Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 April 1895 — The Courtship of Miles Standish. [ARTICLE]

The Courtship of Miles Standish.

Encouraged by the hearty welcome given to these two American poems, Longfellow, in 1858, published a third, “The Courtship if Miles Standish.” In this he told no pathetic tale of parted lovers, nor did he draw on the quaint lore of the red men; he took his story from the annals of his own ancestors, the sturdy founders of New England. As it happened, he himself (like his fel-low-poet, Bryant) was a direct descendant of John Alden and Priscilla, the Puritan maiden, whose wooing the narrated. “The Courtship of Miles Standish” is only less popular than its predecessors, “Evangeline” and “Hiawatha;” all three have been’takefi to heart by the American people, all were composed during the brightest years of the poet's life, when his'family were growing up about him, when he was In the full possession of his powers, and had already achieved fame.—St. Nicholas.