"With a manly breadth of soul, With a virile power of 'hit,' And good fellow!" SUGGESTIONS FOR READING POETRY: Old Ironsides, The Last Leaf, The Chambered Nautilus, Contentment, The Deacon's Masterpiece, The Old Man Dreams, The Boys, The Living Temple, The Iron Gate, The Voiceless, Dorothy Q, Homesick in Heaven, Parson Turell's Legacy, Under the Violets, The Height of the Ridiculous. PROSE: The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table, My Hunt after the Captain, Over the Teacups. HELPFUL BOOKS J. T. Morse's Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Practiced law and wrote for the magazines. First volume of poems published. Married Miss Maria White. The Biglow Papers. Family. Minister to England. Last volume, Heartsease and Rue. The name of Lowell is an honored one in Massachusetts. One member of the family introduced into the state the manufacture of cotton goods, and the city of Lowell commemorates his name and good deeds; another was the author of the section in the Bill of Rights by which slavery was abolished in the state of Massachusetts; while still another was the generous founder of the Lowell Institute in Boston, which annually provides a free course of lectures for the public. With these three noble and high-spirited men we may justly place the subject of this sketch, James Russell Lowell, who as poet, critic, reformer, and diplomatist won for himself eminent distinction. He was born February 22, 1819, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, Dr. Charles Lowell, was a prominent minister in Boston, and his mother, Harriet Spence, was a unusual refinement and literary taste. woman of Birthplace. Elmwood, in Cambridge, the birthplace and home of Lowell, is a familiar spot to readers of American literature. Almost all his life was spent there, and it was there that he died on the 12th of August, 1891. Education. At an early age Lowell was sent to a dame's school and later was intrusted to the care of William Wells, a well-known classical teacher of those days. In 1834 he entered Harvard, graduating in 1838. Lowell, like Emerson and Hawthorne, did not get as much from his college training as he expected. He was too full of the spirit of mischief and too much inclined to lay out his own course rather than to follow the one prescribed for him by the college authorities. Lowell himself says: "A college training is an excellent thing; but, after all, the better part of every man's education is that which he gives himself." During his senior year Lowell was "rusticated," and required to finish his course at Concord under private instruction. He groaned in spirit at this enforced retirement, especially since he had been elected class poet and was unable to read his poem at commencement. The only consolation that he got at Concord was his association with Emerson, who was then beginning to exert a dominating influence over those with whom he came in contact. During Lowell's college course he was very fond of reading good literature, and thus, early in life, he began to lay that foundation which established his reputation as the most learned critic of America at the time of his death. This love for good literature had been fostered in him by his mother and elder sister. After his graduation he entered the Harvard Law School, from which he received his degree two years later. He then opened an office in Boston, but never seriously engaged in the practice of his profession. As an Editor. Lowell's first editorial experience was gained during his college course, when he was chosen one of the five editors of Harvardiana. In 1842 he and Robert Carter began the publication of the Pioneer, which was to be a purely literary magazine, but the standard set by these ambitious youths was too high for the reading public in America, and the magazine did not survive more than three numbers. Fifteen years later Lowell became the editor of the Atlantic Monthly, which was to be the organ of the leading writers of New England. It began its career under the fairest auspices, having as its founders and early contributors such men as Emerson, Lowell, Holmes, Motley, Cabot, Whittier, and Underwood. For four years Lowell not only served as editor but |