SOUTH BOSTON
1844-1851; _aet._ 25-32
THE ROUGH SKETCH
A great grieved heart, an iron will,
As fearless blood as ever ran;
A form elate with nervous strength
And fibrous vigor,--all a man.
A gallant rein, a restless spur,
The hand to wield a biting scourge;
Small patience for the tasks of Time,
Unmeasured power to speed and urge.
He rides the errands of the hour,
But sends no herald on his ways;
The world would thank the service done,
He cannot stay for gold or praise.
Not lavishly he casts abroad
The glances of an eye intense,
And did he smile but once a year,
It were a Christmas recompense.
I thank a poet for his name,
The "Down of Darkness," this should be;
A child, who knows no risk it runs,
Might stroke its roughness harmlessly.
One helpful gift the Gods forgot,
Due to the man of lion-mood;
A Woman's soul, to match with his
In high resolve and hardihood.
J. W. H.
The name of Laura Bridgman will long continue to suggest to the
hearer one of the most brilliant exploits of philanthropy, modern
or ancient. Much of the good that good men do soon passes out of
the remembrance of busy generations, each succeeding to each, with
its own special inheritance of labor and interest. But it will be
long before the world shall forget the courage and patience of the
man who, in the very bloom of his manhood, sat down to besiege this
almost impenetrable fortress of darkness and isolation, and, after
months of labor, carried within its walls the divine conquest of
life and of thought.
J. W. H., _Memoir of Dr. Samuel G. Howe_.
In September, 1844, the travellers returned to America and took up their
residence at the Perkins Institution, in South Boston, in the apartment
known as the "Doctor's Wing."
At first, Laura Bridgman made one of the family, the Doctor considering
her almost as an adopted child. His marriage had been something of a
shock to her.
"Does Doctor love me like Julia?" she asked her teacher anxiously.
"No!"
"Does he love God like Julia?"
"Yes!"
A pause: then--"God was kind to give him his wife!"
She and Julia became much attached to each other, and were friends
through life.
Julia was now to realize fully the great change that had come in her
life. She had been the acknowledged queen of her home and circle in New
York. Up to this time, she had known Boston as a gay visitor knows it.
She came now as the wife of a man who had neither leisure nor
inclination for "_Society_"; a man of tenderest heart, but of dominant
personality, accustomed to rule, and devoted to causes of which she knew
only by hearsay; moreover, so absorbed in work for these causes, that he
could only enjoy his home by snatches.
She herself says: "The romance of charity easily interests the public.
Its laborious details and duties repel and weary the many, and find
fitting ministers only in a few spirits of rare and untiring
benevolence. Dr. Howe, after all the laurels and roses of victory, had
to deal with the thorny ways of a profession tedious, difficult, and
exceptional. He was obliged to create his own working machinery, to
drill and instruct his corps of teachers, himself first learning the
secrets of the desired instruction. He was also obliged to keep the
infant Institution fresh in the interest and goodwill of the public, and
to give it a place among the recognized benefactions of the
Commonwealth."
From the bright little world of old New York, from relatives and
friends, music and laughter, fun and frolic, she came to live in an
Institution, a bleak, lofty house set on a hill, four-square to all the
winds that blew; with high-studded rooms, cold halls paved with white
and gray marble, echoing galleries; where three fourths of the inmates
were blind, and the remaining fourth were devoting their time and
energies to the blind. The Institution was two miles from Boston, where
the friends of her girlhood lived: an unattractive district stretched
between, traversed once in two hours by omnibuses, the only means of
transport.
Again, her life had been singularly free from responsibility. First her
Aunt Francis, then her sister Louisa, had "kept house" in Bond Street;
Julia had been a flower of the field, taking no thought for food or
raiment; her sisters chose and bought her clothes, had her dresses made,
and put them on her. Her studies, her music, her dreams, her
compositions--and, it must be added, her suitors--made the world in
which she lived. Now, life in its most concrete forms pressed upon her.
The baby must be fed at regular intervals, and she must feed it; there
must be three meals a day, and she must provide them; servants must be
engaged, trained, directed, and all this she must do. Her thoughts
soared heavenward; but now there was a string attached to them, and they
must be pulled down to attend to the leg of mutton and the baby's cloak.
This is one side of the picture; the other is different, indeed.
Her girlhood had been shut in by locks and bars of Calvinistic piety;
her friends and family were ready to laugh, to weep, to pray with her;
they were not ready to think with her. It is true that surrounding this
intimate circle was a wider one, where her mind found stimulus in
certain directions. She studied German with Dr. Cogswell; she read Dante
with Felice Foresti, the Italian patriot; French, Latin, music, she had
them all. Her mind expanded, but her spiritual growth dates from her
early visits to Boston.
These visits had not been given wholly to gayety, even in the days when
she wrote, after a ball: "I have been through the burning, fiery
furnace, and it is Sad-rake, Me-sick, and Abed-no-go!" The friends she
made, both men and women, were people alive and awake, seeking new
light, and finding it on every hand. Moreover, at her side was now one
of the torch-bearers of humanity, a spirit burning with a clear flame of
fervor and resolve, lighting the dark places of the earth. Her mind,
under the stimulus of these influences, opened like a flower; she too
became one of the seekers for light, and in her turn one of the
light-bringers.
Among the poems of her early married life, none is more illuminating
than the portrait of Dr. Howe, which heads this chapter. The concluding
stanza gives a hint of the depression which accompanied her first
realization of the driving power of his life, of the white-hot metal of
his nature. She was caught up as it were in the wake of a comet, and
whirled into new and strange orbits: what wonder that for a time she was
bewildered? She had no thought, when writing "The Rough Sketch," that a
later day was to find her soul indeed matched with his, "in high resolve
and hardihood": that through her lips, as well as his, God was to sound
forth a trumpet that should never call retreat.
In her normal health she was a person of abounding vitality, with a
constitution of iron: as is common with such temperaments, she felt a
physical distaste to the abnormal and defective. It required in those
days all the strength of her will to overcome her natural shrinking from
the blind and the other defectives with whom she was often thrown. There
is no clearer evidence of the development of her nature than the
contrast between this mental attitude and the deep tenderness which she
felt in her later years for the blind. After the Doctor's death, they
became her cherished friends; she could never do enough for them; with
every year her desire to visit the Perkins Institution, to talk with the
pupils, to give them all she had to give, grew stronger and more lively.
Of the friends of this time, none had so deep and lasting an influence
over her as Theodore Parker, who had long been a close friend of the
Doctor's. She had first heard of him in her girlhood, as an impious and
sacrilegious person, to be shunned by all good Christians.
In 1843 she met him in Rome, and found him "one of the most sympathetic
and delightful of men"; an intimacy sprang up between the two families
which ended only with Parker's life. He baptized the baby Julia; on
returning to this country, she and the Doctor went regularly to hear him
preach. This she always considered as among the great opportunities of
her life.
"I cannot remember," she says, "that the interest of his sermons ever
varied for me. It was all one intense delight.... It was hard to go out
from his presence, all aglow with the enthusiasm which he felt and
inspired, and to hear him spoken of as a teacher of irreligion, a pest
to the community."
These were the days when it was possible for a minister of a Christian
church, hearing of Parker's dangerous illness, to pray that God might
remove him from the earth. To her, it seemed that "truly, he talked with
God, and took us with him into the divine presence."
Parker could play as well as preach; she loved to "make fun" with him.
Witness her "Philosoph-Master and Poet-Aster" in "Passion Flowers."
Parker's own powers of merrymaking appear in his Latin epitaph on "the
Doctor" (who survived him by many years), which is printed in the
"Letters and Journals of Samuel Gridley Howe."
She used in later years to shake her head as she recalled a naughty
_mot_ of hers apropos of Parker's preaching: "I would rather," she said,
"hear Theodore Parker preach than go to the theatre; I would rather go
to the theatre than go to a party; I would rather go to a party than
stay at home!"
A letter to her sister Annie shows the trend of her religious thought in
these days.
Sunday evening, December 8, 1844.
DEAR ANNIE,--
Do not let the Bishop or Uncle or any one frighten you into any
concessions--tell them, and all others that, even if you agree with them
in doctrine, you think their notion of a religious life narrow, false,
superficial. You owe it to truth, to them, to yourself, to say so. I
think perfect and fearless frankness one of our highest duties to _man_
as well as to God. Only see how one half the world pragmatically sets
its foot down, and says to the other half, "Be converted, my opinion is
truth! I must be right and you must be wrong,"--while the other half
timidly falters a reluctant acquiescence, or scarce audible expression
of doubt, and continues troubled and afraid and discontented with itself
and others. Let me never think of you as in this ignominious position,
dear Annie. Do not think that I misapprehend you. I know you do not
agree in doctrine with me, but I know too that you do not feel that you
can abandon your life and conscience to the charge and guidance of such
a man as Eastburn, or as Uncle Ben. Do not, therefore, be afraid of
them, but let their censure be a very secondary thing with you--while
your life is the true expression of your faith, whom can you fear? You
are accountable to man for the performance of the duties which affect
his welfare and well-being--for those which concern your own soul, you
are accountable to God alone. A man, though with twenty surplices on his
back and twenty prayer books in his hand, can no more condemn than he
can save you.... There may be a hell and a heaven, and it may be good
for most people, for you and me, too, if you choose to think that it is
so. But there is a virtue which rises above such considerations--there
are motives higher than personal fear or hope--the love of good because
it is good, because it is God's and nature's law, because it is the
secret of the beautiful order of things, because they are blessed by
your virtuous deeds and pure thoughts--because every holy, every noble
deed, word, or thought helps to build up the ruins of the world, and to
elevate our degraded humanity. Those who propose to you hell and heaven
as the great incentives to right, appeal merely to your natural love of
personal advantage--those who hold up to you a God now frowning and
indignant, now gracious and benignant, appeal simply to your natural
cowardice, to your natural love of approbation. Does one love God for
one's own advantage? One loves Him for His perfection, and if one loves
Him, one keeps His commandments. Abandon, I pray you, the exploded
formula of selfishness!... I think one should be capable of loving
virtue, were one sure even that hell and not heaven would be its
reward.
The benedictions of the Sermon on the Mount are very simple--no
raptures, no ecstasies are promised. Blessed are all that seek the good
of others and the knowledge of truth--blessed, simply that in so doing
they obey the law of God, imitate His character, and coming nearer and
nearer to Him shall find Him more and more in their hearts. One word
about Unitarians. It is very wrong to say that they reject the Bible,
simply because they interpret it in a different manner from the
(so-called) orthodox, or that they reject Christ, because they
understand him in one way, and you in another--while they emulate his
wonderful life, while they acknowledge his divine mission, and the
divine power of his words, why should they be said to despise him?...
During the years between 1843 and 1859, her life was from time to time
shadowed by the approach of a great joy. Before the birth of each
successive child she was oppressed by a deep and persistent melancholy.
Present and future alike seemed dark to her; she wept for herself, but
still more for the hapless infant which must come to birth in so
sorrowful a world. With the birth of the child the cloud lifted and
vanished. Sunshine and joy--and the baby--filled the world; the mother
sang, laughed, and made merry.
In her letters to her sisters, and later in her journals, both these
moods are abundantly evident. At first, these letters are full of the
bustle of arrival and of settling in the Institution.
"I received the silver.... The soup-ladle is my delight, and I could
almost take the dear old coffee-pot to bed with me.... But here is the
most important thing.
"MY TRAGEDY IS LEFT BEHIND!... My house ... in great confusion, carpets
not down, curtains not up, the devil to pay, and not a sofa to ask him
to sit down upon...."
She now felt sadly the need of training in matters which her girlhood
had despised. (She could describe every room in her father's house save
one--the kitchen!) The Doctor liked to give weekly dinners to his
intimates, "The Five of Clubs," and others. These dinners were something
of a nightmare to Julia, even with the aid of Miss Catherine Beecher's
cookbook. She spent weeks in studying this volume and trying her hand on
its recipes. This was not what her hand was made for; yet she learned to
make puddings, and was proud of her preserves.
Speaking of the dinner parties, she tells of one for which she had taken
special pains, and of which ice-cream, not then the food of every day,
was to form the climax. The ice-cream did not come, and her pleasure was
spoiled; she found it next morning in a snowbank outside the back door,
where the messenger had "dumped" it without word or comment. "I should
laugh at it now," she says, "but then I almost wept over it."
Everything in the new life interested her, even the most prosaic
details. She writes to her sister Louisa:
"Our house has been enlivened of late by two delightful visits. The
first was from the soap-fat merchant, who gave me thirty-four pounds of
good soap for my grease. I was quite beside myself with joy, capered
about in the most enthusiastic manner, and was going to hug in turn the
soap, the grease, and the man, had I not remembered my future
ambassadress-ship, and reflected that it would not sound well in
history. This morning came the rag-man, who takes rags and gives nice
tin vessels in exchange.... Both of these were clever transactions. Oh,
if you had seen me stand by the soap-fat man, and scrutinize minutely
his weights and measures, telling him again and again that it was
beautiful grease, and he must allow me a good price for it--truly, I am
a mother in Israel."
Much as the Doctor loved the Perkins Institution, he longed for a home
of his own, and in the spring of 1845 he found a place entirely to his
mind.
A few steps from the Institution was a plot of land, facing the sun,
sheltered from the north wind by the last remaining bit of "Washington
Heights," the eminence on which Washington planted the batteries which
drove the British out of Boston. Some six acres of fertile ground, an
old house with low, broad, sunny rooms, two towering Balm of Gilead
trees, and some ancient fruit trees: this was all in the beginning; but
the Doctor saw at a glance the possibilities of the place. He bought it,
added one or two rooms to the old house, planted fruit trees, laid out
flower gardens, and in the summer of 1845 moved his little family
thither.
The move was made on a lovely summer day. As our mother drove into the
green bower, half shade, half sunshine, silent save for the birds, she
cried out, "Oh! this is green peace!" The name fitted and clung: "_Green
Peace_" was known and loved as such so long as it existed.
This was the principal home of her married life, but it was not
precisely an abiding one. The summers were spent elsewhere; moreover,
the "Doctor's Wing" in the Institution was always ready for habitation,
and it often happened that for one reason or another the family were
taken back there for weeks or months. Two of the six children, Florence
and Maud, were born at the Institution; the former just before the move
to Green Peace. She was named Florence in honor of Miss Nightingale. The
Doctor had ardently desired a son; finding the baby a girl, "I will
forgive you," he cried, "if you will name her for Florence Nightingale!"
Miss Nightingale became the child's godmother, sent a golden cup (now a
precious heirloom), and wrote as follows:--
EMBLEY, December 26.
I cannot pretend to express, my dear kind friends, how touched and
pleased I was by such a remembrance of me as that of your child's
name.... If I could live to justify your opinion of me, it would have
been enough to have lived for, and such thoughts, as that of your
goodness, are great thoughts, "strong to consume small troubles" which
should bear us up on the wings of the Eagle, like Guido's Ganymede, up
to the feet of the God, there to take what work he has for us to do for
him. I shall hope to see my little Florence before long in this world,
but if not, I trust there is a tie formed between us, which shall
continue in Eternity--if she is like you, I shall know her again there,
without her body on, perhaps the better for not having known her here
with it.
Letters to her sisters give glimpses of the life at Green Peace during
the years 1845-50.
_To her sister Louisa_
... I assure you it is a delightful but a terrible thing to be a mother.
The constant care, anxiety and thought of some possible evil that may
come to the little creature, too precious to be so frail, whose life and
well-being the mother feels God has almost placed in her hands! If I did
not think that angels watched over my baby, I should be crazy about it.
_To the same_
My trouble has been Chev's illness.... He was taken ill the night of his
return, and established himself next morning on the sofa, to be coddled
with Cologne, and dieted with peaches and grapes, when lo, in an hour
more, no coddling save that of (Dr.) Fisher, no _diet_ save ipecac and
werry thin gruel--chills, nausea, and blue devils. Bradford to watch by
night, Rosy and I by day; Fisher and I sympathizing deeply in holding
the head of a perfectabilian philanthropist. I making myself active in a
variety of ways, bathing Chev's eyes with cologne water by mistake
instead of his brow, laying the pillow the wrong way, and being
banished at last in disgrace, to make room for Rosa.
Am I not the most unfortunate of human beings? Devil a bit! I enjoy all
that I can--have I not milk for the baby, and the baby for milk? Cannot
Julia make arrowroot pudding and cold custard? Can I not refresh myself
by looking into Romana's sapphire eyes, with their deep dark fringe? Is
there no balm in Gilead, is there no physician there? Yea, thou, oh
Bradford, art the balm, thou, oh Fisher, art the physician! Food also is
there for cachinnation, that chief duty of man--Quoth Chev this morning,
lifting up his feeble voice and shaking his dizzy head: "Oh, oh, if I
had fallen sick in New York, and old Francis had bled me, you would not
have seen me again...."
Florence's name is Florence Marion--pretty, _n'est-ce pas?_...
Farewell, my own darling. Your
JULES.
Well, life _am_ strange! I am again cookless. I imprudently turned old
Smith off and took a young girl, who left me in four days. Why? Her
lover would not allow her to stay in a family where she did not sit at
table with the lady. I had read of such things in Mrs. Trollope, and
thought them quite impossible. In the place from which I took her, she
had done all the cooking, washing and chamber work of the house--was, in
fine the only servant, for the compensation of six dollars a month. But
then, she sat at table!!! oh, ho!
_To the same_
SOUTH BOSTON, April 21, 1845.
... The weather here is so gloomy, that one really deserves credit for
not hanging oneself!... I passed last evening with ----. Chev was going
to a "'versary," left me there at about seven, and did not come for me
until after ten. Consequence was, I got heartily tired of the whole
family, and concluded that bright people without hearts were in the long
run less agreeable than good gentle people without wits--glory on my
soul, likewise also on my baby's soul, which I am!
_To the same_[24]
[24] Louisa Ward married Thomas Crawford in 1844, and lived thereafter
in Rome.
SOUTH BOSTON, November, 1845.
MY DARLING WEVIE,--
The children have been so very obliging as to go to sleep, and having
worried over them all day, and part of the evening, I will endeavor to
give you what is left of it. When you become the mother of two children
you will understand the value of time as you never understood it before.
My days and nights are pretty much divided between Julia and Florence. I
sleep with the baby, nurse her all night, get up, hurry through my
breakfast, take care of her while Emily gets hers, then wash and dress
her, put her to sleep, drag her out in the wagon, amuse Dudie, kiss,
love and scold her, etc., etc.... Oh, my dear Wevie, for one good
squeeze in your loving arms, for one kiss, and one smile from you, what
would I not give? Anything, even my box of Paris finery, which I have
just opened, with great edification. Oh, what headdresses! what silks!
what a bonnet, what a mantelet! I clapped my hands and cried glory for
the space of half an hour, then danced a few Polkas around the study
table, then sat down and felt happy, then remembered that I had now
nothing to do save to grow old and ugly, and so turned a misanthropic
look upon the Marie Stuart garland, etc., etc. You have certainly chosen
my things with your own perfect taste. The flowers and dresses are alike
exquisite, and so are all the things, not forgetting Dudie's little
darling bonnet. But I fear that even this beautiful toilette will hardly
tempt me from my nursery fireside where my presence is, in these days,
indispensable. I have not been ten minutes this whole day, without
holding one or other of the children. I have to sit with Fo-fo on one
knee and Dudie on the other, trotting them alternately, and singing,
"Jim along Josie," till I can't Jim along any further possibly. Well,
life is peculiar anyhow. Dudie doesn't go alone yet--heaven only knows
when she will. _Sunday evening._ I wore the new bonnet and mantelet to
church, to-day:--frightened the sexton, made the minister squint, and
the congregation stare. It looked rather like a green clam shell, some
folks thought. I did not. I cocked it as high as ever I could, but
somehow it did plague me a little. I shall soon get used to it. Sumner
has been dining with us, and he and Chev have been pitying unmarried
women. Oh, my dear friends, thought I, if you could only have one baby,
you would change your tune.... Heaven grant that your dear little child
may arrive safely, and gladden your heart with its sweet face. What a
new world will its birth open to you, an ocean of love unfathomed even
by your loving heart. I cannot tell you the comfort I have in my little
ones, troublesome as they sometimes are. However weary I may be at
night, it is sweet to feel that I have devoted the day to them. I am
become quite an adept in washing and dressing, and curl my little
Fo-fo's hair beautifully. Tell Donald that I can even wash out the
little crease in her back, without rubbing the skin off....
_To her sister Annie_[25]
[25] Before the marriage of the latter to Adolphe Mailliard.
1846.
My poor dear little Ante-nuptial, I will write to you, and I will come
to you, though I can do you no good--sentiment and sympathy I have none,
but such insipidity as I have give I unto thee.... Dear Annie, your
marriage is to me a grave and solemn matter. I hardly allow myself to
think about it. God give you all happiness, dearest child. Some
sufferings and trials I fear you must have, for after all, the entering
into single combat, hand to hand, with the realities of life, will be
strange and painful to one who has hitherto lived, enjoyed, and
suffered, _en l'air_, as you have done.... To be happily married seems
to me the best thing for a woman. Oh! my sweet Annie, may you be
happy--your maidenhood has been pure, sinless, loving, beautiful--you
have no remorses, no anxious thought about the past. You have lived to
make the earth more beautiful and bright--may your married life be as
holy and harmless--may it be more complete, and more acceptable to God
than your single life could possibly have been. Marriage, like death, is
a debt we owe to nature, and though it costs us something to pay it, yet
are we more content and better _established_ in peace, when we have paid
it. A young girl is a loose flower or flower seed, blown about by the
wind, it may be cruelly battered, may be utterly blighted and lost to
this world, but the matron is the same flower or seed planted, springing
up and bearing fruit unto eternal life. What a comfort would Wevie now
be to you--she is so much more _loving_ than I, but thee knows I try. I
have been better lately, the quiet nights seem to speak to me again, and
to quicken my dead soul. What I feel is a premature _old age_, caused by
the strong passions and conflicts of my early life. It is the languor
and indifference of old age, without its wisdom, or its well-earned
right to repose. Sweetie, wasn't the bonnet letter hideous? I sent it
that you might see how _naughty I could be_....
* * * * *
The Doctor's health had been affected by the hardships and exposures of
his service in the Greek Revolution, and his arduous labors now gave him
little time for rest or recuperation. He was subject to agonizing
headaches, each of which was a brief but distressing illness. In the
summer of 1846 he resolved to try the water cure, then considered by
many a sovereign remedy for all human ailments, and he and our mother
spent some delightful weeks at Brattleboro, Vermont.
_To her sister Louisa_
August 4, 1846.
DEAREST WEVIE,--
... We left dear old Brattleboro on Sunday afternoon, at five o'clock,
serenely packed in our little carriage; the good old boarding-house
woman kissed me, and presented me with a bundle, containing cake,
biscuits, and whortleberries.... Two calico bags, one big and one
little, contained our baggage for the journey. Chev and I felt well and
happy, the children were good, the horses went like birds, and showed
themselves horses of good mettle, by carrying us over a distance of one
hundred miles in something less than two days, for we arrived here at
three o'clock to-day, so that the second 24 hours was not completed.
Very pleasant was our little journey. We started very early each
morning, and went ten or twelve miles to becassim;[26] the country inns
were clean, quiet and funny. We had custards, pickles, and pies for
breakfast, and tea at dinner. Oh, it was a good time! At Athol, I found
a piano, and sat down to sing negro songs for the children. A charming
audience, comprising cook, ostler, and waiter, collected around the
parlour door, and encouraged me with a broom and a pitchfork. Well, it
was pleasant to arrive at our dear Green Peace, or Villa Julia, as they
call it. We found everything in beautiful order, the green corn grown as
high as our heads, and ripe enough to eat, the turkey sitting on eleven
eggs, the peahen on four, six young turkeys already growing up, and two
broods of young chickens.
[26] Breakfast.
Peas, tomatoes, beans, squashes and potatoes, all flourishing. Our
garden entirely supplies us with vegetables, and we shall have many
apples and pears. Immediately upon my arrival, I found the box and
little parcel from you. You may imagine the pleasure it gave me to
receive, at this distance, things which your tasteful little fingers had
worked.... I am rather ashamed to see how beautiful your work is, when
mine is as coarse as possible. In truth, I am a clumsy seamstress, but I
make good puddings, and the little things I make do well enough here in
the country.... _August 15th._ I have passed eleven quiet and peaceful
days since I got so far with my letter. My chicks have been good, and my
husband well. My household affairs go on very pleasantly and easily
nowadays. My good stout German girl takes care of the chicks and helps a
little with the chamber work. My little Lizzie does the cooking, all but
the puddings which I always make myself, so I keep but two house
servants. The man takes care of the horses, drives and keeps the garden
in excellent order. I make my bed and put my room in order as well as I
can. I generally wipe the dishes when Lizzie has washed them, so you see
that I am quite an industrious flea. I have made very nice raspberry jam
and currant jelly with my own hands.... Felton came to tea last evening.
He was pleasant and bright. He will be married some time in November.
Hillard, too, has been to see me. Yesterday was made famous by the
purchase of a very beautiful piano of Chickering's manufacture. The
value of it was $450, but the kind Chick sold it to us at wholesale
price. It arrived at Green Peace to-day, and has already gladdened the
children's hearts by some gay tunes, the rags of my antiquated musical
repertory. You will be glad, I am sure, to know that I have one at last,
for I have been many months without any instrument, so that I have
almost forgotten how to touch one.... My mourning [for a sister-in-law]
has been quite an inconvenience to me, this summer. I had just spent all
the money I could afford for my summer clothes, and was forced to spend
$30 more for black dresses.... The black clothes, however, seem to me
very idle things, and I shall leave word in my will that no one shall
wear them for me....
_To the same_
BORDENTOWN, August, 1846.
... Sumner and Chev came hither with us, and passed two days and nights
here. Chev is well and good. Sumner is as usual, funny but very good and
kind. Philanthropy goes ahead, and slavery will be abolished, and so
shall we. New York is full of engagements in which I feel no interest.
John Astor and Augusta Gibbs are engaged, and are, I think, fairly well
matched. One can only say that each is good enough for the other.
These were the days when Julia sang in her nursery:
"Rero, rero, riddlety rad,
This morning my baby caught sight of her Dad,
Quoth she, 'Oh, Daddy, where have you been?'
'With Mann and Sumner a-putting down sin!'"
_To her sister Annie_
August 17, 1846.
MY DEAR DARLING ANNIE,--
... After seeing the frugal manner in which country people live, and
after deriving great benefit from hydropathic diet, Chev and I thought
we could get along with one servant less, and so we have no cook.
Lizzie[27] cooks, I make the pudding, we have no tea, and live
principally upon vegetables from our own garden, hasty pudding, etc. I
make the beds and do the rooms, as well as I can. We get along quite
comfortably, and I like it very much--the fewer servants one has, the
more comfort, I think.... I have plenty of occupation for my fingers. My
heart will be much taken up with my babies; as for my soul, that part of
me which thinks and believes and imagines, I shall leave it alone till
the next world, for I see it has little to do in this....
Good-bye. Your own, own
DUDIE.
[27] The nurserymaid.
_To her sister Louisa_
BOSTON, December 1, 1846.
Dearest old absurdity that you are, am I to write to you again? Is not
my life full enough of business, of flannel petticoats, aprons, and the
wiping of dirty little noses? Must I sew and trot babies and sing songs,
and tell Mother Goose stories, and still be expected to know how to
write? My fingers are becoming less and less familiar with the pen, my
thoughts grow daily more insignificant and commonplace. What earthly
good can my letters do to anyone? What interesting information can I
impart to anyone? Not that I am not happy, very happy, but then I have
quite lost the power of contributing to the amusement of others....
_To her sister Annie_
1845 or 1846.
... I visited my Mother Otis[28] on Thursday evening, and had a pleasant
time. I went alone, Chev being philanthropically engaged--party being
over, I called for him at Mr. Mann's, but they were so happy over their
report that they concluded to make a night of it, and I came home alone.
Chev returned at one, quite intoxicated with benevolence....
[28] Mrs. Harrison Gray Otis.
Finding that the isolation of South Boston was telling seriously upon
her health and spirits, the Doctor decided on a change, and the winter
of 1846 was spent at the Winthrop House in Boston.
_To the same_
Monday morning, 1846.
MY DEAREST, SWEETEST ANNIE,--
... I have neglected you sadly this winter, and my heart reproaches me
for it.... It has been strange to me, to return to life and to feel that
I have any sympathy with living beings.... I have been singing and
writing poetry, so you may know that I have been happy. Alas! am I not a
selfish creature to prize these enjoyments as I do, above _almost_
everything else in the world? God forgive me if I do wrong in following
with ardor the strongest instincts of my nature, but I have been doing
wrong all my life, in some way or other. I have been giving a succession
of little musical parties on Saturday evenings, and I assure you they
have been quite successful. I have to be sure only my little parlour in
the Winthrop House, but even that is larger than the grand saloon at S.
Niccolo da Tolentino which managed to hold so much fun on Friday
evenings. I have found some musical friends to sing with me--Lizzie
Cary, Mrs. Felton, Mr. Pelosos and William Story, of whom more anon....
Agassiz, the learned and charming Frenchman, is also one of my
_habitués_ on Saturday evenings, and Count Pourtalés, a Swiss nobleman
of good family, who has accompanied Agassiz to this country! I
illuminate my room with a chandelier and some candles, draw out the
piano into the room, and order some ice from Mrs. Mayer's--so that the
reception gives me very little trouble. My friends come at half-past
eight and stay until eleven. I do not usually have more than twenty
people, but once I have had nearly sixty, and those of the best people
in Boston. Chev is very desirous of having a house in town, and is far
more pleased with my success than I am. My next party will be on the
coming Saturday. It is for Lizzie Rice and Sam Guild who are just
married. Am I not an enterprising little woman?... Dear Annie, I am
anxious to be with you, that I may really know how you are, and talk
over all the little matters with you.... I always feel that this
suffering must be some expiation for all the follies of one's life,
whereupon I will improvise a couplet upon the subject.
Woman, being of all critters the darn'dest,
Is made to suffer the consarn'dest.
_To her sister Louisa_
May 17, 1847.
MY SWEETEST BEAUTIFULLEST WEVIE,--
... I have not written because I have been in a studious, meditative,
and most uncommunicative frame of mind, and have very few words to throw
at many dogs. It is quite delightful to take to study again, and to feel
that old and stupid as one may be, there is still in one's mind a little
power of improvement.... The longer I live the more do I feel my utter
childlike helplessness about all practical affairs. Certainly a creature
with such useless hands was never before seen. I seem to need a dry
nurse quite as much as my children. What useful thing can I possibly
teach these poor little monkeys? For everything that is not soul I am an
ass, that I am. I have now been at Green Peace some six weeks, and it is
very pleasant and quiet, but oh! the season is so backward; it is the
17th of May, and the trees are only beginning to blossom. Every day
comes a cold east wind to nip off my nose, and the devil a bit of
anything else comes to Green Peace. I am thin and languid. I have never
entirely recovered from my fever,[29] but my mind is clearer than it has
ever been since my marriage. I am able to think, to study and to pray,
things which I cannot accomplish when my brain is oppressed....
[29] She had had a severe attack of scarlet fever during the winter.
Boston has been greatly enlivened during the past month by a really fine
opera, the troupe from Havana, much better than the N. Y. troupe, with a
fine orchestra and chorus, all Italians. The Prima Donna is an artist of
the first order, and has an exquisite voice. I have had season tickets,
and have been nearly every night. This is a great indulgence, as it is
very expensive, and I have one of the best boxes in the house, but Chev
is the most indulgent of husbands. I never knew anything like it. Think
of all he allows me, a house and garden, a delicious carriage and pair
of horses, etc., etc., etc. My children are coming on famously. Julia,
or as she calls herself, Romana, is really a fine creature, full of
sensibility and of talent. She learns very readily, and reasons about
things with great gravity. She remembers every tune that she hears, and
can sing a great many songs. She is very full of fun, and so is my sweet
Flossy, my little flaxen-haired wax doll. I play for them on the piano,
Lizzie beats the tambourine, and the two babies take hold of hands and
dance. "Is not your heart fully satisfied with such a sight?" you will
ask me. I reply, dear Wevie, that the soul whose desires are not fixed
upon the unattainable is dead even while it liveth, and that I am glad,
in the midst of all my comforts, to feel myself still a pilgrim in
pursuit of something that is neither house nor lands, nor children, nor
health. What that something is I scarce know. Sometimes it seems to me
one thing and sometimes another. Oh, immortality, thou art to us but a
painful rapture, an ecstatic burthen in this earthly life. God teach me
to bear thee until thou shalt bear me! The arms of the cross will one
day turn into angels' wings, and lift us up to heaven. Don't think from
this rhapsody that I am undergoing a fit of pietistic exaltation. I am
not, but as I grow older, many things become clearer to me, and I feel
at once the difficulty and the necessity of holding fast to one's soul
and to its divine relationships, lest the world should cheat us of it
utterly.
_To her sister Annie_
June 19 [1847], GREEN PEACE.
MY DEAREST LITTLE ANNIE,--
... Boston has been in great excitement at the public debates of the
Prison Discipline Society, which have been intensely interesting. Chev
and Sumner have each spoken twice, in behalf of the Philadelphia system,
and against the course of the Society. They have been furiously attacked
by the opposite party. Chev's second speech drew tears from many eyes,
and was very beautiful. Both of Sumner's have been fine, but the last,
delivered last evening, was _masterly_. I never listened to anything
with more intense interest,--he held the audience breathless for two
hours and a half. I have attended all the debates save one--there have
been seven.
_To her sister Louisa_
July 1, 1847.
MY DEAREST OLD WEVIE,--
I should have written you yesterday but that I was obliged to entertain
the whole Club[30] at dinner, prior to Hillard's departure. I gave them
a neat little dinner, soup, salmon, sweetbreads, roast lamb and pigeon,
with green peas, potatoes _au maitre d'hotel_, spinach and salad. Then
came a delicious pudding and blanc-mange, then strawberries, pineapple,
and ice-cream, then coffee, etc. We had a pleasant time upon the whole.
That is, they had; for myself it is easy to find companions more
congenial than the Club. Still, I like them very well. I had last week a
little meeting of the _mutual correction_ club, which was far pleasanter
to me. This society is organized as follows: Julia Howe, grand universal
philosopher; Jane Belknap, charitable censor; Mary Ward, moderator;
Sarah Hale, optimist. I had them all to dinner and we were jolly, I do
assure you. My children looked so lovely yesterday, in muslin dresses of
bright pink plaid, made very full and reaching only to the knee, with
pink ribbands in their sleeves....
[30] The Five of Clubs. See _ante_.
How I do wish for you this summer. My little place is so green, my
flowers so sweet, my strawberries so delicious--the garden produces six
quarts or more a day. The cow gives delicious cream. I even make a sort
of cream cheese which is not by any means to be despised. Do you eat
_ricotta_ nowadays? Chev gave me a little French dessert set yesterday,
which made my table look so pretty. White with very rich blue and gold.
Oh, but it was bunkum! Dear old Wevie, you must give me one summer, and
then I will give you a winter--isn't that fair? Chev promises to take me
abroad in five years, if we should sell Green Peace well. They talk of
moving the Institution, in which case I should have to leave my pretty
Green Peace in two years more, but I should be sad to leave it, for it
is very lovely. I don't know any news at all to communicate. The
President[31] has just made a visit here; he was coolly but civilly
received. His whole course has been very unpopular in Massachusetts, and
nobody wanted to see the man who had brought this cursed Mexican War
upon us. He was received by the Mayor with a brief but polite address,
lodgings were provided for him, and a dinner given him by the city. But
there was no crowd to welcome him, no shouts, no waving of
handkerchiefs. The people quietly looked at him and said, "This is our
chief magistrate, is it? Well, he is _très peu de chose_." I of course
did not trouble myself to go and see him.... I send you an extract from a
daily paper. Can you tell me who is the authoress? It has been much
admired. Uncle John was very much tickled to see _somebody_ in print.
Try it again, Blue Jacket.
[31] James K. Polk.
* * * * *
The wayward moods shown in these letters sometimes found other
expression. In those days her wit was wayward too: its arrows were
always winged, and sometimes over-sharp. In later life, when Boston and
everything connected with it was unspeakably dear to her, she would not
recall the day when, passing on Charles Street the Charitable Eye and
Ear Infirmary, she read the name aloud and exclaimed, "Oh! I did not
know there was a charitable eye or ear in Boston!" Or that other day,
when having dined with the Ticknors, a family of monumental dignity, she
said to a friend afterward, "Oh! I am so cold! I have been dining with
the _Tête Noir_, the _Mer(e) de Glace_, and the _Jungfrau_!"
It may have been in these days that an incident occurred which she thus
describes in "A Plea for Humour": "I once wrote to an intimate friend a
very high-flown and ridiculous letter of reproof for her frivolity. I
presently heard of her as ill in bed, in consequence of my unkindness. I
immediately wrote, 'Did not you see that the whole thing was intended to
be a burlesque?' After a while she wrote back, 'I am just beginning to
see the fun of it, but the next time you intend to make a joke, pray
give me a fortnight's notice.' It was now my turn to take to my bed."
In September, 1847, a heavy sorrow came to her in the death of her
brother Marion, "a gallant, gracious boy, a true, upright and useful
man." She writes to her sister Louisa: "Let us thank Him that Marion's
life gave us as much joy as his death has given us pain.... Our children
will grow up in love and beauty, and one of us will have a sweet boy who
shall bear the dear name of Marion and make it doubly dear to us."
This prophecy was fulfilled first by the birth, on March 2, 1848, of
Henry Marion Howe (named for the two lost brothers), and again in 1854
by that of Francis Marion Crawford.
The winter of 1847-48 was also spent in Boston, at No. 74 Mount Vernon
Street; here the first son was born. The Doctor, recording his birth in
the Family Bible, wrote after the name, "_Dieu donné!_" And, his mind
full of the Revolution of 1848 in France, added, "_Liberté, Egalité,
Fraternité!_"
On April 18 she writes: "My boy will be seven weeks old to-morrow, and
... such a darling little child was never seen in this world before....
I shall have some fears lest his temperament partake of the melancholy
which oppressed me during the period of his _creation_, but so far he is
so placid and gentle, that we call him the little saint.... I have seen
little of the world since his birth, and thought still less. I shall try
to pursue my studies as I have through this last year, for I am good for
nothing without them. I will rather give up the world and cut out Beacon
Street, but an hour or two for the cultivation of my poor little soul I
must and will have...."
_To her sister Annie_
[1848.]
DEAREST ANNIE,--
... My literary reputation is growing apace. Mr. Buchanan Read has
written to me from Philadelphia to beg some poetry for a book he is
about to publish, and I am going to hunt up some trash for him in the
course of the week. I find that my name has been advertised in relation
to Griswold's book[32]--people come to ask Chev if _that_ Mrs. Howe is
his wife. I feel as if I should make a horribly shabby appearance. Do
tell me if Griswold liked the poems....
[32] _Female Poets of America._
_To the same_
Sunday, December 15, 1849.
... I do want to see you, best Annie, and to have a few long talks with
you about theology, the soul, the heart, life, matrimony, and the points
of resemblance between the patriarch Noah and Sir Tipsy Squinteye. Those
talks, madam, are not to be had, so instead of the rich _crême fouettée_
of our conversation, we will take an insipid water-ice of a letter
together, the two spoons being ourselves, the sugar, ice and lemon
representing our three husbands, all mixed up together, the whole to be
considered good when one can't get anything better. I will be hanged,
however, if you shall make me say which is which.
I pass my life after a singular manner, Annie. I am in the old room, in
the old house, even in the old dressing-gown, which is of some value,
inasmuch as it furnishes my _rent_. I am in the old place, but the old
Dudie is not in me; in her stead is a spirit of crossness and dullness,
insensible to all the gentler influences of life, knowing no music,
poetry, wit, or devotion, intent mainly upon holding on to the ropes,
and upon getting through the present without too much consciousness of
it.... All society has been paralyzed by the shocking murder of Dr.
Parkman. There has perhaps never been in Boston so horrible and
atrocious an affair. The details of the crime are too heart-sickening to
be dwelt upon. There can scarcely be a doubt of the guilt of Dr.
Webster--the jury of inquest have returned a verdict of guilty, but he
has still a chance for his life, as his trial in court does not come on
for some months. The wisest people say that he will be convicted and
hanged. I saw Dr. Parkman two or three days before he was missing--he
was an old friend of Chev's.... I have not been able to see much
company, yet we have had a few pleasant people at the house, now and
then. Among these, a Mr. Twisleton, brother of Lord Saye and Sele, the
most agreeable John Bull I have seen this many a day, or indeed ever....
The winter of 1849-50 was also spent at No. 74 Mount Vernon Street.
Here, in February, 1850, a third daughter was born, and named Laura for
Laura Bridgman. In the spring, our parents made a second voyage to
Europe, taking with them the two youngest children, Julia Romana and
Florence being left in the household of Dr. Edward Jarvis.
They spent some weeks in England, renewing the friendships made seven
years before; thence they journeyed to Paris, and from there to Boppart,
where the Doctor took the water cure. Julia seems to have been too busy
for letter-writing during this year; the Doctor writes to Charles Sumner
of the beauty of Boppart, and adds: "Julia and I have been enjoying
walks upon the banks of the Rhine, and rambles upon the hillside, and
musings among the ruins, and jaunts upon the waters as we have enjoyed
nothing since we left home."
He had but six months' leave of absence; it was felt by both that Julia
needed a longer time of rest and refreshment; accordingly when he
returned she, with the two little children, joined her sisters, both
now married, and the three proceeded to Rome, where they spent the
winter.
Mrs. Crawford was living at Villa Negroni, where Mrs. Mailliard became
her companion; Julia found a comfortable apartment in Via Capo le Case,
with the Edward Freemans on the floor above, and Mrs. David Dudley Field
on that below.
These were pleasant neighbors. Mrs. Freeman was Julia's companion in
many delightful walks and excursions; when Mrs. Field had a party, she
borrowed Mrs. Howe's large lamp, and was ready to lend her tea-cups in
return. There was a Christmas tree--the first ever seen in Rome!--at
Villa Negroni; "an occasional ball, a box at the opera, a drive on the
Campagna."
Julia found a learned Rabbi from the Ghetto, and resumed the study of
Hebrew, which she had begun the year before in South Boston. This
accomplished man was obliged to wear the distinctive dress then imposed
upon the Jews of Rome, and to be within the walls of the Ghetto by six
in the evening. There were private theatricals, too, she appearing as
"Tilburina" in "The Critic."
Among the friends of this Roman winter none was so beloved as Horace
Binney Wallace. He was a Philadelphian, a _rosso_. He held that "the
highest effort of nature is to produce a _rosso_"; he was always in
search of the favored tint either in pictures or in living beings.
Together the two _rossi_ explored the ancient city, with mutual pleasure
and profit.
Some years later, on hearing of his death, she recalled these days of
companionship in a poem called "Via Felice,"[33] which she sang to an
air of her own composition. The poem appeared in "Words for the Hour,"
and is one of the tenderest of her personal tributes:--
For Death's eternal city
Has yet some happy street;
'Tis in the Via Felice
My friend and I shall meet.
[33] Formerly part of the Via Sistina.
In the summer of 1851 she turned her face westward. The call of husband,
children, home, was imperative; yet so deep was the spell which Rome had
laid upon her that the parting was fraught with "pain, amounting almost
to anguish." She was oppressed by the thought that she might never again
see all that had grown so dear. Looking back upon this time, she says,
"I have indeed seen Rome and its wonders more than once since that time,
but never as I saw them then."
The homeward voyage was made in a sailing-vessel, in company with Mr.
and Mrs. Mailliard. They were a month at sea. In the long quiet mornings
Julia read Swedenborg's "Divine Love and Wisdom"; in the afternoons
Eugène Sue's "_Mystères de Paris_," borrowed from a steerage passenger.
There was whist in the evening; when her companions had gone to rest she
would sit alone, thinking over the six months, weaving into song their
pleasures and their pains. The actual record of this second Roman winter
is found in "Passion Flowers."