Page:The Poets and Poetry of the West.djvu/219

 CHARLES A. JONES. One of the least known of Western writers, to the present generation of readers, is a poet, who, in 1835, gave promise of much activity and distinction in metrical literature. He had then written his name high in the newspapers ; published his volume,* and taken his first literary degree. Between the years 1836 and 1839 he wrote frequently for tfie Cincinnati Mirror, and in 1840 contributed several of the poems hereafter quoted for the Cincinnati Message, but about that time the inexor- able law of bread-and-butter necessity drew him from the flowery slopes of Parnassus to the dry regions of Blackstone and the bar. After he began the practice of law he touched the harp but seldom, and then in secret. Charles A. Jones is to be honored above the generality of Western writers, because he explored extensively, and made himself well acquainted with Western character, and in the West found the theme of his essay, the incident of his story, and the inspi- ration of his song. His principal poem is a stirring narrative of the exploits of the bold outlaws, who, in the infancy of the settlement of the West, had their common rendezvous in the celebrated Cave-in-Rock on the Ohio. The subjects of many of his lesser productions ai'e the rivers, the mounds, the Indian heroes, and the pioneers of the Mississippi Valley. For five or six years previous to his admission to the bar, Mr. Jones wrote a great deal for the newspapers and periodicals of the West. His habits of composition were extremely rapid and careless, however, and he would never undergo the labor of revision. The hasty production of an hour was sent to the press with all its sins upon its head. The consequence of this rapid work, and quick printing, has shown itself, in the almost total oblivion into which nearly all Mr. Jones's productions have sunk, though many of them contain fine thoughts, beautifully and forcibly expressed. It would be easy to gather many flowers in the broad fields of what he wrote, by very hastily running over them. In the Western Literary Journal of 1836, is a poem of several hundred lines, probably dashed off in an evening, which affords several worth culling. I content myself with one. The poem is called " Marriage a la Mode," and recounts the forced union of a lovely poor girl to a rich rake, who wastes her bloom, breaks her heart and becomes estranged from her. She hopes to regain his affection ; but the poet says : " Bear back the lightning to its cloud, Recall the rose-leaf's vanished hue, And give the dead man in his shroud The breath of life he lately drew ; Then to the bosom seek to bring The love that once has taken wing !" ( 203 )
 * The Outlaw and other poems, dedicated to Morgan Neville. Josiah Drake, pubUsher, Cincinnati, 1835. 18mo., 72 pp.