Francis Parkman 205 



tated instead of holding the pen, and his huge 

 mass of documents had to be read aloud to him. 

 The heroism shown year after year in contending 

 with physical ailments was the index of a character 

 fit to be mated, for its pertinacious courage, with 

 the heroes that live in those shining pages. 



The progress in working up materials was slow 

 and sure. &quot; The Conspiracy of Pontiac,&quot; which 

 forms the sequel and conclusion of Parkman s 

 work, was first published in 1851, only five years 

 after the summer spent with the Indians ; four 

 teen years then elapsed before the &quot; Pioneers &quot; 

 made its appearance in Little, Brown & Co. s 

 window ; and then there were yet seven - and- 

 twenty years more before the final volumes came 

 out in 1892. Altogether, about half a century 

 was required for the building of this grand liter 

 ary monument. Nowhere can we find a better 

 illustration of the French critic s definition of a 

 great life, a thought conceived in youth, and 

 realized in later years. 



This elaborateness of preparation had its share 

 in producing the intense vividness of Parkman s 

 descriptions. Profusion of detail makes them seem 

 like the accounts of an eye-witness. The realism 

 is so strong that the author seems to have come 

 in person fresh from the scenes he describes, with 



