March 12.
May I come up next Thursday afternoon and bring with me an American
friend, Mrs. Stockber of Silverton, Colorado, who has just arrived by
the _Umbria_. Mrs. Stockber is an unusually interesting woman. She is
equal owner with her husband, an intelligent and large-minded German,
of one of the largest silver mines in the States, and is one of the
only two honorary women members of the great Association of Mining
Engineers of the United States. Mrs. Griffin, the President of the new
Society of American Women in London, also wants to come. I don't want
to inundate you; and this is only to ask if you are better, and can
receive a trio safely.
Yours, etc.
March 16.
I am sorry to give you so much trouble. But I have a friend here just
now, a woman of unusual character and ability. I remember I told you
of her. The other is Mrs. Helen T. Richards of the Boston Institute of
Technology. The only moment I can get her is on Monday afternoon, and
I want her to see the collection of prints and your pictures. If it is
all right I will bring her with me on Monday at 3 P.M. We must go to
Miss Ward's at 4.30. Do not have tea at that primitive hour; for we
shall be obliged to have a cup at Miss Ward's. I wish we might have a
chance of seeing Mr. Stopes; but of course that is something that may
be prayed for, but not what common people are made for. Dear, take
care of yourself if you can. There is only one of you.
Yours,
J.C.C.
March 17.
We will postpone. I cannot reach my two troublesome friends, and next
week you will be busy and tired. "By-and-by" is coming with the sun
and flowers. We will come too.
Yours lovingly and really,
J.C.C.
June 25, 1901,
82 SOMERS' STREET, W.C.
My very dear Friend:
I have only time to thank you for your kind "welcome," and tell you
how sorry I am not to see you to-day, and your precious Winnie, who I
hope has really started on the road to recovery. Children are the
richest boon vouchsafed us in this world, and the parents are the
trustees of this wealth committed to their charge, but belonging to
the world at large, and of which time only tells the value. I shall be
very busy now for a few days, but will see you as soon as possible.
Affectionately,
J.C.C.
[Illustration: Facsimile of a portion of a letter written by Mrs.
Croly in October, 1900.]
222 WEST 23D STREET,
NEW YORK, Jan. 16, 1901.
My dear Friend:
Thank you very much for your letter and card. It was a great pleasure
to me to receive it, and to learn something about yourself and what
you are doing. The news was long belated. The letter was to have been
printed the week that I left, and I provided to have it sent to about
a dozen friends as a good-bye. But it was so long delayed by Transvaal
excitement and sad war news, that I did not expect it to appear at
all.
I had a wonderful celebration on my seventieth birthday in December;
poems written, cakes with seventy candles sent, and a great
spontaneous gathering in my honor, which really bothered me not a
little, for I do not pose worth a cent, and do not know where to look
or what to do when people compliment me.
However, one thing gratified me above all others. It was a "birthday
party" given me by the Daughters of 1812--the most exclusive of
patriotic societies that is restricted to lineal descendants. The
gathering was magnificent; the cake was brought in lighted by seventy
candles borne on the shoulders of four men. By unanimous vote they
conferred upon me honorary membership, and the insignia were
conferred. The president in seconding the motion said, this departure
from their rules (alluding to my English birth) was not in honor of
"the club," nor of the "literary women," but of the woman who knew no
line of separation, and whose work had been done for all women. Was
not that a beautiful thing to say? Only that I intend to be cremated,
I would have it put on my tombstone.
We had a very bright and very beautiful beginning here to the "Holy
Year," so far as weather is concerned, and it is also very gay, though
my lameness prevents me from participating much in social doings. I am
also grieved by the unexpected effects of the Boer war, in England.
There must have been shocking blundering and mismanagement somewhere.
The pitying way in which "poor, stupid, decrepit old England" is
talked about is galling. Some military officers remarked recently that
England was hardly worth having a "scrap" with, she would be so easy
to beat.
Our General Federation holds a Congress in Paris in June, and my
passage is taken for May 19th. If nothing untoward prevents, I shall
be in London for a week early in June, and then go to Paris and
Ober-Ammergau. If you could go it would be very pleasant. Give my love
to your daughters, and kind regards to Mr. Stopes.
Yours ever,
J.C. CROLY.