ew England. It is
supplied with the leading periodicals of the day, and choice volumes of
current literature. Here one may always find one or more of the "gifted
few," whose names are familiar to the reader; and frequent reunions of
the book-making fraternity are designed to be held here, under the
genial auspices of the literary partner of the house.

It is not often that men win success in both literature and mercantile
life. Good authors have usually made very poor business managers, and
_vice versa_; but the subject of this memoir, besides winning a great
success as a merchant, and that in one of the most hazardous branches of
mercantile life, has also won an enviable reputation as a man of
letters. His poems have made him well known, both in this country and in
England. Besides the poems recited before various literary associations,
he has published two volumes of fugitive pieces. The first appeared in
1843, while he was still a clerk, and the second in 1858. His poems
abound in humor, pathos, and a delicate, beautiful fancy. One of his
friends has said of him:

"Little of the sad travail of the historic poet has Mr. Fields known.
Of the emaciated face, the seedy garment, the collapsed purse, the
dog-eared and often rejected manuscript, he has never known, save from
well-authenticated tradition. His muse was born in sunshine, and has
only been sprinkled with the tears of affection. Every effort has been
cheered to the echo, and it is impossible for so genial a fellow to fail
of an ample and approving audience for whatever may fall from his lip or
pen."

The following lines, from his second volume, will serve as a specimen of
the "homely beauty" of Mr. Fields' muse, though it hardly sets forth all
his powers:

She came among the gathering crowd
A maiden fair, without pretense,
And when they asked her humble name,
She whispered mildly, "Common Sense."

Her modest garb drew every eye,
Her ample cloak, her shoes of leather;
And when they sneered, she simply said,
"I dress according to the weather."

They argued long and reasoned loud,
In dubious Hindoo phrase mysterious;
While she, poor child, could not divine
Why girls so young should be so serious.

They knew the length of Plato's beard,
And how the scholars wrote in Laturn;
She studied authors not so deep,
And took the Bible for her pattern.

And so