Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 37, November, 1860

Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 37,
November, 1860

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November,
1860, by Various
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Title: Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860
Author: Various
Release Date: February 15, 2004 [eBook #11103]
Language: English
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***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC
MONTHLY VOLUME 6, NO. 37, NOVEMBER, 1860***
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THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.
A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS.
VOL. VI.--NOVEMBER, 1860.--NO. XXXVII.

THOMAS HOOD.
Thomas Hood was originally intended for business, and entered a
mercantile house; but the failure of his health, at fifteen years of age,
compelled him to leave it, and go to Scotland, where he remained two
years, with much gain to his body and his mind. On his return to

London, he applied himself to learn the art of engraving; but his
constitution would not allow him to pursue it. Yet what he did acquire
of this art, with his genius for comic observation, must have been of
excellent service to him in his subsequent career. This, at first, was
simply literary, in a subordinate connection with "The London
Magazine." His relation to this periodical gave him opportunities,
which he did not neglect, of knowing many of its brilliant contributors.
Among these was Charles Lamb, who took a strong liking to the
youthful sub-editor, and, doubtless, discovered a talent that in some
points had resemblance to his own. The influence of his conversation
and companionship may have brought Hood's natural qualities of mind
into early growth, and helped them into early ripeness. Striking as the
difference was, in some respects, between them, in other respects the
likeness was quite as striking. Both were playful in manner, but
melancholy by constitution, and in each there lurked an unsuspected
sadness; both had tenderness in their mirth, and mirth in their
tenderness; and both were born punsters, with more meaning in their
puns than met the ear, and constantly bringing into sudden and
surprising revelation the wonderful mysteries of words.
With a genius of so singular a cast, Hood was not destined to continue
long a subordinate. Almost with manhood he began to be an
independent workman of letters; and as such, through ever-varying
gravities and gayeties, tears and laughter, grimsicalities and
whimsicalities, prose and verse, he labored incessantly till his too early
death. The whole was truly and entirely "Hood's Own." In mind he
owed no man anything. Unfortunately, he did in money. That he might
economize, and be free to toil in order to pay, he went abroad, residing
between four and five years out of England, part of the time at Coblentz,
in Rhenish Prussia, and part at Ostend, in Belgium. The climate of
Rhenish Prussia was bad for his health, and the people were
disagreeable to his feelings. The change to Belgium was at first
pleasant and an improvement; but complete recovery soon seemed as
far away as ever; nay, it was absolutely away forever. But in the midst
of his family--his wife, his little boy and girl, most loving and most
loved--bravely he toiled, with pen and pencil, with head and heart; and
while men held both their sides from laughter, he who shook them held
both his sides from pain; while tears, kindly or comical, came at the

touch of his genius into thousands of eyes, eyes were watching and
weeping in secret by his bed-side in the lonely night, which, gazing
through the cloud of sorrow on his thin features and his uneasy sleep,
took note that the instrument was fast decaying which gave forth the
enchantment and the charm of all this mirthful and melancholy music.
Thus, in bodily pain, in bodily weakness even worse than pain, in
pecuniary embarrassment worse than either, worst of all, often
distressed in mind as to means of support for his family, he still
persevered; his genius did not forsake him, nor did his goodness; the
milk of human kindness did not grow sour, nor the sweet charities of
human life turn into bitter irritations. But what a tragedy the whole
suggests, in its combination of gayety with grief, and in the thought of
laughter that must be created at the cost of sighs, of merriment in which
every grin has been purchased by a groan!
An anecdote which we once read, always, when we recall it, deeply
affects us. A favorite comic actor, on a certain evening, was hissed by
the audience, who had