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JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY.

"THE HOOSIER POET."

O poet of the modern times has obtained a greater popularity with the masses than the Indianian, James Whitcomb Riley, who has recently obtained the rank of a National Poet, and whose temporary hold upon the people equals, if it does not exceed, that of any living verse writer. The productions of this author have crystallized certain features of life that will grow in value as time goes by. In reading "The Old Swimmin' Hole," one almost feels the cool refreshing water touch the thirsty skin. And such poems as "Griggsby's Station," "Airly Days," "When the Frost is on the Punkin," "That Old Sweetheart of Mine," and others, go straight to the heart of the reader with a mixture of pleasant recollections, tenderness, humor, and sincerity, that is most delightful in its effect.

Mr. Riley is particularly a poet of the country people. Though he was not raised on a farm himself, he had so completely imbibed its atmosphere that his readers would scarcely believe he was not the veritable Benjamin F. Johnston, the simple-hearted Boone County farmer, whom he honored with the authorship of his early poems. Το every man who has been a country boy and "played hookey" on the school-master to go swimming or fishing or bird-nesting or stealing water-melons, or simply to lie on the orchard grass, many of Riley's poems come as an echo from his own experiences, bringing a vivid and pleasingly melodious retrospect of the past. Mr. Riley's "Child Verses" are equally as famous. There is an artless catching sing-song in his verses, not unlike the jingle of the "Mother Goose Melodies. Especially fine in their faithfulness to child-life, and in easy rythm, are the pieces describing "Little Orphant Allie" and "The Ragged Man.

An' Little Orphant Allie says, when the blaze is blue,
An' the lampwick sputters, an' the wind goes woo-00!
An' you hear the crickets quit, an' the moon is gray,
An' the lightnin'-bug in dew is all squenched away,-
You better mind yer parents and yer teacher fond an' dear,
An' cherish them 'at loves you and dry the orphant's tear,
An' he'p the poor an' needy ones 'at cluster all about,
Er the gobble-uns 'll git you

Ef you-don't-watch-out.

James Whitcomb Riley was born in Greenfield, Indiana, in 1853. His father was a Quaker, and a leading attorney of that place, and desired to make a lawyer

of his son; but Mr. Riley tells us, "Whenever I picked up 'Blackstone' or 'Greenleaf,' my wits went to wool-gathering, and my father was soon convinced that his hopes of my achieving greatness at the bar were doomed to disappointment." Referring to his education, the poet further says, "I never had much schooling, and what I did get, I believe did me little good. I never could master mathematics, and history was a dull and juiceless thing to me; but I always was fond of reading in a random way, and took naturally to the theatrical. I cannot remember when I was not a declaimer, and I began to rhyme almost as soon as I could talk."

Riley's first occupation was as a sign painter for a patent-medicine man, with whom he traveled for a year. On leaving this employment he organized a company of sign painters, with whom he traveled over the country giving musical entertainments and painting signs. In referring to this he says, "All the members of the company were good musicians as well as painters, and we used to drum up trade with our music. We kept at it for three or four years, made plenty of money, had lots of fun, and did no harm to ourselves or any one else. Of course, during this sign painting period, I was writing verses all the time, and finally after the Graphic Company's last trip I secured a position on the weekly paper at Anderson." For many years Riley endeavored to have his verses published in various magazines, "sending them from one to another," he says, "to get them promptly back again." Finally, he sent some verses to the poet Longfellow, who congratulated him warmly, as did also Mr. Lowell, to whose "New England Dialectic Poems" Mr. Riley's "Hoosier Rhymes" bore a striking resemblance. From this time forward his success was assured, and, instead of hunting publishers, he has been kept more than busy in supplying their eager demands upon his pen.

Mr. Riley's methods of work are peculiar to himself. His poems are composed as he travels or goes about the streets, and, once they are thought out, he immediately stops and transfers them to paper. But he must work as the mood or muse moves him. He cannot be driven. On this point he says of himself, "It is almost impossible for me to do good work on orders. If I have agreed to complete a poem at a certain time, I cannot do it at all; but when I can write without considering the future, I get along much better." He further says, with reference to writing dialect, that it is not his preference to do so. He prefers the recognized poetic form; "but," he adds, "dialectic verse is natural and gains added charm from its very commonplaceness. If truth and depiction of nature are wanted, and dialect is a touch of nature, then it should not be disregarded. I follow nature as closely as I can, and try to make my people think and speak as they do in real life, and such success as I have achieved is due to this."

The first published work of the author was "The Old Swimmin' Hole" and "Leven More Poems," which appeared in 1883. Since that date he published a number of volumes. Among the most popular may be mentioned, "Armazindy," which contains some of his best dialect and serious verses, including the famous Poe Poem, "Leonainie," written and published in early life as one of the lost poems of Poe, and on which he deceived even Poe's biographers, so accurate was he in mimicking the style of the author of the "Raven;" "Neighborly Poems;" "Sketches in Prose," originally published as "The Boss Girl and Other Stories;" "Afterwhiles," comprising sixty-two poems and sonnets, serious, pathetic, humorous and

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dialectic; "Pipes O' Pan," containing five sketches and fifty poems; "Rhymes of Childhood;" Flying Islands of the Night," a weird and grotesque drama in verse; "Green Fields and Running Brooks," comprising one hundred and two poems and sonnets, dialectic, humorous and serious.

The poet has never married. He makes his home in Indianapolis, Indiana, with his sister, where his surroundings are of the most pleasant nature; and he is scarcely less a favorite with the children of the neighborhood than was the renowned child poet, Eugene Field, at his home. The devotion of Mr. Riley to his aged parents, whose last days he made the happiest and brightest of their lives, has been repeatedly commented upon in the current notices of the poet. Mr. Riley has personally met more of the American people, perhaps, than any other living poet. He is constantly "on the wing." For about eight months out of every twelve for the past several years he has been on the lecture platform, and there are few of the more intelligent class of people in the leading cities of America, who have not availed themselves, at one time or another, to the treat of listening to his inimitable recitation of his poems. His short vacation in the summer-" his loafing days," as he calls themare spent with his relatives, and it is on these occasions that the genial poet is found at his best.

OUR HIRED GIRL.*

66 FROM POEMS HERE AT HOME."

THE RAGGEDY MAN.* FROM POEMS HERE AT HOME."

* By permission of The Century Co.