John Greenleaf Whittier, his life, genius and writings

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1882 Excerpt: ...About halfpast nine every morning, when at Amesbury, Mr. Whittier walks down for the mail and the news, and perhaps has a chat with some neighbor on the street, or with the country editor who is setting up in type his own editorials while he grimly rolls his quid of tobacco in his cheek. In the spring and The writer remembers once speaking with a laborer whom Mr. Whittier had employed. The good fellow could not conceal his admiration for the poet. "Why," he said, "you wouldn't think it, would you, but he talks just like common folks. We was talkin' about the apples one day, and he said, ' Some years they ain't wuth pickin','--just like anybody, you know; ain't stuck up at all, and yet he's a great man, you know. He likes to talk with farmers and common folks; he don't go much with the bigbugs;--one of the nicest men, and liberal with his money, too." early summer the poet's dress will be after this fashion: black coat and vest, gray pantaloons, cinnamon-colored overcoat, drab tile hat, and perhaps a small gray tippet around his neck. As he walks, he salutes those whom he meets with a little jerky bow. A fortyyears' residence in Amesbury has made him acquainted with almost everybody, and he might, therefore, very properly be somewhat economical of exertion in his salutations. But his abrupt bow is really the expression of that unbending rectitude and noble pride in Individual freedom that made him the reformer and the poet of liberty. As a single instance of Whittier's kind-heartedness, take the following incident, narrated by an anonymous writer in the Literary World for December, 1877: "When I was a young man trying to get an education, I went about the country peddling sewing-silk to help myself through college; and one Saturday n...