high to pilfer?
Mournful wave! I deem'd thy song

Was telling of a floating prison, Which, when tempests swept along, And the mighty winds were risen, Founder'd in the ocean's grasp.

While the brave and fair were dying, Wave! didst mark a white hand clasp

In thy folds, as thou wert flying?

Hast thou seen the hallow'd rock

Where the pride of kings reposes, Crown'd with many a misty lock,

Wreathed with sapphire, green, and roses! Or with joyous, playful leap,

Hast thou been a tribute flinging,

Up that bold and jutty steep,

Pearls upon the south wind stringing?

Faded Wave! a joy to thee,
Now thy flight and toil are over!
O, may my departure be

Calm as thine, thou ocean-rover!
When this soul's last pain or mirth
On the shore of time is driven,
Be its lot like thine on earth,
To be lost away in heaven!

NATHANIEL P. WILLIS was born at Portland, in Maine, on the twentieth day of January, 1807. During his childhood his parents removed to Boston; and at the Latin school in that city, and at the Philips Academy in Andover, he pursued his studies until he entered Yale College, in 1823. While he resided at New Haven, as a student, he won a high reputation, for so young an author, by a series of "Scripture Sketches," and a few other brief poems; and it is supposed that the warm and too indiscriminate praises bestowed upon these productions, influenced unfavourably his subsequent progress in the poetic art. He was graduated in 1827, and in the following year he published a Poem delivered before the Society of United Brothers of Brown University," which, as well as his "Sketches," issued soon after he left college, was very favourably noticed in the best periodicals of the time. He also edited "The Token," a wellknown annuary, for 1828; and about the same period published, in several volumes, "The Legendary," and established "The American Monthly Magazine." To this periodical several young writers, who afterward became distinguished, were contributors; but the articles by its editor, constituting a large portion of each number, gave to the work its character, and were of all its contents the most popular. In 1830 it was united to the "New York Mirror," of which Mr. WILLIS became one of the conductors; and he soon after sailed for Europe, to be absent several years.

He travelled over Great Britain, and the most interesting portions of the continent, mixing largely in society, and visiting every thing worthy of his regard as a man of letters, or as an American; and his "First Impressions" were given in his letters to the "Mirror," in which he described, with remarkable spirit and fidelity, and in a style peculiarly graceful and elegant, scenery and incidents, and social life among the polite classes in Europe. His letters were collected and republished in London, under the title of "Pencillings by the Way," and violently attacked in several of the leading periodicals, ostensibly on account of their too great freedom of personal detail. Captain MARRYAT, who was at the time editing a monthly magazine, wrote an article, characteristically gross and malignant, which led to a hostile meeting at Chatham, and Mr. LOCKHART, in the "Quarterly Review," published a "criticism" alike illiberal and unfair. WILLIS perhaps erred in giving to the public dinner-table conversations, and some of his descriptions of manners; but Captain MARRYAT himself is not undeserving of censure on account of the " personalities" in his writings; and for other reasons he could not have been the most suitable person in England to avenge the wrong it was alleged Mr. WILLIS had offered to society. That the author of "Peter's Letters to

Mr.

his Kinsfolk," a work which is filled with far more reprehensible personal allusions than are to be found in the " Pencillings," should have ventured to attack the work on this ground, may excite surprise among those who have not observed that the "Quarterly Review" is spoken of with little reverence in the letters of the American traveller.

66

In 1835 Mr. WILLIS was married in England. He soon after published his "Inklings of Adventure," a collection of tales and sketches originally written for a London magazine, under the signature of Philip Slingsby;" and in 1837 he returned to the United States, and retired to his beautiful estate on the Susquehanna, named "Glenmary," in compliment to one of the most admirable wives that ever gladdened a poet's solitude. In the early part of 1839, he became one of the editors of "The Corsair," a literary gazette, and in the autumn of that year went again to London, where, in the following winter, he published his "Loiterings of Travel," in three volumes, and "Two Ways of Dying for a Husband," comprising the plays "Bianca Visconti," and "Tortesa the Usurer." 1840 appeared the illustrated edition of his poems, and his " Letters from Under a Bridge," and he retired a second time to his seat in western New York, where he now resides. Besides the works already mentioned, he is the author of "American Scenery," and of "Ireland,"--two works illustrated in a splendid manner by BARTLETT,--and of numerous papers in the reviews, magazines, and other periodicals.

In

The prose and poetry of Mr WILLIS are alike distinguished for exquisite finish and melody. His language is pure, varied, and rich; his imagination brilliant, and his wit of the finest quality. Many of his descriptions of natural scenery are written pictures; and no other author has represented with equal vivacity and truth the manners of the age.

His dramatic poems have been the most successful works of their kind produced in America. They exhibit a deep acquaintance with the common sympathies and passions, and are as remarkable as his other writings for affluence of language and imagery, and descriptive power.

His leading characteristics are essentially different from those of his contemporaries. DANA and BRYANT are the teachers of a high, religious philosophy; HALLECK and HOLMES excel in humour and delicate satire; LONGFELLOW has a fine imagination and is unequalled as an artist; but WILLIS is more than any other the poet of society,familiar with the secret springs of action in social life, and moved himself by the same influences which guide his fellows. His genius is various : Parrhasius," "Spring," "Hagar in the Wilderness," "The Annoyer," and other pieces, present strong contrasts; and they are alike excellent.

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2 C

301

MELANIE.

1.

I STOOD on yonder rocky brow,
And marvell'd at the Sybil's fane,
When I was not what I am now.

My life was then untouch'd of pain;
And, as the breeze that stirr'd my hair,
My spirit freshen'd in the sky,
And all things that were true and fair
Lay closely to my loving eye,
With nothing shadowy between-
I was a boy of seventeen.

Yon wondrous temple crests the rock,
As light upon its giddy base,
As stirless with the torrent's shock,

As pure in its proportion'd grace,
And seems a thing of air, as then,
Afloat above this fairy glen;

But though mine eye will kindle still In looking on the shapes of art,

The link is lost that sent the thrill,
Like lightning, instant to my heart.
And thus may break, before we die,
The electric chain 'twixt soul and eye!
Ten years-like yon bright valley, sown
Alternately with weeds and flowers-
Had swiftly, if not gayly, flown,

And still I loved the rosy hours;
And if there lurk'd within my breast
Some nerve that had been overstrung
And quiver'd in my hours of rest,

Like bells by their own echo rung,
I was with Hope a masker yet,

And well could hide the look of sadness,
And, if my heart would not forget,

I knew, at least, the trick of gladness,
And when another sang the strain,
I mingled in the old refrain.

"T were idle to remember now,

Had I the heart, my thwarted schemes.
I bear beneath this alter'd brow

The ashes of a thousand dreams:
Some wrought of wild Ambition's fingers,
Some colour'd of Love's pencil well,
But none of which a shadow lingers,
And none whose story I could tell.
Enough, that when I climb'd again
To Tivoli's romantic steep,
Life had no joy, and scarce a pain,

Whose wells I had not tasted deep;
And from my lips the thirst had pass'd

For every fount save one-the sweetest-and the last.

The last-the last! My friends were dead,
Or false; my mother in her grave;
Above my father's honour'd head

The sea had lock'd its hiding wave;
Ambition had but foil'd my grasp,
And Love had perish'd in my clasp;

The story is told during a walk around the Cascatelles of Tivoli.

And still, I say, I did not slack
My love of life, and hope of pleasure,
But gather'd my affections back;
And, as the miser hugs his treasure,

When plague and ruin bid him flee,
I closer clung to mine-my loved, lost MELANIE!
The last of the DE BREVERN race,

My sister claim'd no kinsman's care;
And, looking from each other's face,

The eye stole upward unaware-
For there was naught whereon to lean
Each other's heart and heaven between-
Yet that was world enough for me,
And, for a brief, but blessed while,
There seem'd no care for MELANIE,
If she could see her brother smile;
But life, with her, was at the flow,
And every wave went sparkling higher,
While mine was ebbing, fast and low,
From the same shore of vain desire,

And knew I, with prophetic heart,
That we were wearing aye insensibly apart.

II.

We came to Italy. I felt

A yearning for its sunny sky; My very spirit seem'd to melt

As swept its first warm breezes by. From lip and cheek a chilling mist, From life and soul a frozen rime By every breath seem'd softly kiss'd: GoD's blessing on its radiant clime! It was an endless joy to me

To see my sister's new delight; From Venice, in its golden sea,

To Paestum, in its purple light,
By sweet Val d'Arno's tinted hills,
In Vallombrosa's convent gloom,
Mid Terni's vale of singing rills,

By deathless lairs in solemn Rome,
In gay Palermo's "Golden Shell,"
At Arethusa's hidden well,

We loiter'd like the impassion'd sun,
That slept so lovingly on all,

And made a home of every oneRuin, and fane, and waterfall

And crown'd the dying day with glory, If we had seen, since morn, but one old haunt of

story.

We came, with spring, to Tivoli.

My sister loved its laughing air And merry waters, though, for me, My heart was in another key;

And sometimes I could scarcely bear The mirth of their eternal play,

And, like a child that longs for home, When weary of its holiday,

I sigh'd for melancholy Rome. Perhaps the fancy haunts me still'Twas but a boding sense of ill.

It was a morn, of such a day

As might have dawn'd on Eden first, Early in the Italian May.

Vine-leaf and flower had newly burst,