Ohio History Journal

Editorialana.                       467

stimulation of his firm assurance that all is well here below and all will

be better in the world beyond. His life was above reproach, his career

an inspiration. None knew him but to love him, none named him but to

praise.

No organization with which he was connected seemed to give

him greater pleasure than the Archaeological and Historical Society.

Its field of investigation, its province of collecting and preserving the

records of the past and its work of storing the same for future gen-

erations of students, particularly appealed to his intellectual activities

and his fondness for knowledge of what has been, what is and what may

be. In the pantheon of those who have been most potent in the origin

and growth of this Society-the memory of no one will be more per-

manent or more revered than that of Roeliff Brinkerhoff.

SITE OF FORT GOWER.

An interesting and informing volume could be written on Little

Journeys to Historic Sites in Ohio, and it is one of the dreams of the

Editor of the Quarterly to some day put forth such a volume. Mean-

while, as time permits such "little journeys" are being made. It was

on a brilliant day last August (1911) that the Editor "tripped" to what

in some respects is one of the most historic sites in Ohio. Many articles

have been penned and published on the pioneer forts of Ohio. No

state in the Northwest Territory can boast of as many stockades in

the early days as can the Buckeye commonwealth. Romantic, dramatic

and patriotic are the records of many of them. The French fort of

1745 at the mouth of the Sandusky, the scene of Nicholas' conspiracy;

the stockade defense at Loramie's on the Pickawillany, the scene of

the prelude of the contest between the French and the British for the

Northwest Territory; the first fort built by the Americans, in the

American Revolution, the famous Fort Laurens near the present site

of Bolivar; Fort Stephenson (Fremont) on the Sandusky, the scene of

the siege of Croghan's little band attacked by Proctor and his British

veterans aided by Tecumseh and his horde of western savages, in the

War of 1812; there are few stories in warfare equal to it for display of

bravery and patriotism. But the fort least known to general history

-for it is not mentioned by any of the leading historians-and yet

most significant in western annals, for an event connected therewith,

is Fort Gower at the mouth of the Hocking, or Hockhocking, as it was

once called from the Indian name "Hockin-hockin."

It was the year 1774 in the month of June that the English Parlia-

ment passed the detested Quebec Act-an affirmation of the previous

so-called Quebec Act of 1763. This act of 1774, provided a government

for the Province of Quebec, embracing the territorial domain west

and north of the Ohio River-known later as the Northwest Territory.

468        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

This arbitrary and oppressive jurisdiction covered the scattered western

traders' posts and more firmly than ever excluded any control over it or

interest in it by the sea-board colonies. Settlements from the American

colonies were forbidden in this territory. The Pennsylvanians did not so

seriously protest at this Quebec Act as the Pennsylvanians desired that

the Indians be left in undisputed and undisturbed possession of the trans-

Ohio empire, to the end that the fur trade, extensive and lucrative

to the Quaker provincials, might be undiminished. But with the Vir-

ginians it was different. They claimed, by right of their charter, that

a large part of the Ohio country belonged to Virginia. They claimed

the right to invade the Ohio country and make settlements therein. This

is not the place to enter upon a discussion of the motives and pur-

poses of Dunmore's War-so-called-which followed on the heels of

the Quebec Act.  Suffice it to say, Lord Dunmore, the royal governor

of Virginia, decided upon a hostile expedition across the Ohio, the

main ostensible purpose being to chastise the Ohio Indians for their

aggressive incursions across the Ohio River. We cannot follow the

details of this so-called war. They will be found in an article by the

writer in the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society Quar

terly for October, 1902. Dunmore raised an army of some three thousand

Virginia soldiers. This force was divided into two divisions, fifteen hun-

dred of the contingent were placed under General Andrew Lewis, and

following down the Kanawha reached Point Pleasant October 6th, where

four days later the battle was fought in which Cornstalk, the head

of the Shawnee Confederacy, with over a thousand Indian braves,

was defeated and driven back across the Ohio. Lewis then, in accord-

ance with instructions received from Lord Dunmore, crossed the Ohio

and began his march to the Pickaway Plains, there to unite with Dun-

more's division which was encamped on Sippo Creek. It is the Ohio

invasion of Dunmore's troops that has to do with Fort Gower. While

Andrew Lewis was pursuing the course mapped out for him by Dun-

more, the latter had rendezvoused his division at Pittsburg, whence he

embarked on the Ohio in a flotilla of a hundred canoes, besides keel boats

and pirogues, with George Rogers Clark, Michael Cresap, Simon Girty

and Simon Kenton-then known as Simon Butler-as scouts and guides.

The army moved down the river until it reached the mouth of the

Hocking, at which point the soldiers left the flotilla and built a stockade

which Dunmore called Fort Gower, after Earl Gower, a personal friend

of Dunmore in the British House of Lords. Leaving a garrison of one

hundred men to guard the fort, on October 11th, with White Eyes.

the Delaware chief as an extra guide, Dunmore began his march up

the Hocking Valley, which he followed by way of the present sites of

Athens and Logan, thence he struck a little south of west to the Pick-

away Plains, finally establishing his camp, called Charlotte, on the north

bank of the Sippo. Here took place the famous conference between the

Editorialana.                      469

Virginia general and Cornstalk and his accompanying chiefs, the Mingo

Logan refusing to participate. The treaty of Charlotte was the result.

The "war" was over and Dunmore, breaking camp on October 31st,

proceeded on his return march to the Ohio. He reached Fort Gower

on the 5th of November. Here the soldiers learned, for the first time,

of the action taken by the first Continental Congress, which had assem-

bled at Philadelphia, September 5, 1774. The officers of the army

thereupon held a meeting and passed resolutions which we here insert in

full from the American Archives, 4th Series, Vol. 1, p. 962:

"GENTLEMEN:-Having now concluded the campaign, by the assist-

ance of Providence, with honor and advantage to the colony and our-

selves, it only remains that we should give our country the strongest

assurance that we are ready, at all times, to the utmost of our power,

to maintain and defend her just rights and privileges. We have lived

about three months in the woods without any intelligence from Boston,

or from the delegates at Philadelphia. It is possible, from the groundless

reports of designing men, that our countrymen may be jealous of the use

such a body would make of arms in their hands at this critical juncture.

That we are a respectable body is certain, when it is considered that we

can live weeks without bread or salt; that we can sleep in the open air

without any covering but that of the canopy of heaven; and that our

men can march and shoot with any in the known world. Blessed with

these talents, let us solemnly engage to one another, and our country in

particular, that we will use them to no purpose but for the honor and

advantage of America in general, and of Virginia in particular.  It

behooves us then, for the satisfaction of our country, that we should

give them our real sentiments, by way of resolves, at this very alarming

crisis.

"Whereupon the meeting made choice of a committee to draw up

and prepare resolves for their consideration, who immediately with-

drew, and after some time spent therein, reported that they had agreed

to and prepared the following resolves, which were read, maturely con-

sidered and, agreed to, nemine contradicente, by the meeting, and on

dered to be published in the Virginia Gazette:

"Resolved, That we will bear the most faithful allegiance to His

Majesty, King George the Third, whilst His Majesty delights to reign

over a brave and free people; that we will, at the expense of life, and

everything dear and valuable, exert ourselves in support of his crown,

and the dignity of the British Empire. But as the love of liberty, and

attachment to the real interests and just rights of America outweigh

every other consideration, we resolve that we will exert every power

within us for the defense of American liberty, and for the support of

her just rights and privileges; not in any precipitate, riotous or tumul-

tuous manner, but when regularly called forth by the unanimous voice

of our countrymen.

470        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

"Resolved, That we entertain the greatest respect for His Excellency.

the Right Honorable Lord Dunmore, who commanded the expedition

against the Shawnese; and who, we are confident, underwent the great

fatigue of this singular campaign from no other motive than the true

interest of this country.

"Signed by order and in behalf of the whole corps.

"BENJAMIN ASHBY, Clerk."

These resolutions were virtually a Declaration of Independence on

Ohio soil, by Virginian backwoodsmen, six months before the shot was

fired at Concord that was "heard 'round the world," and more than a year

and a half before the Liberty Bell of Independence Hall pealed forth

the freedom of the Colonies. Is there a spot in Ohio or in the North-

west so deserving of a monument as this historic site of Fort Gower?

Hockingport, to-day, is indeed an "out of the way" place. It is on no

highway of travel, either of steam or electric conveyance. It can only be

reached by ferry across the Ohio from the almost houseless Harris

Station in West Virginia or by a drive or auto whisk from the little

station of Coolville on the south-western division of the B. & O. The

drive from Coolville, a distance of some six miles, is through a most

picturesque country of hill, dale and river, for the route lies along the

north bank of the Hocking river. It was early on the August morning

that we pulled into the little cluster of houses that the inmates designate

as Hockingport. The Ohio at this point takes a plunge due south.

which the Hockhocking, or Hocking, as it is generally known, enters the

Ohio by a curve from the west. The exact location of the almost for

gotten stockade enclosure, as determined by the best traditionary lone

obtainable, "on the spot," by the present writer, was upon the east or

north side of the Hocking, on the elevated bank of the Ohio, from

which its garrison could overlook the broad, placid sweep of the

majestic river, which is here flanked on the Virginia side by a chain

of graceful hills, the tip land of a spur of the Alleghany range. Our

pilot, a scholarly gentleman of many years residence in the town, led

us into the midst of a field covered with tall corn stalks and pointed

out a few heavy stones, which, it is verily believed, were portions of the

magazine receptacle of the fort. The palisaded earthworks, long since

ploughed away, lay on the outskirts of the present burg, a little sleepy

hamlet of only a score and a half scattered dwellings, in which abide

some six score inhabitants, who live the simple life "far away from the

madding crowd's ignoble strife."  Surely Hockingport awaits a just

renown, when it shall be the mecca of historical students, for within its

precincts assembled the Virginia frontiersmen who, of all the Colonists,

were the first to declare their willingness, if called upon, to unsheathe

their swords "for the defense of American liberty."

Editorialana.                       471

THE ICE AGE IN NORTH AMERICA.

The Bibliotheca Sacra Company, Oberlin, Ohio, has recently issued

a fifth and revised edition of "The Ice Age in North America, and Its

Bearings Upon the Antiquity of Man." The author is Professor G.

Frederick Wright, President of the Ohio State Archaeological and

Historical Society. No writer could be better qualified for such a schol-

arly and informing work. Professor Wright has been a most consci-

entious and broad student of theology, and the language and literature

of the Old and New Testaments. For some ten years he was professor

in Oberlin College, on the harmony of science and religion. Professor

Wright is also an accomplished scholar in geology and relative natural

sciences.  He was assistant on the Pennsylvania and United States

Geological Surveys and is the author of several works of a geological

character, bearing upon the formation of the earth's surface, not only

in America but Europe and Asia, which countries he has visited at length

in order to procure his material at first hand. Especially have his studies

been directed to the American Continent and for this work, now reissued

in enlarged and revised form, the author has given the ripest and best

part of his life. When the first edition of this work was issued, in 1889,

Professor Wright had been for fifteen years prominent in glacial in-

vestigations. He had published numerous articles in the scientific jour-

nals recounting his discoveries in New England, had traced the south-

ern boundary of the glaciated region in America from  the Atlantic

Ocean to the Mississippi River, and published the results in Vol. Z.

of the Pennsylvania Reports, and in Tract No. 60, of the Western

Reserve Historical Society of Cleveland, which had kept him in the

field for three years. His delineation of the glaciated boundary east

of the Mississippi is that found on all maps at the present time. Later

he completed investigations in this area and published the results in

Bulletin No. 58 of the U. S. Geological Survey. In 1886, the oppor-

tunity came for him to visit Alaska and make protracted observations

on the Muir Glacier, which though beginning to be visited by tourists

had not been subjected to scientific scrutiny, and it was four years before

any other scientific investigations of the glacier were carried on. He

was then invited to give a course of Lowell Institute Lectures in Boston

upon the subject that is the title of this book. Thus it appears that

Professor Wright was unusually prepared for his work, so that it was

not strange that his book took rank at once as the standard publication

on the subject. The first edition of 1,500 copies, though sold at $5.00

a copy, was disposed of during the first season. Since then three more

editions have been called for and the demand was such that the author

has felt justified in spending a large amount of time and money in

bringing the treatise up to date in this fifth revised and enlarged edition.

Speaking of the fifth and latest edition, the veteran geologist, Pro-

472        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

fessor Charles H. Hitchcock, says "It is the most convenient compendium

in existence of the features of the Glacial period."  Professor Boyd

Dawkins, of England calls it "a valuable addition to the geography and

geology of North America."    The Journal of Education says "No

specialist in geology in any part of the world ever thinks of being with-

out this book, which is now in its fifth edition greatly enlarged, revised

up to the latest contribution of the science." The London Daily News

says that "it forms an almost complete study of glacial formations not

merely in America but over most of the known world." The Springfield

Republican speaks of it as "one of the most important scientific publi-

cations of the present year. . . . The volume should be given a place

in every important public and school library." The San Francisco Bul-

letin says "The volume is a classic in the field of geology, and the new

edition, printed in good, clear type, on the very best of paper, will be

welcomed by geologists throughout the world."

The new material in the book is specially abundant concerning the

glaciers of British Columbia, Alaska, and Greenland, and concerning the

glacial deposits in Pennsylvania, Ohio, the Missouri Valley, and the valley

of the Red River of the North, while the discussion of the cause and

the date of the Glacial period, and of the remains of glacial man have

been greatly enlarged.

It is interesting to note that the main conclusions at which Pro-

fessor Wright had arrived in the first edition are amply supported by

later investigations. His inference that the front of the Muir Glacier

had retreated twenty or twenty-five miles between the visit of Vancouver

in 1794 and Professor Wright's visit in 1886 in fully confirmed by the

fact, (shown by photographs and later reports) that the front has receded

seven miles since 1886. The late date of the close of the glacial period

is supported by a great array of facts discovered during the last twenty

years, especially by the author's own new investigation of the age of

the Niagara Gorge, and of the small amount of post glacial corrosion

which has taken place since the ice withdrew from Northern Ohio, and

by Dr. Warren Upham's investigation of the age of the shore lines about

glacial Lake Agassiz-a body of water which occupied the valley of the

Red River of the North while the continental glacier was melting back

from the Canada line to Hudson Bay. The existence of man in America

before the close of the Glacial period, so fully discussed in the first

edition, is made still more certain by a number of subsequent discoveries.

Professor Wright is confident, however, that this does not indicate so

great an antiquity as is commonly supposed. He believes he has evidence

to prove that glacial man in America was contemporary with highly

civilized man in the valleys of the Nile and of the Euphrates, and in

Central Asia.

Thus much of the work and the impression it has created on the

leaders of scientific scholarship.

Editorialana.                        478

It is not the purpose of the Editor of this Quarterly to review in

any detail the contents of this "Ice Age in North America." The atten-

tion of the readers of the Quarterly is called to this work because aside

from its value to the scientific world it has both a geological and archae-

ological bearing upon the State of Ohio. Prof. Wright describes at length

the location, movement and geological results of the glacial epoch in

what is now the Buckeye State, the north-western two-thirds of which

was in the Ice Age submerged beneath the great ice flow from the north.

The edge, or terminal moraine, of this covering, is clearly defined in an

oblique line, reaching from New Lisbon to Cincinnati. The territory

south-east of this line remained "dry." Prof. Wright deals most inter-

estingly, and in phraseology the layman can easily comprehend, with all

the scientific features of this ice covered region; the testimony of the

terminal moraine; the marks of the deposits by knobs and kettle holes;

the great boulders brought down from Canada and scattered here and

there, gigantic and imperishable records of the ice flood, its direction and

extent; all the great results of this tremendous epoch are related and,

as far as science can do so, explained.

One of the most interesting features of this work to the Ohio reader

is the archaeological proof of the existence of the glacial man in Ohio.

This is found in the chapter on "Man in the Glacial Period." The wit-

nesses of the presence of the original ice man in this State are few

but their evidence seems to be convincing to Professor Wright. In 1844,

Dr. C. L. Metz, of Madisonville, near Cincinnati, found "an implement

chipped from a pebble of black flint" embedded in the gravel, eight feet

below the surface. This paleolith is about the size of a man's hand, and

is almost a replica, in size, shape and material, of one found by Dr.

Abbott in the Trenton (N. J.) gravel. In 1887 Dr. Metz found another

paleolith in an excavation in a similar deposit in the north-east corner

of Clermont county, near Loveland. In October, 1889, Mr. W. C. Mills,

then president of a local Archaeological Society at Newcomerstown, and

now Curator of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society,

found a flint implement of paleolithic type fifteen feet below the surface

of the glacial terrace bordering the valley at Newcomerstown.  This

paleolith, Prof. Wright states, is a duplication, in all respects, to one from

the valley of the Somme, France, and which was placed in the pos-

session of Prof. Wright by Dr. Evans of London. There seems to be

no doubt in the minds of Dr. Metz and Mr. Mills that the paleoliths came

to the places of their lodgment by natural means, and therefore there

can be nothing artificial about their testimony. All this is most interest-

ing and, as the daily journals often say in their head-lines, "important if

true." The entree to, and existence in, the precincts of Ohio seems to

rest upon these three paleolithic proofs.  Are they enough, is the query

suggested to the legal mind, trained to the weighing of evidence? If the

ice man was really here as an inhabitant, why not other, indeed num-

474        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

erous, similar testimonials in other regions covered by the glacial flow?

But this question is not for us to discuss. We leave the debate to the

learned gentlemen of the scientific arena.

Prof. Wright's book is not a "dry as dust" volume of technical

lore. It is written in a clear, simple, entertaining style; holds the reader,

young and old, the collegiate and one only endowed with "common sense,"

with equal intent. It is at once a most successful contribution to the

scientific and popular lore concerning the period, when the ice man

of the north went forth and gripped with his frigid fingers a large por-

tion of the earth. It was a wonderful conquest and Prof. Wright tells

the story in a manner at once charming and scholarly. The work is

printed in clear, legible type and is embellished with copious illustrations

and maps.

THE WILDERNESS TRAIL.

One of the most valuable contributions to the historical literature

of the West, issued in recent years, is one entitled "The Wilderness

Trail," or "The Ventures and Adventures of the Pennsylvania Traders

on the Allegheny Path," with some annals of the "Old West, and the

Records of Some Strong Men and Some Bad Ones." The work, pub-

lished by G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, is in two volumes of four

hundred pages each. There are numerous pictures and portraits, a few

of the latter from rare originals, never before reproduced; there are

also many maps, reduced replicas, from the originals in the government

archives. The author of this work is Mr. Charles A. Hanna, whose

extensive account of "The Scotch-Irish" published some years ago, gave

the author a most favorable introduction to the public. Mr. Hanna is

an Ohio man, having been born and raised in Harrison county, though

for many years he has been a resident of New York City. The work

deserves a more extended and detailed review than our space will permit.

It has met with a most complimentary reception at the hands of the

literary and historical critics. Mr. Hanna has put forth a monumental

production. Possessed of an intense interest in the early history of the

great west, especially the Ohio Valley, endowed with the temperament

and taste of a man of letters, Mr. Hanna has with almost overzealous

application to details and an indefatigible devotion to accuracy accumu-

lated a well nigh overwhelming fund of historical matter. Indeed Mr.

Hanna's volumes present an amplitude of facts that almost bewilder the

reader. But the data acquired through great labor and patience has

been secured from authoritative sources and has the inestimable value

of accuracy. The sources of information are freely stated and original

documents, archives, inaccessible to the ordinary writer, and rare au-

thorities are drawn upon and much historical information, hitherto un-

Editorialana.                        475

published is placed at the command of the book buyer. For the his-

torical student, for the teacher and the writer on historical topics cov-

ered by the reach of the book, it has no equal, indeed no substitute or

equivalent. But for the mere reader, seeking a consecutive narrative,

for entertainment as well as knowledge the volumes will not fill so wide

a field. But this latter evidently was not the ambition or purpose of the

author. He has accomplished what he set forth to do-placed a store-

house of historical material at the command of those wishing to draw

therefrom.  The subjects treated by the author cover the numerous

Indian tribes ranging from Eastern Pennsylvania to the Illinois river.

The tribal differences and hostile relations are related. The great chiefs

and sachems are brought to view. The chief network of the volumes is

the outlining of the Indian paths, the great wilderness trails, that formed

the highways, east and west, north and south, in the territory mentioned

above. No such complete and accurate literary and historical surveying

has been done by any other author. The many forest paths of the aborig-

ine and the pioneer trader have been heretofore more or less labyrinthian

even to the student of aboriginal days. Mr. Hanna, however, has traced

these out, fully described them and descriptively platted their direction and

extent. The Indian villages and trader centers are designated and the lead-

ing traders and adventurers who trod these paths are again led through

their negotiations and adventures. The rivers and streams, the waterways

of the same period are completely described, along the banks of which

waterways and through the paths of the forest interiors move the figures

of the red and the white man of the earliest historic times; personages

of whom we read so often cursorily in the general histories and legend-

arily or pictorially in the romances and stories of imaginative writers.

But in the pages of Mr. Hanna we get the specific data concerning these

actors in the earliest western events. A great host of Indian chiefs and

sachems are noted and all the leading traders and scouts. An idea of the

detail scope of the work is intimated by the fact that in the pages of

the work some three hundred rivers and as many creeks are mentioned

by name and some five hundred Indian towns are designated. The

Indian names of these creeks, rivers and towns are given and in great

numbers of cases the English equivalent. The brief but illuminating

sketches and notes concerning the historic Indians and traders not only

give much fresh knowledge to the reader but correct in innumerable

instances well established errors prevailing heretofore in the popular

literature bearing upon the people and events touched upon by Mr.

Hanna. In short "The Wilderness Trail" is a great work-a vast col-

lection of historic lore which greatly increases our accessible knowledge

of the Indian tribes, their living centers, their movements, their leaders,

their wars; and their pale face enemies and friends, the trader with his

pack-horses, the scout as the forerunner of tribal encounter or bloody

contests between the redman and his invading pale face. Mr. Hanna

476        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

has done a unique and stupendous service in the field of western historic

lore. These volumes will soon be beyond the reach of the purchaser as

but one thousand copies were printed-"from   type and the type de-

stroyed"-say the publishers. Scarcity will therefore soon add to the

value of the work.

A BUCKEYE BOYHOOD.

A very delightful and entertaining little volume of two hundred

pages, recently published by The Robert Clarke Company, Cincinnati, is

"A Buckeye Boyhood," by William Henry Venable. The mention of the

author's name is assurance of the literary excellence of the story and

the charming nature of the narrative. Mr. Venable early won high place

among the Ohio men of letters by his "Beginnings of Literary Culture

in the Ohio Valley," now a classic in Ohioana. His numerous other

books of poetry, history, fiction and essay bespeak the range of his in-

tellectual wealth and the versatility of his talent, thought and study.

A dozen or more volumes on various themes, all gems in their way,

attest the popular place Mr. Venable has attained among the readers not

only of Ohio but the country at large. This last volume is a "veiled

autobiography"-a renaissance of the life and times of the author's

boyhood; much of the recital being his own personal experience. The

story is given in a simple, lucid style of "everyday" English-render-

ing the pages fascinating alike to young and old. In the rush and whirl

of our present day life the literature that seems most in demand is

that either of the purely informing kind-the knowledge more or less

heavy or technical that men and women seek for practical purposes-

or the highly imaginative or sensational class that stimulates the emotions

and is read, much as narcotics and intoxicants are taken, to deaden for

the moment the oppressions and cares of an overwrought nervous ex-

istence. The Buckeye Boyhood is a reversion- evidently delightful to

the author and hence also to the reader-to the simple rural life of a

generation or two ago; the struggle on the farm, for a plain living,

with its attendant enjoyment of the freedom and beauties of nature; the

toil arduous but simple, and unhampered by the exactions and high

pressure of the "get there" ambitions and superfluous luxuries. The

fields and woods and streams and hills and dales were the boy's arena

-the country school with its elemental studies, the glimpses of the

village and city life and the wider range of vision they opened for

the lad; his books and reading and his amusements; all these are set

forth by the pen of Mr. Venable as with the brush of a master upon

the canvas of memory by an artist not an impressionist but a realist.

The chapter on "religious experience" is especially readable as it typi-

fies the crucial trial through which nearly all thoughtful and serious

Editorialana.                        477

minded boys must pass. The "experience" is not unique but universal,

the awakening of the expanding soul to the mysteries of an unseen but

nevertheless a real world; the working of an irresistible spirit upon the

troubled waters of a soul seeking to reconcile the natural inherent re-

ligion with the dogmatic or conventional creed of the church. This

reconciliation must be solved by each youth in his own way, influenced

or aided by his own peculiar environment.    How the Buckeye Boy

wrought out his great problem and found his permanent foothold in

a natural faith is told with unaffected candor and reverential delicacy.

This review of youthful times-the backward look of a half a century

or more--is a rare and precious playspell in the later days of a mature

and fruitful literary life

POEMS ON OHIO.

We believe it was Isaac Walton in his "Complete Angler" who spoke

of "old fashioned poetry, but choicely good."  There are of course

poets and poets, and good, bad and indifferent. The little volume en-

titled "Poems on Ohio," collected and annotated by Professor C. L.

Martzolff, and published by the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical

Society offers a variety in degree of excellency in the quality of the

effusions by the rhyming writers who have taken Ohio, localities therein

and historical incidents and characters connected therewith, as their sub-

jects. Some of these poems are by authors whose names are fixed in

the literary firmament; others of these poems will be classed by the

critics as mere rhyming productions, a few verging towards the class

designated as doggerel, but all are interesting and from some point of

view  deserving of preservation. They number in this volume some

hundred and thirty and reflect the sentiment and culture of the early

pioneer days. It was well worth while for Prof. Martzolff to gather

up these stray poems and put them in permanent form. The editor's

annotations are of great value for they embrace brief biographical

notices of the authors, whose names, many of them at least, would

otherwise have been lost in the shades of oblivion. Mr. Martzolff is

well qualified for his part in the publication, for he has been for years

a zealous student of Ohio history and his many valuable articles in the

volumes of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society have

made for him a recognized place in the literature of the history of Ohio.

This volume should be in every public library in the State and to the

teachers it will be of great use on occasions commemorative of historic

events and in exercises of a patriotic nature. The volume retails for

$1.00 and is sold by the Society publishing it.