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Among a surprising mass of rubbish from her pen there is here and there to be found a true gem. In her Contemplations, written apparently on the banks of the Merrimac at the flood tide of the year, we find the first poetry of the American landscape:

"Sometime now past in the Autumnal tide,When Phoebus wanted but one hour to bed,The trees all nicely clad, yet void of pride,Were gilded o'er by his rich golden head.Their leaves and fruits seem'd painted, but was trueOf green, of red, of yellow, mixed hew;Rapt were my sences at this delectable view."

The surroundings of this early poetess were anything but inspiring. She was lame and of delicate health throughout her life. The mother of eight children, she wrote all her poems amid the hurry and care of multifarious household duties. From Anne Bradstreet has descended a sturdy literary progeny.

Holmes, Channing, R. H. Dana, Buckminster, and many other New England authors trace a lineal descent from this earliest singer of the new world.

2. Michael Wigglesworth (1631—1715).

"The Laureate of Puritanism."

None can fully appreciate the theology of early New England who has not read the remarkable poem, The God's Controversy with New England.
Meat out of the Eater.
The Day of Doom Day of Doom, that blazing, sulphurous picture of the punishment of the wicked according to the ideals of Puritanism. Its author, Michael Wigglesworth, in the words of Mather, "a little feeble shadow