Dear Emerson,--We received your Letter* duly, some time ago, with
many welcomes; and have as you see been too remiss in answering
it. Not from forgetfulness, if you will take my word; no, but
from many causes, too complicated to articulate, and justly
producing an indisposition to put pen to paper at all! Never was
I more silent than in these very months; and, with reason too,
for the world at large, and my own share of it in small, are both
getting more and more unspeakable with any convenience! In
health we of this household are about as well as usual;--and look
across to the woods of Concord with more light than we had,
realizing for ourselves a most mild and friendly picture there.
Perhaps it is quite as well that you are left alone of foreign
interference, even of a Letter from Chelsea, till you get your
huge bale of English reminiscences assorted a little. Nobody
except me seems to have heard from you; at least the rest, in
these parts, all plead destitution when I ask for news. What you
saw and suffered and enjoyed here will, if you had once got it
properly warehoused, be new wealth to you for many years. Of one
impression we fail not here: admiration of your pacific virtues,
of gentle and noble tolerance, often sorely tried in this place!
Forgive me my ferocities; you do not quite know what I suffer in
these latitudes, or perhaps it would be even easier for you.
Peace for me, in a Mother of Dead Dogs like this, there is not,
was not, will not be,--till the battle itself end; which,
however, is a sure outlook, and daily growing a nearer one.
----------
* The letter is missing, but a fragment of the rough draft of it
exists, dated Concord, 2 October, 1848. Emerson had returned
home in July, and he begins: "'T is high time, no doubt, long
since, that you heard from me, and if there were good news in
America for you, you would be sure to hear. All goes at heavy
trot with us... I fell again quickly into my obscure habits, more
fit for me than the fine things I had seen. I made my best
endeavor to praise the rich country I had seen, and its
excellent, energetic, polished people. And it is very easy for
me to do so. England is the country of success, and success has
a great charm for me, more than for those I talk with at home.
But they were obstinate to know if the English were superior to
their possessions, and if the old religion warmed their hearts,
and lifted a little the mountain of wealth. So I enumerated the
list of brilliant persons I had seen, and the [break in MS.].
But the question returned. Did you find kings and priests? Did
you find sanctities and beauties that took away your memory, and
sent you home a changed man with new aims, and with a discontent
of your old pastures?"
Here the fragment ends. Emerson's answer to these questions may be
found in the chapter entitled "Results," in his _English Traits._
----------
Nay, there is another practical question,--but it is from the
female side of the house to the female side,--and in fact
concerns Indian meal, upon which Mrs. Emerson, or you, or the
Miller of Concord (if he have any tincture of philosophy) are now
to instruct us! The fact is, potatoes having vanished here, we
are again, with motives large and small, trying to learn the use
of Indian meal; and indeed do eat it daily to meat at dinner,
though hitherto with considerable despair. Question _first,_
therefore: Is there by nature a _bitter_ final taste, which
makes the throat smart, and disheartens much the apprentice in
Indian meal;--or is it accidental, and to be avoided? We surely
anticipate the latter answer; but do not yet see how. At first
we were taught the meal, all ground on your side of the water,
had got fusty, _raw;_ an effect we are well used to in oaten and
other meals but, last year, we had a bushel of it ground _here,_
and the bitter taste was there as before (with the addition of
much dirt and sand, our millstones I suppose being too soft);--
whereupon we incline to surmise that there is, perhaps, as in the
case of oats, some pellicle or hull that ought to be _rejected_
in making the meal? Pray ask some philosophic Miller, if Mrs.
Emerson or you do not know;--and as a corollary this _second_
question: What is the essential difference between _white_ (or
brown-gray-white) Indian Meal and _yellow_ (the kind we now have;
beautiful as new Guineas, but with an ineffaceable tastekin of
_soot_ in it)?--And question _third,_ which includes all: How to
cook _mush_ rightly, at least without bitter? _Long_-continued
boiling seems to help the bitterness, but does not cure it. Let
some oracle speak! I tell all people, our staff of life is in
the Mississippi Valley henceforth;--and one of the truest
benefactors were an American Minerva who could teach us to cook
this meal; which our people at present (I included) are
unanimous in finding nigh uneatable, and loudly exclaimable
against! Elihu Burritt had a string of recipes that went through
all newspapers three years ago; but never sang there oracle of
longer ears than that,--totally destitute of practical
significance to any creature here!
And now enough of questioning. Alas, alas, I have a quite other
batch of sad and saddest considerations,--on which I must not so
much as enter at present! Death has been very busy in this
little circle of ours within these few days. You remember
Charles Buller, to whom I brought you over that night at the
Barings' in Stanhope Street? He died this day week, almost quite
unexpectedly; a sore loss to all that knew him personally, and
his gladdening sunny presence in many circles here; a sore loss
to the political people too, for he was far the cleverest of all
Whig men, and indeed the only genial soul one can remember in
that department of things.* We buried him yesterday; and now
see what new thing has come. Lord Ashburton, who had left his
mother well in Hampshire ten hours before, is summoned from poor
Buller's funeral by telegraph; hurries back, finds his mother,
whom he loved much, already dead! She was a Miss Bingham, I
think, from Pennsylvania, perhaps from Philadelphia itself. You
saw her; but the first sight by no means told one all or the
best worth that was in that good Lady. We are quite bewildered
by our own regrets, and by the far painfuler sorrow of those
closely related to these sudden sorrows. Of which let me be
silent for the present;--and indeed of all things else, for
_speech,_ inadequate mockery of one's poor meaning, is quite a
burden to me just now!
---------
* The reader of Carlyle's _Reminiscences,_ and of Froude's
volumes of his biography, is familiar with the close relations
that had existed between Buller and Carlyle.
----------
Neuberg* comes hither sometimes; a welcome, wise kind of man.
Poor little Espinasse still toils cheerily at the oar, and
various friends of yours are about us. Brother John did send
through Chapman all the _Dante,_ which we calculate you have
received long ago: he is now come to Town; doing a Preface,
&c., which also will be sent to you, and just about publishing.--
Helps, who has been alarmingly ill, and touring on the Rhine
since we were his guests, writes to me yesterday from Hampshire
about sending you a new Book of his. I instructed him How.
Adieu, dear Emerson; do not forget us, or forget to think
as kindly as you can of us, while we continue in this
world together.
Yours ever affectionately,
T. Carlyle
---------
* Mr. Ireland, in his _Recollections,_ p. 62, gives an
interesting account of Mr. Neuberg,--a highly cultivated German,
who assisted Carlyle in some of the later literary labors of his
life. Neuberg died in 1867, and in a letter to his sister of
that year Carlyle says: "No kinder friend had I in this world;
no man of my day, I believe, had so faithful, loyal, and willing
a helper as he generously was to me for the last twenty or
more years."
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