I have separated and distributed as I could some of the parts which
blended in the rich composite energy which Margaret exerted during the
ten years over which my occasional interviews with her were scattered.
It remains to say, that all these powers and accomplishments
found their best and only adequate channel in her conversation;--a
conversation which those who have heard it, unanimously, as far as
I know, pronounced to be, in elegance, in range, in flexibility,
and adroit transition, in depth, in cordiality, and in moral
aim, altogether admirable; surprising and cheerful as a poem, and
communicating its own civility and elevation like a charm to all
hearers. She was here, among our anxious citizens, and frivolous
fashionists, as if sent to refine and polish her countrymen, and
announce a better day. She poured a stream of amber over the endless
store of private anecdotes, of bosom histories, which her wonderful
persuasion drew forth, and transfigured them into fine fables. Whilst
she embellished the moment, her conversation had the merit of being
solid and true. She put her whole character into it, and had the power
to inspire. The companion was made a thinker, and went away quite
other than he came. The circle of friends who sat with her were not
allowed to remain spectators or players, but she converted them into
heroes, if she could. The muse woke the muses, and the day grew bright
and eventful. Of course, there must be, in a person of such sincerity,
much variety of aspect, according to the character of her company.
Only, in Margaret's case, there is almost an agreement in the
testimony to an invariable power over the minds of all. I conversed
lately with a gentleman who has vivid remembrances of his interviews
with her in Boston, many years ago, who described her in these
terms:--"No one ever came so near. Her mood applied itself to the mood
of her companion, point to point, in the most limber, sinuous, vital
way, and drew out the most extraordinary narratives; yet she had a
light sort of laugh, when all was said, as if she thought she could
live over that revelation. And this sufficient sympathy she had for
all persons indifferently,--for lovers, for artists, and beautiful
maids, and ambitious young statesmen, and for old aunts, and
coach-travellers. Ah! she applied herself to the mood of her
companion, as the sponge applies itself to water." The description
tallies well enough with my observation. I remember she found, one
day, at my house, her old friend Mr. ----, sitting with me. She looked
at him attentively, and hardly seemed to know him. In the afternoon,
he invited her to go with him to Cambridge. The next, day she said to
me, 'You fancy that you know--. It is too absurd; you have never seen
him. When I found him here, sitting like a statue, I was alarmed,
and thought him ill. You sit with courteous, _un_confiding smile, and
suppose him to be a mere man of talent. He is so with you. But the
moment I was alone with him, he was another creature; his manner, so
glassy and elaborate before, was full of soul, and the tones of
his voice entirely different.' And I have no doubt that she saw
expressions, heard tones, and received thoughts from her companions,
which no one else ever saw or heard from the same parties, and that
her praise of her friends, which seemed exaggerated, was her exact
impression. We were all obliged to recall Margaret's testimony, when
we found we were sad blockheads to other people.
I find among her letters many proofs of this power of disposing
equally the hardest and the most sensitive people to open their
hearts, on very short acquaintance. Any casual rencontré, in a
walk, in a steamboat, at a concert, became the prelude to unwonted
confidences.
* * * * *
1843.--'I believe I told you about one new man, a Philistine,
at Brook Farm. He reproved me, as such people are wont, for my
little faith. At the end of the first meeting in the hall, he
seemed to me perfectly hampered in his old ways and technics,
and I thought he would not open his mind to the views of
others for years, if ever. After I wrote, we had a second
meeting, by request, on personal relations; at the end of
which, he came to me, and expressed delight, and a feeling
of new light and life, in terms whose modesty might have done
honor to the wisest.'
* * * * *
'This afternoon we met Mr. ---- in his wood; and he sat down
and told us the story of his life, his courtship, and painted
the portraits of his father and mother with most amusing
naïveté. He says:--"How do you think I offered myself? I never
had told Miss ---- that I loved her; never told her she was
handsome; and I went to her, and said, 'Miss ----, I've come
to offer myself; but first I'll give you my character. I'm
very poor; you'll have to work: I'm very cross and irascible;
you'll have everything to bear: and I've liked many other
pretty girls. Now what do you say?' and she said, 'I'll have
you:' and she's been everything to me."
'"My mother was a Calvinist, very strict, but she was always
reading 'Abelard and Eloisa,' and crying over it. At sixteen
I said to her: 'Mother, you've brought me up well; you've kept
me strict. Why don't I feel that regeneration they talk of?
why an't I one of the elect?' And she talked to me about the
potter using his clay as he pleased; and I said: 'Mother, God
is not a potter: He's a perfect being; and he can't treat the
vessels he makes, anyhow, but with perfect justice, or he's no
God. So I'm no Calvinist.'"'
* * * * *