To Mr. W. H. Shackford

BOSTON, July 21, 1835.

"I went up to 'Lowell' (!!!!!!) yesterday and spent the day. I went upon the railroad at the rate of about twenty miles an hour. I had a good time and a better dinner thanks to mine host of the Merrimack house. Speaking of railroads puts me in mind of the one contemplated between Boston and Portsmouth and which in my opinion will be a losing speculation. There is not trade enough between Boston and Portsmouth for the support of a railroad, the road. will cost at least $700,000, the engines about $5000 apiece, not to speak of passenger cars, baggage cars, repairs, and the whole accompaniments of a railroad. Why I do not believe that any of the railroads will prove very profitable. After the novelty has worn off the passenger cars will not certainly be so full, etc. etc."

Dearest Shack,

To the Same

CAMBRIDGE, January 6, 1836. .. As for myself, I have had a very happy "new year's day," as far at least as presents go. I have been presented with a book, which I rather think you have heard me speak of buying, namely, Hilliard & Gray's beautiful edition of Milton, very handsomely bound in calf or sheep, I don't know which, for there is a diversity of opinion in the family

about it, some saying one and some another; father says it's calf, and as that is considered the handsomest, I of course agree with him. The English edition of Coleridge's works has also been given me by my "paternal relation." You see the editiomania has not left me yet. With some stray cash, I have purchased Butler and Beattie also; these as well as Coleridge belong to the Aldine Edition of the British Poets. Did you ever read "Hudibras"? It always was and always will be a great favorite of mine, an inexhaustible source of mirth from beginning to end. Who but Butler would have thought of so apt and amusing a simile as this,

"And now, like lobster boiled, the morn

From black to red begins to turn"?

... I am reading the life of Milton, and find it very interesting; his first taste (as well as Cowley's) for poetry was formed by reading Spenser. I am glad to have such good examples, for Spenser was always my favorite poet. I like the metre of the "Faëry Queene"; Beattie's "Minstrel” is in the same. Apropos of poetry I myself (you need not turn up your nose and grin) - yes, I myself have cultivated the Muses, and have translated one or two odes from Horace, your favorite Horace. I like Horace much, but prefer Virgil's Bucolics to his Odes, most of them. If you have your Horace by you, turn to the IX. Satire, 1st Book, and read it, and see

if you don't like it (in an expurgated edition). You advise me to attend to chemistry. I intend to; I always had a taste for it, as I have for everything experimental. Did you ever attend at all to the making of Latin poetry? I always wondered why they didn't teach it here. I think it ought to be attended to here as much as in Europe. I shall study it, and the first attempt I make shall be "Ad Patrem optimum"; the second, "Ad carissimum amicum Gulielmum Shackfordum." If I write anything I'll send it to you. When my poems are published I'll send them to you. Does chemistry belong to your branch of instruction? I like mineralogy as much as ever, but the snow covers the ground, so that I can collect none except from the mine. Hilliard & Gray are going to publish a beautiful edition of Shakespeare next month (price $14, 8 vols., royal 8vo), beautifully printed, which I intend to buy if I can afford it. I admire your seal, which, however, you unluckily forgot to make backwards. I got it off whole. Last term I made a few attempts at woodcutting, and really succeeded about as well as, if not better than, "old Caxton." Without looking, except in the " booke of memorie," can you tell me who he was? I am quite an antiquary, the pursuit of black-letter is very con

I

Mr. Shackford was at this time an instructor at Exeter Academy, N. H. He died in 1842.

genial to my tastes. By the bye, Milton has excited my ambition to read all the Greek and Latin classics which he did.

...

Your most affectionate friend,

JAMES RUSSELL Lowell.

To the Same

CAMBRIDGE, February 1, 1836.

The "deturs" have been given out, and I have got Akenside's Poems. They are the best "deturs" that have been given out this long while, they say; they are bound most beautifully (all alike) in yellow calf, and—what I consider very appropriate - have the College arms stamped on the covers, in gold. They have a new stamp for the inside also. It has the College arms, and underneath the old inscription, with this addition, "pro insigni in studiis diligentiâ."

...

To G. B. Loring

BOSTON, 23 () December, 1836.

My dear Friend, Here I am, alone in Bob's room with a blazing fire, in an atmosphere of "poesy" and soft-coal smoke. Pope, Dante, a few of the older English poets, Byron, and last, not least, some of my own compositions, lie around me. Mark my modesty. I don't put myself in the same line with the rest, you see. ... Been Been quite " grouty" all the vacation,

"black as Erebus." Discovered two points of very striking resemblance between myself and Lord Byron; and if you will put me in mind of it, I will propound next term, or in some other letter, "Vanity, thy name is Lowell"!...

"Vo solcando un mar crudele,

Senza vele e senza sarte,” . . .

as Metastasio says in Italian, and which, transmuted into the good old vernacular, may be expressed in the words of Shakespeare embarked "on a sea of troubles.'

Believe me yours,

To His Mother

- I am

J. R. L.

CAMBRIDGE, January 28, 1837.

I am engaged in several poetical effusions, one of which I have dedicated to you, who have always been the patron and encourager of my youthful muse. If you wish to see me as much as I do you, I shall be satisfied.'

...

In the summer of 1837 Dr. and Mrs. Lowell went to Europe. Mrs. Lowell wrote from Paris, May 27, 1838: "Babie Jamie! your poetry was very pleasing to me, and I am glad to have a letter, but not to remind me of you, for you are seldom long out of my head. . . . Don't leave your whistling, which used to cheer me so much. I frequently listen to it here, tho' far from you." In later years, Lowell often recalled how, on his daily return from school, he used to whistle as he came near home, to announce his coming to his mother, who seldom failed to be sitting at her window to welcome him.