Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, James Russell Lowell, Bayard Taylor Part 17

But all this only urged him to greater efforts. "I tell you what, Frank," he writes almost in his next letter, "I am getting a real rage in me to carve out my own fortune, and not a poor one, either.

Sometimes I almost desire that difficulties should be thrown in my way, for the sake of the additional strength gained in surmounting them."

These words were written from Italy; but yet harder things were in store for him. "I reached London for the second time about the middle of March, 1846," he writes in his paper on "A Young Author's Life in London," "after a dismal walk through Normandy and a stormy pa.s.sage across the Channel. I stood upon London Bridge, in the raw mist and the falling twilight, with a franc and a half in my pocket, and deliberated what I should do. Weak from sea-sickness, hungry, chilled, and without a single acquaintance in the great city, my situation was about as hopeless as it is possible to conceive. Successful authors in their libraries, sitting in cus.h.i.+oned chairs and dipping their pens into silver inkstands, may write about money with a beautiful scorn, and chant the praise of Poverty--the 'good G.o.ddess of Poverty,' as George Sand, making 50,000 francs a year, enthusiastically terms her;--but there is no condition in which the Real is so utterly at variance with the Ideal, as to be actually out of money, and hungry, with nothing to p.a.w.n and no friend to borrow from. Have you ever known it, my friend? If not, I could wish that you might have the experience for twenty-four hours, only once in your life."

On this occasion Bayard Taylor went to a chop-house where he could get a wretched bed for a s.h.i.+lling. The next morning he took a sixpenny breakfast, and started out to look for work. By good fortune he met Putnam, the American publisher, who lent him a sovereign (five dollars) and gave him work that would enable him to earn his living until he could get money from America for his return pa.s.sage.

CHAPTER VIII

HIS FIRST LOVE AND GREATEST SORROW

At the very first school which Bayard Taylor attended there was a little Quaker girl who would whisper with a blush to her teacher, "May I sit beside Bayard?" Her name was Mary Agnew. As schoolmates and neighbors the two children grew up together; and in time Bayard began to confide to his diary his dream of happiness with her. Toward this object, all his thoughts and plans were gradually directed.

Mary Agnew's father did not countenance this neighbor lover, however, and when Bayard set out for Europe he was not allowed to write to her.

He sent messages through his mother, and occasionally heard from the young girl in the same way. On his return, however, he grew more bold, and soon became openly engaged to her. The romance is a sadly beautiful one; for this fair girl who was his inspiration during the years of his hardest struggles, finally fell into a decline and died just as he was beginning to earn the money that would have made them happy together.

"I remember him," says a neighbor, speaking of the two at this time, "as a bright, blus.h.i.+ng, diffident youth, just entering manhood; and with him I always a.s.sociate that gentle and beautiful girl, with matchless eyes, who inspired many of his early lyrics, and whose death filled the nest of love with snow."

Mary Agnew reminds us of Poe's beautiful Virginia Clemm, his "Annabel Lee." Grace Greenwood wrote of her as "a dark-eyed young girl with the rose yet unblighted on cheek and lip, with soft brown, wavy hair, which, when blown by the wind, looked like the hair oft given to angels by the old masters, producing a sort of halo-like effect about a lovely head."

And Taylor at this time was evidently her match in looks as well as spirit. A German friend describes him thus: "He was a tall, slender, blooming young man, the very image of youthful beauty and purity. His intellectual head was surrounded by dark hair; the glance of his eyes was so modest, and yet so clear and lucid, that you seemed to look right into his heart."

On his return from Europe, young Taylor found that his letters to the newspapers had attracted some attention, perhaps largely owing to the fact that one who was almost a boy had made the journey on foot, with little or no money. At the same time he had told his story in a simple, straightforward way, which proved him to be a good reporter.

Friends advised him to gather the letters into a volume, which he did under the t.i.tle, "Views Afoot; or Europe Seen with Knapsack and Staff." Within a year six editions were sold, and the sale continued large for a number of years.

Yet this success, quick as it was, did not solve all his difficulties at once. He was anxious to earn a good living as soon as possible, that he might marry Mary Agnew. After looking the field over, he and a friend bought a weekly paper published in Phoenixville, a lively manufacturing town in the same county as his home. This, with the aid of his friend, he edited and managed for a year. He not only failed to make money, but acc.u.mulated debts which he was three years in paying off. At the same time he found that he could no longer endure a narrow country life. He tried to give his paper a literary tone; but the people did not want a literary paper. They cared more for local news and gossip, which he hated.

The old ambition and aspiration to be and to do something really worth doing was still uppermost with him. In a letter to Mary Agnew he says: "Sometimes I feel as if there were a Providence watching over me, and as if an unseen and uncontrollable hand guided my actions. I have often dim, vague forebodings that an eventful destiny is in store for me; that I have vast duties yet to accomplish, and a wider sphere of action than that which I now occupy. These thoughts may be vain; they spring only from the ceaseless impulses of an upward-aspiring spirit; but if they _are_ real, and to be fulfilled, I shall the more need thy love and the gladness of thy dear presence."

He wrote to his friends in New York about getting work there, but they did not encourage him much. Horace Greeley bluntly advised him to stay where he was. The editor of the _Literary World,_ however, offered him employment at five dollars a week. He thereupon sold out his interest in his country paper at a loss, and went to try his fortunes in New York. Before he had been there many weeks, Horace Greeley offered him a position on the _Tribune_ at twelve dollars a week. The connection thus begun lasted for the rest of his life. It was as the _Tribunes_ correspondent that he traveled all over the world. He was soon able to buy stock in the _Tribune_ company, and this was the foundation of his future fortune.

He had many literary and other distinguished friends in New York. And during these first few years he worked very hard indeed, hoping soon to earn enough money to provide for Mary Agnew. In 1850, after three years in New York, he was able to set the date of their marriage. But it was postponed from time to time on account of her illness. At last he knew that she could never be well again; yet in any case he wished the marriage ceremony performed. They were accordingly married October 24, 1850; and two months later she was dead.

CHAPTER IX

"THE GREAT AMERICAN TRAVELER"

It had been Bayard Taylor's boyhood ambition to become a great poet; but it seemed as if fate meant him for a great traveler. He was sorry that this was so: yet he was fond of travel, and never refused any opportunity to visit other lands. In 1849, when the California gold fever was at its height, he was sent by the _Tribune_ to the Pacific Coast.

"I went," he says, "by way of the Isthmus of Panama--the route had just been opened--reached San Francisco in August, and spent five months in the midst of the rough, half-savage life of a new country. I lived almost entirely in the open air, sleeping on the ground with my saddle for a pillow, and sharing the hards.h.i.+ps of the gold diggers, without taking part in their labors."

On his return he gathered his letters into a volume ent.i.tled "Eldorado, or Adventures in the Path of Empire: comprising a voyage to California, via Panama; Life in San Francisco and Monterey; Pictures of the Gold Region, and Experiences of Mexican Travel."

He now began to feel the strength and confidence of success; his brain was seething with new ideas, and he felt as if he could do that which would realize the destiny of which he had dreamed. But sorrow was already at his door. His hopes were for the time broken and thrown back by the death of Mary Agnew.

In the summer of 1851 he found himself worn out and depressed. His health was shattered and his mind was overpowered. But a change and rest were at hand. The editors of the _Tribune_ suggested his going to Egypt and the Holy Land. In the autumn he set out, and spent the winter in ascending the Nile to Khartoum. He even went up the White Nile to the country of the s.h.i.+llooks, a region then scarcely known to white men.

Bayard Taylor fancied that he had two natures, one a southern nature and one a northern nature. Of course the northern nature was his regular and ordinary one. In one of his later journeys, when he had entered Spain from France and was sitting down to a breakfast of red mullet and oranges fresh from the trees, "straightway," he says, "I took off my northern nature as a garment, folded it and packed it neatly away in my knapsack, and took out in its stead the light, beribboned and bespangled southern nature, which I had not worn for eight or nine years."

He donned this southern nature for the first time on his trip to California by way of Panama. Horace Greeley especially commended his letter from Panama. But it was during his journey in Egypt that he became most saturated with the south, and composed his "Poems of the Orient"--perhaps the best he ever wrote. He had not been in Alexandria a day and a half before he wrote to his mother that he had never known such a delicious climate. "The very air is a luxury to breathe," he said. "I am going to don the red cap and sash," he wrote from Cairo, "and sport a saber at my side. To-day I had my hair all cut within a quarter of an inch of the skin, and when I look in the gla.s.s I see a strange individual. Think of me as having no hair, a long beard, and a copper-colored face." So much like a native did he become that when he entered the bank in Constantinople for his letters and money, they addressed him in Turkish.

He made the journey up the Nile on a boat with a wealthy German landowner, a Mr. Bufleb, who became to him like a brother, though he was nearly twice the age of Taylor. Some years later the young man married Mrs. Bufleb's niece.

When he reached Constantinople he received a letter from the managers of the _Tribune_ suggesting that he go across Asia to Hong-Kong, China, and join the expedition of Commodore Perry to j.a.pan. As the expedition would not reach Hong-Kong for some months, however, he had time to visit his German friend and go on to London. From London he returned through Spain and went by way of the Suez, Bombay, and Calcutta to China, stopping on the way to view the Himalayas.

Commodore Perry made the young journalist "master's mate," and gave him a place on the flags.h.i.+p. This was necessary, because no one not a member of the navy was allowed to accompany the expedition.

There is not s.p.a.ce to detail the wonderful sights he saw or the interesting experiences he had. He reached New York, December 20, 1853, after an absence of more than two years, and found that in his absence he had become almost famous. His letters in the _Tribune_ had been read all over the country, and everybody wanted to know more of the "great American traveler."

He at once prepared for the press three books. They were "A Journey to Central Africa; or, Life and Landscapes from Egypt to the Negro Kingdoms of the Nile "; "The Land of the Saracens; or, Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain"; and "A Visit to India, China, and j.a.pan in the Year 1853."

He had hundreds of calls to lecture; and thereafter for several years he made lecturing his princ.i.p.al business. From his books and his lectures he received large sums of money, so that before he was thirty he had acc.u.mulated a modest fortune.

In 1856 Bayard Taylor took his two sisters and his youngest brother to Europe. He left them in Germany, while he himself carried out a plan long in his mind, of visiting northern Sweden and Lapland in winter.

The following summer he visited Norway, and later published the results of these journeys in "Northern Travel."

While in Germany, after his trip to Sweden, he became engaged to Marie Hansen, daughter of Prof. Peter A. Hansen, the noted astronomer and founder of Erfurt Observatory. They were married in the following autumn, October 27, 1857.

He now hurried home with his wife and prepared to build a house and lay out the country estate which he called Cedarcroft. The land had belonged to one of his ancestors, and he was very proud of his fine country house; but he found it a rather expensive enjoyment.

CHAPTER X

HIS POETRY

We have seen how in youth Bayard Taylor conceived the ambition to be known as one of his country's great poets. He saw his books of travel sell by the hundred thousand; but while this brought him money and notoriety, he clung still to his poetry. He even felt annoyed when he heard himself spoken of as "the great American traveler" instead of the great American poet. The truth is, he had not been able to give to poetry the time or energy he could have wished; and he afterwards worked with desperate energy to recover those lost poetic opportunities.

Yet in his busiest days he was always writing verses, which in the minds of excellent judges are the best he ever did. From time to time he published volumes of poetry, and with certain of his intimate friends he always maintained himself on the footing of a poet.

We remember the publication of his first volume, ent.i.tled "Ximena,"

which he never cared to reprint in his collected works. During his first European trip he wrote a great deal. Some of his shorter poems he afterwards published under the t.i.tle "Rhymes of Travel." The fate of a longer poem we must hear in his own words.

"I had in my knapsack," he says, "a ma.n.u.script poem of some twelve hundred lines, called 'The Liberated t.i.tan,'--the idea of which I fancied to be something entirely new in literature. Perhaps it was. I did not doubt for a moment that any London publisher would gladly accept it, and I imagined that its appearance would create not a little sensation. Mr. Murray gave the poem to his literary adviser, who kept it about a month, and then returned it with a polite message.

I was advised to try Moxon; but, by this time, I had sobered down considerably, and did not wish to risk a second rejection.

"I therefore solaced myself by reading the immortal poem at night, in my bare chamber, looking occasionally down into the graveyard, and thinking of mute, inglorious Miltons.

"The curious reader may ask how I escaped the catastrophe of publis.h.i.+ng the poem at last. That is a piece of good fortune for which I am indebted to the Rev. Dr. Bushnell, of Hartford. We were fellow-pa.s.sengers on board the same s.h.i.+p to America, a few weeks later, and I had sufficient confidence in his taste to show him the poem. His verdict was charitable; but he a.s.serted that no poem of that length should be given to the world before it had received the most thorough study and finish--and exacted from me a promise not to publish it within a year. At the end of that time I renewed the promise to myself for a thousand years."