My Dear Friend,--I have had two good letters from you, and it is
fully my turn to write, so you shall have a token on this latest
day of the year. I rejoice in this good will you bear to so many
friends of mine,--if they will go to you, you must thank
yourself. Best when you are mutually contented. I wished lately
I might serve Mr. Macready, who sent me your letter.--I called on
him and introduced him to Sam G. Ward, my friend and the best man
in the city, and, besides all his personal merits, a master of
all the offices of hospitality. Ward was to keep himself
informed of Macready's times, and bring me to him when there was
opportunity. But he stayed but a few days in Boston, and, Ward
said, was in very good hands, and promised to see us when he
returns by and by. I saw him in Hamlet, but should much prefer
to see him as Macready.
I must try to entice Mr. Macready out here into my pines and
alder bushes. Just now the moon is shining on snow-drifts, four,
five, and six feet high, but, before his return, they will melt;
and already this my not native but ancestral village, which I
came to live in nearly ten years ago because it was the quietest
of farming towns, and off the road, is found to lie on the
directest line of road from Boston to Montreal, a railroad is
a-building through our secretest woodlands, and, tomorrow morning,
our people go to Boston in two hours instead of three, and, next
June, in one. This petty revolution in our country matters was
very odious to me when it began, but it is hard to resist the joy
of all one's neighbors, and I must be contented to be carted like
a chattel in the cars and be glad to see the forest fall. This
rushing on your journey is plainly a capital invention for our
spacious America, but it is more dignified and man-like to walk
barefoot.--But do you not see that we are getting to be
neighbors? a day from London to Liverpool; twelve or eleven to
Boston; and an hour to Concord; and you have owed me a visit
these ten years.
I mean to send with your January _Dial_ a copy of the number for
Sterling, as it contains a review of his tragedy and poems, by
Margaret Fuller. I have not yet seen the article, and the lady
affirms that it is very bad, as she was ill all the time she was
writing; but I hope and believe better. She, Margaret Fuller,
is an admirable person, whose writing gives feeble account of
her. But I was to say that I shall send this _Dial_ for J.S. to
your care, as I know not the way to the Isle of Wight.
Enclosed in this letter I send a bill of exchange for L32 8s. 2d.
payable by Baring & Co. It happens to represent an exact balance
on Munroe's books, and that slow mortal should have paid it
before. I have not yet got to Clark, I who am a slow mortal, but
have my eye fixed on him. Remember me and mine with kindest
salutations to your wife and brother.
Ever yours,
R.W. Emerson