Page:The Cambridge History of American Literature, v2.djvu/318

302 Poets of the Civil War II thAstudent of literary history. In 1869 James Wood Davidson's Living Writers oj the South was published in New York, with salient facts as to the biographies and bibliographies of some 241 writers — 166 men and 75 women. Of these he puts down 112 as having written "verse" and eight as having written ' ' poetry. ' ' He adds : Some of these specimens are poor enough, in all conscience, — some inartistic of course; and some, it may be, frivolous, — but each in its way and all together have their use in the general design. Some of the writers have talents and character, with corresponding results, which enable them to stand in the front rank of American authorship. Some have limited ability. And some have none. These words are typical of the judgment and sense that run through the volume. There are, for instance, critical estimates, biographical ■ sketches, and bibliographies of Simms, Hayne, Mrs. Preston, Flash, and RandaU, and surprisingly short ones of Ticknor and Lucas. It required courage on the author's part to characterize the poems of the veteran Simms as "prosaic, commonplace, and Tupperesque." After citing some sixty-five titles of his books of aU kinds he remarks: "He has not written an epic; why, I have no idea, but we may be infinitely grateftd that he has not. " In his criticism of Flash, for whom he shows much enthusi- asm, Davidson puts his finger upon the cardinal defects of many of the Southern poets. Flash, he says, "has never written anything which was not finished at a single sitting, and has never been more than two hours writing anything he has ever published. " He wrote his poem on Polk when his foreman told him that he lacked six or seven inches for the makeup of The Daily Confederate. "You have written about ZoUicoffer and Jackson, you might as well write about PoUc, who was killed the other day. " Flash quickly responded to the sugges- tion, and in five minutes the poem was in the hands of the composer, and in twenty minutes was being printed. Paying full tribute to Flash's good qualities, the author warns him that without work there is not the remotest chance for an enduring reputation, and at the same time makes the same suggestion to others who may have acquired ' ' a reverence for inspiration so called, and a contempt for the art of versification. "