Chapter V: BOSTON, By R.W. Emerson (3)

The next extract is from a letter written to me in 1842, after a journey which we had taken to the White Mountains, in the company of my sister, and Mr. and Mrs. Farrar. During this journey Margaret had conversed with me concerning some passages of her private history and experience, and in this letter she asks me to be prudent in speaking of it, giving her reasons as follows:--

'_Cambridge, July 31, 1842._--... I said I was happy in having
no secret. It is my nature, and has been the tendency of my
life, to wish that all my thoughts and deeds might lie, as
the "open secrets" of Nature, free to all who are able to
understand them. I have no reserves, except intellectual
reserves; for to speak of things to those who cannot receive
them is stupidity, rather than frankness. But in this case,
I alone am not concerned. Therefore, dear James, give heed
to the subject. You have received a key to what was before
unknown of your friend; you have made use of it, now let it
be buried with the past, over whose passages profound and
sad, yet touched with heaven-born beauty, "let silence stand
sentinel."'

I shall endeavor to keep true to the spirit of these sentences in speaking of Margaret's friendships. Yet not to speak of them in her biography would be omitting the most striking feature of her character. It would be worse than the play of Hamlet with Hamlet omitted. Henry the Fourth without Sully, Gustavus Adolphus without Oxenstiern, Napoleon without his marshals, Socrates without his scholars, would be more complete than Margaret without her friends. So that, in touching on these private relations, we must be everywhere "bold," yet not "too bold." The extracts will be taken indiscriminately from letters written to many friends.

The insight which Margaret displayed in finding her friends, the magnetism by which she drew them toward herself, the catholic range of her intimacies, the influence which she exercised to develop the latent germ of every character, the constancy with which she clung to each when she had once given and received confidence, the delicate justice which kept every intimacy separate, and the process of transfiguration which took place when she met any one on this mountain of Friendship, giving a dazzling lustre to the details of common life,--all these should be at least touched upon and illustrated, to give any adequate view of her in these relations.

Such a prejudice against her had been created by her faults of manner, that the persons she might most wish to know often retired from her and avoided her. But she was "sagacious of her quarry," and never suffered herself to be repelled by this. She saw when any one belonged to her, and never rested till she came into possession of her property. I recollect a lady who thus fled from her for several years, yet, at last, became most nearly attached to her. This "wise sweet" friend, as Margaret characterized her in two words, a flower hidden in the solitude of deep woods, Margaret saw and appreciated from the first.

See how, in the following passage, she describes to one of her friends her perception of character, and her power of attracting it, when only fifteen years old.

'_Jamaica Plains, July, 1840_.--Do you remember my telling
you, at Cohasset, of a Mr. ---- staying with us, when I was
fifteen, and all that passed? Well, I have not seen him since,
till, yesterday, he came here. I was pleased to find, that,
even at so early an age, I did not overrate those I valued.
He was the same as in memory; the powerful eye dignifying an
otherwise ugly face; the calm wisdom, and refined observation,
the imposing _manière d'être_, which anywhere would give him
an influence among men, without his taking any trouble, or
making any sacrifice, and the great waves of feeling that
seemed to rise as an attractive influence, and overspread his
being. He said, nothing since his childhood had been so marked
as his visit to our house; that it had dwelt in his thoughts
unchanged amid all changes. I could have wished he had never
returned to change the picture. He looked at me continually,
and said, again and again, he should have known me anywhere;
but O how changed I must be since that epoch of pride and
fulness! He had with him his son, a wild boy of five years
old, all brilliant with health and energy, and with the same
powerful eye. He said,--You know I am not one to confound
acuteness and rapidity of intellect with real genius; but he
is for those an extraordinary child. He would astonish you,
but I look deep enough into the prodigy to see the work of an
extremely nervous temperament, and I shall make him as dull
as I can. "_Margaret_," (pronouncing the name in the same
deliberate searching way he used to do,) "I love him so well,
I will try to teach him moderation. If I can help it, he shall
not feed on bitter ashes, nor try these paths of avarice and
ambition." It made me feel very strangely to hear him talk so
to my old self. What a gulf between! There is scarce a fibre
left of the haughty, passionate, ambitious child he remembered
and loved. I felt affection for him still; for his character
was formed then, and had not altered, except by ripening and
expanding! But thus, in other worlds, we shall remember our
present selves.'

Margaret's constancy to any genuine relation, once established, was surprising. If her friends' _aim_ changed, so as to take them out of her sphere, she was saddened by it, and did not let them go without a struggle. But wherever they continued "true to the original standard," (as she loved to phrase it) her affectionate interest would follow them unimpaired through all the changes of life. The principle of this constancy she thus expresses in a letter to one of her brothers:--

'Great and even _fatal_ errors (so far as this life is
concerned) could not destroy my friendship for one in whom I
am sure of the kernel of nobleness.'

She never formed a friendship until she had seen and known this germ of good; and afterwards judged conduct by this. To this germ of good, to this highest law of each individual, she held them true. But never did she act like those who so often judge of their friend from some report of his conduct, as if they had never known him, and allow the inference from a single act to alter the opinion formed by an induction from years of intercourse. From all such weakness Margaret stood wholly free.

I have referred to the wide range of Margaret's friendships. Even at this period this variety was very apparent. She was the centre of a group very different from each other, and whose only affinity consisted in their all being polarized by the strong attraction of her mind,--all drawn toward herself. Some of her friends were young, gay and beautiful; some old, sick or studious. Some were children of the world, others pale scholars. Some were witty, others slightly dull. But all, in order to be Margaret's friends, must be capable of seeking something,--capable of some aspiration for the better. And how did she glorify life to all! all that was tame and common vanishing away in the picturesque light thrown over the most familiar things by her rapid fancy, her brilliant wit, her sharp insight, her creative imagination, by the inexhaustible resources of her knowledge, and the copious rhetoric which found words and images always apt and always ready. Even then she displayed almost the same marvellous gift of conversation which afterwards dazzled all who knew her,--with more perhaps of freedom, since she floated on the flood of our warm sympathies. Those who know Margaret only by her published writings know her least; her notes and letters contain more of her mind; but it was only in conversation that she was perfectly free and at home.

Margaret's constancy in friendship caused her to demand it in others, and thus she was sometimes exacting. But the pure Truth of her character caused her to express all such feelings with that freedom and simplicity that they became only as slight clouds on a serene sky, giving it a tenderer beauty, and casting picturesque shades over the landscape below. From her letters to different friends I select a few examples of these feelings.

'The world turns round and round, and you too must needs be
negligent and capricious. You have not answered my note; you
have not given me what I asked. You do not come here. Do not
you act so,--it is the drop too much. The world seems not only
turning but tottering, when my kind friend plays such a part.'

* * * * *

'You need not have delayed your answer so long; why not at
once answer the question I asked? Faith is not natural to
me; for the love I feel to others is not in the idleness of
poverty, nor can I persist in believing the best; merely to
save myself pain, or keep a leaning place for the weary
heart. But I should believe you, because I have seen that your
feelings are strong and constant; they have never disappointed
me, when closely scanned.'

* * * * *

'_July 6, 1832._--I believe I behaved very badly the other
evening. I did not think so yesterday. I had been too
surprised and vexed to recover very easily, but to-day my
sophistries have all taken wing, and I feel that nothing
good could have made me act with such childish petulance and
bluntness towards one who spoke from friendly emotions. Be
at peace; I will astonish you by my repose, mildness, and
self-possession. No, that is silly; but I believe it cannot
be right to be on such terms with any one, that, on the least
vexation, I indulge my feelings at his or her expense. We will
talk less, but we shall be very good friends still, I hope.
Shall not we?'

In the last extract, we have an example of that genuine humility, which, being a love of truth, underlaid her whole character, notwithstanding its seeming pride. She could not have been great as she was, without it.[A]

'_December 19th, 1829._--I shall always be glad to have you
come to me when saddened. The melancholic does not misbecome
you. The lights of your character are _wintry_. They are
generally inspiriting, life-giving, but, if perpetual, would
glare too much on the tired sense; one likes sometimes a
cloudy day, with its damp and warmer breath,--its gentle,
down-looking shades. Sadness in some is intolerably ungraceful
and oppressive; it affects one like a cold rainy day in
June or September, when all pleasure departs with the sun;
everything seems out of place and irrelative to the time; the
clouds are fog, the atmosphere leaden,--but 'tis not so with
you.'

Of her own truthfulness to her friends, which led her frankly to speak to them of their faults or dangers, her correspondence gives constant examples.

The first is from a letter of later date than properly belongs to this chapter, but is so wholly in her spirit of candor that I insert it here. It is from a letter written in 1843.

'I have been happy in the sight of your pure design, of the
sweetness and serenity of your mind. In the inner sanctuary we
met. But I shall say a few blunt words, such as were frequent
in the days of intimacy, and, if they are needless, you
will let them fall to the ground. Youth is past, with its
passionate joys and griefs, its restlessness, its vague
desires. You have chosen your path, you have rounded out your
lot, your duties are before you. _Now_ beware the mediocrity
that threatens middle age, its limitation of thought and
interest, its dulness of fancy, its too external life, and
mental thinness. Remember the limitations that threaten
every professional man, only to be guarded against by great
earnestness and watchfulness. So take care of yourself, and
let not the intellect more than the spirit be quenched.

* * * * *

'It is such a relief to me to be able to speak to you upon a
subject which I thought would never lie open between us. Now
there will be no place which does not lie open to the light. I
can always say what I feel. And the way in which you took it,
so like yourself, so manly and noble, gives me the assurance
that I shall have the happiness of seeing in you that
symmetry, that conformity in the details of life with the
highest aims, of which I have sometimes despaired. How much
higher, dear friend, is "the mind, the music breathing from
the" _life_, than anything we can say! Character is higher
than intellect; this I have long felt to be true; may we both
live as if we knew it.

* * 'I hope and believe we may be yet very much to each other.
Imperfect as I am, I feel myself not unworthy to be a true
friend. Neither of us is unworthy. In few natures does such
love for the good and beautiful survive the ruin of all
youthful hopes, the wreck of all illusions.'

* * * * *

'I supposed our intimacy would terminate when I left
Cambridge. Its continuing to subsist is a matter of surprise
to me. And I expected, ere this, you would have found some
Hersilia, or such-like, to console you for losing your
Natalia. See, my friend, I am three and twenty. I believe
in love and friendship, but I cannot but notice that
circumstances have appalling power, and that those links which
are not riveted by situation, by _interest_, (I mean, not mere
worldly interest, but the instinct of self-preservation,)
may be lightly broken by a chance touch. I speak not in
misanthropy, I believe

"Die Zeit ist schlecht, doch giebts noch grosse Herzen."

'Surely I maybe pardoned for aiming at the same results with
the chivalrous "gift of the Gods." I cannot endure to be one
of those shallow beings who can never get beyond the primer of
experience,--who are ever saying,--

"Ich habe geglaubt, _nun glaube ich erst recht_,
Und geht es auch wunderlich, geht es auch schlecht,
Ich bleibe in glaubigen Orden."

Yet, when you write, write freely, and if I don't like what
you say, let me say so. I have ever been frank, as if I
expected to be intimate with you good three-score years and
ten. I am sure we shall always esteem each other. I have that
much faith.'

* * * * *

'_Jan_. 1832.--All that relates to--must be interesting to
me, though I never voluntarily think of him now. The apparent
caprice of his conduct has shaken my faith, but not destroyed
my hope. That hope, if I, who have so mistaken others, may
dare to think I know myself, was never selfish. It is painful
to lose a friend whose knowledge and converse mingled so
intimately with the growth of my mind,--an early friend to
whom I was all truth and frankness, seeking nothing but equal
truth and frankness in return. But this evil may be borne; the
hard, the lasting evil was to learn to distrust my own heart,
and lose all faith in my power of knowing others. In this
letter I see again that peculiar pride, that contempt of the
forms and shows of goodness, that fixed resolve to be anything
but "like unto the Pharisees," which were to my eye such happy
omens. Yet how strangely distorted are all his views! The
daily influence of his intercourse with me was like the breath
he drew; it has become a part of him. Can he escape from
himself? Would he be unlike all other mortals? His feelings
are as false as those of Alcibiades. He influenced me, and
helped form me to what I am. Others shall succeed him. Shall
I be ashamed to owe anything to friendship? But why do I
talk?--a child might confute him by defining the term _human
being_. He will gradually work his way into light; if too late
for our friendship, not, I trust, too late for his own peace
and honorable well-being. I never insisted on being the
instrument of good to him. I practised no little arts, no!
not to effect the good of the friend I loved. I have prayed to
Heaven, (surely we are sincere when doing that,) to guide him
in the best path for him, however far from me that path might
lead. The lesson I have learned may make me a more useful
friend, a more efficient aid to others than I could be to him;
yet I hope I shall not be denied the consolation of knowing
surely, one day, that all which appeared evil in the companion
of happy years was but error.'

* * * * *

'I think, since you have seen so much of my character, that
you must be sensible that any reserves with those whom I call
my friends, do not arise from duplicity, but an instinctive
feeling that I could not be understood. I can truly say that I
wish no one to overrate me; undeserved regard could give me no
pleasure; nor will I consent to practise charlatanism, either
in friendship or anything else.'

* * * * *

'You ought not to think I show a want of generous confidence,
if I sometimes try the ground on which I tread, to see if
perchance it may return the echoes of hollowness.'

* * * * *

'Do not cease to respect me as formerly. It seems to me that I
have reached the "parting of the ways" in my life, and all the
knowledge which I have toiled to gain only serves to show me
the disadvantages of each. None of those who think themselves
my friends can aid me; each, careless, takes the path to which
present convenience impels; and all would smile or stare,
could they know the aching and measureless wishes, the sad
apprehensiveness, which make me pause and strain my almost
hopeless gaze to the distance. What wonder if my present
conduct should be mottled by selfishness and incertitude?
Perhaps you, who _can_ make your views certain, cannot
comprehend me; though you showed me last night a penetration
which did not flow from sympathy. But this I may say--though
the glad light of hope and ambitious confidence, which has
vitalized my mind, should be extinguished forever, I will not
in life act a mean, ungenerous, or useless part. Therefore,
let not a slight thing lessen your respect for me. If you feel
as much pain as I do, when obliged to diminish my respect for
any person, you will be glad of this assurance. I hope you
will not think this note in the style of a French novel.'

[Footnote A: According to Dryden's beautiful statement--

'For as high turrets, in their airy sweep
Require foundations, in proportion deep
And lofty cedars as far upward shoot
As to the nether heavens they drive the root;
So low did her secure foundation lie,
She was not humble, but humility.']

POWER OF CIRCUMSTANCES.

'Do you remember a conversation we had in the garden, one
starlight evening, last summer, about the incalculable power
which outward circumstances have over the character? You would
not sympathize with the regrets I expressed, that mine had not
been formed amid scenes and persons of nobleness and beauty,
eager passions and dignified events, instead of those secret
trials and petty conflicts which make my transition state so
hateful to my memory and my tastes. You then professed the
faith which I resigned with such anguish,--the faith which
a Schiller could never attain,--a faith in the power of the
human will. Yet now, in every letter, you talk to me of the
power of circumstances. You tell me how changed you are. Every
one of your letters is different from the one preceding, and
all so altered from your former self. For are you not leaving
all our old ground, and do you not apologize to me for all
your letters? Why do you apologize? I think I know you very,
very well; considering that we are both human, and have the
gift of concealing our thoughts with words. Nay, further--I do
not believe you will be able to become anything which I cannot
understand. I know I can sympathize with all who feel and
think, from a Dryfesdale up to a Max Piccolomini. You say,
you have become a machine. If so, I shall expect to find you a
grand, high-pressure, wave-compelling one--requiring plenty
of fuel. You must be a steam-engine, and move some majestic
fabric at the rate of thirty miles an hour along the broad
waters of the nineteenth century. None of your pendulum
machines for me! I should, to be sure, turn away my head if I
should hear you tick, and mark the quarters of hours; but the
buzz and whiz of a good large life-endangerer would be
music to mine ears. Oh, no! sure there is no danger of your
requiring to be set down quite on a level, kept in a still
place, and wound up every eight days. Oh no, no! you are not
one of that numerous company, who

--"live and die,
Eat, drink, wake, sleep between,
Walk, talk like clock-work too,
So pass in order due,
Over the scene,
To where the past--_is_ past,
The future--nothing yet," &c. &c.

But we must all be machines: you shall be a
steam-engine;--shall be a mill, with extensive
water-privileges,--and I will be a spinning jenny. No!
upon second thoughts, I will not be a machine. I will be an
instrument, not to be confided to vulgar hands,--for instance,
a chisel to polish marble, or a whetstone to sharpen steel!'

In an unfinished tale, Margaret has given the following studies of character. She is describing two of the friends of the hero of her story. Unquestionably the traits here given were taken from life, though it might not be easy to recognize the portrait of any individual in either sketch. Yet we insert it here to show her own idea of this relation, and her fine feeling of the action and reaction of these subtle intimacies.

'Now, however, I found companions, in thought, at least One,
who had great effect on my mind, I may call Lytton. He was
as premature as myself; at thirteen a man in the range of his
thoughts, analyzing motives, and explaining principles, when
he ought to have been playing cricket, or hunting in the
woods. The young Arab, or Indian, may dispense with mere play,
and enter betimes into the histories and practices of manhood,
for all these are, in their modes of life, closely connected
with simple nature, and educate the body no less than the
mind; but the same good cannot be said of lounging lazily
under a tree, while mentally accompanying Gil Blas through his
course of intrigue and adventure, and visiting with him the
impure atmosphere of courtiers, picaroons, and actresses.
This was Lytton's favorite reading; his mind, by nature subtle
rather than daring, would in any case have found its food in
the now hidden workings of character and passion, the by-play
of life, the unexpected and seemingly incongruous relations
to be found there. He loved the natural history of man, not
religiously, but for entertainment. What he sought, he found,
but paid the heaviest price. All his later days were poisoned
by his subtlety, which made it impossible for him to look at
any action with a single and satisfied eye. He tore the buds
open to see if there were no worm sheathed in the blushful
heart, and was so afraid of overlooking some mean possibility,
that he lost sight of virtue. Grubbing like a mole beneath
the surface of earth, rather than reading its living language
above, he had not faith enough to believe in the flower,
neither faith enough to mine for the gem, and remains at
penance in the limbo of halfnesses, I trust not forever.
Then all his characteristics wore brilliant hues. He was very
witty, and I owe to him the great obligation of being the
first and only person who has excited me to frequent and
boundless gayety. The sparks of his wit were frequent, slight
surprises; his was a slender dart, and rebounded easily to
the hand. I like the scintillating, arrowy wit far better than
broad, genial humor. The light metallic touch pleases me.
When wit appears as fun and jollity, she wears a little of the
Silenus air;--the Mercurial is what I like.

'In later days,--for my intimacy with him lasted many
years,--he became the feeder of my intellect. He delighted to
ransack the history of a nation, of an art or a science, and
bring to me all the particulars. Telling them fixed them in
his own memory, which was the most tenacious and ready I
have ever known; he enjoyed my clear perception as to their
relative value, and I classified them in my own way. As he was
omnivorous, and of great mental activity, while my mind was
intense, though rapid in its movements, and could only give
itself to a few things of its own accord, I traversed on the
wings of his effort large demesnes that would otherwise have
remained quite unknown to me. They were not, indeed, seen to
the same profit as my own province, whose tillage I knew, and
whose fruits were the answer to my desire; but the fact of
seeing them at all gave a largeness to my view, and a candor
to my judgment. I could not be ignorant how much there was I
did not know, nor leave out of sight the many sides to every
question, while, by the law of affinity, I chose my own.

'Lytton was not loved by any one. He was not positively hated,
or disliked; for there was nothing which the general mind
could take firm hold of enough for such feelings. Cold,
intangible, he was to play across the life of others. A
momentary resentment was sometimes felt at a presence which
would not mingle with theirs; his scrutiny, though not
hostile, was recognized as unfeeling and impertinent, and his
mirth unsettled all objects from their foundations. But he
was soon forgiven and forgotten. Hearts went not forth to
war against or to seek one who was a mere experimentalist and
observer in existence. For myself, I did not love, perhaps,
but was attached to him, and the attachment grew steadily, for
it was founded, not on what I wanted of him, but on his truth
to himself. His existence was a real one; he was not without a
pathetic feeling of his wants, but was never tempted to supply
them by imitating the properties of any other character. He
accepted the law of his being, and never violated it. This
is next best to the nobleness which transcends it. I did not
disapprove, even when I disliked, his acts.

'Amadin, my other companion, was as slow and deep of feeling,
as Lytton was brilliant, versatile, and cold. His temperament
was generally grave, even to apparent dulness; his eye gave
little light, but a slow fire burned in its depths. His was a
character not to be revealed to himself, or others, except by
the important occasions of life. Though every day, no doubt,
deepened and enriched him, it brought little that he could
show or recall. But when his soul, capable of religion,
capable of love, was moved, all his senses were united in the
word or action that followed, and the impression made on you
was entire. I have scarcely known any capable of such true
manliness as he. His poetry, written, or unwritten, was the
experience of life. It lies in few lines, as yet, but not one
of them will ever need to be effaced.

'Early that serious eye inspired in me a trust that has never
been deceived. There was no magnetism in him, no lights
and shades that could stir the imagination; no bright ideal
suggested by him stood between the friend and his self. As the
years matured that self, I loved him more, and knew him as
he knew himself, always in the present moment; he could never
occupy my mind in absence.'

Another of her early friends, Rev. F.H. Hedge, has sketched his acquaintance with her in the following paper, communicated by him for these memoirs. Somewhat older than Margaret, and having enjoyed an education at a German university, his conversation was full of interest and excitement to her. He opened to her a whole world of thoughts and speculations which gave movement to her mind in a congenial direction.

* * * * *

"My acquaintance with Margaret commenced in the year 1823, at Cambridge, my native place and hers. I was then a member of Harvard College, in which my father held one of the offices of instruction, and I used frequently to meet her in the social circles of which the families connected with the college formed the nucleus. Her father, at this time, represented the county of Middlesex in the Congress of the United States.

"Margaret was then about thirteen,--a child in years, but so precocious in her mental and physical developments, that she passed for eighteen or twenty. Agreeably to this estimate, she had her place in society, as a lady full-grown.

"When I recall her personal appearance, as it was then and for ten or twelve years subsequent to this, I have the idea of a blooming girl of a florid complexion and vigorous health, with a tendency to robustness, of which she was painfully conscious, and which, with little regard to hygienic principles, she endeavored to suppress or conceal, thereby preparing for herself much future suffering. With no pretensions to beauty then, or at any time, her face was one that attracted, that awakened a lively interest, that made one desirous of a nearer acquaintance. It was a face that fascinated, without satisfying. Never seen in repose, never allowing a steady perusal of its features, it baffled every attempt to judge the character by physiognomical induction. You saw the evidence of a mighty force, but what direction that force would assume,--whether it would determine itself to social triumphs, or to triumphs of art,--it was impossible to divine. Her moral tendencies, her sentiments, her true and prevailing character, did not appear in the lines of her face. She seemed equal to anything, but might not choose to put forth her strength. You felt that a great possibility lay behind that brow, but you felt, also, that the talent that was in her might miscarry through indifference or caprice.

"I said she had no pretensions to beauty. Yet she was not plain. She escaped the reproach of positive plainness, by her blond and abundant hair, by her excellent teeth, by her sparkling, dancing, busy eyes, which, though usually half closed from near-sightedness, shot piercing glances at those with whom she conversed, and, most of all, by the very peculiar and graceful carriage of her head and neck, which all who knew her will remember as the most characteristic trait in her personal appearance.

"In conversation she had already, at that early age, begun to distinguish herself, and made much the same impression in society that she did in after years, with the exception, that, as she advanced in life, she learned to control that tendency to sarcasm,--that disposition to 'quiz,'--which was then somewhat excessive. It frightened shy young people from her presence, and made her, for a while, notoriously unpopular with the ladies of her circle.

"This propensity seems to have been aggravated by unpleasant encounters in her school-girl experience. She was a pupil of Dr. Park, of Boston, whose seminary for young ladies was then at the height of a well-earned reputation, and whose faithful and successful endeavors in this department have done much to raise the standard of female education among us. Here the inexperienced country girl was exposed to petty persecutions from the dashing misses of the city, who pleased themselves with giggling criticisms not inaudible, nor meant to be inaudible to their subject, on whatsoever in dress and manner fell short of the city mark. Then it was first revealed to her young heart, and laid up for future reflection, how large a place in woman's world is given to fashion and frivolity. Her mind reacted on these attacks with indiscriminate sarcasms. She made herself formidable by her wit, and, of course, unpopular. A root of bitterness sprung up in her which years of moral culture were needed to eradicate.

"Partly to evade the temporary unpopularity into which she had fallen, and partly to pursue her studies secure from those social avocations which were found unavoidable in the vicinity of Cambridge and Boston, in 1824 or 5 she was sent to Groton, where she remained two years in quiet seclusion.

"On her return to Cambridge, in 1826, I renewed my acquaintance, and an intimacy was then formed, which continued until her death. The next seven years, which were spent in Cambridge, were years of steady growth, with little variety of incident, and little that was noteworthy of outward experience, but with great intensity of the inner life. It was with her, as with most young women, and with most young men, too, between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five, a period of preponderating sentimentality, a period of romance and of dreams, of yearning and of passion. She pursued at this time, I think, no systematic study, but she read with the heart, and was learning more from social experience than from books.

"I remember noting at this time a trait which continued to be a prominent one through life,--I mean, a passionate love for the beautiful, which comprehended all the kingdoms of nature and art. I have never known one who seemed to derive such satisfaction from the contemplation of lovely forms.

"Her intercourse with girls of her own age and standing was frank and excellent. Personal attractions, and the homage which they received, awakened in her no jealousy. She envied not their success, though vividly aware of the worth of beauty, and inclined to exaggerate her own deficiencies in that kind. On the contrary, she loved to draw these fair girls to herself, and to make them her guests, and was never so happy as when surrounded, in company, with such a bevy. This attraction was mutual, as, according to Goethe, every attraction is. Where she felt an interest, she awakened an interest. Without flattery or art, by the truth and nobleness of her nature, she won the confidence, and made herself the friend and intimate, of a large number of young ladies,--the belles of their day,--with most of whom she remained in correspondence during the greater part of her life.

"In our evening re-unions she was always conspicuous by the brilliancy of her wit, which needed but little provocation to break forth in exuberant sallies, that drew around her a knot of listeners, and made her the central attraction of the hour. Rarely did she enter a company in which she was not a prominent object.

"I have spoken of her conversational talent. It continued to develop itself in these years, and was certainly her most decided gift. One could form no adequate idea of her ability without hearing her converse. She did many things well, but nothing so well as she talked. It is the opinion of all her friends, that her writings do her very imperfect justice. For some reason or other, she could never deliver herself in print as she did with her lips. She required the stimulus of attentive ears, and answering eyes, to bring out all her power. She must have her auditory about her.

"Her conversation, as it was then, I have seldom heard equalled. It was not so much attractive as commanding. Though remarkably fluent and select, it was neither fluency, nor choice diction, nor wit, nor sentiment, that gave it its peculiar power, but accuracy of statement, keen discrimination, and a certain weight of judgment, which contrasted strongly and charmingly with the youth and sex of the speaker. I do not remember that the vulgar charge of talking 'like a book' was ever fastened upon her, although, by her precision, she might seem to have incurred it. The fact was, her speech, though finished and true as the most deliberate rhetoric of the pen, had always an air of spontaneity which made it seem the grace of the moment,--the result of some organic provision that made finished sentences as natural to her as blundering and hesitation are to most of us. With a little more imagination, she would have made an excellent improvisatrice.

"Here let me say a word respecting the character of Margaret's mind. It was what in woman is generally called a masculine mind; that is, its action was determined by ideas rather than by sentiments. And yet, with this masculine trait, she combined a woman's appreciation of the beautiful in sentiment and the beautiful in action. Her intellect was rather solid than graceful, yet no one was more alive to grace. She was no artist,--she would never have written an epic, or romance, or drama,--yet no one knew better the qualities which go to the making of these; and though catholic as to kind, no one was more rigorously exacting as to quality. Nothing short of the best in each kind would content her.

"She wanted imagination, and she wanted productiveness. She wrote with difficulty. Without external pressure, perhaps, she would never have written at all. She was dogmatic, and not creative. Her strength was in characterization and in criticism. Her _critique_ on Goethe, in the second volume of the Dial, is, in my estimation, one of the best things she has written. And, as far as it goes, it is one of the best criticisms extant of Goethe.

"What I especially admired in her was her intellectual sincerity. Her judgments took no bribe from her sex or her sphere, nor from custom nor tradition, nor caprice. She valued truth supremely, both for herself and others. The question with her was not what should be believed, or what ought to be true, but what _is_ true. Her yes and no were never conventional; and she often amazed people by a cool and unexpected dissent from the common-places of popular acceptation."

* * * * *

Margaret, we have said, saw in each of her friends the secret interior capability, which might become hereafter developed into some special beauty or power. By means of this penetrating, this prophetic insight, she gave each to himself, acted on each to draw out his best nature, gave him an ideal out of which he could draw strength and liberty hour by hour. Thus her influence was ever ennobling, and each felt that in her society he was truer, wiser, better, and yet more free and happy, than elsewhere. The "dry light" which Lord Bacon loved, she never knew; her light was life, was love, was warm with sympathy and a boundless energy of affection and hope. Though her love flattered and charmed her friends, it did not spoil them, for they knew her perfect truth. They knew that she loved them, not for what she imagined, but for what she saw, though she saw it only in the germ. But as the Greeks beheld a Persephone and Athene in the passing stranger, and ennobled humanity into ideal beauty, Margaret saw all her friends thus idealized. She was a balloon of sufficient power to take us all up with her into the serene depth of heaven, where she loved to float, far above the low details of earthly life. Earth lay beneath us as a lovely picture,--its sounds came up mellowed into music.

Margaret was, to persons younger than herself, a Makaria and Natalia. She was wisdom and intellectual beauty, filling life with a charm and glory "known to neither sea nor land." To those of her own age she was sibyl and seer,--a prophetess, revealing the future, pointing the path, opening their eyes to the great aims only worthy of pursuit in life. To those older than herself she was like the Euphorion in Goethe's drama, child of Faust and Helen,--a wonderful union of exuberance and judgment, born of romantic fulness and classic limitation. They saw with surprise her clear good-sense balancing her now of sentiment and ardent courage. They saw her comprehension of both sides of every question, and gave her their confidence, as to one of equal age, because of so ripe a judgment.

But it was curious to see with what care and conscience she kept her friendships distinct. Her fine practical understanding, teaching her always the value of limits, enabled her to hold apart all her intimacies, nor did one ever encroach on the province of the other. Like a moral Paganini, she played always on a single string, drawing from each its peculiar music,--bringing wild beauty from the slender wire, no less than from the deep-sounding harp string. Some of her friends had little to give her when compared with others; but I never noticed that she sacrificed in any respect the smaller faculty to the greater. She fully realized that the Divine Being makes each part of this creation divine, and that He dwells in the blade of grass as really if not as fully as in the majestic oak which has braved the storm for a hundred years. She felt in full the thought of a poem which she once copied for me from Barry Cornwall, which begins thus:--

"She was not fair, nor full of grace,
Nor crowned with thought, nor aught beside
No wealth had she of mind or face,
To win our love, or gain our pride,--
No lover's thought her heart could touch,--
No poet's dream was round her thrown;
And yet we miss her--ah, so much!
Now--she has flown."

I will close this section of Cambridge Friendship with the two following passages, the second of which was written to some one unknown to me:

'Your letter was of cordial sweetness to me, as is ever the
thought of our friendship,--that sober-suited friendship, of
which the web was so deliberately and well woven, and which
wears so well.

* * * * *

'I want words to express the singularity of all my past
relations; yet let me try.

'From a very early age I have felt that I was not born to the
common womanly lot. I knew I should never find a being who
could keep the key of my character; that there would be none
on whom I could always lean, from whom I could always learn;
that I should be a pilgrim and sojourner on earth, and that
the birds and foxes would be surer of a place to lay the head
than I. You understand me, of course; such beings can only
find their homes in hearts. All material luxuries, all the
arrangements of society, are mere conveniences to them.

'This thought, all whose bearings I did not, indeed,
understand, affected me sometimes with sadness, sometimes
with pride. I mourned that I never should have a thorough
experience of life, never know the full riches of my being; I
was proud that I was to test myself in the sternest way, that
I was always to return to myself, to be my own priest,
pupil, parent, child, husband, and wife. All this I did not
understand as I do now; but this destiny of the thinker, and
(shall I dare to say it?) of the poetic priestess, sibylline,
dwelling in the cave, or amid the Lybian sands, lay yet
enfolded in my mind. Accordingly, I did not look on any of the
persons, brought into relation with me, with common womanly
eyes.

'Yet, as my character is, after all, still more feminine than
masculine, it would sometimes happen that I put more emotion
into a state than I myself knew. I really was capable or
attachment, though it never seemed so till the hour of
separation. And if a connexion was torn up by the roots, the
soil of my existence showed an unsightly wound, which long
refused to clothe itself in verdure.

'With regard to yourself, I was to you all that I wished to
be. I knew that I reigned in your thoughts in my own way.
And I also lived with you more truly and freely than with any
other person. We were truly friends, but it was not friends
as men are friends to one another, or as brother and sister.
There was, also, that pleasure, which may, perhaps, be termed
conjugal, of finding oneself in an alien nature. Is there any
tinge of love in this? Possibly! At least, in comparing it
with my relation to--, I find _that_ was strictly fraternal.
I valued him for himself. I did not care for an influence over
him, and was perfectly willing to have one or fifty rivals in
his heart. * *

* * 'I think I may say, I never loved. I but see my possible
life reflected on the clouds. As in a glass darkly, I have
seen what I might feel as child, wife, mother, but I have
never really approached the close relations of life. A sister
I have truly been to many,--a brother to more,--a fostering
nurse to, oh how many! The bridal hour of many a spirit, when
first it was wed, I have shared, but said adieu before the
wine was poured out at the banquet. And there is one I always
love in my poetic hour, as the lily looks up to the star from
amid the waters; and another whom I visit as the bee visits
the flower, when I crave sympathy. Yet those who live would
scarcely consider that I am among the living,--and I am
isolated, as you say.

'My dear--, all is well; all has helped me to decipher the
great poem of the universe. I can hardly describe to you the
happiness which floods my solitary hours. My actual life is
yet much clogged and impeded, but I have at last got me
an oratory; where I can retire and pray. With your letter,
vanished a last regret. You did not act or think unworthily.
It is enough. As to the cessation of our confidential inter
course, circumstances must have accomplished that long ago; my
only grief was that you should do it with your own free will,
and for reasons that I thought unworthy. I long to honor you,
to be honored by you. Now we will have free and noble thoughts
of one another, and all that is best of our friendship shall
remain.'

II.

CONVERSATION.--SOCIAL INTERCOURSE.

"Be thou what thou singly art, and personate only thyself.
Swim smoothly in the stream of thy nature, and live but one
man."

SIR THOMAS BROWNE.

"Ah, how mournful look in letters
Black on white, the words to me,
Which from lips of thine cast fetters
Bound the heart, or set It free."

GOETHE, _translated by J.S. Dwight_.

"Zu erfinden, zu beschliessen,
Bleibe, Kunstler, oft allein;
Deines Wirkes zu geniessen
Eile freudig zum Verein,
Hier im Ganzen schau erfahre
Deines eignes Lebenslauf,
Und die Thaten mancher Jahre
Gehn dir in dem Nachbar auf."

GOETHE, _Artist's Song_.

* * * * *

When I first knew Margaret, she was much in society, but in a circle of her own,--of friends whom she had drawn around her, and whom she entertained and delighted by her exuberant talent. Of those belonging to this circle, let me recall a few characters.

The young girls whom Margaret had attracted were very different from herself, and from each other. From Boston, Charlestown, Roxbury, Brookline, they came to her, and the little circle of companions would meet now in one house, and now in another, of these pleasant towns. There was A----, a dark-haired, black-eyed beauty, with clear olive complexion, through which the rich blood flowed. She was bright, beauteous, and cold as a gem,--with clear perceptions of character within a narrow limit,--enjoying society, and always surrounded with admirers, of whose feelings she seemed quite unconscious. While they were just ready to die of unrequited love, she stood untouched as Artemis, scarcely aware of the deadly arrows which had flown from her silver bow. I remember that Margaret said, that Tennyson's little poem of the skipping-rope must have been written for her,--where the lover expressing his admiration of the fairy-like motion and the light grace of the lady, is told--

"Get off, or else my skipping-rope
Will hit you in the eye."

Then there was B----, the reverse of all this,--tender, susceptible, with soft blue eyes, and mouth of trembling sensibility. How sweet were her songs, in which a single strain of pure feeling ever reminded me of those angel symphonies,--

"In all whose music, the pathetic minor
Our ears will cross--"

and when she sang or spoke, her eyes had often the expression of one looking _in_ at her thought, not _out_ at her companion.

Then there was C----, all animated and radiant with joyful interest in life,--seeing with ready eye the beauty of Nature and of Thought,--entering with quick sympathy into all human interest, taking readily everything which belonged to her, and dropping with sure instinct whatever suited her not. Unknown to her was struggle, conflict, crisis; she grew up harmonious as the flower, drawing nutriment from earth and air,--from "common things which round us lie," and equally from the highest thoughts and inspirations.

Shall I also speak of D----, whose beauty had a half-voluptuous character, from those ripe red lips, those ringlets overflowing the well-rounded shoulders, and the hazy softness of those large eyes? Or of E----, her companion, beautiful too, but in a calmer, purer style,--with eye from which looked forth self-possession, truth and fortitude? Others, well worth notice, I must not notice now.

But among the young men who surrounded Margaret, a like variety prevailed. One was to her interesting, on account of his quick, active intellect, and his contempt for shows and pretences; for his inexhaustible wit, his exquisite taste, his infinitely varied stores of information, and the poetic view which he took of life, painting it with Rembrandt depths of shadow and bursts of light. Another she gladly went to for his compact, thoroughly considered views of God and the world,--for his culture, so much more deep and rich than any other we could find here,--for his conversation, opening in systematic form new fields of thought. Yet men of strong native talent, and rich character, she also liked well to know, however deficient in culture, knowledge, or power of utterance. Each was to her a study, and she never rested till she had found the bottom of every mind,--till she had satisfied herself of its capacity and currents,--measuring it with her sure line, as

--"All human wits
Are measured, but a few."

It was by her singular gift of speech that she cast her spells and worked her wonders in this little circle. Full of thoughts and full of words; capable of poetic improvisation, had there not been a slight overweight of a tendency to the tangible and real; capable of clear, complete, philosophic statement, but for the strong tendency to life which melted down evermore in its lava-current the solid blocks of thought; she was yet, by these excesses, better fitted for the arena of conversation. Here she found none adequate for the equal encounter; when she laid her lance in rest, every champion must go down before it. How fluent her wit, which, for hour after hour, would furnish best entertainment, as she described scenes where she had lately been, or persons she had lately seen! Yet she readily changed from gay to grave, and loved better the serious talk which opened the depths of life. Describing a conversation in relation to Christianity, with a friend of strong mind, who told her he had found, in this religion, a home for his best and deepest thoughts, she says--' Ah! what a pleasure 'to meet with such a daring, yet realizing, mind as his!' But her catholic taste found satisfaction in intercourse with persons quite different from herself in opinions and tendencies, as the following letter, written in her twentieth year, will indicate:

* * * * *

'I was very happy, although greatly restrained by the
apprehension of going a little too far with these persons of
singular refinement and settled opinions.