770

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

M

LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY.

RS. LYDIA HUNTLEY SIGOURNEY was an American poet and extensive miscellaneous writer. She was born at Norwich, Conn., in 1791. In 1819 she married Charles Sigourney, a merchant of Hartford, in which city she resided until her death, which occurred in 1865. She was a writer of chaste and elegant style. Her three poems selected for GEMS are eminently worthy of the honorable place accorded them. Her "Niagara" is a standard poem.

JAMES SMITH.

AMES SMITH, author of "The Soldier's Pardon" (p. 236), was an English humorist and miscellaneous writer, born in London, 1775. He became extensively known by his contributions to "The PicNic," "The London Review," and "The Monthly Mirror." In 1812, he brought out "Rejected Addresses," which are humorous imitations of the poems of Coleridge, Wordsworth, Byron, Scott, and others. They met with a brilliant success. He died in 1839, and his "Memoirs, Letters, ets.," were collected and published in 1840.

S

SEBA SMITH.

EBA SMITH was an American writer, born at Buckfield, Maine. In 1833, under the nom de plume of "Major Jack Downing," he published a series of humorous letters on political subjects, which became widely popular. His other principal works are "Powhatan," a poem, and "Away down East, or Portraitures of Yankee Life." He died in 1868. His "Mother in the Snow Storm" (p. 513) is one of his more serious productions, founded on actual experience.

T

R

HORACE SMITH.

E author of "Hymn to the Flowers" (p. 255), was born in London, in 1779. He early became a writer for periodicals. He did much literary work with his brother James. He produced novels and poems, all of a satisfactory kind. He died July 12th, 1849.

ROBERT SOUTHEY.

OBERT SOUTHEY was a poet laureate of England. He was born at Bristol, August 12th, 1774. He began to write verses before he was ten years old. In 1792, he was expelled from Westminster school for writing an essay against corporal punishment He

entered Baliol College, at Oxford, in 1792. In 1793 he wrote "Wat Tyler," a drama, and "Joan of Arc," an epic poem. In 1794, he was introduced to the poet Coleridge, with whom he enjoyed a life-long friendship. After various adventures, and several changes of occupation and residence, he settled, in 1803, at Greta Hall, near Keswick, with Coleridge, who was his brother-in-law. He then became a contributor to the "Quarterly Review," and published various poems. He was appointed poet laureate in 1813. In 1835, he received a pension of three hundred pounds a year from the government. Soon after this time his faculties became enfeebled, and he sank into a state of mental imbecility. He died March 21st, 1843. Two of Southey's choicest poems adorn these pages.

MRS. CAROLINE B. SOUTHEY.

AROLINE ANNE BOWLES was born in England in 1787. She led a retired literary life until 1839, when she married the poet laureate, Robert Southey. She had previously issued several volumes of poems, and had long been an intimate friend of Southey's. Several poems bear the initials of both these gifted writers. She died in 1854. "The Pauper's Death-Bed" (p. 216) is one of her best productions.

EDMUND SPENSER.

DMUND SPENSER, or Spencer, was one of England's most celebrated poets. He was born in London in 1552, and died January 16th, 1599. He was a college-bred man, and had the ideal experience of poets with love and poverty in early life, crowned in old age with plenty and peace. The "Faerie Queene" is Spenser's great work. He was buried in Westminster, his monument, erected in 1620, being restored in 1778. His "Ministry of Angels" (p. 702) is very fine.

WILLIAM B. SPRAGUE.

ILLIAM BUEL SPRAGUE, D.D., was an eminent American Presbyterian divine, born at Andover, Conn., in 1795. His ministerial life was spent, in the main, at Albany, N. Y., where he did a large amount of literary work in addition to his regular employments. His comparison of Voltaire and Wilberforce (p. 661) is in the general style of his literary works. He died in 1876.

772

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

CHARLES SPRAGUE.

HARLES SPRAGUE, author of "I See Thee Still" (p. 144), was born at Boston, Mass., October 26th, 1791; he became a mercantile clerk at the age of thirteen, and rose rapidly in business. He early displayed a fine talent for poetry, and devoted his spare time for many years to the study of old English classics. He was the civic orator at Boston, July 4th, 1825. He died January 14th, 1875.

T

ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY.

HE Rev. Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, better known as Dean Stanley, was born in 1815. He studied at Rugby under the famous Dr. Arnold, and subsequently graduated at Oxford. He was appointed chaplain to Prince Albert, and in 1856 became Regius professor of ecclesiastical history at Oxford. He visited the Holy Land in company with the Prince of Wales, and wrote a very valuable volume on the subject, whence an extract is taken for this collection. He became Dean of Westminster in 1864, and died in 1882, greatly lamented by the Queen of England, and by all the learned and religious world.

ROBERT STORY.

HE author of the bright little poem, "The Whistle," on page 283, was Robert Story, born in Northumberland, England, about 1790. He was a clergyman of eminent worth, and a poet of considerable ability. His death occurred in 1859.

M

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE.

RS. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE is one of the most distinguished lady authors of America. She was born at Litchfield, Conn., June 14th, 1812. While but a child she was passionately fond of such books as Scott's novels, "Arabian Nights," and "Don Quixote." Before she was twelve years of age she wrote a composition, maintaining the negative of the question, "Can the immortality of the soul be proved by the light of nature?" At the age of thirteen she became a pupil of her sister Catharine, then principal of the Female Seminary at Hartford, In 1836 she was married to Professor Calvin E. Stowe. In 1850 she accompanied her husband to Brunswick, Maine, where she wrote her famous. "Uncle Tom's Cabin." The success of this work has been without a parallel. It is thought that half a million copies have been sold in this country,

and probably more than that number in the British dominions. It has been translated also into all the principal European languages, and into several of Asia, including, it is said, the Chinese and Japanese. Two different translations of it have been made into Russian, three into the Magyar language, and thirteen or fourteen into German. One selection given in GEMS, "The Little Evangelist," is from this wonderful book.

SIR JOHN SUCKLING.

IR JOHN SUCKLING, author of one poem in GEMS, "The Bride," was born at Middlesex, England, in 1609, and was educated at Cambridge. In 1631, he offered his services to Gustavus Adolphus, of Sweden, who was then waging war against Germany. Subsequently he was attached to the Court of Charles I., and in 1639 he equipped a troop of horse for service against the Scotch. His works include plays, songs, poems, and metaphysics. He died about 1642.

T

CHARLES SUMNER.

HE great Senator, Charles Sumner, was born in Boston, January 6th, 1811. He was educated at the Boston Public, Latin School and Harvard College, where he graduated in 1830. He was conspicuously studious. In 1831 he entered the Harvard Law School, then under the charge of Judge Story, and gave himself, without relaxation, to profound study. His leisure was devoted to preparing a catalogue of the Law Library, and to work on the "American Jurist," of which he became editor-in-chief. In 1837 he went to Europe, and was received with most flattering attention. His days were passed in society and in the galleries, but his nights were spent in diligent study.

He had purposed a lawyer's life, and his ambition was to reach the Supreme bench. But, in 1845, he turned to politics, speaking and working against the admission of Texas and the war with Mexico. In 1851, he was elected United States Senator for Massachusetts, the first civil office, and the only one, he ever held. In 1852, he began his Congressional assault on slavery by a masterly argument for the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Law, entitled "Freedom National-Slavery Sectional." This phrase became the watchword of his party, and gave the key to most of his later arguments.

In 1857, he was again chosen to the Senatorship; again, in 1863, and subsequently in 1869, thus passing the last twenty-three years of his life in that body. An attack of severe illness in the Senate chamber, on

774

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

March 10th, 1874, proved fatal in his own house in Washington on the day following. Almost his last words were addressed to Judge Hoar, "Take care of my Civil Rights Bill." His remains lie at Mount Auburn, near Boston. The extract on page 453 is a fair specimen of his style.

T

ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.

HIS author was born near London, April 5th, 1837. His education was obtained partly at Eaton, partly in France, and partly at Oxford. He spent some time subsequently in Italy. He has published several dramas and many poems. "Kissing her Hair" (p. 52) is one of his peculiar yet pleasing productions.

T

T. DEWITT TALMAGE.

HE Rev. Thomas De Witt Talmage, D.D., was born in Boundbrook, Somerset Co., N. J., January 7th, 1832. He entered New York University and graduated in 1853. He graduated also from the New Brunswick Theological Seminary in 1856, and in the same year became minister of the Reformed Church. In 1869 he accepted the call of his present charge, the Central Congregational Church in Brooklyn. He has done much newspaper editorial work. He has also published five volumes of sermons, besides several books in lighter vein, and has always been an active pastor, a diligent lecturer, and a man of great general activity.

B

BAYARD TAYLOR.

AYARD TAYLOR was born at Kennett Square, Chester County, Pennsylvania, January 11th, 1825. He began life as a printer, then appeared as a poet, then as a traveler and newspaper correspondent and proprietor, in connection with the New York Tribune. As a traveler he visited all parts of the world. He finally became connected with consular appointments abroad, becoming Minister to Germany in 1878, where he died, after a short residence, in December of the same year. He was a most popular lecturer and author. "The Quaker Widow" (p. 110) is one of Bayard Taylor's earlier gems.

T

BENJAMIN F. TAYLOR.

wo exquisite gems from Benjamin Franklin Taylor brighten these pages. He was born in New York State in 1822. He was edu

cated at Madison University, where his father was the honored president. He published poems and fragmentary papers in 1845,