Lives of Celebrated Women - Goodrich Samuel Griswold

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rich reward at last;

      His pure soul mounts on cherub’s wings,

      And now with saints and angels sings.

      The brightest on the list of Fame,

      In golden letters shines his name;

      Her trump shall sound it through the world,

      And the striped banner ne’er be furled.

      And every sex, and every age,

      From lisping boy to learned sage,

      The widow, and her orphan son,

      Revere the name of Washington!”

      A literary friend, to whom these verses were shown, felt some doubts as to Lucretia’s being the real author of the stanzas, and suffered them to appear. The feeling that her rectitude was impeached made the sensitive girl actually ill; but a poetic remonstrance, which she prepared on the occasion, removed every doubt.

      From what has been before said, it must not be supposed that Lucretia was suffered to abandon herself to literary avocations. She had her prescribed tasks in sewing, and other customary employments, which she generally performed with fidelity and with wonderful celerity; sometimes, however, the voice of her muse struck her in the midst, and “enchanted she dropped each earthly care.” One day, she had promised to do a certain piece of sewing, and had eagerly run for her basket; she was absent long, and on her return found that the work was done. “Where have you been, Lucretia?” said her mother, justly displeased. “O mamma,” she replied, “I did forget; I am grieved. As I passed the window, I saw a solitary sweet pea. I thought they were all gone. This was alone. I ran to smell it, but, before I could reach it, a gust of wind broke the stem. I turned away disappointed, and was coming back to you; but as I passed the table, there stood the inkstand, and I forgot you.” The following beautiful verses insured the forgiveness of her mother: —

      “The last flower of the garden was blooming alone,

      The last rays of the sun on its blushing leaves shone;

      Still a glittering drop on its bosom reclined,

      And a few half-blown buds ’midst its leaves were entwined.

      Say, lovely one, say, why lingerest thou here?

      And why on thy bosom reclines the bright tear?

      ’Tis the tear of the zephyr – for summer ’twas shed,

      And for all thy companions now withered and dead.

      Why lingerest thou here, when around thee are strown

      The flowers once so lovely, by autumn blasts blown?

      Say, why, sweetest floweret, the last of thy race,

      Why lingerest thou here the lone garden to grace?

      As I spoke, a rough blast, sent by winter’s own hand,

      Whistled by me, and bent its sweet head to the sand;

      I hastened to raise it – the dew-drop had fled,

      And the once lovely flower was withered and dead.”

      All her short pieces were composed with equal rapidity; and sometimes she wished that she had two pair of hands to record as fast as her muse dictated. These she composed wherever she chanced to be when the spirit of poesy came over her. In the midst of her family, blind and deaf to all around her, she held sweet communion with her muse. But when composing her longer poems, as “Amie Khan,” or “Chicomicos,” she required complete seclusion. She retired to her own room, closed the blinds, and placed her Æolian harp in the window. Her mother gives this graphic description: “I entered her room, – she was sitting with scarcely light enough to discern the characters she was tracing; her harp was in the window, touched by a breeze just sufficient to rouse the spirit of harmony; her comb had fallen on the floor, and her long, dark ringlets hung in rich profusion over her neck and shoulders; her cheek glowed with animation; her lips were half unclosed; her full, dark eye was radiant with the light of genius, and beaming with sensibility; her head rested on her left hand, while she held her pen in her right. She looked like the inhabitant of another sphere. She was so wholly absorbed that she did not observe my entrance. I looked over her shoulder, and read the following lines: —

      ‘What heavenly music strikes my ravished ear,

      So soft, so melancholy, and so clear?

      And do the tuneful nine then touch the lyre,

      To fill each bosom with poetic fire?

      Or does some angel strike the sounding strings,

      Who caught from echo the wild note he sings?

      But, ah! another strain! how sweet! how wild!

      Now, rushing low, ’tis soothing, soft, and mild.’”

      The noise made by her mother roused Lucretia, who soon afterwards brought her the preceding verses, with the following added to them, being an address to her Æolian harp: —

      “And tell me now, ye spirits of the wind,

      O, tell me where those artless notes to find —

      So lofty now, so loud, so sweet, so clear,

      That even angels might delighted hear.

      But hark! those notes again majestic rise,

      As though some spirit, banished from the skies,

      Had hither fled to charm Æolus wild,

      And teach him other music, sweet and mild.

      Then hither fly, sweet mourner of the air,

      Then hither fly, and to my harp repair;

      At twilight chant the melancholy lay,

      And charm the sorrows of thy soul away.”

      Her parents indulged her in the utmost latitude in her reading. History, profane and sacred, novels, poetry, and other works of imagination, by turns occupied her. Before she was twelve, she had read the English poets. Dramatic works possessed a great charm for her, and her devotion to Shakspeare is expressed in the following verses, written in her fifteenth year: —

      “Shakspeare, with all thy faults, (and few have more,)

      I love thee still, and still will con thee o’er.

      Heaven, in compassion to man’s erring heart,

      Gave thee of virtue, then of vice, a part,

      Lest we, in wonder here, should bow before thee,

      Break God’s commandment, worship, and adore thee;

      But admiration, now, and sorrow join;

      His works we reverence, while we pity thine.”

      But above all other books she valued the Bible. The more poetical parts of the Old Testament she almost committed to memory; and the New Testament, especially those parts which relate the life of our Savior, was studied by her, and excited in her the deepest emotions. As an evidence of this we give the following verses, written in her thirteenth year: —

“THE GOOD SHEPHERD

      “The shepherd feeds his fleecy flock with care,

      And mourns to find one little lamb has strayed;

      He, unfatigued, roams through the midnight air,

      O’er hills, o’er rocks, and through the mossy glade.

      But when that lamb is found, what joy is seen

      Depicted on the careful shepherd’s face,

      When, sporting o’er the smooth and level green,

      He sees his favorite charge is in its place!

      Thus the great Shepherd of his flock doth mourn,

      When from his fold a wayward lamb has strayed,

      And

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