Lucy Larcom: Life, Letters, and Diary. Daniel Dulany Addison
on quite familiar terms with me, and when the messenger said, “Three books and two letters for Miss Larcom,” their curiosity was greatly excited, and there was so much sly peeping at corners and picking at strings that they were not, on the whole, very logical. They asked to hold them for me till I was ready to open them, and I believe in letting “young ladies” act like children while they can. … I was thinking how much I should enjoy a quiet forenoon writing to you, when the words, “Study hour out”—accompanied the clang of the bell, and a Babel of voices broke into the hall outside my door.
I am trying not to hear—to get back into the quiet places of thought where your letters, open before me, were leading me, but I cannot; there is a jar, a discord—and I suppose it is selfish in me not to be willing to be thus disturbed. How I long for a quiet place to live in! I never found a place still enough yet. But all kinds of natural sounds, as winds, waters, and even the crying of a baby, if not too loud and protracted, are not noises to me. Is it right to feel the sound of human voices a great annoyance? One who loved everybody would always enjoy the “music of speech,” I suppose, and would find music where I hear only discord.
TO THE SAME.
Sabbath evening.
… I read in school yesterday morning, something from the “Sympathy of Christ.” We have had some very naughty girls here, and have had to think of expulsion; but one of them ran away, and so saved us the trouble. How hard it is to judge the erring rightly—Christianly. I am always inclined to be too severe, for the sake of the rest; one corrupt heart that loves to roll its corruption about does so much evil. I do not think that a school like this is the place for evil natures—the family is the place, it seems to me, or even something more solitary. And yet there have been such reforms here, that sometimes I am in doubt. When there is a Christian, sympathizing heart to take the erring home, and care for her as a mother would, that is well. But we are all so busy here, with the everythings. I am convinced that I have too much head-employment altogether; I get hardly breathing time for heart and home life. …
In 1854, Miss Larcom published her first book—“Similitudes from the Ocean and the Prairie.” It was a little volume of not more than one hundred pages, containing brief prose parables drawn from nature, with the purpose of illustrating some moral truth. The titles of the Similitudes suggest their meaning: “The Song before the Storm;” “The Veiled Star;” “The Wasted Flower;” and “The Lost Gem.” Though the conception was somewhat crude, yet her desire to find in all things a message of a higher life and a greater beauty, showed the serious beginnings of the poet’s insight, which in after years was to reveal to her so many hidden truths. She characterized the book as “a very immature affair, often entirely childish.”
Her first distinct literary success was the writing of the Kansas Prize Song, in 1855. When Kansas was being settled, the New England Emigrant Aid Company offered a prize of fifty dollars for the best song, written with the object of inspiring in the emigrants the sentiments of freedom. The power of a popular melody was to be used in maintaining a free soil. She gained this prize; and her stirring words were sung all through the West. They were printed, with the appropriate music of Mr. E. Norman, on cotton handkerchiefs, which were given away by the thousand.
“Yeomen strong, hither throng,
Nature’s honest men;
We will make the wilderness
Bud and bloom again;
Bring the sickle, speed the plough,
Turn the ready soil;
Freedom is the noblest pay
For a true man’s toil.
“Ho, brothers! come, brothers!
Hasten all with me;
We’ll sing upon the Kansas plains
A song of liberty.”
Her next little book, “Lottie’s Thought-book,” was published by the American Sunday School Union, Philadelphia, in 1858. Not unlike the Similitudes in its method of teaching by parables, it gave the thoughts of a clever child, as they would be suggested by such scenes as a beautiful spring morning in the country, “when glad thoughts praise God;” the first snow, typifying the purity of the earth; or the thought of the joy of living, in the chapter “Glad to be alive” that recalls an exclamation she uses in one of her letters, “Oh! how happy I am, that I did not die in childhood!” These little books are like the inner biography of her youth, a pure crystal stream of love, reflecting the sunlight in every ripple and eddy.
She also wrote for various magazines, notably “The Crayon,” in which appeared some criticisms of poetry, especially Miss Muloch’s, and some of her poems, like “Chriemhild,” a legend of Norse romance. The only payment she received was the subscription to the magazine. Her famous poem, “Hannah Binding Shoes,” was first printed in the “Knickerbocker,” without her knowledge—then a few months later, in “The Crayon.” This fact gave rise to the accusation of plagiarism which, though it greatly annoyed her, brought her poem into general notice. Having sent the poem to the “Knickerbocker,” but not receiving any answer about its acceptance, she concluded that it had been rejected. She then sent it to “The Crayon,” where it appeared, but in the mean time it had been printed in the “Knickerbocker.” The editor of the last-named paper wrote a letter to the “New York Tribune,” in which he accused Lucy Larcom of being “a literary thiefess,” and claimed the “stolen goods.” In answer to this, Miss Larcom wrote immediately a reply to the “Tribune.”
Norton. Mass., February 13, 1858.
To the Editor of the New York Tribune:
Sir—Will you please say to “Old Nick” that he does not tell the truth. His statements regarding me, in your paper, February 10, are not correct. Lucy Larcom is not a “literary thiefess;” “Hannah Binding Shoes” was not written “five or six years,” but about four years since. I have only to blush that I wrote it, and that I sent it to the editor of the “Knickerbocker.”
The latter was done at a time when it seemed desirable for me to attempt writing for pecuniary profit—a very ridiculous idea, of course—and I enclosed the poem in a letter, intimating such a desire to that gentleman, and supposing that courtesy would suggest that the letter should be answered, or the poem returned. As neither of these things was done, I innocently considered it my own property, and sent it to “The Crayon,” as an original composition.
I hereby reclaim from “Old Nick,” my “stolen goods,” which he has inadvertently advertised.
Yours truly,Lucy Larcom.
She wrote rather a severe letter to the “most honorable Old Nick” himself, in which she says, “In my ignorance, I supposed that editors were as polite as other people, in such matters as answering letters, and acknowledging even small favors. I am sure I never would have sent you a poem, if I had supposed you would one day have accused me of stealing it, and I hereby promise with sincere penitence, never to do so again. I suppose I can hardly look for the courtesy of an explanation as public as your accusation has been.”
She also wrote an explanation to Mr. John Durand, the editor of “The Crayon.”
TO JOHN DURAND.
Norton, February 12, 1858.
Dear Mr. Durand—“Hannah Binding Shoes” I may truly say is “a poor thing, sir, but mine own.” I should hardly have supposed that the identity of so humble an individual would be thought worth calling in question. The poem was written four years since, and was sent to the editor of the “Knickerbocker” in my own name, but as I received no acknowledgment from him, and have never seen a copy of the paper since, I supposed it either failed to reach him, or was not accepted. Was I not justifiable in sending it to you? I had no idea that it had been published before.
Yours truly,Lucy Larcom.
“Hannah Binding Shoes” was set to music, and became very popular. Rev. Samuel Longfellow wrote her, “I wish you could