HART 



2706 



HARTE 



HART, ALBERT BUSHNELL (1854- ), an 

 American historian and educator who has made 

 his influence felt throughout the United States 

 in connection with modern methods of studying 

 history; that is, by investigating original 

 sources. He was born at Clarksville, Pa., pre- 

 pared for college at Cleveland, Ohio, and in 

 1880 was graduated from Harvard University. 

 Three years later he received a degree at Frei- 

 burg University, Germany, and on his return to 

 America became instructor in American history 

 at Harvard. Various promotions followed, un- 

 til, in 1910, he was made f professor of govern- 

 ment in the university. 



His work as an author and editor is notable. 

 From 1894 to 1902 he was joint editor of the 

 Harvard Graduates' Magazine, and from 1895 to 

 1909 was one of the editors of the American His- 

 torical Review. He has also edited several series 

 on American history and government, especially 

 The American Nation, A History (1904-1907), 

 and was joint editor of the Cyclopaedia oj 

 American Government (1910-1914). His nu- 

 merous books on historical subjects include 

 Actual Government (1909), Formation oj the 

 Union (1890), The War in Europe (1914) and 

 The Monroe Doctrine, An Interpretation 

 (1915). He enjoys high rank among modern 

 American historians, and has served as presi- 

 dent of the American Historical Association 

 and of the American Political Science Associa- 

 tion. 



HARTE, hahrt, [FRANCIS] BRET (1839-1902), 

 an American poet and short-story writer, 

 usually known as BRET HARTE, whose pictur- 

 esque and realistic tales of life in the mining 

 camps of California are among the best short 

 stories in Ameri- 

 can literature. He 

 was born in Al- 

 bany, N. Y., but 

 his father died :#>. 

 wh en he was 

 young, and at the 

 age of fifteen he 

 went to Califor- 

 n i a with his 

 mother. There he 

 drifted with the BRET TIARTE 



human tide, trying, at different times, to make 

 his way as a miner, school-teacher, express mes- 

 senger and typesetter. Meantime, the varied 

 life and scenery of the California plains and 

 mountains were making impressions that he 

 later reproduced with wonderful fidelity; the 

 types of character that live in his pages he was 



becoming familiar with through personal con- 

 tact and observation. 



In 1857 he was employed as a typesetter by 

 the Golden Era, a weekly newspaper of San 

 Francisco, and for it he began to write sketches 

 that eventually won him the position of assist- 

 ant editor. In 1864 he joined the staff of the 

 Weekly Calijornian, in which appeared the 

 clever parodies on the styles of various authors 

 that were later published as Condensed Novels. 

 At the same time he became secretary of the 

 United States Branch Mint at San Francisco, 

 an office which he held until 1870. 



It was in 1868, when he became editor of the 

 newly-founded Overland Monthly, that Bret 

 Harte won national fame by publishing The 

 Luck oj Roaring Camp, the first of those West- 

 ern tales that best represent his genius. It 

 was followed by The Outcasts oj Poker Flat, 

 Tennessee's Partner, Miggles, An Idyl oj Red 

 Gulch and others, stories in which the grandeur 

 of California scenery serves as a background 

 for narratives of the wild and often dissolute 

 life of the "Forty-niners," as the early gold- 

 seekers were called. 



Adventurers, gamblers, wrecks of humanity 

 of both sexes, move across his pages, forming 

 a picturesque and vivid gallery of human por- 

 traits. These are presented without apology or 

 explanation; there are no unnecessary com- 

 ments or descriptions, for Harte's characters 

 reveal themselves wholly in their words and ac- 

 tions. Often the sorriest specimen of humanity 

 is shown to possess the divine spark of heroism, 

 as in The Outcasts oj Poker Flat, where a 

 wretched woman, driven out from the town, 

 starves to death that her snow-bound compan- 

 ions may have her portion of food. From a 

 literary standpoint these tales are examples of 

 the highest art. 



The author's most popular poem, Plain Lan- 

 guage from Truthful James, also known as The 

 Heathen Chinee, was published in 1870. This 

 often-quoted poem, of which the first stanza 

 appears below, has a breezy humor, vivacity 

 and original touch characteristic of his best 

 verse : 



Which I wish to remark, 



And my language is plain, 

 That for \.ays that are dark 



And for t 'cks that are vain, 

 The heathen Chinee is peculiar, 



Which the same I would rise to explain. 



In 1871, after serving for a few months as 

 professor of recent literature in the University 

 of California, Harte went to New York to con- 

 tinue his literary work. For several years after 



