Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 December 1881 — Dr. Holland’s First Poem. [ARTICLE]

Dr. Holland’s First Poem.

The first article of mine that ever saw the light was a little poem of four stanzas entitled “James’ Tree.” A little lad, son of the late Judge Dewey, of Massachusetts, Btuck a willow twig into the ground of his father’s garden, which took root after the manner of such twigs, and grew into a tree. The boy lived long enough to call this tree his own, and to secure its protection as such, and then died. After his death I wrote the poem, and it was published in The Youth's Companion, a publication still prosperous. I was then seventeen years old. I took the printed copy containing it from the postoffice, peeped within and then walked home on air. I shall probably never be so absorbingly happy as I was then. Earth has nothing like it—earth never had anything like it—for me. I have seen my work in type since then until I have been tired of the sight of it, but I can never forget the great joy of that occasion. Smith College in Northampton now stand on the sight of the old Dewey place, and when they cleared things away for the new buildings they found an old, gnarled willow tree. On learning the history of the tree, and the nature of my association with it, President Seelye had a book : rack, elegantly mounted,- made of it, and sent it to me. Of course it was installed among my household gods.— Letter Written to a Randolph (O.) Reading Club.

When Emile de Girardin introduced into France the cheap newspaper and daily slice of a novel ‘‘ to be continued in our next,” the age of literary fortunes began. The elder Dumas made and spent millions of francs. With the Siecle alone he had a contract for 100,000 lines a year at thirty cents a line—a figure that remained unparalleled until this year, when Alphonse Daudet was paid the same price for his novel, in the Illustration of Paris, in the Independence Beige and the Neve Freie Presse simultaneously. The old Constitutionnel paid $20,000 for Eugene Sue’s “ Wandering Jew.” .w——. With the Sandwich Islanders tears are recognized as a sign of joy.