No More Learning

* * * * *

'Multos enim, quibus loquendi ratio non desit, invenias, quos curiose
potius loqui dixeris quam Latine; quomodo et illa Attica anus
Theophrastum, hominem alioqui disertissimum, annotata unius affectatione
verbi, hospitem dixit, nec alio se id deprehendisse interrogata
respondit, quam quod nimium Attice loqueretur. '--QUINTILIANUS.

'Et Anglice sermonicari solebat populo, sed secundum linguam Norfolchie
ubi natus et nutritus erat. '--CRONICA JOCELINI.

'La politique est une pierre attachee an cou de la litterature, et qui en
moins de six mois la submerge. . . . Cette politique va offenser mortellement
une moitie des lecteurs, et ennuyer l'autre qui l'a trouvee bien autrement
speciale et energique dans le journal du matin. '--HENRI BEYLE.

[When the book appeared it bore a dedication to E. R. Hoar, and was
introduced by an essay of the Yankee form of English speech. This
Introduction is so distinctly an essay that it has been thought best to
print it as an appendix to this volume, rather than allow it to break in
upon the pages of verse. There is, however, one passage in it which may
be repeated here, since it bears directly upon the poem which serves as
a sort of prelude to the series.
]


'The only attempt I had ever made at anything like a pastoral (if that
may be called an attempt which was the result almost of pure accident)
was in _The Courtin'_. While the introduction to the First Series was
going through the press, I received word from the printer that there was
a blank page left which must be filled. I sat down at once and
improvised another fictitious "notice of the press," in which, because
verse would fill up space more cheaply than prose, I inserted an extract
from a supposed ballad of Mr. Biglow. I kept no copy of it, and the
printer, as directed, cut it off when the gap was filled. Presently I
began to receive letters asking for the rest of it, sometimes for the
_balance_ of it. I had none, but to answer such demands, I patched a
conclusion upon it in a later edition. Those who had only the first
continued to importune me. Afterward, being asked to write it out as an
autograph for the Baltimore Sanitary Commission Fair, I added other
verses, into some of which I infused a little more sentiment in a homely
way, and after a fashion completed it by sketching in the characters and
making a connected story. Most likely I have spoiled it, but I shall put
it at the end of this Introduction, to answer once for all those kindly
importunings. '



THE COURTIN'

God makes sech nights, all white an' still
Fur 'z you can look or listen,
Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill,
All silence an' all glisten.

Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown
An' peeked in thru' the winder,
An' there sot Huldy all alone,
'ith no one nigh to hender.

A fireplace filled the room's one side
With half a cord o' wood in--
There warn't no stoves (tell comfort died)
To bake ye to a puddin'.

The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out
Towards the pootiest, bless her,
An' leetle flames danced all about
The chiny on the dresser.

Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung,
An' in amongst 'em rusted
The ole queen's-arm thet gran'ther Young
Fetched back f'om Concord busted.

The very room, coz she was in,
Seemed warm f'om floor to ceilin',
An' she looked full ez rosy agin
Ez the apples she was peelin'.