Shaw, the only daughter of the Chief Justice, and their marriage followed on August 4, 1847, in Boston.
The wanderings of our nautical Othello were thus brought to a conclusion. Mr. and Mrs. Melville resided in
New York City until 1850, when they purchased a farmhouse at Pittsfield, their farm adjoining that formerly
owned by Mr. Melville's uncle, which had been inherited by the latter's son. The new place was named
'Arrow Head,' from the numerous Indian antiquities found in the neighbourhood. The house was so situated
as to command an uninterrupted view of Greylock Mountain and the adjacent hills. Here Melville remained
for thirteen years, occupied with his writing, and managing his farm. An article in Putnam's Monthly entitled
'I and My Chimney,' another called 'October Mountain,' and the introduction to the 'Piazza Tales,' present
faithful pictures of Arrow Head and its surroundings. In a letter to Nathaniel Hawthorne, given in 'Nathaniel
Hawthorne and His Wife,' his daily life is set forth. The letter is dated June 1, 1851.
'Since you have been here I have been building some shanties of houses (connected with the old one), and
likewise some shanties of chapters and essays. I have been ploughing and sowing and raising and printing
and praying, and now begin to come out upon a less bristling time, and to enjoy the calm prospect of things
from a fair piazza at the north of the old farmhouse here. Not entirely yet, though, am I without something to
be urgent with. The 'Whale' is only half through the press; for, wearied with the long delays of the printers,
and disgusted with the heat and dust of the Babylonish brick−kiln of New York, I came back to the country to
feel the grass, and end the book reclining on it, if I may.'
Mr. Hawthorne, who was then living in the red cottage at Lenox, had a week at Arrow Head with his
daughter Una the previous spring. It is recorded that the friends 'spent most of the time in the barn, bathing in
the early spring sunshine, which streamed through the open doors, and talking philosophy.' According to Mr.
J. E. A. Smith's volume on the Berkshire Hills, these gentlemen, both reserved in nature, though near
neighbours and often in the same company, were inclined to be shy of each other, partly, perhaps, through the
knowledge that Melville had written a very appreciative review of 'Mosses from an Old Manse' for the New
York Literary World, edited by their mutual friends, the Duyckincks. 'But one day,' writes Mr. Smith, 'it
chanced that when they were out on a picnic excursion, the two were compelled by a thundershower to take
shelter in a narrow recess of the rocks of Monument Mountain. Two hours of this enforced intercourse settled
the matter. They learned so much of each other's character, . . . that the most intimate friendship for the future
was inevitable.' A passage in Hawthorne's 'Wonder Book' is noteworthy as describing the number of literary
neighbours in Berkshire:
'For my part, I wish I had Pegasus here at this moment,' said the student. 'I would mount him forthwith, and
gallop about the country within a circumference of a few miles, making literary calls on my brother authors.
Dr. Dewey would be within ray reach, at the foot of the Taconic. In Stockbridge, yonder, is Mr. James [G. P.
R. James], conspicuous to all the world on his mountain−pile of history and romance. Longfellow, I believe,
is not yet at the Oxbow, else the winged horse would neigh at him. But here in Lenox I should find our most
truthful novelist [Miss Sedgwick], who has made the scenery and life of Berkshire all her own. On the hither
side of Pittsfield sits Herman Melville, shaping out the gigantic conception of his 'White Whale,' while the
gigantic shadow of Greylock looms upon him from his study window. Another bound of my flying steed
would bring me to the door of Holmes, whom I mention last, because Pegasus would certainly unseat me the
next minute, and claim the poet as his rider.'
While at Pittsfield, Mr. Melville was induced to enter the lecture field. From 1857 to 1860 he filled many
engagements in the lyceums, chiefly speaking of his adventures in the South Seas. He lectured in cities as
widely apart as Montreal, Chicago, Baltimore, and San Francisco, sailing to the last−named place in 1860, by
way of Cape Horn, on the Meteor, commanded, by his younger brother, Captain Thomas Melville, afterward
governor of the 'Sailor's Snug Harbor' at Staten Island, N.Y. Besides his voyage to San Francisco, he had, in
1849 and 1856, visited England, the Continent, and the Holy Land, partly to superintend the publication of
English editions of his works, and partly for recreation.
Typee: A Romance of the South Sea
INTRODUCTION TO THE EDITION OF 1892. BY ARTHUR STEDMAN. 5