Rock Me to Sleep
elbow—the Honorable Oliver O. Morse, of Cherry Valley, New York. Morse was probably not a conscious Iago; he no doubt believed all that he wrote, but unquestionably his own amour propre as well as that of Ball’s other friends was involved in the controversy—they had to prove they were right or confess themselves credulous fools—and his influence was as fatal to Ball as the real Iago’s was to Othello. It was Morse who set the final seal to Ball’s claim—committed it to imperishable bronze, as it were!—by writing a book about it, which was published by M. W. Dodd, of 506 Broadway, New York City, in 1867. It was probably at Ball’s expense—or perhaps the “M. W.” in both their names means that they were relatives.
This book was entitled “A Vindication of the Claim of Alexander M. W. Ball, of Elizabeth, N. J., to the Authorship of the Poem, ‘Rock Me to Sleep, Mother.’” It had an introductory note from Luther R. Marsh, of New York City, and a preface by E. W. Leavenworth, of Syracuse. It is now something of a rarity. The copy in the Library of Congress, to which the present writer has had access, was given to the library in 1912, and was originally a presentation copy from Mr. Leavenworth to a cousin, Mrs. Ella E. Day. It is an octavo of seventy-two pages, with a closely-printed sup-
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