John Kendall (AKA Dum Dum) - "Rhymes of the East and Re collected Verses"

William D. Howells - "A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories"

Richard Jefferies - "Round About a Great Estate"

DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS - "The Deluge"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Ten American Girls From History

K >> Kate Dickinson Sweetser >> Ten American Girls From History




For four years she did this work, and it was a touching scene when she
was called before the Committee on Investigation to tell of its
results. With quiet simplicity she stood before the row of men and
reported, "Over thirty thousand men, living and dead, already traced.
No available funds for the necessary investigation; in consequence,
over eight thousand dollars of my own income spent in the search."

As the men confronting her heard the words of the bright-eyed woman
who was looked on as a sister by the soldiers from Maine to Virginia,
whose name was a household one throughout the land, not one of them
was ashamed to wipe the tears from his eyes! Later the government paid
her back in part the money she had spent in her work; but she gave her
time without charge as well as many a dollar which was never returned,
counting it enough reward to read the joyful letters from happy,
reunited families.

While doing this work she gave over three hundred lectures through the
East and West, and as a speaker she held her audiences as if by magic,
for she spoke glowingly about the work nearest to her heart, giving
the proceeds of her lectures to the continuance of that work. One
evening in the winter of 1868, when speaking in one of the finest
opera-houses in the East, before one of the most brilliant assemblages
she had ever faced, her voice suddenly gave out, as it had in the days
when she was teaching. The heroic army nurse and worker for the
soldiers was worn out in body and nerves. As soon as she was able to
travel the doctor commanded that she take three years of absolute
rest. Obeying the order, she sailed for Europe, and in peaceful
Switzerland with its natural beauty hoped to regain normal strength;
for her own country had emerged from the black shadow of war, and she
felt that her life work had been accomplished, that rest could
henceforth be her portion.

But Clara Barton was still on the threshold of her complete
achievement. When she had been in Switzerland only a month, and her
broken-down nerves were just beginning to respond to the change of air
and scene, she received a call which changed the color of her future.
Her caller represented the International Committee of the Red Cross
Society. Miss Barton did not know what the Red Cross was, and said so.
He then explained the nature of the society, which was founded for the
relief of sick and wounded soldiers, and he told his eager listener
what she did not know, that back of the Society was the Geneva Treaty,
which had been providing for such relief work, signed by all the
civilized nations except her own. From that moment a new ambition was
born in Clara Barton's heart--to find out why America had not signed
the treaty, and to know more about the Red Cross Society.

Nearly a year later, while still resting in quiet Switzerland, there
broke one day upon the clear air of her Swiss home the distant sounds
of a royal party hastening back from a tour of the Alps. To Miss
Barton's amazement it came in the direction of her villa. Finally
flashed the scarlet and gold of the liveries of the Grand Duke of
Baden. After the outriders came the splendid coach of the Grand
Duchess, daughter of King Wilhelm of Prussia, so soon to be Emperor
William of Germany. In it rode the Grand Duchess. After presenting her
card through the footman, she herself alighted and clasped Miss
Barton's hand, hailing her in the name of humanity, and said she
already knew her through what she had done in the Civil War. Then,
still clasping her hand in a tight grip of comradeship, she begged
Miss Barton to leave Switzerland and aid in Red Cross work on the
battle-fields of the Franco-Prussian War, which was in its beginnings.
It was a real temptation to once again work for suffering humanity,
yet she put it aside as unwise. But a year later, when the officers of
the International Red Cross Society came again to beg that Miss Barton
take the lead in a great systematic plan of relief work such as that
for which she had become famous during the Civil War, she accepted. In
the face of such consequences as her health might suffer from her
decision, she rose, and, with head held high and flashing eyes, said:

"Command me!"

Clara Barton was no longer to be the Angel of the American
battle-fields only--from that moment she belonged to the world, and
never again could she be claimed by any one country. But it is as the
guardian angel of our soldiers in the United States that her story
concerns us, although there is reason for great pride in the part she
played in nursing the wounded at Strassburg, and later when her
presence carried comfort and healing to the victims of the fight with
the Commune in Paris.

As tangible results of her work abroad, she was given an amethyst cut
in the shape of a pansy, by the Grand Duchess of Baden, also the
Serbian decoration of the Red Cross as the gift of Queen Natalie, and
the Gold Cross of Remembrance, which was presented her by the Grand
Duke and Duchess of Baden together. Queen Victoria, with her own hand,
pinned an English decoration on her dress. The Iron Cross of Germany,
as well as the Order of Melusine given her by the Prince of Jerusalem,
were among an array of medals and pendants--enough to have made her a
much-bejeweled person, had it been her way to make a show of her own
rewards.

Truly Clara Barton belonged to the world, and a suffering person had
no race or creed to her--she loved and cared for all.

When at last she returned to America, it was with the determination to
have America sign the Geneva Treaty and to bring her own country into
line with the Red Cross movement, which she had carefully watched in
foreign countries, and which she saw was the solution to efficient aid
of wounded men, either in the battle-field or wherever there had been
any kind of disaster and there was need of quick aid for suffering. It
was no easy task to convince American officials, but at last she
achieved her end. On the 1st of March, 1882, the Geneva Treaty was
signed by President Arthur, ratified by the Senate, and immediately
the American National Red Cross was formed with Clara Barton as its
first president.

The European "rest" trip had resulted in one of the greatest
achievements for the benefit of mankind in which America ever
participated, and its birth in the United States was due solely to the
efforts of the determined, consecrated nurse who, when eleven years
old, gave her all to a sick brother, and later consecrated her life to
the service of a sick brotherhood of brave men.

On the day after her death, on April 12, 1912, one editor of an
American newspaper paid a tribute to her that ranks with those paid
the world's greatest heroes. He said:

"On the battle-fields of the Rebellion her hands bound up the wounds
of the injured brave.

"The candles of her charity lighted the gloom of death for the heroes
of Antietam and Fredericksburg.

"Across the ocean waters of her sweet labors followed the flag of the
saintly Red Cross through the Franco-Prussian war.

"When stricken Armenia cried out for help in 1896, it was Clara Barton
who led the relief corps of salvation and sustenance.

"A woman leading in answering the responsibility of civilization to
the world!

"When McKinley's khaki boys struck the iron from Cuba's bondage it was
Clara Barton, in her seventy-seventh year, who followed to the
fever-ridden tropics to lead in the relief-work on Spanish
battle-grounds.

"She is known wherever man appreciates humanity."

* * * * *

Hers was the honor of being the first president of the American Red
Cross, but she was more than that--she _was_ the Red Cross at that
time. It was, as she said, "her child," and she furnished headquarters
for it in her Washington home, dispensing the charities of a nation,
amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars, and was never requested
to publish her accounts, an example of personal leadership which is
unparalleled.

In 1897 we find the Red Cross president settled in her home at Glen
Echo, a few miles out of Washington, on a high slope overlooking the
Potomac, and, although it was a Red Cross center, it was a friendly
lodging as well, where its owner could receive her personal friends.
Flags and Red Cross testimonials from rulers of all nations fluttered
from the walls, among them a beautiful one from the Sultan of Turkey.
Two small crosses of red glass gleamed in the front windows over the
balcony, but above the house the Red Cross banner floated high, as if
to tell the world that "the banner over us is love." And to Glen Echo,
the center of her beloved activity, Clara Barton always loved to
return at the end of her campaigns. To the many thousands who came to
visit her home as one of the great humane centers of the world, she
became known as the "Beautiful Lady of the Potomac," and never did a
title more fittingly describe a nature.

To the last she was a soldier--systematic, industrious, severely
simple in her tastes. It was a rule of the household that every day's
duties should be disposed of before turning in for the night, and at
five o'clock the next morning she would be rolling a carpet-sweeper
over the floor. She always observed military order and took a
soldier's pride in keeping her quarters straight.

Hanging on the wall between her bedroom and private sitting-room was a
small mirror into which her mother looked when she came home as a
bride.

Her bed was small and hard. Near it were the books that meant so much
to her--the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress, the stories of Sarah Orne
Jewett, the poems of Lucy Larcom, and many other well-worn, much-read
classics.

That she was still feminine, as in the days of girlhood when she
fashioned her first straw bonnet, so now she was fond of wearing
handsome gowns, often with trains. Lavender, royal purple, and wine
color were the shades she liked best to wear, and in which her friends
most often remember her. Despite her few extravagant tastes, Clara
Barton was the most democratic woman America ever produced, as well as
the most humane. She loved people, sick and well, and in any State and
city of the Union she could claim personal friends in every walk of
life.

When, after ninety-nine years of life and fifty of continuous service
to suffering human nature, death laid its hand upon her on that spring
day, the world to its remotest corner stopped its busy barter and
trade for a brief moment to pay reverent tribute to a woman, who was
by nature of the most retiring, bashful disposition, and yet carried
on her life-work in the face of the enemy, to the sound of cannon, and
close to the firing-line. She was on the firing-line all her life.
That is her life story.

Her "boys" of all ages adored her, and no more touching incident is
told of her than that of a day in Boston, when, after a meeting, she
lingered at its close to chat with General Shafter. Suddenly the great
audience, composed entirely of old soldiers, rose to their feet as she
came down the aisle, and a voice cried:

"Three cheers for Clara Barton!"

They were given by voices hoarse with feeling. Then some one shouted:

"Tiger!"

Before it could be given another voice cried:

"No! _Sweetheart!_"

Then those grizzled elderly men whose lives she had helped to save
broke into uproar and tears together, while the little bent woman
smiled back at them with a love as true as any sweetheart's.

* * * * *

To-day we stand at the parting of the ways. Our nation is in the
making as a world power, and in its rebirth there must needs be
bloodshed and scalding tears. As we American girls and women go out
bravely to face the untried future and to nurse under the banner of
the Red Cross, we shall do our best work when we bear to the
battle-field the same spirit of high purpose and consecration that
inspired Clara Barton and made her the "Angel of the Battle-fields."
Let us, as loyal Americans, take to heart part of a speech she once
made on Memorial Day, when she stood with the "Boys in Blue" in the
"God's-acre" of the soldier, and declared:

"We cannot always hold our great ship of state out of the storms and
breakers. She must meet and buffet with them. Her timbers must creak
in the gale. The waves must wash over her decks, she must lie in the
trough of the sea as she does to-day. But the Stars and Stripes are
above her. She is freighted with the hopes of the world. God holds the
helm, and she's coming to port. The weak must fear, the timid tremble,
but the brave and stout of heart will work and hope and trust."




VIRGINIA REED: MIDNIGHT HEROINE OF THE PLAINS IN PIONEER DAYS OF
AMERICA


On a lovely April morning in 1846 there was an unusual stir in the
streets of Springfield, Illinois, for such an early hour. From almost
every house some one was hurrying, and as neighbor nodded to neighbor
the news passed on:

"The wagons are ready--they are going!"

As the sun mounted slowly in the cloudless sky, from all parts of town
there still flocked friends and relatives of the small band of
emigrants who were about to start on their long trip across the
plains, going to golden California.

California--magic word! Not one of those who were hurrying to wish the
travelers God-speed, nor any of the band who were leaving their homes,
but felt the thrilling promise and the presage of that new country
toward which the emigrants were about to turn their faces.

The crowd of friends gathered at the Reeds' home, where their great
prairie-wagons and those of the Donners were drawn up in a long line
before the door; the provision wagons, filled to overflowing with
necessities and luxuries, the family wagons waiting for their human
freight. Mr. James F. Reed, who had planned the trip, was one of
Springfield's most highly respected citizens, and the Donner brothers,
who lived just outside of the town, had enthusiastically joined him in
perfecting the details of the journey, and had come in to town the
night before, with their families, to be ready for an early start. And
now they were really going!

All through the previous winter, in the evening, when the Reeds were
gathered before their big log fire, they had talked of the wonderful
adventure, while Mrs. Reed's skilful fingers fashioned such garments
as would be needed for the journey. And while she sewed, Grandma Keyes
told the children marvelous tales of Indian massacres on those very
plains across which they were going to travel when warmer days came.
Grandma told her breathless audience of giant red men, whose tomahawks
were always ready to descend on the heads of unlucky travelers who
crossed their path--told so many blood-curdling stories of meetings
between white men and Indian warriors that the little boys, James and
Thomas, and little black-eyed Patty and older Virginia, were
spellbound as they listened.

To Virginia, an imaginative girl, twelve years old, the very flames,
tongueing their way up the chimney in fantastic shapes, became bold
warriors in mortal combat with emigrants on their way to the golden
West, and even after she had gone to bed it seemed to her that
"everything in the room, from the high old-fashioned bedposts down to
the shovel and tongs, was transformed into the dusky tribe in paint
and feathers, all ready for a war-dance" as they loomed large out of
shadowy corners. She would hide her head under the clothes, scarcely
daring to wink or breathe, then come boldly to the surface, face her
shadowy foes, and fall asleep without having come to harm at the hands
of the invisibles.

Going to California--oh the ecstatic terror of it! And now the day and
the hour of departure had come!

The Reeds' wagons had all been made to order, and carefully planned by
Mr. Reed himself with a view to comfort in every detail, so they were
the best of their kind that ever crossed the plains, and especially
was their family wagon a real pioneer _car de luxe_, made to give
every possible convenience to Mrs. Reed and Grandma Keyes. When the
trip had been first discussed by the Reeds, the old lady, then
seventy-five years old and for the most part confined to her bed,
showed such enthusiasm that her son declared, laughingly: "I declare,
mother, one would think you were going with us."

"I am!" was the quick rejoinder. "You do not think I am going to be
left behind when my dear daughter and her children are going to take
such a journey as that, do you? I thought you had more sense, James!"

And Grandma did go, despite her years and her infirmities.

The Reeds' family wagon was drawn by four yoke of fine oxen, and their
provision wagons by three. They had also cows, and a number of driving
and saddle horses, among them Virginia's pony Billy, on whose back she
had been held and taught to ride when she was only seven years old.

The provision wagons were filled to overflowing with all sorts of
supplies. There were farming implements, to be used in tilling the
land in that new country to which they were going, and a bountiful
supply of seeds. Besides these farm supplies, there were bolts of
cotton prints and flannel for dresses and shirts, also gay
handkerchiefs, beads, and other trinkets to be used for barter with
the Indians. More important still, carefully stowed away was a store
of fine laces, rich silks and velvets, muslins and brocades, to be
exchanged for Mexican land-grants. The family wagon, too, had been
fitted up with every kind of commodity, including a cooking-stove,
with its smoke-stack carried out through the canvas roof of the wagon,
and a looking-glass which Mrs. Reed's friends had hung on the canvas
wall opposite the wagon door--"so you will not forget to keep your
good looks, they said!"

And now the party was ready to start. Among its number were Mrs. Reed
and her husband, with little Patty, the two small boys, James and
Thomas, and the older daughter, Virginia; the Donners, George and
Jacob, with their wives and children; Milton Elliott, driver of the
Reed family wagon, who had worked for years in Mr. Reed's big sawmill;
Eliza Baylis, the Reeds' domestic, with her brother and a number of
other young men, some of them drivers, others merely going for
adventure. In all, on that lovely April morning, it was a group of
thirty-one persons around whom friends and relatives clustered for
last words and glimpses, and it was a sad moment for all. Mrs. Reed
broke down when she realized that the moment of parting had really
come, while Mr. Reed, in response to the good wishes showered on him,
silently gripped hand after hand, then he hurried into the house with
Milt Elliott, and presently came out carrying Grandma, at the sight of
whom her friends cheered lustily. She waved her thin hand in response
as she was lifted gently into the wagon and placed on a large
feather-bed, where she was propped up with pillows and declared
herself to be perfectly comfortable.

And indeed her resting-place was very much like a room, for the wagon
had been built with its entrance at the side, like an old-fashioned
stage-coach, and from the door one stepped into a small square room.
At the right and left were spring seats with high backs, which were
comfortable for riding, and over the wheels for the length of the
wagon, a wide board had been placed, making what Virginia called a
"really truly second story" on which beds were made up. Under this
"second story" were roomy compartments in which were stowed away stout
bags holding the clothing of the party, each bag plainly marked with a
name. There was also a full supply of medicines, with lint and
bandages for an emergency, and Mr. Reed had provided a good library of
standard books, not only to read during the journey, but knowing they
could not be bought in the new West. Altogether, from provision wagon
to family caravan, there was a complete equipment for every need, and
yet when they arrived in California, as one of the party said, "We
were almost destitute of everything!"

The wagons were loaded, Grandma was safely stowed away in her warm
bed, with little Patty sitting on its end where she could hold back
the door flap that the old lady might have a last glimpse of her old
home--the hard farewells had been said, and now Mr. Reed called in as
cheery a voice as he could command, "All aboard!"

Milton Elliott cracked his whip, and the long line of prairie-wagons,
horses and cattle started. Then came a happy surprise. Into saddles
and vehicles sprang more than a score of friends and relatives who
were going to follow the party to their first night's encampment,
while many of Virginia's schoolmates ran at the side of the wagon
through the principal streets of the town until one by one they
dropped back from fatigue, Virginia waving a continued farewell from
the wagon while they were in sight.

The first day's trip was not a long one, as it was thought wise to
make the start easy for man and beast. Most of the way Virginia rode
on Billy, sometimes beside the wagon, then again galloping ahead with
her father. A bridge was seen in the distance, and Patty and the boys
cried out to Milton, "Please stop, and let us get out and walk over
it; the oxen may not take us across safely!" Milt threw back his head
and roared with laughter at such an idea, but he halted to humor them,
then with a skilful use of his loud-voiced "Gee! and Haw!" made the
huge beasts obey his will.

On the line of great wagons wound its way beyond the town, until the
sun was sinking in the west, when they stopped for the night on the
ground where the Illinois State House now stands. The oxen were then
unhitched and the wagons drawn up in a hollow circle or "corral,"
within the protection of which cattle and horses were set free for
the night, while outside the corral a huge camp-fire soon blazed,
around which the party gathered for their first evening meal together,
and their last one with those friends who had come thus far on their
way with them. It was a determinedly merry group around the fire, and
stories were told and songs sung, which to the radiant Virginia were a
foretaste of such coming adventure as was beyond her wildest dreams.

As she sat in the glow of the camp-fire, with sleepy Patty's head
pillowed on her lap, she felt even more than before the thrill of this
wonderful adventuring. To keep a record of her travels,--that was the
thing to do! Full of the idea, she pinned together sheets of
wrapping-paper into a bulky blank-book, on the outside of which she
printed:

_Going to California. 1846._

From that time she kept a faithful though not a continuous record of
the experiences of what came to be known later as "the ill-fated
Donner party of martyr pioneers." And from that record she later wrote
her story of their journeying to the golden West.

By the eleventh day of May the band of emigrants had reached the town
of Independence, Missouri, and Virginia's record says:

"Men and beasts are in fine condition. There is nothing in all the
world so fascinating as to travel by day in the warm sunshine and to
camp by night under the stars. Here we are just outside the most
bustling town I ever saw and it is good news to find a large number of
inhabitants with their wagons, ready to cross the prairie with us. Who
knows, perhaps some new friendships will be made as we all go on
together! They all seem to feel as eager to go as we are, and
everybody is glad. I will get acquainted with as many as I can now,
and bring cheerful ones to visit Grandma, for she feels rather
homesick, except when Patty and I make her laugh."

Again, "The first few days of travel through the Territory of Kansas
were lovely. The flowers were so bright and there were so many birds
singing. Each day father and I would ride ahead to find a place to
camp that night. Sometimes when we galloped back we would find the
wagons halting at a creek, while washing was done or the young people
took a swim. Mother and I always did our wash at night, and spread it
on the bushes to dry. All this is such a peaceful recital that I began
to think I need not keep a diary at all, till one hot day when I was
in the wagon helping Patty cut out some doll's dresses, Jim came
running up to the wagon, terribly excited and crying out:

"'Indians, Virginia! Come and see! They have to take us across the
river!' Out he rushed and I after him, with every story Grandma ever
told us dancing through my brain. Now there was going to be an
adventure! But there wasn't. We had reached the Caw River, where there
were Indians to ferry us across. They were real and red and
terrifying, but I never flinched. If they brought out tomahawks in
midstream, I would be as brave as a pioneer's daughter should be. But
would you believe me, those Indians were as tame as pet canaries, and
just shot us across the river without glancing at us, and held out
their big hands with a grunt, for the coins! That was one of the
greatest disappointments of my life."

All went well with the travelers during those first weeks of the trip,
and no one enjoyed it more than Grandma Keyes after she got over being
homesick. But when they reached the Big Blue river, it was so swollen
that they had to lie by and wait for it to go down, or make rafts to
cross it on. As soon as they stopped traveling Grandma began to fail,
and on the 29th of May, with scarcely any pain, she died. Virginia's
diary says: "It was hard to comfort mother until I persuaded her that
to die out in that lovely country, and with most of your family around
you, was far better than living longer at home. Besides, she might
have died in Springfield. So mother cheered up a little, while all the
party helped us in making the sad preparations. A coffin was made from
a cotton-wood tree, and a young man from home found a gray stone slab
and cut Grandma's name, birthplace, and age on it. A minister of the
party made a simple address, and with the sunlight filtering through
the trees we buried her under an oak-tree and covered the grave with
wild flowers. Then we had to go on our way and leave dear Grandma in
the vast wilderness, which was so hard for mother that for many days I
did not take my rides on Billy, but just stayed with her. But the
landscape was so comfortingly beautiful that at last she cheered up
and began to feel that Grandma was not left alone in the forest, but
was with God. Strange to say, that grave in the woods has never been
disturbed; around it grew up the city of Manhattan, Kansas, and there
it is in the city cemetery of to-day."

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