]
[Illustration: CELIA THAXTER. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN IN 1890.]
[Illustration: DAVID A. WASSON. FROM A PORTRAIT BY HIS SON GEORGE,
TAKEN IN 1878.]
She made the best use of her material, which after all is much the same
as Emerson's, with the difference between a barren island and a
well-wooded country town taken into account. Another difference is that
she looks at her subject objectively, and then treats it subjectively;
whereas Emerson does exactly the reverse. It is like the difference
between Schiller and Goethe, or Longfellow and Browning; and is the
manner in which a poet always must write in order to be popular. Her
verses are graceful, refined, and--as they should be--feminine. Yet
there is a good deal of strength in it also: or if the phrase is
permissible, a good deal of back-bone.
Her style reminds one of Whittier, but is sufficiently original.
Sometimes she escapes from concrete things into abstract subjects; and
her short poem on "Heroism" seems to me the best she ever wrote. There
was formerly a strong prejudice against this kind of poetry, but it
seems to be disappearing. Those of her poems which Whittier included in
his collection of English and American poetry are also fine, and may be
said to deserve their place. Her criticism was better than is usually
the case with poets; and her conversation about authors and literature
always interesting.
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