publish, in the year 1874, her famous “Rhymes and Jingles”; in 1877, a book of essays and short stories entitled “Theophilus and Others”; and in 1879 a collection of poems and verses for grown-up readers, entitled “Along the Way.”
From the first issue the success of “Rhymes and Jingles” was almost as great as that of “Hans Brinker.” Their keen wit and frolicsome jollity, their cleverness and pith and point, had an irresistible charm tor youngsters, who delighted in the nonsense-verses and jingles, declaring them “every bit as good as ‘Mother Goose’”; while parents found many pieces useful as sermonettes for the nursery. Many a child has been shamed out of the crying habit by the story of “Whimpy, Little Whimpy” who
That his mother could n’t stand it
And his father ran away.”
And there are hundreds of like rhymes which are equally familiar to every St. Nicholas boy or girl, for Mrs. Dodge continued to write delightful verses for the magazine long after “Rhymes and Jingles” was published as a book, Nor were they all mere clever jingles of words, or rhymes with a moral. In many of them there was genuine poetry and a fine lyric quality. The music-book “St. Nicholas Songs” gives ample evidence of this, for more than a third of all the text in the volume was written by Mrs. Dodge.
“Theophilus and Others” was a book of stories and sketches for grown people. Among its contents were a remarkably clever satire, “The Insanity of Cain,” which at once attracted wide notice, and that mirth-provoking comicality in Irish dialect “Miss Maloney on the Chinese Question.” This skit—well worthy to rank with Bret Harte’s “Heathen Chinee”—had an enormous popularity in its day, and has since been included in almost every collection of humorous masterpieces. It was written in a single evening, to fill a blank space in a magazine, Charlotte Cushman immediately gave it a place of honor in her public readings as one of her favorite selections, and sending for its author asked her to write a companion-piece. A long and warm friendship between the two distinguished women dated from this interview.
With her usual modesty, Mrs, Dodge would not dignify her volume of verse by the name of “poems,” preferring the simple title of “Along the Way.” But, as one critic said of it at the time, “It is a happy thing for those of us who do not walk such ways to have her show us what may there be seen.” Only last year Mrs. Dodge was persuaded to issue a new edition of this work, under the title “Poems and Verses.” Throughout, it shows sincerity of poetic feeling; a rich imagination; a genuine love of nature; and a happy serenity of heart. “Enfoldings,” the sonnet on “The Stars,” “Inverted,” “The Two Mysteries,” and not a few other pieces are poems indeed—poems that the world will not willingly let die. They have found their way already into various Anthologies of Poetry, whose editors—some of them distinguished critics—are quite willing to call them poems, even if their author was not.
In 1882 Mrs. Dodge wrote as a serial for St. Nicholas her well-known “Donald and Dorothy,” the narrative of a boy’s chivalrous love for his sister. This was one of her favorites among her books, and it is still one of the most popular of children’s stories in the book-stores and libraries. It has an original and absorbing plot and a full share of the author’s rich humor. In description and character-drawing, it quite equals “Hans Brinker.” So alluringly were the brother and sister depicted that in many families throughout the land there are living Donalds and Dorothys who were named after the hero and heroine of Mrs. Dodge’s noble story.
Tn 1894. she brought out two other books: “The Land of Pluck,” a collection of sketches and stories which takes its name from the opening article about Holland, and “When Life is Young,” a collection of her later verses for children. The first of these ought to be read by every lover of “Hans Brinker,” for it adds many new and fresh pictures of Dutch life to those which the earlier book presented; while the volume of verses opens with her well-known poem “The Minuet,” and contains many other favorite pieces. Both books have won the heartiest praise from critics, and a very large audience among young readers. With “Poems