He was a word-painter of its landscapes, a rider over its
surfaces. Cradled "in a covered wagon pointing West," mingling
with wild frontier life from Alaska to Nicaragua, miner, Indian
fighter, hermit, poseur in London and Washington, then hermit
again in California, the author of "Songs of the Sierras" at
least knew his material. Byron, whom he adored and imitated,
could have invented nothing more romantic than Joaquin's life;
but though Joaquin inherited Scotch intensity, he had nothing of
the close mental grip of the true Scot and nothing of his humor.
Vast stretches of his poetry are empty; some of it is grandiose,
elemental, and yet somehow artificial, as even the Grand Canyon
itself looks at certain times.
John Muir, another immigrant Scot who reached California in 1868,
had far more stuff in him than Joaquin Miller. He had studied
geology, botany, and chemistry at the new University of
Wisconsin, and then for years turned explorer of forests, peaks,
and glaciers, not writing, at first, except in his "Journal," but
forever absorbing and worshiping sublimity and beauty with no
thought of literary schemes.
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