The New England school, which had so dominated the mid-nineteenth century, left, as we have seen, no heirs. As the great figures of the "Brahmins" disappeared one by one, vigorous young leaders from without the Boston circle came into their places, but the real succession--the native New England literary generation after Emerson--was feminine. During the decade from 1868 the following books, written by women born, the most of them, in those thirties which had witnessed the beginnings of the earlier group, came from the American press:

1868. _Little Women_, Louisa M. Alcott (1832-1888). 1868. _The Gates Ajar_, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1844-1911). 1870. _Verses_, Helen Hunt Jackson (1831-1885). 1872. _Poems_, Celia Thaxter (1836-1894). 1873. _The Saxe Holm Stories_, "Saxe Holm." 1875. _One Summer_, Blanche Willis Howard (1847-1898). 1875. _After the Ball and Other Poems_, Nora Perry (1841-1896). 1877. _Deephaven_, Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909). 1878. _The China Hunter's Club_, Annie Trumbull Slosson (1838----).

A History of American Literature Since 1870 — Part 190

Of the same generation, but earlier or else later in the literary field, were the poets Elizabeth Akers Allen (1832-1911), and Louise Chandler Moulton (1835-1908); the essayist Mary Abigail Dodge, "Gail Hamilton" (1838-1896); the novelists Rose Terry Cooke (1827-1892), Jane G. Austin (1831-1894), and Harriet Prescott Spofford (1835----); and, latest of all to be known, the intense lyrist Emily Dickinson (1830-1886). In the eighties was to come the school of the younger realists, a part of the classical reaction--Alice Brown (1857----), Kate Douglas Wiggin (1859----) and Mary E. Wilkins (1862----), who were to record the later phases of the New England decline.

A History of American Literature Since 1870 — Part 190

Outside of the New England environment there was also a notable outburst of feminine literature. In the thirteen years from 1875 appeared the following significant first volumes:

A History of American Literature Since 1870 — Part 190

1875. _Castle Nowhere_, Constance Fenimore Woolson (1848-1894). 1875. _A Woman in Armor_, Mary Hartwell Catherwood (1847-1902). 1877. _That Lass o' Lowrie's_, Frances Hodgson Burnett (1849----). 1883. _The Led Horse Claim_, Mary Hallock Foote (1847----). 1884. _In the Tennessee Mountains_, Mary Noailles Murfree (1850----). 1884. _A New Year's Masque_, Edith M. Thomas (1854----). 1886. _The Old Garden and Other Verses_, Margaretta Wade Deland (1857----). 1886. _Monsieur Motte_, Grace King (1852----). 1887. _Knitters in the Sun_, Alice French (1850----).