Julia Ward Howe - Richards Laura E. - Страница 27

She writes to her sister Annie:—

"The history of all these days, beloved, is comprised in one phrase, the miseries of proof-reading. Oh, the endless, endless plague of looking over these proof-sheets—the doubts about phrases, rhymes, and expressions, the perplexity of names, especially, in which I have not been fortunate. To-morrow I get my last proof. Then a fortnight must be allowed for drying and binding. Then I shall be out, fairly out, do you hear? So far my secret has been pretty well kept. My book is to bear a simple title without my name, according to Longfellow's advice. Longfellow has been reading a part of the volume in sheets. He says it will make a sensation.... I feel much excited, quite unsettled, sometimes a little frantic. If I succeed, I feel that I shall be humbled by my happiness, devoutly thankful to God. Now, I will not write any more about it."

The warmest praise came from the poets,—the "high, impassioned few" of her "Salutatory." Whittier wrote:—

Amesbury, 29th, 12 mo. 53.

My dear Fr'd,—

A thousand thanks for thy volume! I rec'd it some days ago, but was too ill to read it. I glanced at "Rome," "Newport and Rome," and they excited me like a war-trumpet. To-day, with the wild storm drifting without, my sister and I have been busy with thy book, and basking in the warm atmosphere of its flowers of passion. It is a great book—it has placed thee at the head of us all. I like its noble aims, its scorn and hate of priestcraft and Slavery. It speaks out bravely, beautifully all I have felt, but could not express, when contemplating the condition of Europe. God bless thee for it!

I owe an apology to Dr. Howe, if not to thyself, for putting into verse[34] an incident of his early life which a friend related to me. When I saw his name connected with it, in some of the papers that copied it, I felt fearful that I had wounded, perhaps, the feelings of one I love and honor beyond almost any other man, by the liberty I have taken. I can only say I could not well help it—a sort of necessity was before me, to say what I did.

I wish I could tell thee how glad thy volume has made me. I have marked it all over with notes of admiration. I dare say it has faults enough, but thee need not fear on that account. It has beauty enough to save thy "slender neck" from the axe of the critical headsman. The veriest "de'il"—as Burns says—"wad look into thy face and swear he could na wrang thee."

With love to the Doctor and thy lovely little folk,

I am

Very sincerely thy friend,

John G. Whittier.

Emerson wrote:—

Concord, Mass., 30 Dec., 1853.

Dear Mrs. Howe,—

I am just leaving home with much ado of happy preparation for an absence of five weeks, but must take a few moments to thank you for the happiness your gift brings me. It was very kind in you to send it to me, who have forfeited all apparent claims to such favor, by breaking all the laws of good neighborhood in these years. But you were entirely right in sending it, because, I fancy, that among all your friends, few had so earnest a desire to know your thoughts, and, I may say, so much regret at never seeing you, as I. And the book, as I read in it, meets this curiosity of mine, by its poems of character and confidence, private lyrics, whose air and words [are] all your own. I have not gone so far in them as to have any criticism to offer you, and like better the pure pleasure I find in a new book of poetry so warm with life. Perhaps, when I have finished the book, I shall ask the privilege of saying something further. At present I content myself with thanking you.

With great regard,

R. W. Emerson.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, always generous in his welcome to younger writers, sent the following poem, never before printed:—

If I were one, O Minstrel wild.

That held "the golden cup"

Not unto thee, Art's stolen child,

My hand should yield it up;

Why should I waste its gold on one

That holds a guerdon bright—

A chalice, flashing in the sun

Of perfect chrysolite.

And shaped on such a swelling sphere

As if some God had pressed

Its flowing crystal, soft and clear

On Hebe's virgin breast?

What though the bitter grapes of earth

Have mingled in its wine?

The stolen fruits of heavenly birth

Have made its hue divine.

Oh, Lady, there are charms that win

Their way to magic bowers,

And they that weave them enter in

In spite of mortal powers;

And hearts that seek the chapel's floor

Will throb the long aisle through,

Though none are waiting at the door

To sprinkle holy dew!

I, sitting in the portal gray

Of Art's cathedral dim,

Can see thee, passing in to pray

And sing thy first-born hymn;—

Hold out thy hand! these scanty drops

Come from a hallowed stream,

Its sands, a poet's crumbling hopes,

Its mists, his fading dream.

Pass on. Around the inmost shrine

A few faint tapers burn;

This altar, Priestess, shall be thine

To light and watch in turn;

Above it smiles the Mother Maid,

It leans on Love and Art,

And in its glowing depth is laid

The first true woman's heart!

O. W. H.

Boston, Jan. 1, 1854.

This tribute from the beloved Autocrat touched her deeply, the more so that in the "Commonwealth"[35] she had recently reviewed some of his own work rather severely. She made her acknowledgment in a poem entitled "A Vision of Montgomery Place,"[36] in which she pictures herself as a sheeted penitent knocking at Dr. Holmes's door.

I was the saucy Commonwealth:

Oh! help me to repent.

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Behind my embrasure well-braced,