"I have been absent from home since the noble Saturday evening, or
should have sent you this book of Mr. Stirling's, which you expressed
a wish to see. The papers on Macaulay, Tennyson, and Coleridge
interest me, and the critic is master of his weapons.
"Meantime, in these days, my thoughts are all benedictions on the
dwellers in the happy home of number 148 Charles Street."
His appreciation of the hospitality of others was only a reflection
from his own. I find a few words in the journal as follows: "Mr.
Emerson was like a benediction in the house, as usual. He was up early
in the morning looking over books and pictures in the library."
I find also the mention of one evening when he brought his own journal
to town and read us passages describing a visit in Edinburgh, where he
was the guest of Mrs. Crowe. She was one of those ladies of Edinburgh,
he said, "who could turn to me, as she did, and say, 'Whom would you
like to meet?' Of course I said, Lord Jeffrey, De Quincey, Samuel
Brown, called the alchemist by chemists, and a few others. She was
able, with her large hospitality, to give me what I most desired. She
drove with Samuel Brown and myself to call on De Quincey, who was then
living most uncomfortably in lodgings with a landlady who persecuted
him continually. While I was staying at Mrs. Crowe's, De Quincey
arrived there one evening, after being exposed to various vicissitudes
of weather, and latterly to a heavy rain. Unhappily Mrs. Crowe's
apparently unlimited hospitality was limited at pantaloons, and poor
De Quincey was obliged to dry his water-soaked garments at the
fireside."
Emerson read much also that was interesting of Tennyson and of
Carlyle. Of the latter he said that the last time he was in England he
drove directly to his house. "Jane Carlyle opened the door for me, and
the man himself stood behind and bore the candle. 'Well, here we are,
shoveled together again,' was his greeting. Carlyle's talk is like a
river, full and never ceasing; we talked until after midnight, and
again the next morning at breakfast we went on. Then we started to
walk to London; and London bridge, the Tower, and Westminster were all
melted down into the river of his speech."
After the reading that evening there was singing, and Emerson listened
attentively. Presently he said, when the first song ended, "I should
like to know what the words mean." The music evidently signified
little to his ears. Before midnight, when we were alone, he again
reverted to Tennyson. He loves to gather and rehearse what is known of
that wonderful man.
Early in the morning he was once more in the library. I found him
there laughing over a little book he had discovered. It was Leigh
Hunt's copy of "English Traits," and was full of marginal notes, which
amused Emerson greatly.
Not Mrs. Crowe's hospitality nor any other could ever compare in his
eyes with that of the New York friend to whom I have already alluded.
We all agreed that her genius was preeminent. Here are two brief notes
of graceful acknowledgment to his Boston friends which, however, may
hardly be omitted. In one of these he says:--
"My wife is very sensible of your brave hospitality, offered in your
note a fortnight since, and resists all my attempts to defend your
hearth from such a crowd. Of course I am too glad to be persuaded to
come to you, and so it is our desire to spend the Sunday of my last
lecture at your house."