Chapter Chapter 5 of Index by Simonds History of American Literature

Honors in England.

In the spring of 1868, Mr. Longfellow went again to Europe, accompanied by his children. The poet was everywhere accorded a royal welcome. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge honored him with their degrees, and Queen Victoria received him as her guest at Windsor. The winter was spent in Florence and Rome and (after again visiting England) the party returned home in the fall.

The Later Volumes.

Longfellow's most ambitious, but not most successful, dramatic work, Christus: a Mystery (which includes The Divine Tragedy, The Golden Legend, and The New England Tragedies), was published, complete, in 1872; The Masque of Pandora and Other Poems, in 1875; Kéramos and Other Poems, in 1878; Ultima Thule, in 1880, and In the Harbor, in 1882. Michael Angelo, a Fragment, did not appear until 1884. The most notable among these later compositions was the Morituri Salutamus¹ written for the fiftieth anniversary of the famous class at Bowdoin.

Closing Days.

Longfellow's last years can hardly be termed declining years. His health continued vigorous, his spirit was cheerful, his house remained a centre of sociability. His children married and established their homes around him. Outside the circle of distinguished men in Cambridge and Boston who cherished his friendship, he might well have called all his countrymen his friends, for no American man of letters was ever so widely beloved. His popularity, indeed, had its drawbacks. It was sometimes amusing and often annoying to the poet, -- this insistent pressure of friendly feeling. His time and strength were absorbed by well- meaning but inconsiderate visitors whose only errand was to express their admiration. Requests for autographs were numberless; in one day Longfellow wrote, sealed, and directed seventy replies. One ingenious lady in Ohio sent him a hundred cards, with the request that he would write his name on each, that she might distribute them among her guests at a party which she was to give upon the poet's birthday!

The Poet and the Children.

No account of Longfellow's personality would be complete without reference to his love for children. His relation to them was singularly intimate and tender. Among his sweetest poems are those which treat of childhood. It was no perfunctory greeting that he uttered:--

"Come to me, O ye children!
   And whisper in my ear
What the birds and the winds are singing
   In your sunny atmosphere.

"For what are all our contrivings,
   And the wisdom of our books,
When compared with your caresses,
   And the glandness of your looks?

"Ye are better than all the ballads
   That ever were sung or said;
For ye are living poems,
   And all the rest are dead."¹

The End.

And the children came to him. On his seventy-second birthday they brought him the famous chair made from the wood of the "spreading chestnut tree" which had shaded the doorway of the village smith. They continued to come collectively and individually; for the warm-hearted poet gave orders that no child who wished to see the chair should be excluded; and the muddy print of many a little shoe was left on the floor of the hall in Craigie house. Longfellow's seventy-fifth birthday was celebrated in the public schools throughout the land. His last visitors were four Boston schoolboys who had asked permission to call, whom the poet received with accustomed kindliness. That night he had a sudden attack of illness, and six days later, March 24, 1882, he died. His last poem, The Bells of San Blas, was written a few days before his death. One finds a touch of prophecy in the closing lines -- the last verses that he wrote: --

"Out of the shadows of night
The world rolls into light;
   It is daybreak everywhere."