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Four American poets

Chapter 39: CHAPTER II A FARMER’S BOY
By Sherwin Cody
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About This Book

Aimed at young readers, this compact collection presents four readable biographical sketches of notable poets, following childhood influences, schooling, early experiments in verse, and the circumstances behind key works. Each section pairs narrative anecdotes with explanations of themes such as nature, moral conviction, and public engagement, and includes episodes about professional life, honors, and later years. Organized into short chapters that highlight formative scenes, poetic methods, and memorable incidents, the book uses plain language and illustrative detail to make poetic craft and imagery accessible while encouraging appreciation of differing temperaments and literary approaches.

CHAPTER II
A FARMER’S BOY

The first Thomas Whittier, after he married, built a log house, not far from the present Whittier homestead; but when he grew old and became well-to-do he put up what was then a fine house. This was as long ago as 1688, or thereabouts.

In this house, which is still standing, the poet John Greenleaf Whittier was born, December 17, 1807. His father was nearly fifty at the time of his birth, and twenty-one years older than his mother. His grandfather was about the same age when his father was born, and his great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather were equally old at the births of their sons.

On his mother’s side Whittier was descended from a remarkable old preacher named Stephen Bachiler. This man had deep-set, bright eyes, and handsome features, which were inherited by most of his descendants, many of whom became famous men. One was Daniel Webster, who looked very much indeed like Whittier. Both had the Bachiler eye and brow.

New England farm life is not easy or pleasant, though Whittier never admitted that he didn’t have a first-rate time when he was a boy, as you may see by reading “Snow-Bound.” His father’s family had to raise most of the food they ate. They had no comfortable sofas, and the chairs were very straight-backed. Besides, they did not succeed very well in keeping warm in the winter. As they thought it was necessary to toughen themselves, they went out on very cold days without much clothing on. Indeed, they probably had but very few warm clothes. There were no such things in those days as heavy flannels or great overcoats. The cloth in their garments was spun and woven at home by the mother, and she did not always get the threads very close together. So there were a great many spaces for the wind to blow through. Of course they had to go to meeting every First-day (Sunday), and as there were no fires in the meeting-house, they suffered much from the cold in winter.

Even the dwelling houses were not very warm. There was only one fire, and it was built in a chimney-place so large that there was room for benches inside the chimney next to the fire. Then the wind would come in through the cracks and crevices; and while it was very hot before the fireplace, a little way back it was cold. It would often happen on cold, windy nights that their faces would burn while their backs were almost freezing. And the bedrooms were like ice-chests, and never warm except in summer, when they were sure to be too hot. Whittier was sickly all the latter part of his life; and he laid his trouble largely to exposure in childhood; for he was always delicate. He lived to be very old, however, as did all his ancestors.

This was the unpleasant side to his boyhood; of the pleasant side Whittier himself has told us. If you wish to know what good times he had in the summer season, read the “Barefoot Boy”:

Blessings on thee, little man,
Barefoot boy with cheeks of tan!...
From my heart I give thee joy—
I was once a barefoot boy!

It is only the country boy who knows—

How the tortoise bears his shell,
How the woodchuck digs his cell,
And the ground-mole sinks his well;
How the robin feeds her young,
How the oriole’s nest is hung;
Where the whitest lilies blow,
Where the freshest berries grow,
Where the groundnut trails its vine,
Where the wood-grape’s clusters shine.

But it is in “Snow-Bound,” his greatest and most beautiful poem, that we hear of all the pleasant times which the farm boy has in winter, and also all about the members of Whittier’s own family. He begins the poem by telling how the snowstorm came up, and then goes on—

Meanwhile we did our nightly chores,—
Brought in the wood from out of doors,
Littered the stalls, and from the mows
Raked down the herd’s-grass for the cows.

Every farmer boy knows what “chores” are. The fun came the next morning when their father, “a prompt, decisive man,” wasting no breath, said, “Boys, a path!” You must go to the poem itself to read about the Aladdin’s cave they dug in the snow, and the other things they did. “As night drew on,” says the poet,

We piled with care our nightly stack
Of wood against the chimney back,—
The oaken log, green, huge and thick
And on its top the stout back stick;
The knotty forestick laid apart,
And filled between with curious art
The ragged brush; then, hovering near,
We watched the first red blaze appear,
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam,
Until the old, rude-furnished room,
Burst flower-like into rosy bloom....
Shut in from all the world without,
We sat the clean-winged hearth about
Content to let the north wind roar
In baffled rage at pane and door;
While the red logs before us beat
The frost line back with tropic heat;
And ever, when a louder blast
Shook beam and rafter as it passed,
The merrier up its roaring draught
The great throat of the chimney laughed.
The house dog on his paws outspread
Laid to the fire his drowsy head,
The cat’s dark silhouette on the wall
A couchant tiger’s seemed to fall;
And, for the winter fireside meet,
Between the andirons’ straddling feet,
The mug of cider simmered slow,
The apples sputtered in a row,
And, close at hand, the basket stood
With nuts from brown October’s wood.

Whittier was nearly sixty years old when he wrote this poem, and perhaps he had forgotten partly the hardships of his boyhood; but the poem is so great because it is so simple and natural and true. It may seem strange that the greatest work of a great poet is no more than a description of his every-day home when he was a boy. Whittier’s home was not finer nor better than anybody else’s home—than yours or mine; in fact, in comparison with what we have, it was very poor indeed. Yet Whittier made this wonderful poem about it. That shows how great a poet he was. Only a great poet could take a barefoot boy, or a snowstorm, or a common farmhouse and write such beautiful verses about it. Think of this carefully, and you will come to understand what good poetry really is.