Page:The Poetical Works of Jonathan E. Hoag.djvu/84



(From EURUS for February, 1918, published by the well-known New England poetess Winifred V. Jackson and dedicated to Mr. Hoag on his 87th birthday.)

It is with a feeling of genuine pride, keen respect, and warm regard, that we dedicate this opening number of EURUS to a fellow-worker whose poetic grace and merit have endeared him to the entire amateur world, and whose long years of intellectual activity and virtuous endeavor entitle him to a double share of affection and veneration.

JONATHAN E. HOAG, whose eighty-seventh birthday our pages cordially celebrate, was born at Valley Falls, New York, on the tenth of February, 1831. Throughout his life a student, poet, philosopher, and temperance worker, he stands today as a model for the rising age; an example of the best which the generous past affords. In Mr. Hoag we may observe that rarest and finest of mortals—a true gentleman of the old school.

Residing during recent years at Greenwich, New York, Mr. Hoag learned of our Association (the United Amateur Press Association) through his gifted neighbor, Miss Verna McGeoch, and through that foremost of recruiters, Mrs. Anne Tillery Renshaw. His sweet, stately, and melodious verse soon proved a leading factor in the literature of amateurdom, and each new piece from his pen is today awaited with eagerness. His Muse, as versatile as it is graceful, covers a wide variety of themes and measures; one moment singing the vast unfathomed deeps of Old Ocean, and the next moment portraying in quaintly inimitable brogue the longing of a lonely Celt for his far Erin home. The grandeur of ancient Nature awakes him to noble strains, and the contemplation of Life draws sublime and solemn chords from his many-stringed lyre.

We take delight in being able to head these pages with one of Mr. Hoag's longest and most spirited compositions, "To The Falls of Dionondawa," which preserves in song the fame of a beautiful and legend-haunted cataract of the Battenkill River, close to Vista Buena, the author's pleasant Greenwich estate. This poem, we feel, forms a substantial addition to the lore of a natural wonder already rich in poetic associations; and is a fitting specimen of its creator's art to adorn a publication dedicated to him at this happy milestone of his extended career. WINIFRED VIRGINIA JACKSON. Boston, 1918.