No one who called at Phillips Brooks's house was ever told that the
master of the house was out when he was in. That was a rule laid down by
Doctor Brooks: a maid was not to perjure herself for her master's
comfort or convenience. Therefore, when Edward was told that Doctor
Brooks was out, he knew he was out. The boy waited, and as he waited he
had a chance to look around the library and into the books. The rector's
faithful housekeeper said he might when he repeated what Wendell
Phillips had told him of the interest that was to be found in her
master's books. Edward did not tell her of Mr. Phillips's advice to
"borrow" a couple of books. He reserved that bit of information for the
rector of Trinity when he came in, an hour later.
"Oh! did he?" laughingly said Doctor Brooks. "That is nice advice for a
man to give a boy. I am surprised at Wendell Phillips. He needs a little
talk: a ministerial visit. And have you followed his shameless advice?"
smilingly asked the huge man as he towered above the boy. "No? And to
think of the opportunity you had, too. Well, I am glad you had such
respect for my dumb friends. For they are my friends, each one of them,"
he continued, as he looked fondly at the filled shelves. "Yes, I know
them all, and love each for its own sake. Take this little volume," and
he picked up a little volume of Shakespeare. "Why, we are the best of
friends: we have travelled miles together--all over the world, as a
matter of fact. It knows me in all my moods, and responds to each, no
matter how irritable I am. Yes, it is pretty badly marked up now, for a
fact, isn't it? Black; I never thought of that before that it doesn't
make a book look any better to the eye. But it means more to me because
of all that pencilling.
"Now, some folks dislike my use of my books in this way. They love their
books so much that they think it nothing short of sacrilege to mark up a
book. But to me that's like having a child so prettily dressed that you
can't romp and play with it. What is the good of a book, I say, if it is
too pretty for use? I like to have my books speak to me, and then I like
to talk back to them.
"Take my Bible, here," he continued, as he took up an old and much-worn
copy of the book. "I have a number of copies of the Great Book: one copy
I preach from; another I minister from; but this is my own personal
copy, and into it I talk and talk. See how I talk," and he opened the
Book and showed interleaved pages full of comments in his handwriting.
"There's where St. Paul and I had an argument one day. Yes, it was a
long argument, and I don't know now who won," he added smilingly. "But
then, no one ever wins in an argument, anyway; do you think so?
"You see," went on the preacher, "I put into these books what other men
put into articles and essays for magazines and papers. I never write for
publications. I always think of my church when something comes to me to
say. There is always danger of a man spreading himself out thin if he
attempts too much, you know."
Doctor Brooks must have caught the boy's eye, which, as he said this,
naturally surveyed his great frame, for he regarded him in an amused
way, and putting his hands on his girth, he said laughingly: "You are
thinking I would have to do a great deal to spread myself out thin,
aren't you?"
The boy confessed he was, and the preacher laughed one of those deep
laughs of his that were so infectious.
"But here I am talking about myself. Tell me something about yourself?"
And when the boy told his object in coming to Boston, the rector of
Trinity Church was immensely amused.
"Just to see us fellows! Well, and how do you like us so far?"
And is the most comfortable way this true gentleman went on until the
boy mentioned that he must be keeping him from his work.
"Not at all; not at all," was the quick and hearty response. "Not a
thing to do. I cleaned up all my mail before I had my breakfast this
morning.
"These letters, you mean?" he said, as the boy pointed to some letters
on his desk unopened. "Oh, yes! Well, they must have come in a later
mail. Well, if it will make you feel any better I'll go through them,
and you can go through my books if you like. I'll trust you," he added
laughingly, as Wendell Phillips's advice occurred to him.
"You like books, you say?" he went on, as he opened his letters. "Well,
then, you must come into my library here at any time you are in Boston,
and spend a morning reading anything I have that you like. Young men do
that, you know, and I like to have them. What's the use of good friends
if you don't share them? There's where the pleasure comes in."
He asked the boy then about his newspaper work: how much it paid him,
and whether he felt it helped him in an educational way. The boy told
him he thought it did; that it furnished good lessons in the study of
human nature.
"Yes," he said, "I can believe that, so long as it is good journalism."
Edward told him that he sometimes wrote for the Sunday paper, and asked
the preacher what he thought of that.
"Well," he said, "that is not a crime."
The boy asked him if he, then, favored the Sunday paper more than did
some other clergymen.
"There is always good in everything, I think," replied Phillips Brooks.
"A thing must be pretty bad that hasn't some good in it." Then he
stopped, and after a moment went on: "My idea is that the fate of Sunday
newspapers rests very much with Sunday editors. There is a Sunday
newspaper conceivable in which we should all rejoice--all, that is, who
do not hold that a Sunday newspaper is always and per se wrong. But some
cause has, in many instances, brought it about that the Sunday paper is
below, and not above, the standard of its weekday brethren. I mean it is
apt to be more gossipy, more personal, more sensational, more frivolous;
less serious and thoughtful and suggestive. Taking for granted the fact
of special leisure on the part of its readers, it is apt to appeal to
the lower and not to the higher part of them, which the Sunday leisure
has set free. Let the Sunday newspaper be worthy of the day, and the day
will not reject it. So I say its fate is in the hands of its editor. He
can give it such a character as will make all good men its champions and
friends, or he can preserve for it the suspicion and dislike in which it
stands at present."
Edward's journalistic instinct here got into full play; and although, as
he assured his host, he had had no such thought in coming, he asked
whether Doctor Brooks would object if he tried his reportorial wings by
experimenting as to whether he could report the talk.
"I do not like the papers to talk about me," was the answer; "but if it
will help you, go ahead and practise on me. You haven't stolen my books
when you were told to do so, and I don't think you'll steal my name."
The boy went back to his hotel, and wrote an article much as this
account is here written, which he sent to Doctor Brooks. "Let me keep it
by me," the doctor wrote, "and I will return it to you presently."
And he did, with his comment on the Sunday newspaper, just as it is
given here, and with this note:
If I must go into the
newspapers at all--which
I should always vastly
prefer to avoid--no words could
have been more kind than
those of your article. You
were very good to send it
to me. I am ever
Sincerely, Your friend,
Phillips Brooks
As he let the boy out of his house, at the end of that first meeting, he
said to him:
"And you're going from me now to see Emerson? I don't know," he added
reflectively, "whether you will see him at his best. Still, you may. And
even if you do not, to have seen him, even as you may see him, is
better, in a way, than not to have seen him at all."
Edward did not know what Phillips Brooks meant. But he was, sadly, to
find out the next day.
A boy of sixteen was pretty sure of a welcome from Louisa Alcott, and
his greeting from her was spontaneous and sincere.
"Why, you good boy," she said, "to come all the way to Concord to see
us," quite for all the world as if she were the one favored. "Now take
your coat off, and come right in by the fire."
"Do tell me all about your visit," she continued.
Before that cozey fire they chatted. It was pleasant to the boy to sit
there with that sweet-faced woman with those kindly eyes! After a while
she said: "Now I shall put on my coat and hat, and we shall walk over to
Emerson's house. I am almost afraid to promise that you will see him. He
sees scarcely any one now. He is feeble, and--" She did not finish the
sentence. "But we'll walk over there, at any rate."
She spoke mostly of her father as the two walked along, and it was easy
to see that his condition was now the one thought of her life. Presently
they reached Emerson's house, and Miss Emerson welcomed them at the
door. After a brief chat Miss Alcott told of the boy's hope. Miss
Emerson shook her head.
"Father sees no one now," she said, "and I fear it might not be a
pleasure if you did see him."
Then Edward told her what Phillips Brooks had said.
"Well," she said, "I'll see."
She had scarcely left the room when Miss Alcott rose and followed her,
saying to the boy: "You shall see Mr. Emerson if it is at all possible."
In a few minutes Miss Alcott returned, her eyes moistened, and simply
said: "Come."
The boy followed her through two rooms, and at the threshold of the
third Miss Emerson stood, also with moistened eyes.
"Father," she said simply, and there, at his desk, sat Emerson--the man
whose words had already won Edward Bok's boyish interest, and who was
destined to impress himself upon his life more deeply than any other
writer.
Slowly, at the daughter's spoken word, Emerson rose with a wonderful
quiet dignity, extended his hand, and as the boy's hand rested in his,
looked him full in the eyes.
No light of welcome came from those sad yet tender eyes. The boy closed
upon the hand in his with a loving pressure, and for a single moment the
eyelids rose, a different look came into those eyes, and Edward felt a
slight, perceptible response of the hand. But that was all!
Quietly he motioned the boy to a chair beside the desk. Edward sat down
and was about to say something, when, instead of seating himself,
Emerson walked away to the window and stood there softly whistling and
looking out as if there were no one in the room. Edward's eyes had
followed Emerson's every footstep, when the boy was aroused by hearing a
suppressed sob, and as he looked around he saw that it came from Miss
Emerson. Slowly she walked out of the room. The boy looked at Miss
Alcott, and she put her finger to her mouth, indicating silence. He was
nonplussed.
Edward looked toward Emerson standing in that window, and wondered what
it all meant. Presently Emerson left the window and, crossing the room,
came to his desk, bowing to the boy as he passed, and seated himself,
not speaking a word and ignoring the presence of the two persons in the
room.
Suddenly the boy heard Miss Alcott say: "Have you read this new book by
Ruskin yet?"
Slowly the great master of thought lifted his eyes from his desk, turned
toward the speaker, rose with stately courtesy from his chair, and,
bowing to Miss Alcott, said with great deliberation: "Did you speak to
me, madam?"
The boy was dumfounded! Louisa Alcott, his Louisa! And he did not know
her! Suddenly the whole sad truth flashed upon the boy. Tears sprang
into Miss Alcott's eyes, and she walked to the other side of the room.
The boy did not know what to say or do, so he sat silent. With a
deliberate movement Emerson resumed his seat, and slowly his eyes roamed
over the boy sitting at the side of the desk. He felt he should say
something.
"I thought, perhaps, Mr. Emerson," he said, "that you might be able to
favor me with a letter from Carlyle."
At the mention of the name Carlyle his eyes lifted, and he asked:
"Carlyle, did you say, sir, Carlyle?"
"Yes," said the boy, "Thomas Carlyle."
"Ye-es," Emerson answered slowly. "To be sure, Carlyle. Yes, he was here
this morning. He will be here again to-morrow morning," he added
gleefully, almost like a child.