"Pray come and see me about it without delay. Come so as to pass a night
with us, if possible, this week; if not a day and night.
"Ever sincerely yours,
"HENRY W. LONGFELLOW." There is nothing in our literary annals more
unique and delightful than this history of Longfellow's warm recognition
of his old classmate, and the mutual courtesies to which it led. One is
reminded by it of the William Tell episode between Goethe and Schiller,
though it was in this case only the theme and nothing of material that
was transferred.
An author now almost forgotten, Charles Fenno Hoffman, also published in
"The American Monthly Magazine," [Footnote: For March, 1838.] which he
was editing, a kindly review, which, however, underestimated the
strength of the new genius, as it was at first the general habit to do.
"Minds like Hawthorne's," he said, "seem to be the only ones suited to
an American climate.... Never can a nation be impregnated with the
literary spirit by minor authors alone.... Yet men like Hawthorne are
not without their use.".... In this same number of the magazine, by the
way, was printed Hawthorne's "Threefold Destiny," under the pseudonyme
of Ashley Allen Royce; and the song of Faith Egerton, afterward omitted,
is thus given:----
"O, man can seek the downward glance,
And each kind word,----affection's spell,----
Eye, voice, its value can enhance;
For eye may speak, and tongue can tell.
"But woman's love, it waits the while
To echo to another's tone;
To linger on another's smile,
Ere dare to answer with its own.
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