Henry Childs Merwin

The Life of Bret Harte Henry Childs Merwin

Francis Brett Harte was born at Albany in the State of New York, on August twenty-fifth, 1836. By his relatives and early friends he was called Frank; but soon after beginning his career as an author in San Francisco he signed his name as ?Brett,? then as ?Bret,? and finally as ?Bret Harte.? ?Bret Harte,? therefore, is in some degree a nom de guerre, and it was commonly supposed at first, both in the Eastern States and in England, to be wholly such. Our great New England novelist had a similar experience, for ?Nathaniel Hawthorne? was long regarded by most of his readers as an assumed name, happily chosen to indicate the quaint and poetic character of the tales to which it was signed. Bret Harte?s father was Henry Hart; but before we trace his ancestry, let us endeavor to see how he looked. Fanny Kemble met him at Lenox, in the year 1875, and was much impressed by his appearance. In a letter to a relative she wrote: ?He reminded me a good deal of our old pirate and bandit friend, Trelawney, though the latter was an almost orientally dark-complexioned man, and Mr. Bret Harte was comparatively fair. They were both tall, well-made men of fine figure; both, too, were handsome, with a peculiar expression of face which suggested small sucsuccess to any one who might engage in personal conflict with them.? In reality Bret Harte was not tall, though others beside Mrs. Kemble thought him to be so; his height was five feet, eight and a half inches. His face was smooth and regular, without much color; the chin firm and well rounded; the nose straight and rather large, ?the nose of generosity and genius?; the under-lip having what Mr. Howells called a ?fascinating, forward thrust.? The following description dates from the time when he left California: ?He was a handsome, distinguished-looking man, and although his oval face was slightly marred by scars of small-pox, and his abundant dark hair was already streaked with gray, he carried his slight, upright figure with a quiet elegance that would have made an impression, even when the refinement of face, voice and manner had not been recognized.? Mr. Howells says of him at the same period: ?He was, as one could not help seeing, thickly pitted, but after the first glance one forgot this, so that a lady who met him for the first time could say to him, ?Mr. Harte, aren?t you afraid to go about in the cars so recklessly when there is this scare about small-pox?? ?No! madam!? he said, in that rich note of his, with an irony touched by pseudo-pathos, ?I bear a charmèd life.?? Almost every one who met Bret Harte was struck by his low, rich, well-modulated voice. Mr. Howells speaks of ?the mellow cordial of a voice that was like no other.? His handwriting was small, firm and graceful.