"But besides 'Congressional Documents' and the like, the terror of librarians and the delight of paper-makers, we do a good deal of other printing. We make some books, a good many books, a great many books, so many that the hyperbole at the end of St. John's gospel would hardly be an extravagance in speaking of them. And among these are a number of histories which hold an honorable place on the shelves of all the great libraries of Christendom. Why should I enumerate them? For history is a Boston specialty. From the days of Prescott and Ticknor to those of Motley and Parkman, we have always had an historian or two on hand, as they used always to have a lion or two in the Tower of London. "Next to the historians naturally come the story-tellers and romancers. The essential difference is--I would not apply the rough side of the remark to historians like the best of our own, but it is very often the fact--that history tells lies about real persons and fiction tells truth through the mouths of unreal ones. England threw open the side doors of its library to Irving. The continent flung wide its folding doors to Cooper. Laplace was once asked who was the greatest mathematician of Germany. 'Pfaff is the greatest,' he answered. 'I thought Gauss was,' the questioner said. 'You asked me,' rejoined Laplace, 'who was the greatest mathematician of Germany. Gauss was the greatest mathematician of Europe.' So, I suppose we might say _The Pilot_ is or was the most popular book ever written in America, but _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ is the most popular story ever published in the world. And if _The Heart of Mid Lothian_ added a new glory of romance to the traditions of Auld Reekie, _The Scarlet Letter_ did as much for the memories of our own New England. I need not speak of the living writers, some of whom are among us, who have changed the old scornful question into 'Who _does not_ read an American book?' "As to poetical literature, I must confess that, except a line or two of Philip Freneau's, I know little worthy of special remembrance before the beginning of this century, always excepting, as in duty bound, the verses of my manifold grandmother. The conditions of the country were unfavorable to the poetical habit of mind. The voice that broke the silence was that of Bryant, a clear and smooth baritone, if I may borrow a musical term, with a gamut of a few notes of a grave and manly quality. Then came Longfellow, the poet of the fireside, of the library, of all gentle souls and cultivated tastes, whose Muse breathed a soft contralto that was melody itself, and Emerson, with notes that reached an octave higher than any American poet--a singer whose Voice fell like a falling star. Like that of the bird addressed by Wordsworth-- At once far off and near, it was a Cry Which made [us] look a thousand ways, In bush and tree and sky;