Page:Southern Life in Southern Literature.djvu/433

 

[Sidney Lanier was born in Macon, Georgia, in 1842. His ancestors had been for generations musicians. At fourteen he entered the sophomore class of Oglethorpe College at Midway. Georgia, and graduated in 1860. He was at once appointed a tutor in the college, but the war broke out shortly and he joined the Confederate army. He saw service in Virginia, and toward the close of the war was put in charge of a blockade-running vessel. His vessel was captured in 1864, and he was confined for five months in Point Look out prison. The exposure and hardships of this experience germinated the seeds of consumption, against which he had to fight the rest of his life and to which he finally succumbed. After the war Lanier lived in Georgia and Alabama, earning a living as teacher, hotel clerk, and lawyer. But finding that his health grew no better and feeling that he was wasting his genius in uncongenial pursuits, he decided to devote himself to literature and music. In 1873 he went to Baltimore and found employment as first flutist in the Peabody Symphony Orchestra. In Baltimore he found musicians, literary people, and libraries, and his genius would undoubtedly have blossomed rapidly had it not been for ill health. Recurring attacks of his malady compelled him to seek health in visits to the mountains of North Carolina and the mild climate of Florida. In 1879 he was appointed lecturer on English literature at Johns Hopkins University, a position which assured an income and which was entirely congenial. His health, however, was rapidly failing, and finally the sufferer was obliged to quit work and go to the mountains of North Carolina. There in the little village of Lynn his brave fight closed in the early autumn of 1881.]

