We hardly know another instance like it; but
so much the better for him. He had no immature efforts of early life to
regret; and when the cask once was tapped, the old wine came forth with a
fine bouquet. When Phillips & Sampson consulted Lowell in regard to the
editorship of the _Atlantic,_ he said at once: "We must get
something from Oliver Wendell Holmes." He was Lowell's great discovery
and proved to be his best card,--a clear, shining light, and not an
_ignis fatuus._
When the "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" first appeared few were in the
secret of its authorship and everybody asked: "Who is this new luminary?"
It was exactly what the more intelligent public wanted, and Holmes jumped
at once into the position in literature which he has held ever since.
Readers were delighted with his wit, surprised at his originality and
impressed by his proverbial wisdom. It was the advent of a sound, healthy
intelligence, not unlike that of President Lincoln, which could deal with
common-place subjects in a significant and characteristic manner. The
landlady's daughter, the schoolmistress, little Boston, and the young man
called John, are as real and tangible as the _dramatis personae_ in
one of Moliere's plays. They seem more real to us than many of the
distinguished men and women whom we read of in the newspapers.
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