Chapter VI: Part 6

And now enough of questioning. Alas, alas, I have a quite other batch of sad and saddest considerations,--on which I must not so much as enter at present! Death has been very busy in this little circle of ours within these few days. You remember Charles Buller, to whom I brought you over that night at the Barings' in Stanhope Street? He died this day week, almost quite unexpectedly; a sore loss to all that knew him personally, and his gladdening sunny presence in many circles here; a sore loss to the political people too, for he was far the cleverest of all Whig men, and indeed the only genial soul one can remember in that department of things.* We buried him yesterday; and now see what new thing has come. Lord Ashburton, who had left his mother well in Hampshire ten hours before, is summoned from poor Buller's funeral by telegraph; hurries back, finds his mother, whom he loved much, already dead! She was a Miss Bingham, I think, from Pennsylvania, perhaps from Philadelphia itself. You saw her; but the first sight by no means told one all or the best worth that was in that good Lady. We are quite bewildered by our own regrets, and by the far painfuler sorrow of those closely related to these sudden sorrows. Of which let me be silent for the present;--and indeed of all things else, for _speech,_ inadequate mockery of one's poor meaning, is quite a burden to me just now!

--------- * The reader of Carlyle's _Reminiscences,_ and of Froude's volumes of his biography, is familiar with the close relations that had existed between Buller and Carlyle. ----------

Neuberg* comes hither sometimes; a welcome, wise kind of man. Poor little Espinasse still toils cheerily at the oar, and various friends of yours are about us. Brother John did send through Chapman all the _Dante,_ which we calculate you have received long ago: he is now come to Town; doing a Preface, &c., which also will be sent to you, and just about publishing.-- Helps, who has been alarmingly ill, and touring on the Rhine since we were his guests, writes to me yesterday from Hampshire about sending you a new Book of his. I instructed him How.

Adieu, dear Emerson; do not forget us, or forget to think as kindly as you can of us, while we continue in this world together.

Yours ever affectionately,
T. Carlyle

--------- * Mr. Ireland, in his _Recollections,_ p. 62, gives an interesting account of Mr. Neuberg,--a highly cultivated German, who assisted Carlyle in some of the later literary labors of his life. Neuberg died in 1867, and in a letter to his sister of that year Carlyle says: "No kinder friend had I in this world; no man of my day, I believe, had so faithful, loyal, and willing a helper as he generously was to me for the last twenty or more years." -----------

CXXXIX. Emerson to Carlyle

Boston, 28 January, 1849

My Dear Carlyle,--Here in Boston for the day, though in no fit place for writing, you shall have, since the steamer goes tomorrow, a hasty answer to at least one of your questions....

You tell me heavy news of your friends, and of those who were friendly to me for your sake. And I have found farther particulars concerning them in the newspapers. Buller I have known by name ever since he was in America with Lord Durham, and I well remember his face and figure at Mr. Baring's. Even England cannot spare an accomplished man.

Since I had your letter, and, I believe, by the same steamer, your brother's _Dante,_* complete within and without, has come to me, most welcome. I heartily thank him. 'T is a most workmanlike book, bearing every mark of honest value. I thank him for myself, and I thank him, in advance, for our people, who are sure to learn their debt to him, in the coming months and years. I sent the book, after short examination, the same day, to New York, to the Harpers, lest their edition should come out without Prolegomena. But they answered, the next day, that they had already received directly the same matter;--yet have not up to this time returned my book. For the Indian corn,--I have been to see Dr. Charles T. Jackson (my wife's brother, and our best chemist, inventor of etherization), who tells me that the reason your meal is bitter is, that all the corn sent to you from us is kiln-dried here, usually at a heat of three hundred degrees, which effectually kills the starch or diastase (?) which would otherwise become sugar. This drying is thought necessary to prevent the corn from becoming musty in the contingency of a long voyage. He says, if it should go in the steamer, it would arrive sound without previous drying. I think I will try that experiment, shortly on a box or a barrel of our Concord maize, as Lidian Emerson confidently engages to send you accurate recipes for johnny-cake, mush, and hominy.

--------- * The _Inferno_ of Dante, a translation in prose by John Carlyle; an excellent piece of work, still in demand. ---------

Why did you not send me word of Clough's hexameter poem, which I have now received and read with much joy.* But no, you will never forgive him his metres. He is a stout, solid, reliable man and friend,--I knew well; but this fine poem has taken me by surprise. I cannot find that your journals have yet discovered its existence. With kindest remembrances to Jane Carlyle, and new thanks to John Carlyle, your friend,

--R.W. Emerson

---------- * "The Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich." ----------

CXL. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 19 April, 1849

My Dear Emerson,--Today is American Postday; and by every rule and law,--even if all laws but those of Cocker were abolished from this universe,--a word from me is due to you! Twice I have heard since I spoke last: prompt response about the Philadelphia Bill; exact performance of your voluntary promise,--Indian Corn itself is now here for a week past....

Still more interesting is the barrel of genuine Corn ears,-- Indian Cobs of edible grain, from the Barn of Emerson himself! It came all safe and right, according to your charitable program; without cost or trouble to us of any kind; not without curious interest and satisfaction! The recipes contained in the precedent letter, duly weighed by the competent jury of housewives (at least by my own Wife and Lady Ashburton), were judged to be of decided promise, reasonable-looking every one of them; and now that the stuff itself is come, I am happy to assure you that it forms a new epoch for us all in the Maize department: we find the grain _sweet,_ among the sweetest, with a touch even of the taste of _nuts_ in it, and profess with contrition that properly we have never tasted Indian Corn before. Millers of due faculty (with millstones of _iron_) being scarce in the Cockney region, and even cooks liable to err, the Ashburtons have on their resources undertaken the brunt of the problem one of their own Surrey or Hampshire millers is to grind the stuff, and their own cook, a Frenchman commander of a whole squadron, is to undertake the dressing according to the rules. Yesterday the Barrel went off to their country place in Surrey,-- a small Bag of select ears being retained here, for our own private experimenting;--and so by and by we shall see what comes of it.--I on my side have already drawn up a fit proclamation of the excellences of this invaluable corn, and admonitions as to the benighted state of English eaters in regard to it;--to appear in _Fraser's Magazine,_ or I know not where, very soon. It is really a small contribution towards World-History, this small act of yours and ours: there is no doubt to me, now that I taste the real grain, but all Europe will henceforth have to rely more and more upon your Western Valleys and this article. How beautiful to think of lean tough Yankee settlers, tough as gutta-percha, with most occult unsubduable fire in their belly, steering over the Western Mountains, to annihilate the jungle, and bring bacon and corn out of it for the Posterity of Adam! The Pigs in about a year eat up all the rattlesnakes for miles round: a most judicious function on the part of the Pigs. Behind the Pigs comes Jonathan with his all-conquering ploughshare,--glory to him too! Oh, if we were not a set of Cant-ridden blockheads, there is no _Myth_ of Athene or Herakles equal to this _fact;_--which I suppose _will_ find its real "Poets" some day or other; when once the Greek, Semitic, and multifarious other Cobwebs are swept away a little! Well, we must wait.--For the rest, if this skillful Naturalist and you will make any more experiments on Indian Corn for us, might I not ask that you would try for a method of preserving _the meal_ in a sound state for us? Oatmeal, which would spoil directly too, is preserved all year by kiln-drying the grain before it is ground,--parching it till it is almost _brown,_ sometimes the Scotch Highlanders, by intense parching, can keep their oatmeal good for a series of years. No Miller here at present is likely to produce such beautiful meal as some of the American specimens I have seen:--if possible, we must learn to get the grain over in the shape of proper durable meal. At all events, let your Friend charitably make some inquiry into the process of millerage, the possibilities of it for meeting our case;--and send us the result some day, on a separate bit of paper. With which let us end, for the present.

Alas, I have yet written nothing; am yet a long way off writing, I fear! Not for want of matter, perhaps, but for redundance of it; I feel as if I had the whole world to write yet, with the day fast bending downwards on me, and did not know where to begin,--in what manner to address the deep-sunk populations of the Theban Land. Any way my Life is very _grim,_ on these terms, and is like to be; God only knows what farther quantity of braying in the mortar this foolish clay of mine may yet need!-- They are printing a third Edition of _Cromwell;_ that bothered me for some weeks, but now I am over with that, and the Printer wholly has it: a sorrowful, not now or ever a joyful thing to me, that. The _stupor_ of my fellow blockheads, for Centuries back, presses too heavy upon that,--as upon many things, O Heavens! People are about setting up some _Statue of Cromwell,_ at St. Ives, or elsewhere: the King-Hudson Statue is never yet set up; and the King himself (as you may have heard) has been _discovered_ swindling. I advise all men not to erect a statue for Cromwell just now. Macaulay's _History_ is also out, running through the fourth edition: did I tell you last time that I had read it,--with wonder and amazement? Finally, it seems likely Lord John Russell will shortly walk out (forever, it is hoped), and Sir R. Peel come in; to make what effort is in him towards delivering us from the _pedant_ method of treating Ireland. The _beginning,_ as I think, of salvation (if he can prosper a little) to England, and to all Europe as well. For they will all have to learn that man does need government, and that an able- bodied starving beggar is and remains (whatever Exeter Hall may say to it) a _Slave_ destitute of a _Master;_ of which facts England, and convulsed Europe, are fallen foundly ignorant in these bad ages, and will plunge ever deeper till they rediscover the same. Alas, alas, the Future for us is not to be made of _butter,_ as the Platforms prophesy; I think it will be harder than steel for some ages! No noble age was ever a soft one, nor ever will or can be.--Your beautiful curious little discourse (report of a discourse) about the English was sent me by Neuberg; I thought it, in my private heart, one of the best words (for _hidden_ genius lodged in it) I had ever heard; so sent it to the _Examiner,_ from which it went to the _Times_ and all the other Papers: an excellent sly little word.

Clough has gone to Italy; I have seen him twice,--could not manage his hexameters, though I like the man himself, and hope much of him. "Infidelity" has broken out in Oxford itself,--immense emotion in certain quarters in consequence, virulent outcries about a certain "Sterling Club," altogether a secular society!

Adieu, dear Emerson; I had much more to say, but there is no room. O, forgive me, forgive me all trespasses,--and love me what you can!

Yours ever,
T. Carlyle

CXLI. Carlyle to Emerson

Scotsbrig, Ecclefechan, N.B., 13 August, 1849

Dear Emerson,--By all laws of human computation, I owe you a letter, and have owed, any time these seven weeks: let me now pay a little, and explain. Your _second_ Barrel of Indian Corn arrived also perfectly fresh, and of admirable taste and quality; the very bag of new-ground meal was perfect; and the "popped corn" ditto, when it came to be discovered: with the whole of which admirable materials such order was taken as promised to secure "the greatest happiness to the greatest number"; and due silent thanks were tendered to the beneficence of the unwearied Sender:--but all this, you shall observe, had to be done in the thick of a universal packing and household bustle; I just on the wing for a "Tour in Ireland," my Wife too contemplating a run to Scotland shortly after, there to meet me on my return. All this was seven good weeks ago: I hoped somewhere in my Irish wayfarings to fling you off a Letter; but alas, I reckoned there quite without my host (strict "host," called _Time_), finding nowhere half a minute left to me; and so now, having got home to my Mother, not to see my Wife yet for some days, it is my _earliest_ leisure, after all, that I employ in this purpose. I have been terribly knocked about too,--jolted in Irish cars, bothered almost to madness with Irish balderdash, above all kept on dreadfully short allowance of sleep;--so that now first, when fairly down to rest, all aches and bruises begin to be fairly sensible; and my clearest feeling at this present is the uncomfortable one, "that I am not Caliban, but a Cramp": terribly cramped indeed, if I could tell you everything!

What the other results of this Irish Tour are to be for me I cannot in the least specify. For one thing, I seem to be farther from _speech_ on any subject than ever: such masses of chaotic ruin everywhere fronted me, the general fruit of long-continued universal falsity and folly; and such mountains of delusion yet possessing all hearts and tongues I could do little that was not even _noxious,_ except _admire_ in silence the general "Bankruptcy of Imposture" as one there finds and sees it come to pass, and think with infinite sorrow of the tribulations, futile wrestlings, tumults, and disasters which yet await that unfortunate section of Adam's Posterity before any real improvement can take place among them. Alas, alas! The Gospels of Political Economy, of _Laissez-faire,_ No-Government, Paradise to all comers, and so many fatal Gospels,--generally, one may say, all the Gospels of this blessed "New Era,"--will first have to be tried, and found wanting. With a quantity of written and uttered nonsense, and of suffered and inflicted misery, which one sinks fairly dumb to estimate! A kind of comfort it is, however, to see that "Imposture" _has_ fallen openly "bankrupt," here as everywhere else in our old world; that no dexterity of human tinkering, with all the Parliamentary Eloquence and Elective Franchises in nature, will ever set it on its feet again, to go many yards more; but that _its_ goings and currencies in this Earth have as good as ceased for ever and ever! God is great; all Lies do now, as from the first, travel incessantly towards Chaos, and there at length lodge! In some parts of Ireland (the Western "insolvent Unions," some twenty-seven of them in all), within a trifle of _one half_ of the whole population are on Poor-Law rations (furnished by the British Government, L1,100 a week furnished here, L1,300 there, L800 there); the houses stand roofless, the lands unstocked, uncultivated, the landlords hidden from bailiffs, living sometimes "on the hares of their domain": such a state of things was never witnessed under this sky before; and, one would humbly expect, cannot last long!--What is to be done? asks every one; incapable of _hearing_ any answer, were there even one ready for imparting to him. "_Blacklead_ these two million idle beggars," I sometimes advised, "and sell them in Brazil as Niggers,--perhaps Parliament, on sweet constraint, will allow you to advance them to be Niggers!" In fact, the Emancipation Societies should send over a deputation or two to look at _these_ immortal Irish "Freemen," the _ne plus ultra_ of their class it would perhaps moderate the windpipe of much eloquence one hears on that subject! Is not this the most illustrious of all "ages"; making progress of the species at a grand rate indeed? Peace be with it.

Waiting for me here, there was a Letter from Miss Fuller in Rome, written about a month ago; a dignified and interesting Letter; requesting help with Booksellers for some "History of the late Italian Revolution" she is about writing; and elegiacally recognizing the worth of Mazzini and other cognate persons and things. I instantly set about doing what little seemed in my power towards this object,--with what result is yet hidden, and have written to the heroic Margaret: "More power to her elbow!" as the Irish say. She has a beautiful enthusiasm; and is perhaps in the right stage of insight for doing that piece of business well.--Of other persons or interests I will say nothing till a calmer opportunity; which surely cannot be very long in coming.

In four days I am to rejoin my wife; after which some bits of visits are to be paid in this North Country; necessary most of them, not likely to be profitable almost any. In perhaps a month I expect to be back in Chelsea; whither direct a word if you are still beneficent enough to think of such a Castaway!

Yours ever,
T. Carlyle

I got Thoreau's Book; and meant well to read it, but have not yet succeeded, though it went with me through all Ireland: tell him so, please. Too Jean-Paulish, I found it hitherto.

CXLII. Carlyle to Emerson Chelsea, 19 July, 1850

My Dear Emerson, My Friend, my Friend,--You behold before you a remorseful man! It is well-nigh a year now since I despatched some hurried rag of paper to you out of Scotland, indicating doubtless that I would speedily follow it with a longer letter; and here, when gray Autumn is at hand again, I have still written nothing to you, heard nothing from you! It is miserable to think of:--and yet it is a fact, and there is no denying of it; and so we must let it lie. If it please Heaven, the like shall not occur again. "Ohone Arooh!" as the Irish taught me to say, "Ohone Arooh!"

The fact is, my life has been black with care and toil,--labor above board and far worse labor below;--I have hardly had a heavier year (overloaded too with a kind of "health" which may be called frightful): to "burn my own smoke" in some measure, has really been all I was up to; and except on sheer immediate compulsion I have not written a word to any creature.-- Yesternight I finished the last of these extraordinary _Pamphlets;_ am about running off somewhither into the deserts, of Wales or Scotland, Scandinavia or still remoter deserts;--and my first signal of revived reminiscence is to you.

Nay I have not at any time forgotten you, be that justice done the unfortunate: and though I see well enough what a great deep cleft divides us, in our ways of practically looking at this world,--I see also (as probably you do yourself) where the rock- strata, miles deep, unite again; and the two poor souls are at one. Poor devils!--Nay if there were no point of agreement at all, and I were more intolerant "of ways of thinking" than I even am,--yet has not the man Emerson, from old years, been a Human Friend to me? Can I ever forget, or think otherwise than lovingly of the man Emerson? No more of this. Write to me in your first good hour; and say that there is still a brother-soul left to me alive in this world, and a kind thought surviving far over the sea!--Chapman, with due punctuality at the time of publication, sent me the _Representative Men;_ which I read in the becoming manner: you now get the Book offered you for a shilling, at all railway stations; and indeed I perceive the word "representative man"' (as applied to the late tragic loss we have had in Sir Robert Peel) has been adopted by the Able- Editors, and circulates through Newspapers as an appropriate household word, which is some compensation to you for the piracy you suffer from the Typographic Letter-of-marque men here. I found the Book a most finished clear and perfect set of _Engravings in the line manner;_ portraitures full of _likeness,_ and abounding in instruction and materials for reflection to me: thanks always for such a Book; and Heaven send us many more of them. _Plato,_ I think, though it is the most admired by many, did least for me: little save Socrates with his clogs and big ears remains alive with me from it. _Swedenborg_ is excellent in _likeness;_ excellent in many respects;--yet I said to myself, on reaching your general conclusion about the man and his struggles: "_Missed_ the consummate flower and divine ultimate elixir of Philosophy, say you? By Heaven, in clutching at _it,_ and almost getting it, he has tumbled into Bedlam,--which is a terrible _miss,_ if it were never so _near!_ A miss fully as good as a mile, I should say!" --In fact, I generally dissented a little about the _end_ of all these Essays; which was notable, and not without instructive interest to me, as I had so lustily shouted "Hear, hear!" all the way from the beginning up to that stage.--On the whole, let us have another Book with your earliest convenience: that is the modest request one makes of you on shutting this.

I know not what I am now going to set about: the horrible barking of the universal dog-kennel (awakened by these _Pamphlets_) must still itself again; my poor nerves must recover themselves a little:--I have much more to say; and by Heaven's blessing must try to get it said in some way if I live.--

Bostonian Prescott is here, infinitely _lionized_ by a mob of gentlemen; I have seen him in two places or three (but forbore speech): the Johnny-cake is good, the twopence worth of currants in it too are good; but if you offer it as a bit of baked Ambrosia, _Ach Gott!_--

Adieu, dear Emerson, forgive, and love me a little.

Yours ever,
T. Carlyle

CXLIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 14 November, 1850

Dear Emerson,--You are often enough present to my thoughts; but yesterday there came a little incident which has brought you rather vividly upon the scene for me. A certain "Mr. ---" from Boston sends us, yesterday morning by post, a Note of yours addressed to Mazzini, whom he cannot find; and indicates that he retains a similar one addressed to myself, and (in the most courteous, kindly, and dignified manner, if Mercy prevent not) is about carrying it off with him again to America! To give Mercy a chance, I by the first opportunity get under way for Morley's Hotel, the address of Mr. ---; find there that Mr.--, since morning, _has been_ on the road towards Liverpool and America, and that the function of Mercy is quite extinct in this instance! My reflections as I wandered home again were none of the pleasantest. Of this Mr. --- I had heard some tradition, as of an intelligent, accomplished, and superior man; such a man's acquaintance, of whatever complexion he be, is and was always a precious thing to me, well worth acquiring where possible; not to say that any friend of yours, whatever his qualities otherwise, carries with him an imperative key to all bolts and locks of mine, real or imaginary. In fact I felt punished;--and who knows, if the case were seen into, whether I deserve it? What "business" it was that deprived me of a call from Mr. ---, or of the possibility of calling on him, I know very well,--and ---, the little dog, and others know! But the fact in that matter is very far different indeed from the superficial semblance; and I appeal to all the _gentlemen_ that are in America for a candid interpretation of the same. "Eighteen million bores,"--good Heavens don't I know how many of that species we also have; and how with us, as with you, the difference between them and the Eighteen thousand noble-men and non-bores is immeasurable and inconceivable; and how, with us as with you, the _latter_ small company, sons of the Empyrean, will have to fling the former huge one, sons of Mammon and Mud, into some kind of chains again, reduce them to some kind of silence again,--unless the old Mud-Demons are to rise and devour us all? Truly it is so I construe it: and if --- and the Eighteen millions are well justified in their anger at me, and the Eighteen thousand owe me thanks and new love. That is my decided opinion, in spite of you all! And so, along with ---, probably in the same ship with him, there shall go my protest against the conduct of ---; and the declaration that to the last I will protest! Which will wind up the matter (without any word of yours on it) at this time.--For the rest, though --- sent me his Pamphlet, it is a fact I have not read a word of it, nor shall ever read. My Wife read it; but I was away, with far other things in my head; and it was "lent to various persons" till it died!--Enough and ten times more than enough of all that. Let me on this last slip of paper give you some response to the Letter* I got in Scotland, under the silence of the bright autumn sun, in my Mother's house, and read there.

-------- * This letter is missing. --------

You are bountiful abundantly in your reception of those _Latter Day Pamphlets;_ and right in all you say of them;--and yet withal you are not right, my Friend, but I am! Truly it does behove a man to know the inmost resources of this universe, and, for the sake both of his peace and of his dignity, to possess his soul in patience, and look nothing doubting (nothing wincing even, if that be his humor) upon all things. For it is most indubitable there is good in all;--and if you even see an Oliver Cromwell assassinated, it is certain you may get a cartload of turnips from his carcass. Ah me, and I suppose we had too much forgotten all this, or there had not been a man like you sent to show it us so emphatically! Let us well remember it; and yet remember too that it is _not_ good always, or ever, to be "at ease in Zion"; good often to be in fierce rage in Zion; and that the vile Pythons of this Mud-World do verily require to have sun-arrows shot into them and red-hot pokers struck through them, according to occasion: woe to the man that carries either of these weapons, and does not use it in their presence! Here, at this moment, a miserable Italian organ-grinder has struck up the _Marseillaise_ under my window, for example: was the _Marseillaise_ fought out on a bed of down, or is it worth nothing when fought? On those wretched _Pamphlets_ I set no value at all, or even less than none: to me their one benefit is, my own heart is clear of them (a benefit not to be despised, I assure you!)--and in the Public, athwart this storm of curses, and emptyings of vessels of dishonor, I can already perceive that it is all well enough there too in reference to them; and the controversy of the Eighteen millions _versus_ the Eighteen thousands, or Eighteen units, is going on very handsomely in that quarter of it, for aught I can see! And so, Peace to the brave that are departed; and, Tomorrow to fresh fields and pastures new!--

I was in Wales, as well as Scotland, during Autumn time; lived three weeks within wind of St. Germanus's old "College" (Fourteen Hundred years of age or so) and also not far from _Merthyr Tydvil,_ Cyclops' Hell, sootiest and horridest avatar of the Industrial Mammon I had ever anywhere seen; went through the Severn Valley; at Bath stayed a night with Landor (a proud and high old man, who charged me with express remembrances for you); saw Tennyson too, in Cumberland, with his new Wife; and other beautiful recommendable and 'questionable things;--and was dreadfully tossed about, and torn almost to tatters by the manifold brambles of my way: and so at length am here, a much- lamed man indeed! Oh my Friend, have tolerance for me, have sympathy with me; you know not quite (I imagine) what a burden mine is, or perhaps you would find this duty, which you always do, a little easier done! Be happy, be busy beside your still waters, and think kindly of me there. My nerves, health I call them, are in a sad state of disorder: alas, that is nine tenths of all the battle in this world. Courage, courage!--My Wife sends salutations to you and yours. Good be with you all always.

Your affectionate,
T. Carlyle

CXLIV. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 8 July, 1851

Dear Emerson,--Don't you still remember very well that there is such a man? I know you do, and will do. But it is a ruinously long while since we have heard a word from each other;--a state of matters that ought immediately to _cease._ It was your turn, I think, to write? It was somebody's turn! Nay I heard lately you complained of bad eyes; and were grown abstinent of writing. Pray contradict me this. I cannot do without some regard from you while we are both here. Spite of your many sins, you are among the most human of all the beings I now know in the world;-- who are a very select set, and are growing ever more so, I can inform you!

In late months, feeling greatly broken and without heart for anything weighty, I have been upon a _Life of John Sterling;_ which will not be good for much, but will as usual gratify me by taking itself off my hands: it was one of the things I felt a kind of obligation to do, and so am thankful to have done. Here is a patch of it lying by me, if you will look at a specimen. There are four hundred or more pages (prophesies the Printer), a good many _Letters_ and Excerpts in the latter portion of the volume. Already half printed, wholly written; but not to come out for a couple of months yet,--all trade being at a stand till this sublime "Crystal Palace" go its ways again.--And now since we are upon the business, I wish you would mention it to E.P. Clark (is not that the name?) next time you go to Boston: if that friendly clear-eyed man have anything to say in reference to it and American Booksellers, let him say and do; he may have a Copy for anybody in about a month: if _he_ have nothing to say, then let there be nothing anywhere said. For, mark O Philosopher, I expressly and with emphasis prohibit _you_ at this stage of our history, and henceforth, unless I grow poor again. Indeed, indeed, the commercial mandate of the thing (Nature's little order on that behalf) being once fulfilled (by speaking to Clark), I do not care a snuff of tobacco how it goes, and will prefer, here as elsewhere, my night's rest to any amount of superfluous money.

This summer, as you may conjecture, has been very noisy with us, and productive of little,--the "Wind-dust-ry of all Nations" involving everything in one inane tornado. The very shopkeepers complain that there is no trade. Such a sanhedrim of windy fools from all countries of the Globe were surely never gathered in one city before. But they will go their ways again, they surely will! One sits quiet in that faith;--nay, looks abroad with a kind of pathetic grandfatherly feeling over this universal Children's Ball which the British Nation in these extraordinary circumstances is giving it self! Silence above all, silence is very behoveful! I read lately a small old brown French duodecimo, which I mean to send you by the first chance there is. The writer is a Capitaine Bossu; the production, a Journal of his experiences in "La Louisiane," "Oyo" (_Ohio_), and those regions, which looks very genuine, and has a strange interest to me, like some fractional Odyssey or letter.* Only a hundred years ago, and the Mississippi has changed as never valley did: in 1751 older and stranger, looked at from its present date, than Balbec or Nineveh! Say what we will, Jonathan is doing miracles (of a sort) under the sun in these times now passing.--Do you know _Bartram's Travels?_ This is of the Seventies (1770) or so; treats of _Florida_ chiefly, has a wondrous kind of floundering eloquence in it; and has also grown immeasurably _old._ All American libraries ought to provide themselves with that kind of book; and keep them as a kind of future _biblical_ article.-- Finally on this head, can you tell me of any _good_ Book on California? Good: I have read several bad. But that too is worthy of some wonder; that too, like the Old Bucaniers, hungers and thirsts (in ingenuous minds) to have some true record and description given of it.

---------- * Bossu wrote two books which are known to the student of the history of the settlement of America; one, "Nouveaux Voyages aux Indes occidentales," Paris, 1768; the other, "Nouveaux Voyages dans l'Amerique septentrionale," Amsterdam (Paris), 1777. ----------

And poor Miss Fuller, was there any _Life_ ever published of her? or is any competent hand engaged on it? Poor Margaret, I often remember her; and think how she is asleep now under the surges of the sea. Mazzini, as you perhaps know, is with us this summer; comes across once in the week or so, and tells me, or at least my Wife, all his news. The Roman revolution has made a man of him,--quite brightened up ever since;--and the best friend _he_ ever saw, I believe, was that same Quack-President of France, who relieved him while it was still time.

My Brother is in Annandale, working hard over _Dante_ at last; talks of coming up hither shortly; I am myself very ill and miserable in the _liver_ regions; very tough otherwise,--though I have now got spectacles for small print in the twilight. _Eheu fugaces,_--and yet why _Eheu?_ In fact it is better to be silent.--Adieu, dear Emerson; I expect to get a great deal brisker by and by,--and in the first place to have a Missive from Boston again. My Wife sends you many regards. I am as ever,-- affectionately Yours,

--T. Carlyle

CXLV. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 28 July, 1851

My Dear Carlyle,--You must always thank me for silence, be it never so long, and must put on it the most generous interpretations. For I am too sure of your genius and goodness, and too glad that they shine steadily for all, to importune you to make assurance sure by a private beam very often. There is very little in this village to be said to you, and, with all my love of your letters, I think it the kind part to defend you from our imbecilities,--my own, and other men's. Besides, my eyes are bad, and prone to mutiny at any hint of white paper.

And yet I owe you all my story, if story I have. I have been something of a traveler the last year, and went down the Ohio River to its mouth; walked nine miles into, and nine miles out of the Mammoth Cave, in Kentucky,--walked or sailed, for we crossed small underground streams,--and lost one day's light; then steamed up the Mississippi, five days, to Galena. In the Upper Mississippi, you are always in a lake with many islands.

"The Far West" is the right name for these verdant deserts. On all the shores, interminable silent forest. If you land, there is prairie behind prairie, forest behind forest, sites of nations, no nations. The raw bullion of nature; what we call "moral" value not yet stamped on it. But in a thousand miles the immense material values will show twenty or fifty Californias; that a good ciphering head will make one where he is. Thus at Pittsburg, on the Ohio, the "Iron" City, whither, from want of railroads, few Yankees have penetrated, every acre of land has three or four bottoms; first of rich soil; then nine feet of bituminous coal; a little lower, fourteen feet of coal; then iron, or salt; salt springs, with a valuable oil called petroleum floating on their surface. Yet this acre sells for the price of any tillage acre in Massachusetts; and, in a year, the railroads will reach it, east and west.--I came home by the great Northern Lakes and Niagara.

No books, a few lectures, each winter, I write and read. In the spring, the abomination of our Fugitive Slave Bill drove me to some writing and speech-making, without hope of effect, but to clear my own skirts. I am sorry I did not print whilst it was yet time. I am now told that the time will come again, more's the pity. Now I am trying to make a sort of memoir of Margaret Fuller, or my part in one;--for Channing and Ward are to do theirs. Without either beauty or genius, she had a certain wealth and generosity of nature which have left a kind of claim on our consciences to build her a cairn. And this reminds me that I am to write a note to Mazzini on this matter; and, as you say you see him, you must charge yourself with delivering it. What we do must be ended by October. You too are working for Sterling. It is right and kind. I learned so much from the New York _Tribune,_ and, a few days after, was on the point of writing to you, provoked by a foolish paragraph which appeared in Rufus Griswold's Journal, (New York,) purporting that R.W.E. possessed important letters of Sterling, without which Thomas Carlyle could not write the Life. What scrap of hearsay about contents of Sterling's letters to me, or that I had letters, this paltry journalist swelled into this puff-ball, I know not. He once came to my house, and, since that time, may have known Margaret Fuller in New York; but probably never saw any letter of Sterling's or heard the contents of any. I have not read again Sterling's letters, which I keep as good Lares in a special niche, but I have no recollection of anything that would be valuable to you. For the American Public for the Book, I think it important that you should take the precise step of sending Phillips and Sampson the early copy, and at the earliest. I saw them, and also E.P. Clark, and put them in communication, and Clark is to write you at once.

Having got so far in my writing to you, I do not know but I shall gain heart, and write more letters over sea. You will think my sloth suicidal enough. So many men as I learned to value in your country,--so many as offered me opportunities of intercourse,-- and I lose them all by silence. Arthur Helps is a chief benefactor of mine. I wrote him a letter by Ward,--who brought the letter back. I ought to thank John Carlyle, not only for me, but for a multitude of good men and women here who read his _Inferno_ duly. W.E. Forster sent me his Penn Pamphlet; I sent it to Bancroft, who liked it well, only he thought Forster might have made a still stronger case. Clough I prize at a high rate, the man and his poetry, but write not. Wilkinson I thought a man of prodigious talent, who somehow held it and so taught others to hold it cheap, as we do one of those bushel-basket memories which school-boys and school-girls often show,--and we stop their mouths lest they be troublesome with their alarming profusion. But there is no need of beginning to count the long catalogue. Kindest, kindest remembrance to my benefactress, also in your house, and health and strength and victory to you.

Your affectionate,
Waldo Emerson

CXLVI. Carlyle to Emerson

Great Malvern, Worcestershire, 25 August, 1851

Dear Emerson,--Many thanks for your Letter, which found me here about a week ago, and gave a full solution to my bibliopolic difficulties. However sore your eyes, or however taciturn your mood, there is no delay of writing when any service is to be done by it! In fact you are very good to me, and always were, in all manner of ways; for which I do, as I ought, thank the Upper Powers and you. That truly has been and is one of the possessions of my life in this perverse epoch of the world....

I have sent off by John Chapman a Copy of the _Life of Sterling,_ which is all printed and ready, but is not to appear till the first week of October.... Along with the _Sheets_ was a poor little French Book for you,--Book of a poor Naval _Mississippi_ Frenchman, one "Bossu," I think; written only a Century ago, yet which already seemed old as the Pyramids in reference to those strange fast-growing countries. I read it as a kind of defaced _romance;_ very thin and lean, but all _true,_ and very marvelous as such.

It is above three weeks since my Wife and I left London, (the Printer having done,) and came hither with the purpose of a month of what is called "Water Cure"; for which this place, otherwise extremely pleasant and wholesome, has become celebrated of late years. Dr. Gully, the pontiff of the business in our Island, warmly encouraged my purpose so soon as he heard of it; nay, urgently offered at once that both of us should become his own guests till the experiment were tried: and here accordingly we are; I water-curing, assiduously walking on the sunny mountains, drinking of the clear wells, not to speak of wet wrappages, solitary sad _steepages,_ and other singular procedures; my Wife not meddling for her own behoof, but only seeing me do it. These have been three of the idlest weeks I ever spent, and there is still one to come: after which we go northward to Lancashire, and across the Border where my good old Mother still expects me; and so, after some little visiting and dawdling, hope to find ourselves home again before September end, and the inexpressible Glass Palace with its noisy inanity have taken itself quite away again. It was no increase of ill-health that drove me hither, rather the reverse; but I have long been minded to try this thing: and now I think the result will be,--_zero_ pretty nearly, and one imagination the less. My long walks, my strenuous idleness, have certainly done me good; nor has the "water" done me any _ill,_ which perhaps is much to say of it. For the rest, it is a strange quasi-monastic--godless and yet _devotional_--way of life which human creatures have here, and useful to them beyond doubt. I foresee, this "Water Cure," under better forms, will become the _Ramadhan_ of the overworked unbelieving English in time coming; an institution they were dreadfully in want of, this long while!--We had Twisleton* here (often speaking of you), who is off to America again; will sail, I think, along with this Letter; a semi-articulate but solid- minded worthy man. We have other officials and other _litterateurs_ (T.B. Macaulay in his hired villa for one): but the mind rather shuns than seeks them, one finds solitary quasi- devotion preferable, and [Greek], as Pindar had it!

----------- * The late Hon. Edward Twisleton, a man of high character and large attainments, and with a personal disposition that won the respect and affection of a wide circle of friends on both sides of the Atlantic. He was the author of a curious and learned treatise entitled "The Tongue not Essential to Speech," and his remarkable volume on "The Handwriting of Junius" seems to have effectually closed a long controversy. ---------

Richard Milnes is married, about two weeks ago, and gone to Vienna for a jaunt. His wife, a Miss Crewe (Lord Crewe's sister), about forty, pleasant, intelligent, and rather rich: that is the end of Richard's long first act. Alfred Tennyson, perhaps you heard, is gone to Italy with his wife: their baby died or was dead-born; they found England wearisome: Alfred has been taken up on the top of the wave, and a good deal jumbled about since you were here. Item Thackeray; who is coming over to lecture to you: a mad world, my Masters! Your Letter to Mazzini was duly despatched; and we hear from him that he will write to you, on the subject required, without delay. Browning and his wife, home from Florence, are both in London at present; mean to live in Paris henceforth for some time. They had seen something both of Margaret and her d'Ossoli, and appeared to have a true and lively interest in them; Browning spoke a long while to me, with emphasis, on the subject: I think it was I that had introduced poor Margaret to them. I said he ought to send these reminiscences to America,--that was the night before we left London, three weeks ago; his answer gave me the impression there had been some hindrance somewhere. Accordingly, when your Letter and Mazzini's reached me here, I wrote to Browning urgently on the subject: but he informs me that they _have_ sent all their reminiscences, at the request of Mr. Story; so that it is already all well.--Dear Emerson, you see I am at the bottom of my paper. I will write to you again before long; we cannot let you lie fallow in that manner altogether. Have you got proper _spectacles_ for your eyes? I have adopted that beautiful symbol of old age, and feel myself very venerable: take care of your eyes!

Yours ever,
T. Carlyle

CXLVII. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 14 April, 1852

My Dear Carlyle,--I have not grown so callous by my sulky habit, but that I know where my friends are, and who can help me, in time of need. And I have to crave your good offices today, and in a matter relating once more to Margaret Fuller.... You were so kind as to interest yourself, many months ago, to set Mazzini and Browning on writing their Reminiscences for us. But we never heard from either of them. Lately I have learned, by way of Sam Longfellow, in Paris, brother of our poet Longfellow, that Browning assured him that he did write and send a memoir to this country,--to whom, I know not. It never arrived at the hands of the Fullers, nor of Story, Channing, or me;--though the book was delayed in the hope of such help. I hate that his paper should be lost.

The little French _Voyage,_ &c. of Bossu, I got safely, and compared its pictures with my own, at the Mississippi, the Illinois, and Chicago. It is curious and true enough, no doubt, though its Indians are rather dim and vague, and "Messieurs Sauvages" Good Indians we have in Alexander Henry's _Travels in Canada,_ and in our modern Catlin, and the best Western America, perhaps, in F.A. Michaux, _Voyage a l'ouest des monts Alleghanis,_ and in Fremont. But it was California I believe you asked about, and, after looking at Taylor, Parkman, and the rest, I saw that the only course is to read them all, and every private letter that gets into the newspapers. So there was nothing to say.

I rejoiced with the rest of mankind in the _Life of Sterling,_ and now peace will be to his Manes, down in this lower sphere. Yet I see well that I should have held to his opinion, in all those conferences where you have so quietly assumed the palms. It is said: here, that you work upon Frederick the Great?? However that be, health, strength, love, joy, and victory to you.

--R.W. Emerson

CXLVIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 7 May, 1852

Dear Emerson,--I was delighted at the sight of your hand again. My manifold sins against you, involuntary all of them I may well say, are often enough present to my sad thoughts; and a kind of remorse is mixed with the other sorrow,--as if I could have _helped_ growing to be, by aid of time and destiny, the grim Ishmaelite I am, and so shocking your serenity by my ferocities! I admit you were like an angel to me, and absorbed in the beautifulest manner all thunder-clouds into the depths of your immeasurable a ether;--and it is indubitable I love you very well, and have long done, and mean to do. And on the whole you will have to rally yourself into some kind of Correspondence with me again; I believe you will find that also to be a commanded duty by and by! To me at any rate, I can say, it is a great want, and adds perceptibly to the sternness of these years: deep as is my dissent from your Gymnosophist view of Heaven and Earth, I find an agreement that swallows up all conceivable dissents; in the whole world I hardly get, to my spoken human word, any other word of response which is authentically _human._ God help us, this is growing a very lonely place, this distracted dog- kennel of a world! And it is no joy to me to see it about to have its throat cut for its immeasurable devilries; that is not a pleasant process to be concerned in either more or less,-- considering above all how many centuries, base and dismal all of them, it is like to take! Nevertheless _Marchons,_--and swift too, if we have any speed, for the sun is sinking.... Poor Margaret, that is a strange tragedy that history of hers; and has many traits of the Heroic in it, though it is wild as the prophecy of a Sibyl. Such a predetermination to _eat_ this big Universe as her oyster or her egg, and to be absolute empress of all height and glory in it that her heart could conceive, I have not before seen in any human soul. Her "mountain me" indeed:-- but her courage too is high and clear, her chivalrous nobleness indeed is great; her veracity, in its deepest sense, _a toute epreuve._--Your Copy of the Book* came to me at last (to my joy): I had already read it; there was considerable notice taken of it here; and one half-volume of it (and I grieve to say only one, written by a man called Emerson) was completely approved by me and innumerable judges. The rest of the Book is not without considerable geniality and merits; but one wanted a clear concise Narrative beyond all other merits; and if you ask here (except in that half-volume) about any fact, you are answered (so to speak) not in words, but by a symbolic tune on the bagpipe, symbolic burst of wind-music from the brass band;--which is not the plan at all!--What can have become of Mazzini's Letter, which he certainly did write and despatched to you, is not easily conceivable. Still less in the case of Browning: for Browning and his Wife did also write; I myself in the end of last July, having heard him talk kindly and well of poor Margaret and her Husband, took the liberty on your behalf of asking him to put something down on paper; and he informed me, then and repeatedly since, he had already done it,--at the request of Mrs. Story, I think. His address at present is, "No. 138 Avenue des Champs Elysees, a Paris," if your American travelers still thought of inquiring.--Adieu, dear Emerson, till next week.

Yours ever,
T. Carlyle

-------- * "The Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli." --------

CXLIX. Emerson to Carlyle*

Concord, May [?], 1852