Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
For an Autograph
By James Russell Lowell (18191891)[From Poetical Works. Collective Edition. 1885.]
T
’Tis his at last who says it best,—
I’ll try my fortune with the rest.
Whereon each one of us may write
His word or two, and then comes night.
“To write an epic!” so we try
Our nibs upon the edge, and die.
Luck hates the slow and loves the bold,
Soon come the darkness and the cold.
But for a line, be that sublime,—
Not failure, but low aim, is crime.
But we forget it, dream of fame,
And scrawl, as I do here, a name.