Literature, Principally Belletristic - University of Tennessee, Knoxville

· Literature,
Principally Belletristic .
In 1747 an anonymous contributor sent to the South-Carolina Gazette HAn
Elegy, on the much lamented Death of the Rev. Mr. Robert Betham, who
died May 31st, 1747, Aged 32 Years." The thirty lines were published
in the issue of June 15 in a format unusual in the South, for the printed
title of the elegy is flanked by symbolic cuts of the kind popular in broadside
elegies of both New and Old England. To the left of the title is a
skull and crossbones, to the right an hourglass, yet the lines themselves
contain no mortuary detail. And despite the fact that it mourns an Anglican
clergyman, the poem has at least as much pagan pastoral detail of
flocks and shepherds as of glorious saints.
On August 31 of the same year was printed a thirty-one-line elegy "On
the Death of the Rev. Mr. Kennedy," concerning the minister of the Scots
meetinghouse, by "Omasius." The author, and probably the subject, were
participants in the Great Awakening, and the verse reflects the piety and
fervor of that movement. It is a good elegy, however, vivid in imagery
and moving in feeling. It portrays an active clergyman of the Presbyterian
New Light persuasion, but it employs basically the imagery of the pastoral
elegy, concluding
But think, that once we'll tread the dismal shore,
When Love and Joy must ne'er be dreamt on more.
Adieu the muse, adieu the country plain,
Adieu each nymph, and each enchanting strain.
In the same issue "Philagathus" had published (or at least sent in for
someone) "Lines occasioned by the Death of that worthy Young Gentleman,
Mr. John Ball." The lines are quite unlike those on Kennedy, for this
piece is entirely in the classical tradition. It celebrates the young scion of
a prominent family, cut off at twenty-one years of age, in the eulogistic
cliches characteristic of "the unfulfilled renown" sort of tribute.
Then in September 7 appeared another longer and less fervid poem on
Kennedy. Warning that life is short and death and judgment must follow,
it depicts Kennedy as the ideal minister of a middle way between the
formal Anglicans and the "enthusiasts." That not all New Light Presbyterians
admired Whitefield is evident here. The author, 1--, is mindful
of the classical tradition of the elegy, for he compares Kennedy's departure
with the departures of Cicero, }Eneas, and Cata.
In 1748 at least two competent elegies appeared in the Gazette, the
first by C.W.F. (Charles Walter Fortesque, teacher of the classics?) which
appeared on May I !. "On the much lamented Death of Benjamin Godin"
is a eulogistic thirty-two-line piece lamenting the death of a prominent
South Carolina merchant. Orthodox, pious, and patriotic, "No sour enthusiastic
whims, possest . . . his peaceful breast." On September 12