. The poets' New England. ey lived many years together and had several chil-dren. It is said that a singular prosperity markedthe latter years of his life, but that in all his pros-perity he never remembered the Puritan friends whohad helped him. This extraordinary romance is a sub-ject fitted to the hand of a Victor Hugo, rather thanto that of our gentle Quaker poet. A drama to rivalHernani in melodramatic situations might be madefrom such material. Whittier has touched upon many of the romanticaspects of early New England life, and has writtenabout them simply and most sympathetically in afo
. The poets' New England. ey lived many years together and had several chil-dren. It is said that a singular prosperity markedthe latter years of his life, but that in all his pros-perity he never remembered the Puritan friends whohad helped him. This extraordinary romance is a sub-ject fitted to the hand of a Victor Hugo, rather thanto that of our gentle Quaker poet. A drama to rivalHernani in melodramatic situations might be madefrom such material. Whittier has touched upon many of the romanticaspects of early New England life, and has writtenabout them simply and most sympathetically in aform which makes of them genuine classics of New^England lore, but in The Courtship of MilesStandish, Longfellow has produced the chief poeticxomance of Colonial New England. He has twisted history and the facts in relation toPriscilla and John Alden to suit himself, yet fromthis poem is gained a vivid picture of the PlymouthColony and its ways. Especially does the doughtyMiles stand before us—a mixture of piety and mili-. o Of <Ph THE POETS NEW ENGLAND 137 xary enthusiasm, hardly to be matched in the annalsof Christendom. It is the same hardy and uncompromisingly genu-ine soul which speaks in Lowells poem, and whothinks Tis shame to see such painted sticks inVanes and Winthrops places. Longfellow and Whittier both lend the distinctionof their muse to the quaint seaside town of Marble-head. The former gives but a glimpse of the placein his Fire of Drift Wood, and not an altogetheraccurate one, as it was in his own day, while Whit-tier puts a bit of life into verse characteristic of theearly days of the town in Skipper Iresons as contrasted with Yankee calculation istypical, says Samuel Roads, Jr., in his History, ofMarblehead. The women impulsively stoned certainIndian women to death on a fine Simday morning,on their way to church. He attributes this to thefact that the colonists of Marblehead from the Chan-nel Islands had French blood in their veins. Fortwo hun
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