Perhaps  it  is  not  strange  that  such  a  consider-
able  part  of  Mrs.  Sigourney's  facile  effusions
related  to  the  tomb  for  hers  was  the  age  of
pensive  sentiment.  It  was  the  time  when  the
weeping  willow  was  popular  in  all  forms  of  art,
from  the  tombstone  to  the  mezzotint  illustration,
when  young  ladies  sang  captivatingly,  to  the
harp,  of  an  early  death,  when  funeral  sermons
were  printed,  widely  circulated  and  even  read,
and  when  everybody  was  wondering  whether
they  were  numbered  among  the  "elect"  or—
not.
Yet  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  give  the  impres-
sion that  all  the  sentiment  of  the  time,  or  all  of
Mrs.  Sigourney's  poetry,  partook  of  gloom.  Far
[73]


The  Friendly  Club


from  it.  Though  there  was,  to  be  sure,  a  kind
of  background  of  agreeable  melancholy,  and
such  alluring  titles  of  her  books  as  *  'Whisper  to
a  Bride"  and  "Water  Drops"  (a  plea  for  tenv
perance)  were  doubtless  not  intentionally  humor^
ous,  Mrs.  Sigourney  could  be  playful  at  times
and  she  invariably  painted  the  immediate  scene
in  colors  of  the  rose.  She  was,  in  fact,  an  idealist.
