for the "Portico," and at last for the public, as an editor and as an author, mainly at the instigation of Mr. Pierpont, for whom I wrote both "Niagara"[1] and "Guldau," and a part of "Allen's" American Revolution, studying law, and languages by the half-dozen at the same time, and laboring upon the average about sixteen hours a day, while Mr. Pierpont struck out boldly for a far-off perilous and rocky shore, with a lighthouse, in the shape of a pulpit, before him, and achieved the "Airs of Palestine" while undergoing the process of regeneration, and starving by inches upon what there were left of his wife's teaspoons, which were sold one by one to pay the rent of a cheap room in Howard Street. So poor indeed were we at one time, that we could hardly muster enough between us to pay our bootblack.
I have already said that Mr. Pierpont had no aptitude for extemporaneous speaking; and what was even worse, he had no hope of being able to overcome the difficulty. Once, and once only, did I ever hear him try his hand in that way, until many years after he had entered upon the ministry. A club had been organized among us for literary purposes. We were both members, and he the Vice-President. We called ourselves the Delphians, and passed among our contemporaries for the male Muses, our number being limited to nine,—not seven, as I see it stated in the Boston Advertiser, on the authority of our friend Paul Allen. The rest of the story is near enough to the truth, although the verses therein mentioned were written by Mr. Pierpont as a volunteer offering, after the Della-Cruscan school, or manner of "Laura Matilda," and not upon the spur of the occasion, as there related, nor as a trial of wit; and the last line should be, "Pulls where'er the zephyr roves"—not, as given there, "Pulls where'er the zephyr moves."
It was in this club that Mr. Pierpont first tried himself—and the brethren—with extemporaneous speaking. It was a pitiable failure, worse if possible than my own, and I never made another attempt. Even General Winder, who was a fine advocate, and a capital speaker before a jury, boggled wretchedly before the club, and our President, Watkins, who was said to be exceedingly eloquent before the great Masonic lodges, where he occupied the highest position, could not be persuaded to open his mouth, and all the rest of the brethren were mutes. True, it was like apostrophizing your own grandmother, in the hope of raising a laugh or of bringing tears into her eyes, to make speeches at one another across the table, whatever Molière might be able to do, when alone with his aged servant. Nor did it much help the matter, when, with a view to the treasury, which began to threaten a collapse, we made a law, like that of the Medes and Persians which altereth not, whereby it was provided, among other things, that no member should ever talk over five minutes, nor stop short of three, under any circumstances,—the President being timekeeper, and the sufferer not being allowed to look at a watch. Fines of course were inevitable, and we were once more able to luxuriate on bread and cheese, with an occasional pot of beer,—nothing better or stronger being tolerated among us under any pretence, except on our anniversaries, when the
- ↑ And here I may as well mention a curious incident. When I wrote my poem, I had never seen Niagara; but we agreed to go together on a pilgrimage at our earliest convenience. One thing and another happened, until I had been abroad and returned, without our seeing it together. At last, being about to go to the South of Europe, I made a new arrangement with him; but just as we—my wife and I—were ready to go, he was called away to consecrate some church in the West, and we started on a journey of two thousand miles through portions of our country I had never seen, and was ashamed to go abroad again without seeing. On my way back we stopped in Buffalo, and as I stood in the piazza I saw a little card on one of the pillars saying that the Rev. Mr. Pierpont would preach in the evening somewhere. I found him, and we went together at last, and saw Niagara together, as we had agreed to do forty years before. And that night the heavens rained fire upon us, and the great November star-shooting occurred, and our landlord, being no poet, was unwilling to disturb us, so that we missed the show altogether.
