Upham, Thomas C. American Cottage Life: A Series of Poems illustrative of American Scenery, and of the Associations, Feelings, and Employments of the American Cottager and Farmer. Brunswick, [Maine]: Joseph Griffin, 1850-51. Second Edition. [10527]
Green cloth with bright gilt decorative pieces on front and back, gilt to spine dull, all page edges gilt, 7 1/2 x 4 3/4 inches. Yellow waxed end papers with 1852 gift inscription, neat contemporary owner's signature on tp. Extra engraved title page by Thayer & Co., Boston. 12 fine lithograph plates of rural and cottage scenes by B. F. Nutting. 212 clean pp. The book is a bit shaken with nothing detached. Good. Hardcover.
The contents are arranged thusly: American Cottage Life; Ballads and Songs for the Cottage (includes Yanko, the Noble Negro); Cottage Hymns and Religious Songs; Scripture Sonnets for Religious Hours.
Yanko, the Noble Negro is based on the true events surrounding two children who were left to the care of a Negro "who belonged to his family" on board a ship, the father taking leave of them for a short visit on another vessel. A storm arose and wrecked the ship, and Yanko delivered the children to a lifeboat while "cheerfully remaining on the wreck, and perished."
The illustrator is Benjamin Franklin Nutting (c. 1803-1887), b. New Hampshire. Nutting was a portrait and landscape painter, lithographer, and the author of several instruction books for artists. He was an apprentice in Pendleton's lithographic establishment along with Nathaniel Currier c. 1828-33. His work was frequently exhibited at art galleries and exhibitions.
Thomas Cogswell Upham (1799-1872), b. in Deerfield, N.H.; graduated at Dartmouth and at the Theological Seminary at Andover; pastor of a Congregational Church in Rochester, N.H., Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy and Instructor in Hebrew at Bowdoin College. Upham was a sound scholar with an attraction to studies of the inner life of the Christian. He was the author, among other works, of several books on the life of holiness.
