Page:Famous Single Poems (1924).djvu/82

 At that time my brothers in looking over his papers found the original in his own handwriting with his many fugitive pieces which he had preserved. And then too the style was so exactly his, when he felt in a humorous mood, and we have often said could it be possible that another could express the same originality of thought and use the same phrases so familiar to us as Father!

I remember my brother Charles took the poem home with him. He was then living in Ohio and I have an indistinct idea that he intended to have it published, but I am not at all sure on this point, so don't like to assert it as fact.

My Father had a fine poetical taste, and wrote a great deal, both prose and poetry, not for publication but for his own amusement. He also had a great taste for drawing and painting. When we were children, he used to entertain us on winter evenings by getting down his paint box, we seated around the table. First he would portray something very pathetic which would melt us to tears, the next thing would be so comic that we would be almost wild with laughter; and this dear good man was your great greatgrandfather, Henry Livingston.

Now my dear, give Mama and Grandmama my warmest love.Yours very truly,

Elvie Cottage, 8 Court Street,
 * March 4, 1879.

Still another letter from Henry Livingston, of Babylon, L. I., tells what became of the original draft: