The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
VOLUME XV. Colonial and Revolutionary Literature; Early National Literature, Part I.
V. Bryant and the Minor Poets.
§ 21. Charles Fenno Hoffman.
Charles Fenno Hoffman (1806-1884), another Knicker-bocker editor 35 and a song-writer, who, says a recent critic, 36 “possessed a lyric note almost completely unknown in the America of his time,”—by which is meant a certain catchy musical lilt,—is, however, chiefly memorable for the fine ballad Monterey:
| | | We were not many, we who stood |
| Before the iron sleet that day: |
| Yet many a gallant spirit would |
| Give half his years if but he could |
| Have been with us at Monterey. |
|
This is, or should be, a classic in a genre rare in our literature, whose poets have seldom communicated with martial fire the rapture of the strife or celebrated worthily the achievements of our arms. Bryant wrote a critical sketch for the last edition of Hoffman’s poems. |
32 |
|