Daughters (& Sons)

Joseph Rodman Drake

Janet Halleck (Drake) de Kay, his daughter, got The Culprit Fay published after he died. 

"I.'Tis the middle watch of a summer's night --

The earth is dark, but the heavens are bright;

Nought is seen in the vault on high

But the moon, and the stars, and the cloudless sky,

And the flood which rolls its milky hue,

A river of light on the welkin blue.

The moon looks down on old Cronest,

She mellows the shades on his shaggy breast,

And seems his huge gray form to throw

In a sliver cone on the wave below;

His sides are broken by spots of shade,

By the walnut bough and the cedar made,

And through their clustering branches dark

Glimmers and dies the fire-fly's spark --

Like starry twinkles that momently break

Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack."

It goes on for many pages. This was some of the best early 1800s American writing around.

An interesting piece is the ornamental framed mirror above. 

It was commissioned by Charles de Kay
as a present for their mother. Janet. 

It was designed and hand painted by Albert Pinkham Ryder, and
depicts scenes from "The Culprit Fay" written by Helena De Kay Gilder's grandfather. 

The gentleman portrayed in the middle panel on the right side is Joseph Rodman Drake. 

The middle panel on the bottom is
supposed to be Helena (portraying a earth goddess)

I've been trying to transcribe Helena and her husband's diary from the original (which was hand-written) and had just about given up, when I discovered a typed transcript of it at The Lily Library in Indiana. I should have a copy in a week. Done, by Helena's daughter I'm sure. There are the 1500 pages of Helena's letters to Molly Foote and her answers there as well, that her daughter transcribed and tried to get published without luck.

May we all be blessed with gracious children.