Note T — HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW[T]

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the best-known and best-beloved of American poets, was born at Portland, Maine, on February 27, 1807. The son of a lawyer, he graduated at Bowdoin College at the age of eighteen, and then entered his father's office, not, however, with any intention of adopting the law as a profession. Shortly afterwards, the college trustees sent him on a European tour to qualify himself for the chair of foreign languages, one result of which was a number of translations and his book "Outre Mer." "Voices of the Night," his first volume of original verse, appeared in 1839, and created a favourable impression, which was deepened on the publication in 1841 of Ballads, and Other Poems," containing such moving pieces as "The Wreck of the Hesperus," "The Village Blacksmith," and "Excelsior." From that moment Longfellow's reputation as poet was established—he became a singer whose charm and simplicity not only appealed to his own countrymen, but to English-speaking people the world over. In 1847 he produced what many regard as the greatest of his works, namely, "Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie." The story is founded on the compulsory expatriation by the British of the people of Acadia (Nova Scotia), in 1713, on the charge of having assisted the French (from whom they were descended) at a siege of the war then in progress. The poem is told with infinite pathos and rare narrative power. Longfellow died on March 24, 1882.