AMERICAN ACADEMY 226 



ward, at a reunion of the Harvard class of 

 which both Smith and Oliver Wendell Holmes 

 were members, Holmes read a poem entitled 

 Boys, in which he spoke of Smith in the 

 words: 



Here's a nice youngster of excellent pith : 

 Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith, 

 But he chanted a song for the brave and the 



free; 

 Just read on his medal, "My country, of thee." 



The music to America was borrowed from 

 England, having been composed by Henry 

 Carey about 1742. The English national 

 hymn, God Save the King, is set to the same 

 music, as is also the popular German patriotic 

 song, HeU dir in Siegerkranz. The words of 

 this best-known of America's national hymns 

 are as follows: 



My country, 'tis of thee, 

 Sweet land of liberty. 



Of thee I sing ; 

 Land where my fathers died, 

 Land of the pilgrims' pride, 

 From every mountain side 



Let freedom ring. 



My native country, thee 

 Land of the noble free 



Thy name I love ; 

 I love thy rocks and rills, 

 Thy woods and templed hills, 

 My heart with rapture thrills 



Like that above. 



Let music swell the breeze, 

 And ring from all the trees 



Sweet freedom's song; 

 Let mortal tongues awake ; 

 Let all that breathe partake; 

 Let rocks their silence break 



The sound prolong. 



Our fathers' God, to thee, 

 Author of liberty, 



To thee we sing : 

 Long may our land be bright 



With freedom's holy light ; 

 . Protect us by thy might, 



Great God, our King. 



AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND 

 LETTERS, an organization of distinguished 

 artists, musicians and authors, established in 

 1904. The members of the Academy, whose 

 number is limited to fifty, are chosen from 

 the National Institute of Arts and Letters, an 

 organization of 250 members. The larger body 

 was founded in 1898 by a committee of the 

 American Social Science Association with the 

 purpose of creating in the United States an 

 association like the Institute of France. The 

 committee named a small group of initial 

 members, who were to elect other members. 



AMERICAN BEAUTY 



The membership was at first very small, but 

 was later increased to 150, and finally to 250. 

 After the Institute had established itself, 

 and included most of the prominent writers 

 and artists of the United States, a new and 

 smaller organization was planned, to be called 

 the American Academy of Arts and Letters. 

 Its constitution states that the purpose of the 

 Academy is to further and represent the inter- 

 ests of fine arts and literature. In 1904 seven 

 men were chosen to form the nucleus of the 

 Academy; these seven were William Dean 

 Howells, Augustus St. Gaudens, Edmund 

 Clarence Stedman, John La Farge, Samuel 

 Langhorne Clemens (Mark Twain), John Hay 

 and Edward A. MacDowell. They were given 

 power to elect eight more members, and the 

 combined fifteen then elected five more, and 

 thus by successive steps the membership was 

 increased to fifty. Among the distinguished 

 men who have been members of the Academy 

 are Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Joseph Jefferson, 

 Carl Schurz, Joel Chandler Harris, John Bige- 

 low and Edward Everett Hale. The only 

 woman member was Julia Ward Howe. The 

 members in 1917, in the order of their elec- 

 tion, were the following: 



Elihu Vedder 

 George Edward Wood- 

 berry 



Kenyon Cox 



George Whitefleld Chad- 

 wick 

 Abbott Handerson 



Thayer 



Henry Mills Alden 

 George de Forest Brush 

 William Rutherford 



Mead 



Bliss Ferry 



Abbott Lawrence Lowell 

 Nicholas Murray Butler 

 Paul Wayland Bartlett 

 Owen Wister 

 Herbert Adams 

 Augustus Thomas 

 Timothy Cole 

 Cass Gilbert 

 William Roscoe Thayer 

 Robert Grant 

 Frederick Macmonnies 

 J. Alden Weir 

 William Gillette 

 Paul Elmer More 

 George Lockhart Rives 

 Hamlin Garland 



William Dean Howells 

 Henry Adams 

 Theodore Roosevelt 

 John Singer Sargent 

 Daniel Chester French 

 John Burroughs 

 James Ford Rhodes 

 Horatio William Parker 

 William Milligan 



Sloane 

 Robert Underwood 



Johnson 

 George Washington 



Cable 



Andrew Dickson White 

 Henry Van Dyke 

 William Crary Brownell 

 Basil Lanneau Gilder- 

 sleeve 



Woodrow Wilson 

 Arthur Twining Hadley 

 Henry Cabot Lodge 

 Edwin Rowland Blash- 



fleld 



William Merritt Chase 

 Thomas Hastings 

 Hamilton Wright Mabie 

 Brander Matthews 

 Thomas Nelson Page 



The history of nearly all the past and pres- 

 ent members is given in its alphabetical place 

 in these volumes. W.F.Z. 



AMERICAN BEAUTY, a choice variety of 

 cultivated rose, famous for the size of its 



