Chapter III: Part 3

The family at this time moved to Groton, a great privation for Margaret, who enjoyed and needed the culture of Boston society. But she says, "As, sad or merry, I must always be learning, I laid down a course of study at the beginning of the winter." This consisted of the history and geography of modern Europe, and of America, architecture, and the works of Alfieri, Goethe, and Schiller. The teaching was continued because her brothers must be sent to Harvard College, and this required money; not the first nor the last time that sisters have worked to give brothers an education superior to their own.

At last the constitution, never robust, broke down, and for nine days Margaret lay hovering between this world and the next. The tender mother called her "dear lamb," and watched her constantly, while the stern father, who never praised his children, lest it might harm them, said, "My dear, I have been thinking of you in the night, and I cannot remember that you have any _faults._ You have defects, of course, as all mortals have, but I do not know that you have a single fault."

"While Margaret recovered, the father was taken suddenly with cholera, and died after a two days' illness. He was sadly missed, for at heart he was devoted to his family. When the estate was settled, there was little left for each; so for Margaret life would be more laborious than ever. She had expected to visit Europe with Harriet Martineau, who was just returning home from a visit to this country, but the father's death crushed this long-cherished and ardently-prayed-for journey. She must stay at home and work for others.

Books were read now more eagerly than ever,--_Sartor Resartus_, Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Heine. But money must be earned. Ah! if genius could only develop in ease and prosperity. It rarely has the chance. The tree grows best when the dirt is oftenest stirred about the roots; perhaps the best in us comes only from such stirring.

Margaret now obtained a situation as teacher of French and Latin in Bronson Alcott's school. Here she was appreciated by both master and pupils. Mr. Alcott said, "I think her the most brilliant talker of the day. She has a quick and comprehensive wit, a firm command of her thoughts, and a speech to win the ear of the most cultivated." She taught advanced classes in German and Italian, besides having several private pupils.

Before this time she had become a valued friend of the Emerson family. Mr. Emerson says, "Sometimes she stayed a few days, often a week, more seldom a month, and all tasks that could be suspended were put aside to catch the favorable hour in walking, riding, or boating, to talk with this joyful guest, who brought wit, anecdotes, love-stories, tragedies, oracles with her.... The day was never long enough to exhaust her opulent memory, and I, who knew her intimately for ten years, never saw her without surprise at her new powers."

She was passionately fond of music and of art, saying, "I have been very happy with four hundred and seventy designs of Raphael in my possession for a week." She loved nature like a friend, paying homage to rocks and woods and flowers. She said, "I hate not to be beautiful when all around is so."

After teaching with Mr. Alcott, she became the principal teacher in a school at Providence, R.I. Here, as ever, she showed great wisdom both with children and adults. The little folks in the house were allowed to look at the gifts of many friends in her room, on condition that they would not touch them. One day a young visitor came, and insisted on taking down a microscope, and broke it. The child who belonged in the house was well-nigh heart-broken over the affair, and, though protesting her innocence, was suspected both of the deed and of falsehood. Miss Fuller took the weeping child upon her knee, saying, "Now, my dear little girl, tell me all about it; only remember that you must be careful, for I shall believe every word you say." Investigation showed that the child thus confided in told the whole truth.

After two years in Providence she returned to Boston, and in 1839 began a series of parlor lectures, or "conversations," as they were called. This seemed a strange thing for a woman, when public speaking by her sex was almost unknown. These talks were given weekly, from eleven o'clock till one, to twenty-five or thirty of the most cultivated women of the city. Now the subject of discussion was Grecian mythology; now it was fine arts, education, or the relations of woman to the family, the church, society, and literature. These meetings were continued through five winters, supplemented by evening "conversations," attended by both men and women. In these gatherings Margaret was at her best,--brilliant, eloquent, charming.

During this time a few gifted men, Emerson, Channing, and others, decided to start a literary and philosophical magazine called the _Dial_. Probably no woman in the country would have been chosen as the editor, save Margaret Fuller. She accepted the position, and for four years managed the journal ably, writing for it some valuable essays. Some of these were published later in her book on _Literature and Art_. Her _Woman in the Nineteenth Century_, a learned and vigorous essay on woman's place in the world, first appeared in part in the _Dial_. Of this work, she said, in closing it, "After taking a long walk, early one most exhilarating morning, I sat down to work, and did not give it the last stroke till near nine in the evening. Then I felt a delightful glow, as if I had put a good deal of my true life in it, and as if, should I go away now, the measure of my footprint would be left on the earth."

Miss Fuller had published, besides these works, two books of translations from the German, and a sketch of travel called _Summer on the Lakes_. Her experience was like that of most authors who are beginning,--some fame, but no money realized. All this time she was frail in health, overworked, struggling against odds to make a living for herself and those she loved. But there were some compensations in this life of toil. One person wrote her, "What I am I owe in large measure to the stimulus you imparted. You roused my heart with high hopes; you raised my aims from paltry and vain pursuits to those which lasted and fed the soul; you inspired me with a great ambition, and made me see the worth and the meaning of life."

William Hunt, the renowned artist, was looking in a book that lay on the table of a friend. It was Mrs. Jameson's _Italian Painters._ In describing Correggio, she said he was "one of those superior beings of whom there are so few." Margaret had written on the margin, "And yet all might be such." Mr. Hunt said, "These words struck out a new strength in me. They revived resolutions long fallen away, and made me set my face like a flint."

Margaret was now thirty-four. The sister was married, the brothers had finished their college course, and she was about to accept an offer from the _New York Tribune_ to become one of its constant contributors, an honor that few women would have received. Early in December, 1844, Margaret moved to New York and became a member of Mr. Greeley's family. Her literary work here was that of, says Mr. Higginson, "the best literary critic whom America has yet seen."

Sometimes her reviews, like those on the poetry of Longfellow and Lowell, were censured, but she was impartial and able. Society opened wide its doors to her, as it had in Boston. Mrs. Greeley became her devoted friend, and their little son "Pickie," five years old, the idol of Mr. Greeley, her restful playmate.

A year and a half later an opportunity came for Margaret to go to Europe. Now, at last, she would see the art-galleries of the old world, and places rich in history, like Rome. Still there was the trouble of scanty means, and poor health from overwork. She said, "A noble career is yet before me, if I can be unimpeded by cares. If our family affairs could now be so arranged that I might be tolerably tranquil for the next six or eight years, I should go out of life better satisfied with the page I have turned in it than I shall if I must still toil on."

After two weeks on the ocean, the party of friends arrived in London, and Miss Fuller received a cordial welcome. Wordsworth, now seventy-six, showed her the lovely scenery of Rydal Mount, pointing out as his especial pride, his avenue of hollyhocks--crimson, straw-color, and white. De Quincey showed her many courtesies. Dr. Chalmers talked eloquently, while William and Mary Howitt seemed like old friends. Carlyle invited her to his home. "To interrupt him," she said, "is a physical impossibility. If you get a chance to remonstrate for a moment, he raises his voice and bears you down."

In Paris, Margaret attended the Academy lectures, saw much of George Sand, waded through melting snow at Avignon to see Laura's tomb, and at last was in Italy, the country she had longed to see. Here Mrs. Jameson, Powers, and Greenough, and the Brownings and Storys, were her warm friends. Here she settled down to systematic work, trying to keep her expenses for six months within four hundred dollars. Still, when most cramped for means herself, she was always generous. Once, when living on a mere pittance, she loaned fifty dollars to a needy artist. In New York she gave an impecunious author five hundred dollars to publish his book, and, of course, never received a dollar in return. Yet the race for life was wearing her out. So tired was she that she said, "I should like to go to sleep, and be born again into a state where my young life should not be prematurely taxed."

Meantime the struggle for Italian unity was coming to its climax. Mazzini and his followers were eager for a republic. Pius IX. had given promises to the Liberal party, but afterwards abandoned it, and fled to Gaeta. Then Mazzini turned for help to the President of the French Republic, Louis Napoleon, who, in his heart, had no love for republics, but sent an army to reinstate the Pope. Rome, when she found herself betrayed, fought like a tiger. Men issued from the workshops with their tools for weapons, while women from the housetops urged them on. One night over one hundred and fifty bombs were thrown into the heart of the city.

Margaret was the friend of Mazzini, and enthusiastic for Roman liberty. All those dreadful months she ministered to the wounded and dying in the hospitals, and was their "saint," as they called her.

But there was another reason why Margaret Fuller loved Italy.

Soon after her arrival in Rome, as she was attending vespers at St. Peter's with a party of friends, she became separated from them. Failing to find them, seeing her anxious face, a young Italian came up to her, and politely offered to assist her. Unable to regain her friends, Angelo Ossoli walked with her to her home, though he could speak no English, and she almost no Italian. She learned afterward that he was of a noble and refined family; that his brothers were in the Papal army, and that he was highly respected.

After this he saw Margaret once or twice, when she left Rome for some months. On her return, he renewed the acquaintance, shy and quiet though he was, for her influence seemed great over him. His father, the Marquis Ossoli, had just died, and Margaret, with her large heart, sympathized with him, as she alone knew how to sympathize. He joined the Liberals, thus separating himself from his family, and was made a captain of the Civic Guard.

Finally he confessed to Margaret that he loved her, and that he "must marry her or be miserable." She refused to listen to him as a lover, said he must marry a younger woman,--she was thirty-seven, and he but thirty,--but she would be his friend. For weeks he was dejected and unhappy. She debated the matter with her own heart. Should she, who had had many admirers, now marry a man her junior, and not of surpassing intellect, like her own? If she married him, it must be kept a secret till his father's estate was settled, for marriage with a Protestant would spoil all prospect of an equitable division.

Love conquered, and she married the young Marquis Ossoli in December, 1847. He gave to Margaret the kind of love which lasts after marriage, veneration of her ability and her goodness. "Such tender, unselfish love," writes Mrs. Story, "I have rarely before seen; it made green her days, and gave her an expression of peace and serenity which before was a stranger to her. When she was ill, he nursed and watched over her with the tenderness of a woman. No service was too trivial, no sacrifice too great for him. 'How sweet it is to do little things for you,' he would say."

To her mother, Margaret wrote, though she did not tell her secret, "I have not been so happy since I was a child, as during the last six weeks."

But days of anxiety soon came, with all the horrors of war. Ossoli was constantly exposed to death, in that dreadful siege of Rome. Then Rome fell, and with it the hopes of Ossoli and his wife. There would be neither fortune nor home for a Liberal now--only exile. Very sadly Margaret said goodbye to the soldiers in the hospitals, brave fellows whom she honored, who in the midst of death itself, would cry "Viva l' Italia!"

But before leaving Rome, a day's journey must be made to Rieta, at the foot of the Umbrian Apennines. And for what? The most precious thing of Margaret's life was there,--her baby. The fair child, with blue eyes and light hair like her own, had already been named by the people in the house, Angelino, from his beauty. She had always been fond of children. Emerson's Waldo, for whom _Threnody_ was written was an especial favorite; then "Pickie," Mr. Greeley's beautiful boy, and now a new joy had come into her heart, a child of her own. She wrote to her mother: "In him I find satisfaction, for the first time, to the deep wants of my heart. Nothing but a child can take the worst bitterness out of life, and break the spell of loneliness. I shall not be alone in other worlds, whenever Eternity may call me.... I wake in the night,--I look at him. He is so beautiful and good, I could die for him!"

When Ossoli and Margaret reached Rieta, what was their horror to find their child worn to a skeleton, half starved through the falsity of a nurse. For four weeks the distressed parents coaxed him back to life, till the sweet beauty of the rounded face came again, and then they carried him to Florence, where, despite poverty and exile, they were happy.

"In the morning," she says, "as soon as dressed, he signs to come into our room; then draws our curtain with his little dimpled hand, kisses me rather violently, and pats my face.... I feel so refreshed by his young life, and Ossoli diffuses such a power and sweetness over every day, that I cannot endure to think yet of our future.... It is very sad we have no money, we could be so quietly happy a while. I rejoice in all Ossoli did; but the results, in this our earthly state, are disastrous, especially as my strength is now so impaired. This much I hope--in life or death, to be no more separated from Angelino."

Margaret's friends now urged her return to America. She had nearly finished a history of Rome in this trying time, 1848, and could better attend to its publication in this country. Ossoli, though coming to a land of strangers, could find something to help, support the family.

To save expense, they started from Leghorn, May 17, 1850, in the _Elizabeth_, a sailing vessel, though Margaret dreaded the two months' voyage, and had premonitions of disaster. She wrote: "I have a vague expectation of some crisis,--I know not what. But it has long seemed that, in the year 1850, I should stand on a plateau in the ascent of life, when I should be allowed to pause for a while, and take more clear and commanding views than ever before. Yet my life proceeds as regularly as the fates of a Greek tragedy, and I can but accept the pages as they turn.... I shall embark, praying fervently that it may not be my lot to lose my boy at sea, either by unsolaced illness, or amid the howling waves; or, if so, that Ossoli, Angelo, and I may go together, and that the anguish may be brief."

For a few days all went well on shipboard; and then the noble Captain Hasty died of small-pox, and was buried at sea. Angelino took this dread disease, and for a time his life was despaired of, but he finally recovered, and became a great pet with the sailors. Margaret was putting the last touches to her book. Ossoli and young Sumner, brother of Charles, gave each other lessons in Italian and English, and thus the weeks went by.

On Thursday, July 18, after two months, the _Elizabeth_ stood off the Jersey coast, between Cape May and Barnegat. Trunks were packed, good nights were spoken, and all were happy, for they would be in New York on the morrow. At nine that night a gale arose; at midnight it was a hurricane; at four o'clock, Friday morning, the ship struck Fire Island beach. The passengers sprung from their berths. "We must die!" said Sumner to Mrs. Hasty. "Let us die calmly, then!" was the response of the widow of the captain.

At first, as the billows swept over the vessel, Angelino, wet and afraid, began to cry; but his mother held him closely in her arms and sang him to sleep. Noble courage on a sinking ship! The Italian girl who had come with them was in terror; but after Ossoli prayed with her, she became calm. For hours they waited anxiously for help from the shore. They could see the life-boat, and the people collecting the spoils which had floated thither from the ship, but no relief came. One sailor and another sprang into the waves and saved themselves. Then Sumner jumped overboard, but sank.

One of the sailors suggested that if each passenger sit on a plank, holding on by ropes, they would attempt to push him or her to land. Mrs. Hasty was the first to venture, and after being twice washed off, half-drowned, reached the shore. Then Margaret was urged, but she hesitated, unless all three could be saved. Every moment the danger increased. The crew were finally ordered "to save themselves," but four remained with the passengers. It was useless to look longer to the people on shore for help, though it was now past three o'clock,--twelve hours since the vessel struck.

Margaret had finally been induced to try the plank. The steward had taken Angelino in his arms, promising to save him or die with him, when a strong sea swept the forecastle, and all went down together. Ossoli caught the rigging for a moment, but Margaret sank at once. When last seen, she was seated at the foot of the foremast, still clad in her white nightdress, with her hair fallen loose upon her shoulders. Angelino and the steward were washed upon the beach twenty minutes later, both dead, though warm. Margaret's prayer was answered,--that they "might go together, and that the anguish might be brief."

The pretty boy of two years was dressed in a child's frock taken from his mother's trunk, which had come to shore, laid in a seaman's chest, and buried in the sand, while the sailors, who loved him, stood around, weeping. His body was finally removed to Mt. Auburn, and buried in the family lot. The bodies of Ossoli and Margaret were never recovered. The only papers of value which came to shore were their love letters, now deeply prized. The book ready for publication was never found.

When those on shore were asked why they did not launch the life-boat, they replied, "Oh! if we had known there were any such persons of importance on board, we should have tried to do our best!"

Thus, at forty, died one of the most gifted women in America, when her work seemed just begun. To us, who see how the world needed her, her death is a mystery; to Him who "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will" there is no mystery. She filled her life with charities and her mind with knowledge, and such are ready for the progress of Eternity.

MARIA MITCHELL.

In the quiet, picturesque island of Nantucket, in a simple home, lived William and Lydia Mitchell with their family of ten children. William had been a school-teacher, beginning when he was eighteen years of age, and receiving two dollars a week in winter, while in summer he kept soul and body together by working on a small farm, and fishing.

In this impecunious condition he had fallen in love with and married Lydia Coleman, a true-hearted Quaker girl, a descendant of Benjamin Franklin, one singularly fitted to help him make his way in life. She was quick, intelligent, and attractive in her usual dress of white, and was the clerk of the Friends' meeting where he attended. She was enthusiastic in reading, becoming librarian successively of two circulating libraries, till she had read every book upon the shelves, and then in the evenings repeating what she had read to her associates, her young lover among them.

When they were married, they had nothing but warm hearts and willing hands to work together. After a time William joined his father in converting a ship-load of whale oil into soap, and then a little money was made; but at the end of seven years he went back to school-teaching because he loved the work. At first he had charge of a fine grammar school established at Nantucket, and later, of a school of his own.

Into this school came his third child, Maria, shy and retiring, with all her mother's love of reading. Faithful at home, with, as she says, "an endless washing of dishes," not to be wondered at where there were ten little folks, she was not less faithful at school. The teacher could not help seeing that his little daughter had a mind which would well repay all the time he could spend upon it.

While he was a good school-teacher, he was an equally good student of nature, born with a love of the heavens above him. When eight years old, his father called him to the door to look at the planet Saturn, and from that time the boy calculated his age from the position of the planet, year by year. Always striving to improve himself, when he became a man, he built a small observatory upon his own land, that he might study the stars. He was thus enabled to earn one hundred dollars a year in the work of the United States Coast Survey. Teaching at two dollars a week, and fishing, could not always cramp a man of such aspiring mind.

Brought up beside the sea, he was as broad as the sea in his thought and true nobility of character. He could see no reason why his daughters should not be just as well educated as his sons. He therefore taught Maria the same as his boys, giving her especial drill in navigation. Perhaps it is not strange that after such teaching, his daughter could have no taste for making worsted work or Kensington stitches. She often says to this day, "A woman might be learning seven languages while she is learning fancy work," and there is little doubt that the seven languages would make her seven times more valuable as a wife and mother. If teaching navigation to girls would give us a thousand Maria Mitchells in this country, by all means let it be taught.

Maria left the public school at sixteen, and for a year attended a private school; then, loving mathematics, and being deeply interested in her father's studies, she became at seventeen his helper in the work of the Coast Survey. This astronomical labor brought Professors Agassiz, Bache, and other noted men to the quiet Mitchell home, and thus the girl heard the stimulating conversation of superior minds.

But the family needed more money. Though Mr. Mitchell wrote articles for _Silliman's Journal_, and delivered an able course of lectures before a Boston society of which Daniel Webster was president, scientific study did not put many dollars in a man's pocket. An elder sister was earning three hundred dollars yearly by teaching, and Maria felt that she too must help more largely to share the family burdens. She was offered the position of librarian at the Nantucket library, with a salary of sixty dollars the first year, and seventy-five the second. While a dollar and twenty cents a week seemed very little, there would be much time for study, for the small island did not afford a continuous stream of readers. She accepted the position, and for twenty years, till youth had been lost in middle life, Maria Mitchell worked for one hundred dollars a year, studying on, that she might do her noble work in the world.

Did not she who loved nature, long for the open air and the blue sky, and for some days of leisure which so many girls thoughtlessly waste? Yes, doubtless. However, the laws of life are as rigid as mathematics. A person cannot idle away the hours and come to prominence. No great singer, no great artist, no great scientist, comes to honor without continuous labor. Society devotees are heard of only for a day or a year, while those who develop minds and ennoble hearts have lasting remembrance.

Miss Mitchell says, "I was born of only ordinary capacity, but of extraordinary persistency," and herein is the secret of a great life. She did not dabble in French or music or painting and give it up; she went steadily on to success. Did she neglect home duties? Never. She knit stockings a yard long for her aged father till his death, usually studying while she knit. To those who learn to be industrious early in life, idleness is never enjoyable.

There was another secret of Miss Mitchell's success. She read good books early in life. She says: "We always had books, and were bookish people. There was a public library in Nantucket before I was born. It was not a free library, but we always paid the subscription of one dollar per annum, and always read and studied from it. I remember among its volumes Hannah More's books and Rollin's _Ancient History_. I remember too that Charles Folger, the present Secretary of the Treasury, and I had both read this latter work through before we were ten years old, though neither of us spoke of it to the other until a later period."

All this study had made Miss Mitchell a superior woman. It was not strange, therefore, that fame should come to her. One autumn night, October, 1847, she was gazing through the telescope, as usual, when, lo! she was startled to perceive an unknown comet. She at once told her father, who thus wrote to Professor William C. Bond, director of the Observatory at Cambridge: --

MY DEAR FRIEND,--I write now merely to say that Maria discovered a telescopic comet at half-past ten on the evening of the first instant, at that hour nearly above Polaris five degrees. Last evening it had advanced westerly; this evening still further, and nearing the pole. It does not bear illumination. Maria has obtained its right ascension and declination, and will not suffer me to announce it. Pray tell me whether it is one of Georgi's, and whether it has been seen by anybody. Maria supposes it may be an old story. If quite convenient, just drop a line to her; it will oblige me much. I expect to leave home in a day or two, and shall be in Boston next week, and I would like to have her hear from you before I can meet you. I hope it will not give thee much trouble amidst thy close engagements. Our regards are to all of you most truly.

WILLIAM MITCHELL.

The answer showed that Miss Mitchell had indeed made a new discovery. Frederick VI., King of Denmark, had, sixteen years before, offered a gold medal of the value of twenty ducats to whoever should discover a telescopic comet. That no mistake might be made as to the real discoverer, the condition was made that word be sent at once to the Astronomer Royal of England. This the Mitchells had not done, on account of their isolated position. Hon. Edward Everett, then President of Harvard College, wrote to the American Minister at the Danish Court, who in turn presented the evidence to the King. "It would gratify me," said Mr. Mitchell, "that this generous monarch should know that there is a love of science even in this, to him, remote corner of the earth."

The medal was at last awarded, and the woman astronomer of Nantucket found herself in the scientific journals and in the press as the discoverer of "Miss Mitchell's Comet." Another had been added to the list of Mary Somervilles and Caroline Herschels. Perhaps there was additional zest now in the mathematical work in the Coast Survey. She also assisted in compiling the _American Nautical Almanac_, and wrote for the scientific periodicals. Did she break down from her unusual brain work? Oh, no! Probably astronomical work was not nearly so hard as her mother's,--the care of a house and ten children!

For ten years more Miss Mitchell worked in the library, and in studying the heavens. But she had longed to see the observatories of Europe, and the great minds outside their quiet island. Therefore, in 1857, she visited England, and was at once welcomed to the most learned circles. Brains always find open doors. Had she been rich or beautiful simply, Sir John Herschel, and Lady Herschell as well, would not have reached out both hands, and said, "You are always welcome at this house," and given her some of his own calculations? and some of his Aunt Caroline's writing. Had she been rich or handsome simply, Alexander Von Humboldt would not have taken her to his home, and, seating himself beside her on the sofa, talked, as she says, "on all manner of subjects, and on all varieties of people. He spoke of Kansas, India, China, observatories; of Bache, Maury, Gould, Ticknor, Buchanan, Jefferson, Hamilton, Brunow, Peters, Encke, Airy, Leverrier, Mrs. Somerville, and a host of others."

What, if he had said these things to some women who go abroad! It is safe for women who travel to read widely, for ignorance is quickly detected. Miss Mitchell said of Humboldt: "He is handsome--his hair is thin and white, his eyes very blue. He is a little deaf, and so is Mrs. Somerville. He asked me what instruments I had, and what I was doing; and when I told him that I was interested in the variable stars, he said I must go to Bonn and see Agelander."

There was no end of courtesies to the scholarly woman. Professor Adams, of Cambridge, who, with his charming wife, years afterward helped to make our own visit to the University a delight, showed her the spot on which he made his computations for Neptune, which he discovered at the same time as Leverrier. Sir George Airy, the Astronomer Royal of England, wrote to Leverrier in Paris to announce her coming. When they met, she said, "His English was worse than my French."

Later she visited Florence, where she met, several times, Mrs. Somerville, who, she says, "talks with all the readiness and clearness of a man," and is still "very gentle and womanly, without the least pretence or the least coldness." She gave Miss Mitchell two of her books, and desired a photographed star sent to Florence. "She had never heard of its being done, and saw at once the importance of such a step." She said with her Scotch accent, "Miss Mitchell, ye have done yeself great credit."

In Rome she saw much of the Hawthornes, of Miss Bremer, who was visiting there, and of the artists. From here she went to Venice, Vienna, and Berlin, where she met Encke, the astronomer, who took her to see the wedding presents of the Princess Royal.

Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, in an admirable sketch of Miss Mitchell, tells how the practical woman, with her love of republican institutions, was impressed. "The presents were in two rooms," says Miss Mitchell, "ticketed and numbered, and a catalogue of them sold. All the manufacturing companies availed themselves of the opportunity to advertise their commodities, I suppose, as she had presents of all kinds. What she will do with sixty albums I can't see, but I can understand the use of two clothes-lines, because she can lend one to her mother, who must have a large Monday's wash!"

After a year, Miss Mitchell returned to her simple Nantucket home, as devoted to her parents and her scientific work as ever. Two years afterward, in 1860, her good mother died, and a year later, desiring to be near Boston, the family removed to Lynn. Here Miss Mitchell purchased a small house for sixteen hundred and fifty dollars. From her yearly salary of one hundred dollars, and what she could earn in her government work, she had saved enough to buy a home for her father! The rule is that the fathers wear themselves out for daughters; the rule was reversed in this case.

Miss Mitchell now earned five hundred dollars yearly for her government computations, while her father received a pension of three hundred more for his efficient services. Five years thus passed quietly and comfortably.

Meanwhile another life was carrying out its cherished plan, and Miss Mitchell, unknowingly, was to have an important part in it. Soon after the Revolutionary War there came to this country an English wool-grower and his family, and settled on a little farm near the Hudson River. The mother, a hard-working and intelligent woman, was eager in her help toward earning a living, and would drive the farm-wagon to market, with butter and eggs, and fowls, while her seven-year-old boy sat beside her. To increase the income some English ale was brewed. The lad grew up with an aversion to making beer, and when fourteen, his father insisting that he should enter the business, his mother helped him to run away. Tying all his worldly possessions, a shirt and pair of stockings, in a cotton handkerchief, the mother and her boy walked eight miles below Poughkeepsie, when, giving him all the money she had, seventy-five cents, she kissed him, and with tears in her eyes saw him cross the ferry and land safely on the other side. He trudged on till a place was found in a country store, and here, for five years, he worked honestly and industriously, coming home to his now reconciled father with one hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket.

Changes had taken place. The father's brewery had burned, the oldest son had been killed in attempting to save something from the wreck, all were poorer than ever, and there seemed nothing before the boy of nineteen but to help support the parents, his two unmarried sisters, and two younger brothers. Whether he had the old dislike for the ale business or not, he saw therein a means of support, and adopted it. The world had not then thought so much about the misery which intoxicants cause, and had not learned that we are better off without stimulants than with them.

Every day the young man worked in his brewery, and in the evening till midnight tended a small oyster house, which he had opened. Two years later, an Englishman who had seen Matthew Vassar's untiring industry and honesty, offered to furnish all the capital which he needed. The long, hard road of poverty had opened at last into a field of plenty. Henceforward, while there was to be work and economy, there was to be continued prosperity, and finally, great wealth.

Realizing his lack of early education, he began to improve himself by reading science, art, history, poetry, and the Bible. He travelled in Europe, and being a close observer, was a constant learner.

One day, standing by the great London hospital, built by Thomas Guy, a relative, and endowed by him with over a million dollars, Mr. Vassar read these words on the pedestal of the bronze statue:--

SOLE FOUNDER OF THE HOSPITAL.
IN HIS LIFETIME.

The last three words left a deep impression on his mind. He had no children. He desired to leave his money where it would be of permanent value to the world. He debated many plans in his own mind. It is said that his niece, a hard-working teacher, Lydia Booth, finally influenced him to his grand decision.

There was no real college for women in the land. He talked the matter over with his friends, but they were full of discouragements. "Women will never desire college training," said some. "They will be ruined in health, if they attempt it," said others. "Science is not needed by women; classical education is not needed; they must have something appropriate to their sphere," was constantly reiterated. Some wise heads thought they knew just what that education should be, and just what were the limits of woman's sphere; but Matthew Vassar had his own thoughts.

Calling together, Feb. 26, 1861, some twenty or thirty of the men in the State most conversant with educational matters, the white-haired man, now nearly seventy, laid his hand upon a round tin box, labelled "Vassar College Papers," containing four hundred thousand dollars in bonds and securities, and said: "It has long been my desire, after suitably providing for those of my kindred who have claims upon me, to make such a disposition of my means as should best honor God and benefit my fellow-men. At different periods I have regarded various plans with favor; but these have all been dismissed one after another, until the subject of erecting and endowing a college for the education of young women was presented for my consideration. The novelty, grandeur, and benignity of the idea arrested my attention.

"It occurred to me that woman, having received from the Creator the same intellectual constitution as man, has the same right as man to intellectual culture and development.

"I considered that the mothers of a country mould its citizens, determine its institutions, and shape its destiny.

"It has also seemed to me that if woman was properly educated, some new avenues of useful and honorable employment, in entire harmony with the gentleness and modesty of her sex, might be opened to her.

"It further appeared, there is not in our country, there is not in the world, so far as known, a single fully endowed institution for the education of women.... I have come to the conclusion that the establishment and endowment of a COLLEGE FOR THE EDUCATION OF YOUNG WOMEN is a work which will satisfy my highest aspirations, and will be, under God, a rich blessing to this city and State, to our country and the world.

"It is my hope to be the instrument in the hands of Providence, of founding and perpetuating an institution _which shall accomplish for young women what our colleges are accomplishing for young men_."

For four years Matthew Vassar watched the great buildings take form and shape in the midst of two hundred acres of lake and river and green sward, near Poughkeepsie; the main building, five hundred feet long, two hundred broad, and five stories high; the museum of natural history, with school of art and library; the great observatory, three stories high, furnished with the then third largest telescope in the country.

In 1865 Vassar College was opened, and three hundred and fifty students came pouring in from all parts of the land. Girls, after all, did desire an education equal to that of young men. Matthew Vassar was right. His joy seemed complete. He visited the college daily, and always received the heartiest welcome. Each year his birthday was celebrated as "Founder's Day." On one of these occasions he said: "This is almost more happiness than I can bear. This one day more than repays me for all I have done." An able and noble man, John Howard Raymond, was chosen president.

Mr. Vassar lived but three years after his beloved institution was opened. June 23, 1868, the day before commencement, he had called the members of the Board around him to listen to his customary address. Suddenly, when he had nearly finished, his voice ceased, the paper dropped from his hand, and--he was dead! His last gifts amounted to over five hundred thousand dollars, making in all $989,122.00 for the college. The poor lad wrought as he had hoped, a blessing "to the country and the world." His nephews, Matthew Vassar, Jr., and John Guy Vassar, have given over one hundred and forty thousand dollars.

After the observatory was completed, there was but one wish as to who should occupy it; of course, the person desired was Maria Mitchell. She hesitated to accept the position. Her father was seventy and needed her care, but he said, "Go, and I will go with you." So she left her Lynn home for the arduous position of a teacher. For four years Mr. Mitchell lived to enjoy the enthusiastic work of his gifted daughter. He said, "Among the teachers and pupils I have made acquaintances that a prince might covet."

Miss Mitchell makes the observatory her home. Here are her books, her pictures, her great astronomical clock, and a bust of Mrs. Somerville, the gift of Frances Power Cobbe. Here for twenty years she has helped to make Vassar College known and honored both at home and abroad. Hundreds have been drawn thither by her name and fame. A friend of mine who went, intending to stay two years, remained five, for her admiration of and enjoyment in Miss Mitchell. She says: "She is one of the few genuine persons I have ever known. There is not one particle of deceit about her. For girls who accomplish something, she has great respect; for idlers, none. She has no sentimentality, but much wit and common sense. No one can be long under her teaching without learning dignity of manner and self-reliance."

She dresses simply, in black or gray, somewhat after the fashion of her Quaker ancestors. Once when urging economy upon the girls, she said, "All the clothing I have on cost but seventeen dollars, and four suits would last each of you a year." There was a quiet smile, but no audible expression of a purpose to adopt Miss Mitchell's style of dress.

The pupils greatly honor and love the undemonstrative woman, who, they well know, would make any sacrifices for their well-being. Each week the informal gatherings at her rooms, where various useful topics are discussed, are eagerly looked forward to. Chief of all, Miss Mitchell's own bright and sensible talk is enjoyed. Her "dome parties," held yearly in June, under the great dome of the observatory, with pupils coming back from all over the country, original poems read and songs sung, are among the joys of college life.

All these years the astronomer's fame has steadily increased. In 1868, in the great meteoric shower, she and her pupils recorded the paths of four thousand meteors, and gave valuable data of their height above the earth. In the summer of 1869 she joined the astronomers who went to Burlington, Iowa, to observe the total eclipse of the sun, Aug. 7. Her observations on the transit of Venus were also valuable. She has written much on the _Satellites of Saturn_, and has prepared a work on the _Satellites of Jupiter_.

In 1873 she again visited Europe, spending some time with the family of the Russian astronomer, Professor Struve, at the Imperial Observatory at Pultowa.

She is an honor to her sex, a striking example of what a quiet country girl can accomplish without money or fortuitous circumstances.

* * * * *

She resigned her position at Vassar in 1888. Miss Mitchell died on the morning of June 28, 1889, at Lynn, Mass., at the age of seventy-one, and was buried at Nantucket on Sunday afternoon, June 30.

LOUISA M. ALCOTT.

A dozen of us sat about the dinner-table at the Hotel Bellevue, Boston. One was the gifted wife of a gifted clergyman; one had written two or three novels; one was a journalist; one was on the eve of a long journey abroad; and one, whom we were all glad to honor, was the brilliant author of _Little Women_. She had a womanly face, bright, gray eyes, that looked full of merriment, and would not see the hard side of life, and an air of common sense that made all defer to her judgment. She told witty stories of the many who wrote her for advice or favors, and good-naturedly gave bits of her own personal experience. Nearly twenty years before, I had seen her, just after her _Hospital Sketches_ were published, over which I, and thousands of others, had shed tears. Though but thirty years old then, Miss Alcott looked frail and tired. That was the day of her struggle with life. Now, at fifty, she looked happy and comfortable. The desire of her heart had been realized,--to do good to tens of thousands, and earn enough money to care for those whom she loved.

Louisa Alcott's life, like that of so many famous women, has been full of obstacles. She was born in Germantown, Pa., Nov. 29, 1832, in the home of an extremely lovely mother and cultivated father, Amos Bronson Alcott. Beginning life poor, his desire for knowledge led him to obtain an education and become a teacher. In 1830 he married Miss May, a descendant of the well-known Sewells and Quincys, of Boston. Louise Chandler Moulton says, in her excellent sketch of Miss Alcott, "I have heard that the May family were strongly opposed to the union of their beautiful daughter with the penniless teacher and philosopher;" but he made a devoted husband, though poverty was long their guest.

For eleven years, mostly in Boston, he was the earnest and successful teacher. Margaret Fuller was one of his assistants. Everybody respected his purity of life and his scholarship. His kindness of heart made him opposed to corporal punishment, and in favor of self-government. The world had not come then to his high ideal, but has been creeping toward it ever since, until whipping, both in schools and homes, is fortunately becoming one of the lost arts.

He believed in making studies interesting to pupils; not the dull, old-fashioned method of learning by rote, whereby, when a hymn was taught, such as, "A Charge to keep I have," the children went home to repeat to their astonished mothers, "Eight yards to keep I have," having learned by ear, with no knowledge of the meaning of the words. He had friendly talks with his pupils on all great subjects; and some of these Miss Elizabeth Peabody, the sister of Mrs. Hawthorne, so greatly enjoyed, that she took notes, and compiled them in a book.

New England, always alive to any theological discussion, at once pronounced the book unorthodox. Emerson had been through the same kind of a storm, and bravely came to the defence of his friend. Another charge was laid at Mr. Alcott's door: he was willing to admit colored children to his school, and such a thing was not countenanced, except by a few fanatics(?) like Whittier, and Phillips, and Garrison. The heated newspaper discussion lessened the attendance at the school; and finally, in 1839, it was discontinued, and the Alcott family moved to Concord.

Here were gifted men and women with whom the philosopher could feel at home, and rest. Here lived Emerson, in the two-story drab house, with horsechestnut-trees in front of it. Here lived Thoreau, near his beautiful Walden Lake, a restful place, with no sound save, perchance, the dipping of an oar or the note of a bird, which the lonely man loved so well. Here he built his house, twelve feet square, and lived for two years and a half, giving to the world what he desired others to give,--his inner self. Here was his bean-field, where he "used to hoe from five o'clock in the morning till noon," and made, as he said, an intimate acquaintance with weeds, and a pecuniary profit of eight dollars seventy-one and one-half cents! Here, too, was Hawthorne, "who," as Oliver Wendell Holmes says, "brooded himself into a dream-peopled solitude."

Here Mr. Alcott could live with little expense and teach his four daughters. Louisa, the eldest, was an active, enthusiastic child, getting into little troubles from her frankness and lack of policy, but making friends with her generous heart. Who can ever forget Jo in _Little Women_, who was really Louisa, the girl who, when reproved for whistling by Amy, the art-loving sister, says: "I hate affected, niminy-piminy chits! I'm not a young lady; and if turning up my hair makes me one, I'll wear it in two tails till I'm twenty. I hate to think I've got to grow up, and be Miss March, and wear long gowns, and look as prim as a china-aster! Its bad enough to be a girl, anyway, when I like boy's games and work and manners!"

At fifteen, "Jo was very tall, thin, and brown, and reminded one of a colt; for she never seemed to know what to do with her long limbs, which were very much in her way. She had a decided mouth, a comical nose, and sharp, gray eyes, which appeared to see everything, and were by turns fierce or funny or thoughtful. Her long, thick hair was her one beauty, but it was usually bundled into a net to be out of her way. Round shoulders had Jo, and big hands and feet, a fly-away look to her clothes, and the uncomfortable appearance of a girl who was rapidly shooting up into a woman, and didn't like it."

The four sisters lived a merry life in the Concord haunts, notwithstanding their scanty means. Now, at the dear mother's suggestion, they ate bread and milk for breakfast, that they might carry their nicely prepared meal to a poor woman, with six children, who called them _Engel-kinder_, much to Louisa's delight. Now they improvised a stage, and produced real plays, while the neighbors looked in and enjoyed the fun.

Louisa was especially fond of reading Shakespeare, Goethe, Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Miss Edgeworth, and George Sand. As early as eight years of age she wrote a poem of eight lines, _To a Robin_, which her mother carefully preserved, telling her that "if she kept on in this hopeful way, she might be a second Shakespeare in time." Blessings on those people who have a kind smile or a word of encouragement as we struggle up the hard hills of life!

At thirteen she wrote _My Kingdom_. When, years afterward, Mrs. Eva Munson Smith wrote to her, asking for some poems for _Woman in Sacred Song_, Miss Alcott sent her this one, saying, "It is the only hymn I ever wrote. It was composed at thirteen, and as I still find the same difficulty in governing my kingdom, it still expresses my soul's desire, and I have nothing better to offer."

"A little kingdom I possess
Where thoughts and feelings dwell,
And very hard the task I find
Of governing it well;
For passion tempts and troubles me,
A wayward will misleads,
And selfishness its shadow casts
On all my words and deeds.

"How can I learn to rule myself,
To be the child I should,
Honest and brave, and never tire
Of trying to be good?
How can I keep a sunny soul
To shine along life's way?
How can I tune my little heart
To sweetly sing all day?

"Dear Father, help me with the love
That casteth out my fear;
Teach me to lean on Thee, and feel
That Thou art very near:
That no temptation is unseen,
No childish grief too small,
Since Thou, with patience infinite,
Doth soothe and comfort all.

"I do not ask for any crown,
But that which all may win;
Nor try to conquer any world
Except the one within.
Be Thou my guide until I find,
Led by a tender hand,
Thy happy kingdom in myself,
And dare to take command."