Perhaps it may be best
described as that of serious and tender thoughtfulness. He had
conquered his own sorrows thus far; but the sorrows of others threw
their shadow over him.... There was a strange touch of sorrowful
majesty and prophetic fortitude commingled with the composure and
kindness of his features.... His spontaneous desire, the natural
instinct of his great heart, was to be helpful,--to lift up the lowly,
to strengthen the weak, to bring out the best in every person, to dry
every tear, and make every pathway smooth."
Although naturally of a buoyant disposition and fond of pleasure,
Longfellow lived as far as possible from the public eye, especially
during the last twenty years of his life. The following note gives a
hint of his natural gayety, and details one of the many excuses by
which he always declined to speak in public; the one memorable
exception being that beautiful occasion at Bowdoin, when he returned
in age to the scenes of his youth and read to the crowd assembled
there to do him reverence his poem entitled "Morituri Salutamus."
After speaking of the reasons which must keep him from the Burns
festival, he adds:--
"I am very sorry not to be there. You will have a delightful supper,
or dinner, whichever it is; and human breath enough expended to fill
all the trumpets of Iskander for a month or more.
"I behold as in a vision a friend of ours, with his left hand under
the tails of his coat, blowing away like mad; and alas! I shall not be
there to applaud.
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