IF the young readers of THE PANSY had lived forty years ago, and had
been readers of the _New York Tribune_, they would, without doubt, have
been interested in certain letters upon art and literature written
by Margaret Fuller; or, if you are so fortunate as to belong to a
grandfather who stored away his files of the _Tribune_ in some now
long-forgotten chest in the attic, you may find in the old, yellow and
musty papers these same letters, and may read them now. I do not like
musty old papers very much! What's the use, when we have fresh ones in
such numbers that we cannot begin to read all that are taken by the
different members of the family?
Sarah Margaret Fuller was a native of Cambridgeport, Mass. Very early
in life she gave promise of the brilliant literary career which she
afterwards ran. She was a fine scholar even in childhood, especially in
the languages, and in general literature. Her education was carried on
in private. After she entered her teens, she became a teacher of the
languages in classes in Boston, and in Mr. Alcott's school, and was
at one time the principal of a school in Providence. While she was a
contributor to the _Tribune_, she was a member of the family of Horace
Greeley. Her views of life were modelled after the philosophy of Ralph
Waldo Emerson, and about the year 1839, or 1840, she gave a series of
lectures, or talks, though I believe they were called _conversazioni_,
especially for ladies, the object being the propagation of then
somewhat novel ideas. She also became the editor of a paper. She wrote
much, and with considerable brilliancy. Her "Summer on the Lakes" gives
pictures of the Lake Superior region. Her "Woman in the Nineteenth
Century" has to do with some phases of the "Woman's Rights Question."
In 1846 she went abroad, and married, in Rome, a nobleman, Giovanni
Angelo Ossoli. But she bore the name and the title attached to it only
a few years. For when she was returning to America, accompanied by
her husband, both lost their lives in a shipwreck. She was a woman of
strong passions, indeed it has been said of her that "She was noted
for her eccentricities and her ungovernable passions." Not just what I
would wish to be written of any of my young friends of THE PANSY. It
is a sad thing when a great and gifted woman misses the happiness of a
quiet spirit.