Chapter IX: Part 9

It was not strange that the writer of just such a poem should have seemed to Fields, before his death in 1881, the ideal friend to fill the impending gap in the life of his wife. He must have known that, when the time should come for readjusting herself to life without him, she would need something more than random contacts with friends, no matter how rewarding each such relationship might be. He must have realized that the intensely personal element in her nature would require an outlet through an intensely personal devotion. If he could have foreseen the relation that grew up between Mrs. Fields and Miss Jewett—her junior by about fifteen years—almost immediately upon his death, and continued throughout the life of the younger friend, he would surely have felt a great security of satisfaction in what was yet to be. In all her personal manifestations, and in all her work, Miss Jewett embodied a quality of distinction, a quality of the true _aristophile_,—to employ a term which has seemed to me before to fit that small company of lovers of the best to which these ladies preëminently belonged,—that made them foreordained companions. To Mrs. Fields it meant much to stand in a close relation—apart from all considerations of a completely uniting friendship—with such an artist as Miss Jewett, to feel that through sympathy and encouragement she was furthering a true and permanent contribution to American letters. To Miss Jewett, whose life, before this intimacy began, had been led almost entirely in the Maine village of her birth,—a village of dignity and high traditions that were her own inheritance,—there came an extension of interests and stimulating contacts through finding herself a frequent member of another household than her own, and that a very nucleus of quickening human intercourse. To pursue her work of writing chiefly at South Berwick, to come to Boston, or Manchester, for that freshening of the spirit which the creative writer so greatly needs, and there to find the most sympathetic and devoted of friends, also much occupied herself with the writing of books and with all commerce of vital thoughts—what could have afforded a more delightful arrangement of life?

Even as early as 1881, the year of Fields’s death, Miss Jewett published the fourth of her many books, “Country By-Ways,” preceded by “Deephaven” (1877), “Play Days” (1878), and “Old Friends and New” (1879). From 1881 onward her production was constant and abundant. In 1881 also began a period of remarkable productiveness on the part of Mrs. Fields. In that very year of her husband’s death she published both her “James T. Fields: Biographical Notes and Personal Sketches,” and a second edition of “Under the Olive,” a small volume in which she had brought together in 1880 a number of poems in which the influence of the Greek and English poets is sometimes manifested—notably in “Theocritus”—to excellent purpose. If Mrs. Fields had been a poet of distinctive power, the fact would long ago have established itself. To make any such claim for her at this late day would be to depart from the purpose of this book. It was for the most part rather as a friend than as a daughter of the Muses that she turned to verse, the medium of utterance for so many of that nest of singing-birds in which her life was passed. In 1883 came her little volume “How to Help the Poor,” representing an interest in the less fortunate which prepared her to become one of the founders of the Associated Charities of Boston, kept her long active and influential in the service of that organization, and made her at the last one of its generous benefactors. In 1895 and 1900, respectively, appeared two more volumes of verse, “The Singing Shepherd and Other Poems,” assembling the work of earlier and later years, and “Orpheus, a Masque,” each strongly touched, like “Under the Olive,” with the Grecian spirit. From “The Singing Shepherd” I cannot resist quoting one of the best things it contains—a sonnet, “Flammantis Mœnia Mundi,” under which, in my own copy of the book, I find the penciled note, written probably more than twenty years ago: “Mrs. Fields tells me that this sonnet came to her complete, one may almost say; standing on her feet she made it, but for one or two small changes, just as it is, in about fifteen minutes.”

I stood alone in purple space and saw
The burning walls of the world, like wings of flame,
Circling the sphere; there was no break nor flaw
In those vast airy battlements whence came
The spirits who had done with time and fame
And all the playthings of earth’s little hour;
I saw them each, I knew them for the same,
Mothers and brothers and the sons of power.

Yet were they changed; the flaming walls had burned
Their perishable selves, and there remained
Only the pure white vision of the soul,
The mortal part consumed, and swift returned
Ashes to ashes; while unscathed, unstained,
The immortal passed beyond the earth’s control.

For the rest, her writings may be said to have grown out of the life which the pages of her diary have pictured. The successive volumes were these: “Whittier: Notes of his Life and of his Friendship” (New York, 1893); “A Shelf of Old Books” (New York, 1894); “Letters of Celia Thaxter” (edited with Miss Rose Lamb, Boston, 1895); “Authors and Friends” (Boston, 1896); “Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe” (Boston, 1897); “Nathaniel Hawthorne” (in the “Beacon Biographies,” Boston, 1899); “Charles Dudley Warner” (New York, 1909); and, after the death of the friend whose name appears above this chapter, “Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett” (Boston, 1911).

This catalogue of publications is in itself a dry bit of reading, and to add the titles of all the books produced by Miss Jewett after 1881 would not enliven the record. But the lists, explicit and implicit, will serve at least to suggest the range and nature of the activities of mind and spirit in which the two friends shared for many years. It is no wonder that Mrs. Fields, who abandoned the regular maintenance of her diary in the face of her husband’s failing health, resumed it in later years only under the special provocations of travel. In its place she took up the practice of writing daily missives—sometimes letters, more often the merest notes—to Miss Jewett whenever they were separated. These innumerable little messages of affection contained frequent references to persons and passing events, but rather as memoranda for talk when the two friends should meet than as records at all resembling the earlier journals. Such local friends as Mrs. Pratt and Mrs. Bell, in whom the spirit and wit of their father, Rufus Choate, shone on for later generations; Mrs. Whitman, mistress of the arts of color and of friendship; Miss Guiney, figuring always as “the Linnet,” even as Mrs. Thaxter was “the Sandpiper”; Dr. Holmes, Phillips Brooks, “dear Whittier”—these and scores of others, young and old, known and unknown to fame, people the scene which the little notes recall. There are, besides, such visitors from abroad as Matthew Arnold and his wife, Mrs. Humphry Ward and her daughter, M. and Mme. Brunetière, and Mme. Blanc (“Th. Bentzon”), whose article, “Condition de la Femme aux États-Unis,” in the “Revue des Deux Mondes” for September, 1894, could not have been written but for the knowledge of Boston acquired through a long visit to the house in Charles Street. Of the salon of her hostess she wrote: “Je voudrais essayer de peindre celui qui se rapproche le plus, par beaucoup de côtés, les salons de France de la meilleure époque, le salon de Mrs. J. T. Fields.” She goes on to paint it, and from the picture at least one fragment—apropos of the portraits in the house—should be rescued, if only for the piquancy conferred by Mme. Blanc’s native tongue upon a bit of anecdote: “Emerson réalise bien, en physique, l’idée d’immatérialité que je me faisais de lui. Mrs. Fields me conte une jolie anecdote: vers la fin de sa vie, il fut prit d’un singulier accès de curiosité; il voulut savoir une fois ce que c’était le whisky et entra dans un bar pour s’en servir:—Vous voulez un verre d’eau, Mr. Emerson? dit le garçon, sans lui donner le temps d’exprimer sa criminelle envie. Et le philosophe but son verre d’eau, ... et il mourut sans connaître le goût du whisky.”

But if the notes of Mrs. Fields to Miss Jewett, and Miss Jewett’s own letters to her friend in Boston, do not provide any counterpart to the diaries which make up the greater portion of this book, there are, in the journals kept by Mrs. Fields on special occasions of travel, records of experiences shared by the two friends which should be given here.

When they went to Europe together, as early as 1882, the two travellers were happily characterized by Whittier in a sonnet, “Godspeed,” as

her in whom
All graces and sweet charities unite
The old Greek beauty set in holier light;
And her for whom New England’s byways bloom,
Who walks among us welcome as the Spring,
Calling up blossoms where her light feet stray.

No effort or adventure seemed to daunt the companions in their journeyings. There was an indomitable quality in Mrs. Fields which Miss Jewett used to ascribe to her “May blood,” with its strain of abolitionism, and it showed itself when she accepted with enthusiasm, and successfully urged Miss Jewett to accept, an invitation to make a two months’ winter cruise in West Indian waters, in company with Mr. and Mrs. Aldrich, on the yacht Hermione of their friend, Henry L. Pierce. The diary of Mrs. Fields records discomforts and pleasures with an equal hand, and gives lively glimpses of island and ocean scenes. At Santo Domingo, for example, the President of the Republic of Haiti dined on the Hermione on St. Valentine’s Day, 1896, and talked in a manner to which the impending liberation of Cuba from the Spanish yoke may now be seen to have added some significance.

Anything more interesting than his conversation [wrote Mrs.
Fields] would be impossible to find. He ended just before
we left the table by speaking of Cuba. He is inclined to
believe that the day of Spain is over. The people are already
conquerors in the interior and are approaching Havana. Spain
will soon be compelled to retire to her coast defenses and she
is sure to be driven thence in two years or sooner. Of course,
if the Cubans are recognized by the great powers they will
triumph all the sooner.

“Do these island republics take the part of Cuba?” someone
asked.

“I will tell you a little tale of a camel,” he said, “if you
will allow me—a camel greatly overladen who lamented his sad
fate. ‘I am bent to the earth,’ he said; ‘everything is heaped
upon me and I feel as if I could never rise again under such a
load.’ Upon his pack was seated a flea, who heard the lament
of the camel. Immediately the flea jumped to the ground. ‘See!’
he said; ‘now rise, I have relieved you of my own weight.’
‘Thank you, Mr. Elephant,’ said the camel, as he glanced at the
flea hopping away. The recognition of these islands would help
Cuba about as much,” he added laughingly.

But the President of Haiti, concerning whom much more might be quoted, is less a part of the present picture than Thomas Bailey Aldrich, of whom Mrs. Fields wrote, February 21:—

T. B. A.’s wit and pleasant company never fail—he is so
natural, finding fault at times, without being a fault-finder,
and being crusty like another human creature when out of
sorts—but on the whole a most refreshing companion, coming
up from below every morning with a shining countenance, his
hair curling like a boy’s, and ready for a new day. He said
yesterday that he should like to live 450 years—“shouldn’t
you?” “No,” I said; “I am on tip-toe for the flight.” “Ah,”
he said with a visible shudder, “we know nothing about it!
Oddly enough, I have strange impressions of having lived
before—once in London especially—not at St. Paul’s, or Pall
Mall, or in any of the great places where I might have been
deceived by previous imaginations,—not at all,—but among some
old streets where I had never been before and where I had no
associations.” He would have gone on in this vein and would
have drawn me into giving some reasons for my faith which would
have been none to him, but fortunately we were interrupted.
He is full of quips and cranks in talk—is a worshipper of the
English language and a good student of Murray’s Grammar, in
which he faithfully believes. His own training in it he values
as much as anything which ever came to him. He picks up the
unfortunates, of which I am chief, who say “people” meaning
“persons,” who say “at length” for “at last,” and who use
foolish redundancies, but I cannot seem to record his fun. He
began to joke Bridget early in the voyage about the necessity
of being tattooed when she arrived at the Windward Islands,
like the rest of the crew! Fancying that he saw a sort of half
idea that he was in earnest, he kept it up and told her that
the butter-mark of Ponkapog should be the device! The matter
had nearly blown over when yesterday he wanted her suddenly and
called, “Bridget,” at the gangway rather sharply. “Here, sir,”
said the dear creature running quickly to mount the stairs.
“The tattoo-man is here,” said T. B. With all seriousness
Bridget paused a moment, wavered, looked again, and then came
on laughing to do what he really wanted. “That man will be
the death of me—so he will,” said B. as she went away on her
errand. She is his slave; gets his clothes and waits upon him
every moment; but his fun and sweetness with her “_désennuie de
service_,” and more, charges it with pleasantness.

T. B. A. is a most careful reader and a true reporter upon the
few good books of which he is cognizant. He has read Froude’s
history twice through, and Queen Mary’s reign three times. He
has read a vast number of novels, hundreds and hundreds,—French
and English,—but his knowledge of French seems to stop there.
He also once knew Spanish, but that seems to have dropped—he
never, I think, could speak much of any language save his
own. Being a master there is so much more than the rest of us
achieve that we feel he has won his laurels.

On a later journey, in 1898, Mrs. Fields and Miss Jewett, visiting England and France in company with Miss Jewett’s sister and nephew, were on more familiar and more suitable ground—if indeed that word can be used even figuratively for the unstable deck of a yacht. In London there were many old and new friends to be seen. In Paris Mme. Blanc opened for the travellers the doors of many a salon not commonly accessible to visiting Americans. But from all the abundant chronicle of these experiences, it will be enough to make two selections. The first describes a visit to the Provençal poet, Mistral, with his “Boufflo Beel” dog and hat; the second, a glimpse of Henry James at Rye.

It was in May of 1898, that Mrs. Fields and Miss Jewett, finding Paris cold and rainy, determined to strike for sunshine, and the South. A little journey into Provence, and a visit to Mistral, followed this decision. The following notes record the visit.

A perfect time and perfect weather in which to see the country
of Provence. Fields of great white poppies and other flowers
planted for seed in this district made the way beautiful on
either hand. Olive trees with rows of black cypress and old
tiled-roofed farmhouses, and the mountains always on the
horizon, filled the landscape. The first considerable house
we reached was the home of the poet. A pretty garden which
attracted our attention with a rare eglantine called La Reine
Joanne, and other charming things hanging over the wall made
us suspicious of the poet’s vicinity. Turning the corner of
this garden and driving up a short road, we found the courtyard
and door on the inner side as it were. We heard a barking
dog. “Take care,” said the driver, “there is a dangerous dog
inside.” We waited until Mistral himself came to meet us from
the garden; he was much amused. There was an old dog tied,
half asleep, on a bench and a young one by his side. He said
laughing, “These are all, and they could not be less dangerous.
The elder” (he let them loose while he spoke and they played
about us), “the elder I call Bouffe, from Boufflo Beel”
(Mistral does not speak any English, nor does his wife) “and
the reason is because I happened to be in the neighborhood of
Paris once just after Buffalo Bill had passed on toward Calais
with his troupe. I saw a little dog, unlike the dogs of our
country, who seemed to be lost, but the moment he saw me, he
thought I was ‘Boufflo Beel’ and adopted me for his master.
You see I look like him,” he said, putting his wide felt hat
a little more on one side! Yes, we did think so. “Well, the
little dog has been with us ever since. He possesses the most
wonderful intelligence and understands every word we say. One
day I said to him, ‘What a pity such a nice dog as you should
have no children!’ A few days later the servant said to me,
‘Bouffe has been away nearly two days, but he has now come
back bringing his wife.’ ‘Ah!’ I said, ‘take good care of them
both.’ In due time this other little dog, his son, arrived
in the world, and shortly after Bouffe carried his wife away
again, but kept the little dog. He is a wonderful fellow, to be
sure.”

We went into the house and sat down to talk awhile about poetry
and books. There was a large book-case full of French and
Provençal literature here, but it was rather the parlor and
everyday sitting-room than his work-room. Unhappily, they have
no children. Evidently they are exceedingly happy together and
naturally do not miss what they have never had. She opened the
drawing-room for us, which is the room of state. It is full
of interesting things connected with Provence and their own
life, but perfectly simple, in accord with the country-like
fashion of their existence. There is a noble bas-relief of
the head of Mistral, the drum or “tambour” of the Félibre, or
for the Farandole, and, without overloading, plenty of good
things—photographs, one or two pictures, not many, for the
house is not that of a rich man, plaster casts, and one or
two busts,—perhaps the presents of artists,—illustrations of
“Mirèio,” and things associated with their individual lives
or the life of Provence. Presently Mistral gave me his arm
and we went across the hall. Standing in the place of honor
opposite the front door and in the large corner made by the
staircase, is a fine copy of the bust of Lamartine, crowned
with an olive wreath. We paused a moment here while Mistral
spoke of Lamartine, and always with the sincere reverence which
he has expressed in the poem entitled “_Élégie sur la mort de
Lamartine_.” ...

The dining-room was still more Provençal, if possible, than the
rooms we had visited. The walls were white, which, with the
closed green blinds, must give a pleasant light when the days
are hot, yet bright even on grey days. Specimens of the pottery
of the country hang around, decorated with soft colors. The
old carved bread-mixing-and-holding affair, which belonged in
every well-to-do house of the old time, was there, and one or
two other old pieces of furniture, while the chairs, sofa, and
table were of quaint shape, painted green with some decorations.

The details are all petty enough, but they proved how sincerely
Mistral and his wife love their country and their surroundings
and endeavor to ennoble them and make the most of them. After
sitting at table and enjoying their hospitality, we went out
again into the garden where Madame Mistral gathered “Nerto”
(myrtle) for us, beside roses and other more beautiful but
more formidable things. “Nerto” is the title of one of his
last books (I hear) and the wife doubtless believed that we
should cherish a branch of her myrtle especially in memory of
the visit. She was quite right, but these things which are
“to last”—how frail they are; the things that remain are those
which are written on the heart.

We cannot forget these two picturesque beings standing in their
garden, filling our hands with flowers and bidding us farewell.
As we drove away into the sunny plain once more, we found it
speaking to us with a voice of human kindness echoing from
that poetic and friendly home. In a more personal vein, the
address to Lamartine by Mistral expresses better his mood of
the afternoon when we stood together looking at the bust and
recalling each our personal remembrance of the man.

An excursion from London, on September 12, devoted to a day with Henry James, gave Mrs. Fields a memorable glimpse of the son of an old friend, and an honest pleasure in learning at first hand of his appreciation of Miss Jewett’s writings.

_Monday, September 13, 1898._—We left London about 11 o’clock
for Rye, to pass the day with Mr. Henry James. He was waiting
for us at the station with a carriage, and in five minutes we
found ourselves at the top of a silent little winding street,
at a green door with a brass knocker, wearing the air of
impenetrable respectability which is so well known in England.
Another instant and an old servant, Smith (who with his wife
has been in Mr. James’s service for 20 years), opened the door
and helped us from the carriage. It was a pretty interior—large
enough for elegance, and simple enough to suit the severe
taste of a scholar and private gentleman.

Mr. James was intent on the largest hospitality. We were asked
upstairs over a staircase with a pretty balustrade and plain
green drugget on the steps; everything was of the severest
plainness, but in the best taste, “not at all austere,” as he
himself wrote us.

We soon went down again after leaving our hats, to find a
young gentleman, Mr. McAlpine, who is Mr. James’s secretary,
with him, awaiting us. This young man is just the person to
help Mr. James. He has a bump of reverence and appreciates
his position and opportunity. We sat in the parlor opening on
a pretty garden for some time, until Mr. James said he could
not conceive why luncheon was not ready and he must go and
inquire, which he did in a very responsible manner, and soon
after Smith appeared to announce the feast. Again a pretty room
and table. We enjoyed our talk together sincerely at luncheon
and afterward strolled into the garden. The dominating note was
dear Mr. James’s pleasure in having a home of his own to which
he might ask us. From the garden, of course, we could see the
pretty old house still more satisfactorily. An old brick wall
concealed by vines and laurels surrounds the whole irregular
domain; a door from the garden leads into a paved courtyard
which seemed to give Mr. James peculiar satisfaction; returning
to the garden, and on the other side, at an angle with the
house, is a building which he laughingly called the temple
of the Muse. This is his own place _par excellence_. A good
writing-table and one for his secretary, a typewriter, books,
and a sketch by Du Maurier, with a few other pictures (rather
mementoes than works of art), excellent windows with clear
light, such is the temple! Evidently an admirable spot for his
work.

After we returned to the parlor Mr. James took occasion to
tell Sarah how deeply and sincerely he appreciated her work;
how he re-reads it with increasing admiration. “It is foolish
to ask, I know,” he said, “but were you in just such a place
as you describe in the ‘Pointed Firs’?” “No,” she said, “not
precisely; the book was chiefly written before I visited
the locality itself.” “And such an island?” he continued.
“Not exactly,” she said again. “Ah! I thought so,” he said
musingly; and the language—“It is so absolutely true—not a word
overdone—such elegance and exactness.” “And Mrs. Dennet—how
admirable she is,” he said again, not waiting for a reply. I
need not say they were very much at home together after this.

Meanwhile the carriage came again to the door, for he had made
a plan to take us on a drive to Winchelsea, a second of the
Cinq Portes, Rye itself also being one. The sea has retreated
from both these places, leaving about two miles of the Romney
Marsh between them and the shore. Nothing could be more
like something born of the imagination than the old city of
Winchelsea.... Just outside the old gate looking towards Rye
and the sea from a lonely height is the cottage where Ellen
Terry has found a summer resting-place and retirement. It is a
true home for an artist—nothing could be lovelier. Unhappily
she was not there, but we were happy to see the place which she
described to us with so great satisfaction.

From Winchelsea Mr. James drove us to the station, where we
took the train for Hastings. He had brought his small dog, an
aged black and tan terrier, with him for a holiday. He put on
the muzzle, which all dogs just now must wear, and took it off
a great many times until, having left it once when he went to
buy the tickets and recovered it, he again lost it and it could
not be found; so as soon as he reached Hastings, he took a
carriage again to drive us along the esplanade, but the first
thing was to buy a new muzzle. This esplanade is three miles
long, but we began to feel like tea, so having looked upon
the sea sufficiently from this decidedly unromantic point of
view, we went into a small shop and enjoyed more talk under new
conditions. “How many cakes have you eaten?” “Ten,” gravely
replied Mr. James—at which we all laughed. “Oh, I know,” said
the girl with a wise look at the desk. “How do you suppose they
know?” said Mr. James musingly as he turned away. “They always
do!” And so on again presently to the train at Hastings, where
Mr. McAlpine appeared at the right instant. Mr. James’s train
for Rye left a few moments before ours for London. He took a
most friendly farewell and having left us to Mr. McA. ran for
his own carriage. In another five minutes we too were away,
bearing our delightful memories of this meeting.

Not because they record momentous events and encounters, but merely as little pictures of the life which Mrs. Fields and Miss Jewett led together, these passages are brought to light. They are the last to be presented here. For more than another decade beyond the summer of 1898, Miss Jewett, sorely invalided through the final years as the result of a carriage accident, remained the central personal fact in Mrs. Fields’s interest and affections. Soon after her death, in June, 1909, Mrs. Fields wrote about her to a common friend: “Of my dear Sarah—I believe one of her noblest qualities was her great generosity. Others could only guess at this, but I was allowed to know it. Not that she made gifts, but a wide sympathy was hers for every disappointed or incompetent fellow creature. It was a most distinguishing characteristic! Governor Andrew spoke of Judge B—— once as ‘A friend to every man who did not need a friend’! Sarah’s quick sympathy knew a friend was in need before she knew it herself; she was the spirit of beneficence, and her quick delicate wit was such a joy in daily companionship!”

Of this daily companionship an anonymous contributor to the “Atlantic Monthly” for August, 1909, had been a fortunate witness. I need not ask his permission to repeat a portion of what he then wrote:—

“There is but one familiar portrait of Miss Jewett. It has been so often reprinted that many who have seen it, even without seeing her, must think of her as immune from change, blessed with perpetual youth, with a gracious, sympathetic femininity, with an air of breeding and distinction quite independent of shifting fashions.

“This portrait is intimately symbolic of her work. It typifies with a rare faithfulness the quality of all the products of her pen. In them one found, and finds, the same abiding elements of beauty, sympathy, and distinction. The element of sympathy—perhaps the greatest of these—found its expression in a humor that provoked less of outward laughter than of smiles within, and in a pathos the very counterpart of this delicate quality. The beauty and the distinction may be less capable of brief characterization, but they pervaded her art....

“This work of hers, in dealing with the New England life she knew and loved, was essentially American, as purely indigenous as the pointed firs of her own countryside. The art with which she wrought her native themes was limited, on the contrary, by no local boundaries. At its best it had the absolute quality of the highest art in every quarter of the globe. And the spirit in which she approached her task was as broad in its scope and sympathy as her art in its form. It was precisely this union of what was at once so clearly American and so clearly universal that distinguished her stories, in the eyes of both editor and reader, as the best—so often—in any magazine that contained them.

“Her constant demand upon herself was for the best. There were no compromises with mediocrity, either in her tastes or in her achievements. It was the best aspect of New England character and tradition on which her vision steadily dwelt. She was satisfied with nothing short of the best in her interpretation of New England life. The form of creative writing in which she won her highest successes—the short story—is the form in which Americans have made their most distinctive contributions to English literature: and her place with the few best of these writers appears to be secure.

“If the familiar portrait typifies her work, it is equally true to the person herself. The quick, responsive spirit of youth, with all its sincerity, all its enjoyment in friendship or whatever else the day might hold, was an immutable possession. So were all the other qualities for which the features spoke. Through the recent years of physical disability, due in the first instance to an accident so gratuitous that it seemed to her friends unendurable, there was a noble patience, a sweet endurance, that could have sprung only from an heroic strain of character.”

For nearly six years Mrs. Fields survived Miss Jewett, bereaved as by the loss of half her personal world, yet indomitable of spirit and energy, so long as her physical forces would permit any of the old accustomed exercises of hospitality and friendship. The selection and publication of Miss Jewett’s letters was a labor of love which continued the sense of companionship for the first two of the remaining years. Through the four others there was a failing of bodily strength, though not at all of mental and spiritual eagerness; and in her outward mien through all the later years, there was that which must have recalled to many the ancient couplet:—

No Spring, nor summer’s beauty hath such grace
As I have seen in one autumnal face.

Towards the end there was a brief return to the keeping of a sporadic diary. Its final words, written January 25, 1913, were these: “The days go on cheerfully. I have just read Mark Twain’s life, the life of a man who had greatness in him. I am now reading his ‘Joan of Arc.’ I hope to wait as cheerfully as he did for the trumpet call and as usefully, but I am ready.”

When Mrs. Fields died and the Charles Street door was finally closed, at the beginning of 1915, the world had entered upon its first entire year of a new era. It is an era as sharply separated from that of her intimate contemporaries, the American Victorians, as any new from any old order. The figures of every old order take their places by degrees as “museum pieces,” objects of curious and sometimes condescending study. But let us not be too sure that in parting with the past we have let it keep only that which can best be spared. We would not wish them back, those Victorians of ours. They were the product of their own day, and would be hardly at ease—poor things—in our twentieth-century Zion. Even some of us who inhabit it gain a sense of rest in reëntering their quiet, decorous dwelling-places. As we emerge again from one of them, may it be with a renewed allegiance to those lasting “things that are more excellent,” which belong to every generation of civilized men and women.

FOOTNOTES

[1] _A Shelf of Old Books_, by Mrs. Fields (1894), pictures many aspects of the house and its contents.

[2] About two months later, Mrs. Fields wrote in her diary: “Emerson says Hawthorne’s book is ‘pellucid but not deep.’ He has cut out the dedication and letter, as others have done.”

[3] The greater part of this chapter appeared in the _Yale Review_ for April, 1918.

[4] George Tyler Bigelow, of the Harvard Class of 1829.

[5] Harvard festivals were frequently noted. After the great day on which Lowell gave his _Commemoration Ode_, Mrs. Fields wrote (July 22, 1865): “What an ever-memorable day, the one at Harvard! The prayer of Phillips Brooks, the ode of Lowell, the address of Dr. Putnam and the Governor, and the heartfelt verses of Holmes, and the lovely music and the hymns. But Lowell’s Ode!! How it overtops the whole of what is preserved on paper beside! Charles G. Loring presided. ‘Awkwardly enough done,’ said O. W. H.; ‘It is a delicate thing to introduce a poet, he should be delivered to the table as a falconer delivers the falcon into the air, but Mr. Loring puts you down hard on the table—ca-chunk.’”

[6] This anecdote of the revision of _The Last Leaf_, written in 1831, is told a little differently in the annotations of Holmes’s Complete Works.

[7] See _Yesterdays with Authors_, p. 98, and _The Atlantic Monthly and Its Makers_, p. 46.

[8] _The Dolliver Romance._

[9] Fields drew upon this paragraph for one in _Yesterdays with Authors_, p. 112.

[10] Only a month after making this entry, Mrs. Fields wrote in her journal: “A note came from Longfellow saying he had received a sad note from Hawthorne. ‘I wish we could have a little dinner for him,’ he says, ‘of two sad authors and two jolly publishers—nobody else.’”

[11] In Rose Hawthorne Lathrop’s _Memories of Hawthorne_ the relation between the two households is indicated in a sentence containing the nicknames of Mr. and Mrs. Fields: “My father also tasted the piquant flavors of merriment and luxury in this exquisite domicile of Heart’s-Ease and Mrs. Meadows.”

[12] Thoreau’s younger sister.

[13] In 1865 Alcott printed privately and anonymously the essay, _Emerson_, which appeared later in his acknowledged volume, _Ralph Waldo Emerson, an Estimate of his Character and Genius_ (Boston, 1882). This was evidently _The Rhapsodist_.

[14] Thoreau’s older sister.

[15] Josiah Phillips Quincy.

[16] An allusion to the controversy over the claims of Dr. Jackson and Dr. Morton to the discovery of ether.

[17] Daughter of the Rev. William Henry Furness, of Philadelphia, and translator of German novels.

[18] One of Lowell’s reminiscences at the Saturday Club, recorded two years earlier by Mrs. Fields, suggests his essential youthfulness of spirit. Apropos of a story told by Dr. Holmes, “Lowell said that reminded him of experiments the boys at his school used to make on flies, to see how much weight they could carry. One day he attached a thread, which he pulled out of his silk handkerchief, to a fly’s leg, and to the other end a bit of paper with ‘the master is a fool’ written on it in small distinct letters. The fly flew away and lighted on the master’s nose; but he, regardless of all but the lessons, brushed him off, and the fly rose with his burden to the ceiling.”

[19] After an evening of high discussion at Mrs. Howe’s in an earlier year, Mrs. Fields wrote in her journal (October 4, 1863): “The talk grew deep, and after it was over, she [Mrs. Howe] recalled the saying of Mrs. Bell, after a like evening, when she called for ‘a fat idiot.’”

[20] If Mrs. Fields had lived to see _The Early Years of the Saturday Club_ (Boston, 1918), she would have found that I drew from the notes in her own diary a large portion of the memoir of James T. Fields which it contains.

[21] This was in the midst of Aldrich’s occupancy of Elmwood, during Lowell’s two years’ absence in Europe.

[22] The greater part of this chapter appeared in _Harper’s Magazine_ for May and June, 1922.

[23] A few passages from it, relating to Dickens, are included in _James T. Fields: Biographical Notes and Personal Sketches_. When they are occasionally repeated here, it is in their original form, and not as Mrs. Fields edited them for publication.

[24] On this very day Lowell wrote in the course of a letter to Fields: “James tells me you had a tremendous _queue_ this morning. Don’t fail to get me tickets, and for the first night. I should like to see his reception. It will leave a picture on the brain. And why should I not be there to welcome him, as well as Tom, Dick, or Harry?”

[25] Even after Dickens’s return to England, his sayings found their way into Mrs. Fields’s journal; as, for example:—

“_July 4, 1868._—J. made me laugh this morning (it was far too hot to laugh) by telling me that Dickens said of Gray, the poet, ‘No man ever walked down to posterity with so small a book under his arm!’”

[26] See Forster’s _Life_, III, 368, for the same story told by Dickens in a letter to Lord Lytton, without naming Longfellow as the narrator.

[27] In _Yesterdays with Authors_ (see pp. 230-31), Fields made use, with revisions and omissions, of this portion of his wife’s diary.

[28] Mrs. Stowe’s unhappily historic article on “The True Story of Lady Byron’s Life” appeared in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for September, 1869.

[29] On April 20, 1870, Longfellow wrote to Fields (See _Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow_, etc., edited by Samuel Longfellow, III, 148):—

“Some English poet has said or sung:

‘At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still,
And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove.’

“I wish Hamlet would be still! I wish I could prove the sweets of forgetfulness! I wish Fechter would depart into infinite space, and ‘leave, oh, leave me to repose!’ When will this disturbing star disappear, and suffer the domestic planetary system to move on in the ordinary course and keep time with the old clock in the corner?”

[30] A contemporary definition of Cincinnati.

[31] Dr. J. Baxter Upham, the moving spirit in the building of the Music Hall and the installation of the organ. He presided at its dedication.

[32] See _ante_, page 111.

[33] “A Newport Romance,” published in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for October, 1871.

[34] Probably _Gabriel Conroy_ and _Two Men of Sandy Bar_.

[35] See _The Atlantic Monthly and Its Makers_, pp. 73-75.

INDEX

Page numbers set in =bold-faced type= indicate, generally speaking, the more important references to the persons concerned. As a complete list of the pages on which Mr. or Mrs. Fields, or both, are mentioned would include substantially the whole book, only a few of the more significant references to them have been selected for inclusion under their names.

Adams, Annie, marries =J. T. F.=, 11. And _see_ Fields, Annie.

Adams, Charles F., Jr., 278.

Adams, Lizzie, 20.

Adams, Zabdiel B., 11.

Agassiz, Alexander, 256, 257, 258.

Agassiz, Elizabeth C., 159.

Agassiz, Louis, 48, 93, 105, 141.

Alcott, A. Bronson, 63, =72-77=, 81, 82, 95.

Alcott, Mrs. A. Bronson, 63.

Alcott, Louisa M., 73.

Alden, Henry M., 57, 89.

Aldrich, Lilian (Woodman), 126, 203, 229, 290.

Aldrich, Thomas B., 11, 116, 126 and _n._, 127, =197= _ff._,
=226-229=, 290, =291-293=.

Andrew, John A., 11, 36 _n._, 302.

Andrew, Mrs. John A., 28, 213, 214.

Appleton, Thomas Gold, 115, 116, 126, 152, 154, 209, 211, 212,
213, 216, 246, 253.

Aristotle, 133.

Arnold, Matthew, 288.

Astor, John Jacob, 76, 77.

_Atlantic Monthly_, 6, 13, 14, 107, 111, 191 _n._, 209, 233,
252, 281, 282, 302.

Bacon, Francis, Lord, 112.

Baker, Sir Samuel, 149.

Barbauld, Anna L. A., 101.

Barker, Fordyce, 151, 185.

Barlow, Francis C., 61.

Barrett, Lawrence, 240.

Bartol, Cyrus A., 114, 215, 239.

Beal, James H., 143.

Beal, Louisa (Adams), 42, 143.

Beal, Thomas, 199.

Beecher, Henry Ward, 89, 224, 263, =267-269=, 270.

Bell, Helen (Choate), 98, 143, 288.

Bellows, Henry W., 199.

Bentzon, Th. _See_ Blanc, Marie T.

Bigelow, George T., 36.

Bigelow, Mr. and Mrs., 143, 144.

Blagden, Isa, 260.

Blake, Harrison G. O., 89, 90.

Blanc, Marie Thérèse, 288, 289, 293.

Blessington, Countess of, 274.

Blumenbach, Johann F., 128, 129.

Boccaccio, Giovanni, 58.

Booth, Edwin, 28, =198-203=, 210, =240-241=.

Booth, J. Wilkes, 28, 198, 199.

Booth, Junius Brutus, 196.

Booth, Mary (Mrs. Edwin), 241.

Booth, Mary A. (Mrs. J. B.), 198.

Boswell, James, 60.

Boutwell, George S., 89.

Bradford, George, 81, 82, 90.

Bright, John, 177.

Brontë, Charlotte, 131, 266.

Brooks, Phillips, 36 _n._, 94, 288.

Brown, John, _Pet Marjorie_, 59.

Browne, Charles F., 21.

Brownell, Henry Howard, 29.

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 270.

Browning, Robert, 43, 142, 260, 269.

Brunetière, Ferdinand, 288.

Bryant, William Cullen, 239, 257.

“Buffalo Bill.” _See_ Cody, W. F.

Bugbee, James M., 126.

Bull, Ole, 225.

Burr, Aaron, 270, 271.

Butler, Benjamin F., 95.

Cabot, Mrs., 236.

Calderon de la Barca, Pedro, 110.

Carleton, G. W., 233.

Carlyle, Jane Welsh, 75, 142, 220.

Carlyle, Thomas, 73, 75, 79, 89, 141, 142, 165, 167, 190, 191,
220.

Channing, W. Ellery, 81, 98, 114.

Cheney, Arthur, 216.

Cheney, Ednah D., 114.

Child, Lydia M., 265, 266.

Childs, George W., 64.

Choate, Rufus, 288.

Cicero, 45.

Clapp, Henry, 185.

Clarke, James Freeman, 72, 114.

Clarke, Sara, 205.

Clemens, Samuel L., 232, 233, =244-257=, 305.

Clemens, Mrs. S. L., 245 _ff._

Cobden, Richard, 177.

Cody, William F., 294.

Colchester (medium), 168, 169, 170.

Collins, Charles, 168.

Collins, Mrs. Charles (daughter of Dickens), 190.

Collins, W. Wilkie, 145, 189.

Collyer, Robert, 215.

Conway, Judge, 219.

Cooke, George W., 120.

Crabbe, George, 186.

Crawford, Thomas, 264.

Crawford, Mrs. Thomas, 264, 265.

Cubas, Isabella, 22, 23.

Curtis, George William, 14, 33, =184=, 188.

Curtis, Mrs. G. W., 14.

Cushing, Caleb, 266, 267.

Cushman, Charlotte, 123, =219-222=.

Dana, Charlotte, 161.

Dana, Richard H., Jr., 93, 95, 116, 144, 250, 278.

Dana, Mrs. R. H., Jr. 92, 93.

Dana, Sallie, 161.

Daniel, George, 95.

Dante Alighieri, 258.

Davidson, Edith, 99.

Davis, George T., 19, 20.

Dennet, of the _Nation_, 127.

De Normandie, James, 81.

Dewey, Dr., 219.

Dickens, Bessy, 194.

Dickens, Catherine (Hogarth), 160.

Dickens, Charles, in America, 138-188; his readings, 140, 144,
145, 152, 157, 171, 172, 181, 182; letters of, to =J. T. F.=,
150, 191; 12, 32, 33, 118, 119, 120, =135-195=, 209, 210, 211,
212, 223, 240.

Dickens, Charles, Jr., 194.

Dickens, John, 175.

Dickens, Mary: quoted, 193; 140, 164, 169, 194.

Dickinson, Lowes, 232.

Dodge, Mary Abigail, 144, 220, 221.

Dolby, George, 136, 138, 139, 140, 143, 144, 149, 150, 161,
162, 165, 166, 171, 173, 178, 180, 185, 189, 190.

Donne, Father, 102.

Donne, John, 95.

Dorr, Charles, 149, 209.

Dorr, Mrs. Charles, 35, 149, 150, 209, 215.

Dryden, John, 109.

Dufferin, Earl of, 163.

Dumas, Alex., 211.

Dumas, Alex., _fils._, 211.

Du Maurier, George, 300.

Dunn, Rev. Mr., 122.

Ecce Homo, 167.

Eliot, Charles W., 41.

Eliotson, Dr., 182, 183.

Ellsler, Fanny, 24.

Emerson, Edith, 89, 91. And _see_ Forbes, Edith (Emerson).

Emerson, Edward W., 94, 103, 104.

Emerson, Ellen, 88, 94, 96, 97, 99, 100, 103, 104.

Emerson, Lilian (Jackson), letter of, to =Mrs. F.=, 88; 61, 62,
89, 94, 95, 99, 101, 203.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, letter of, to =J. T. F.=, 87; 14, 15
_n._, 24, 61, 62, 67, 73, 74, 79, 83, 84, =86-105=, 130, 131,
141, =158=, 161, 165, 203, 206, 238, 239, =289=.

Emerson, W. R., 219.

England, Hawthorne on, 59, 60.

Everett, Edward, 116, 270, 271.

Everett, William, 270.

_Every Saturday_, 197.

Falstaff, Sir John, 110.

Fechter, Charles, 139, 146, 148, 149, 159, 179, 190, 191, =209=
_ff._

Field, John W., 124.

Field, Kate, 152, 259, 260, 261.

Fielding, Henry, _Tom Jones_, 110, 111.

Fields, Annie, disposition of her papers, 3; her Journals, 4,
12; H. James quoted on, 5; marriage, 11; her neighbors, 11;
and Leigh Hunt, 15, 16; letter of Holmes to, on her memorial
volume, 50, 51; her books, 53; H. James, Sr., quoted on,
85; “Thunderbolt Hill,” 101; her character as revealed in
her diary, 132-134; her championship of Dickens, 156, 157;
the variety of her friendships, 196 _ff._; her ode for the
installation of the Music Hall organ, 219, 220, 221; with =J.
T. F.=, visits Mark Twain at Hartford, 246 _ff._; and the cause
of equal rights for women, 275, 278; her skill in digesting
reports of conversations, 279, 280; her intimate friendship
with Miss Jewett, 281 _ff._; her poetry, 285, 286; list of her
published prose works, 286; friends of her later years, 288;
travelling with Miss Jewett, 289 _ff._; and the President of
Haiti, 290, 291; visits Mistral, 293-297; visits H. James, Jr.,
at Rye, 297-301; quoted, on Miss Jewett, 302; her last years,
301, 305; the last words in her diary, 305; her death, 305.
_James T. Field: Biographical Notes_, 4, 13, 16, 50; _Authors
and Friends_, 4, 31, 86, 87, 105, 129, 134, 279; _A Shelf of
Old Books_, 12 _n._; _Hawthorne_, 54.

Fields, Eliza J. (Willard), 11.

FIELDS, JAMES T., early days in Boston, 10, 11, 196; marries
Annie Adams, 11; their home on Charles St., 11, 12, 137, 138,
218, 219; editor of the _Atlantic_, 14, 58, 67, 87, 107, 111,
119, 191 _n._, 233, 282; as _raconteur_, 21; Holmes quoted on
his position in the literary world, 34; retires from business,
40; H. James, Sr., quoted on, 85; his love of the theatre and
stage folk, 196, 197; his death, 280; fosters =Mrs. F.’s=
friendship with Miss Jewett, 283. _Yesterdays with Authors_, 4,
54, 55, 62, 137, 176 _n._, 190.

Fields, Osgood & Co., 10.

Fiske, John, 48.

Forbes, Edith (Emerson), 91.

Forbes, William H., 91.

Forrest, Edwin, 207, 218.

Forrest, Mrs. Edwin, 218.

Forster, John, 154, 160, 163, 171, 213.

Foster, Charlotte, 259.

Frothingham, Octavius B., 274.

Froude, James A., 68, 293.

Fuller, Margaret, 24, 239.

Fulton, J. D., 122.

Furness, William H., 101 _n._, 102, 103.

Garrett (impressario), 214.

Gaskell, Elizabeth C. S., 131.

Godwin, Mrs. William, 16.

Goethe, Johann W. von, _Wilhelm Meister_, 132, 133.

Gorges, Sir F., 74.

Gounod, Charles, 44.

Grant, Julia Dent, 159.

Grant, Ulysses S., 159, 262.

Grau, Maurice, 222.

Greene, George W., 19, 20, 44, 45, 47, 126, 141, 256, 258, 260.

Gregory, Lady, 218.

Guiney, Louise Imogen, 288.

Haiti, President of, 290, 291.

Hale, Edward E., 93.

Hale, John P., 261.

Hallam, Henry, 89.

Hamilton, Gail. _See_ Dodge, Mary Abigail.

Hammersley, Mr., 247.

_Harper’s Weekly_, 14.

Harris, William T., 81.

Harte, F. Bret, 117, =233-243=.

Harte, Mrs. F. B., 239, 240.

Harvard College, Commemoration Day at, 36 _n._

Hawthorne, Julian, 15, 144.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel, death of, 27, 28, 67; letters of, to =J.
T. F.=, 54, 55, 56; his last letter, 65-67; =13=, =14=, =15=
and _n._, =18=, 19, 30, 32, 33, =54-72=, 97, =105=, 127, =236=.

Hawthorne, Sophia (Peabody), letter to =Mrs. F.= on Hawthorne,
70-72; 61, 65, 66, 67, 68, 91, 144, 246.

Hawthorne, Una, 15, 97, 221.

Hawthorne, E. M., sister of Nathaniel, 69.

Hayes, Isaac I., 33, 34.

Herbert, George, 95.

Herrick, Robert, 95.

Higginson, Thomas W., 114.

Hill, Thomas, 92.

Hillard, George S. 17, 18, 19, 143.

Hoar, Ebenezer R., 37, 90, 91, 141.

Hogarth, Georgina, quoted, 193, 194; 140, 155, 165, 195.

Holmes, Amelia (Jackson), 30, 34, 39, 40, 41, 51, 153, 203,
213, 214, 221.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, his relations with the Fieldses,
generally, =17-52=; letters of, to =J. T. F.=, 17, 49, and to
=Mrs. F.=, 50; 11, 13, 54, 90, 94, 96, 110, 111 _n_., 115, 116,
117, 118, 135, 141, 142, 203, 205, 206, 207, 208, 221, 256,
257, 273, 288.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr., 21, 31.

Home (medium), 163, 168.

Horace, 238.

Howe, Julia Ward, =9=, =10=, 61, 90, 114 and _n._, 221.

Howe, Laura (Mrs. Richards), 150.

Howe, Samuel G., 219, 273.

Howells, William D., 38, 116, 166.

Howes, Miss, 236.

Howison, George H., 81.

Hunt, Henry, 48.

Hunt, Leigh, 15, 16, 58, 122.

Hunt, T. Sterry, 199.

Hunt, William M., 96, =97-99=, =230=, =232=.

Hunt, Mrs. W. M., 96, 98, 222, 230.

Hyacinthe, Père, 44.

Ingelow, Jean, 142.

Jackson, Charles T., 94 and _n._

James, Alice, 77, 81, 83.

James, George Abbot, 42.

James, Henry, Sr., letter of, to =J. T. F.=, 82, and to =Mrs.
F.=, 83, 85; =72-85=.

James, Mrs. Henry, 75, 77, 81.

James, Henry, Jr., quoted, 6, 7, 137, 281; letter of, to
author, 8, 9; 119, 120, =297-301=.

Jan (Booth’s servant), 200, 202.

Jefferson, Joseph, =203-208=, 247.

Jewett, Sarah Orne, her intimate relations with =Mrs. F.=, 281
_ff._, 302-304; her early days, 281, 282; her literary work,
282-284; correspondence with =Mrs. F.=, 288, 289; H. James on
her work, 300; her death, 302; 12, 50.

Johnson, Andrew, impeachment of, 159; 261, 262, 263.

Johnson, Samuel, 60.

Jonson, Ben, 96.

Julius Cæsar, 45.

Keats, John, 43, 68, 206, 207.

Kellogg, Elijah, 271, 272.

Kemble, Charles, 196.

Kemble, Frances Anne, 196, 222, 223, 224

Kennard, Mr., 267, 268.

King, Preston, 262, 263.

Kirkup, Seymour S., 258.

Knowlton, Helen M., 232.

Lamartine, Alphonse de, 296, 297.

Lamb, Charles, 270.

Landor, Walter Savage, 259-261.

Langdon, Mr., Mark Twain’s father-in-law, 245.

Langdon, Mrs., 246.

Larcom, Lucy, 70.

Lathrop, George P., 97.

Lathrop, Rose (Hawthorne), quoted, 67 _n._; 97, 144.

Lear, Edward, 280.

Leclercq, Carlotta, 216.

Lemaître, Frédérick, 178, 179, 180, 211.

Lincoln, Abraham, assassination of, 28, 198; 55, 56, 77, 262,
263.

Livermore, Mary A., 275-278.

Locke, David R., 33.

Longfellow, Alice, 42, 96, 224.

Longfellow, Charles, 128, 216.

Longfellow, Edith, 42, 213, 214.

Longfellow, Mrs. Ernest W., 42.

Longfellow, Henry W., 13, 19, 33, 34, =35=, 39, 42, 43, =44=,
45, 46, 47, 48, =60= and _n._, 90, 96, =97=, 98, 99, 109, 115,
116, =117=, =119=, 123, 124, =125=, =126=, 127, =128=, =129=,
141, 144, 152, =153=, =159=, =160=, =161=, 172, 205, 206, 207,
=208=, 209, 211, =212= and _n._, =213=, =214=, =215=, 216,
=222=, =223=, 224, =243=, 256, 257, 258, 273.

Longfellow, Mrs. H. W., 55, 223.

Longfellow, Samuel, 42, 212 _n._

Loring, Charles G., 36 _n._

Lowell, Frances (Dunbar), 123, 124.

Lowell, James Russell, letters of, to =J. T. F.=, 107, 108,
112, 113, 120, 141 _n._; =5=, 13, =33=, 34, 35, =36= _n._,
=90=, =92=, =93=, =94=, =95=, 104, =105=, =106=, =107= _ff._,
116, =117=, =123=, =124=, 126, 127, =149=, 159, 163, 164, 166,
243, 273.

Lowell, Mabel, 107, 113, 123, 124, 149.

Lunt, George, 214.

Luther, Martin, 89.

Lytton, Edward Bulwer, Lord, 168, 176, 177.

Macready, William, 218.

Maistre, Joseph de, 221.

Mars, Anne F. H., 210, 211.

Mathews, Charles, 207.

Merivale, Herman, 95.

Miller, Joaquin, 43, 126.

Milton, John, 74.

Mistral, Frédéric, 293-297.

Mistral, Mme. Frédéric, 295, 296, 297.

Mitchell, Donald G., 185.

Mitford, Mary R., 98.

Montaigne, Michel de, 112, 238, 239.

Morton, W. T. G., 94 and _n._

Motley, J. Lothrop, 37.

Mott, Lucretia C., 74.

Murdoch, James E., 217, 218.

Music Hall, Boston, great organ in, 219, 220, 221.

“Nasby, Petroleum V.” _See_ Locke, D. R.

Nichol, Professor, 90.

Nilsson, Christine, 214, =224-226=.

Norton, Caroline (Sheridan), 46.

Norton, Charles Eliot, 92, 103, 104, 141, 144, 172, 185, 187.

Norton, Mrs. C. E., 163.

O’Brien, Fitz-James, 227-229.

O’Connell, Daniel, 173, 176, 177.

Orsay, Count d’, 145.

Osgood, James R., 116, 136, 151, 153, 161, 162, 165, 166, 167,
185.

Parker, Harvey D., 206.

Parkman, Francis, 104, 105.

Parkman, Mrs. Francis, 35.

Parkman, George, murder of, 153.

Parsons, Thomas W., 208, 214.

Parton, James, 110, 111, 232.

Peabody, Elizabeth, 82, 119.

Pedro, Dom, Emperor of Brazil, 127, 128.

Perabo, Ernst, 224.

Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart, 275.

Phi Beta Kappa, Harvard (1868), 36, 37; 92.

Phillips, Wendell, 89, 114.

Phipps, Colonel, 188, 189.

Pickwick, Mr., 111.

Pierce, Franklin, Hawthorne’s loyalty to, 13, 14, 15; 57, 58,
67.

Pierce, Mrs. Franklin, death of, 57, 58.

Pierce, Henry L., 229, 290.

Poore, Ben Perle, 266.

Pratt, Mrs. Ellerton, 288.

Prescott, Harriet (Mrs. Spofford), 58.

Putnam, George, 36 _n._, 213.

Putnam, John P., 221.

Quincy, Edmund, 86, 273.

Quincy, Josiah, 85, 275, 276, 277.