Longfellow may well be called the Poet of the Bells; for who has so
largely voiced their many uses as he, or interpreted the part they have
taken in the world's history. That he was a great lover of bells and
bell music is evinced by the many times he chose them as themes for his
poems; nearly a dozen of which are about them, containing some of the
sweetest of his thoughts; and allusions to them, like this from
Evangeline,--

Anon from the belfry
Softly the Angelus sounded,"--


are sprinkled all through his longer poems, as well as his prose. The
Song of the Bell, beginning,--

"Bell! thou soundest merrily
When the bridal party
To the church doth hie!"


was among his earliest writings; and The Bells of San Blas was his last
poem, having been written March 15, 1882, nine days only before he
died:--

"What say the Bells of San Blas
To the ships that southward pass
From the harbor of Mazatlan?"