"The melancholy presentiment has for some time hung on my spirits, that we were parted forever; and the letters I received this day, by Mr. ——, convince me that it was not without foundation. You allude to some other letters, which I suppose have miscarried; for most of those I have got were only a few, hasty lines calculated to wound the tenderness that the sight of the superscriptions excited.

"I mean not, however, to complain; yet so many feelings are struggling for utterance, and agitating a heart almost bursting with anguish, that I find it very difficult to write with any degree of coherence.

"You left me indisposed, though you have taken no notice of it; and the most fatiguing journey I ever had contributed to continue it. However, I recovered my health; but a neglected cold, and continual inquietude during the last two months, have reduced me to a state of weakness I never before experienced. Those who did not know that the canker-worm was at work at the core cautioned me about suckling my child too long. God preserve this poor child, and render her happier than her mother!

"But I am wandering from my subject; indeed, my head turns giddy, when I think that all the confidence I have had in the affection of others is come to this. I did not expect this blow from you. I have done my duty to you and my child; and if I am not to have any return of affection to reward me, I have the sad consolation of knowing that I deserved a better fate. My soul is weary; I am sick at heart; and but for this little darling I would cease to care about a life which is now stripped of every charm.

"You see how stupid I am, uttering declamation when I meant simply to tell you that I consider your requesting me to come to you as merely dictated by honor. Indeed, I scarcely understand you. You request me to come, and then tell me that you have not given up all thoughts of returning to this place.

"When I determined to live with you, I was only governed by affection. I would share poverty with you, but I turn with affright from the sea of trouble on which you are entering. I have certain principles of action; I know what I look for to found my happiness on. It is not money. With you, I wished for sufficient to procure the comforts of life; as it is, less will do. I can still exert myself to obtain the necessaries of life for my child, and she does not want more at present. I have two or three plans in my head to earn our subsistence; for do not suppose that, neglected by you, I will lie under obligations of a pecuniary kind to you! No; I would sooner submit to menial service. I wanted the support of your affection; that gone, all is over! I did not think, when I complained of ——'s contemptible avidity to accumulate money, that he would have dragged you into his schemes.

"I cannot write. I enclose a fragment of a letter, written soon after your departure, and another which tenderness made me keep back when it was written. You will see then the sentiments of a calmer, though not a more determined moment. Do not insult me by saying that 'our being together is paramount to every other consideration!' Were it, you would not be running after a bubble, at the expense of my peace of mind.

"Perhaps this is the last letter you will ever receive from me."

Grief sometimes makes men strong. Mary's stimulated her into a determination to break her connection with Imlay, and to live for her child alone. She would remain in Paris and superintend Fanny's education. She had already been able to look out for herself; there was no reason why she should not do it again. Until she settled upon the means of support to be adopted, she would borrow money from her friends. Anything was better than to live at Imlay's expense. As for him, such a course would probably be a relief, and certainly it would do him no harm. "As I never concealed the nature of my connection with you," she wrote him, "your reputation will not suffer." But her plans, for some reason, did not meet with his approval. He was tired of her, and yet he seems to have been ashamed to confess his inconstancy. At one moment he wrote that he was coming to Paris; at the next he bade her meet him in London. But no mention was made of the farm in America. The excitement of commerce proved more alluring than the peace of country life. His shilly-shallying unnerved Mary; positive desertion would have been easier to bear. On February 19 she wrote him:—

"When I first received your letter putting off your return to an indefinite time, I felt so hurt that I knew not what I wrote. I am now calmer, though it was not the kind of wound over which time has the quickest effect; on the contrary, the more I think, the sadder I grow. Society fatigues me inexpressibly; so much so that, finding fault with every one, I have only reason enough to discover that the fault is in myself. My child alone interests me, and but for her I should not take any pains to recover my health."

The child was now the strongest bond of union between them. For her sake she felt the necessity of continuing to live with Imlay as long as possible, though his love was dead. Therefore, when he wrote definitely that he would like her to come to him, since he could not leave his business to go to her, she relinquished her intentions of remaining alone in France with Fanny, and set out at once for London. She could hardly have passed through Havre without feeling the bitter contrast between her happiness of the year before, and her present hopelessness. "I sit, lost in thought," she wrote to Imlay, "looking at the sea, and tears rush into my eyes when I find that I am cherishing any fond expectations. I have indeed been so unhappy this winter, I find it as difficult to acquire fresh hopes as to regain tranquillity. Enough of this; be still, foolish heart! But for the little girl, I could almost wish that it should cease to beat, to be no more alive to the anguish of disappointment." The boat upon which she sailed was run aground, and she was thus unexpectedly detained at Havre. During this interval she touched still more closely upon sorrow's crown of sorrow in remembering happier things, by writing to Mr. Archibald Hamilton Rowan, who had escaped from his prison in Ireland to France, and giving him certain necessary information about the house she had left, and which he was about to occupy.

She reached London in April, 1795. Her gloomiest forebodings were confirmed. Imlay had provided a furnished house for her, and had considered her comforts. But his manner was changed. He was cold and constrained, and she felt the difference immediately. He was little with her, and business was, as of old, the excuse. According to Godwin, he had formed another connection with a young strolling actress. Life was thus even less bright in London than it had been in Paris. If hell is but the shadow of a soul on fire, she was now plunged into its deepest depths. Its tortures were more than she could endure. For her there were, indeed, worse things waiting at the gate of life than death, and she resolved by suicide to escape from them. This part of her story is very obscure. But it is certain that her suicidal intentions were so nearly carried into effect, that she had written several letters containing her, as she thought, last wishes, and which were to be opened after all was over. There is no exact account of the manner in which she proposed to kill herself, nor of the means by which she was prevented. "I only know," Godwin says, "that Mr. Imlay became acquainted with her purpose at a moment when he was uncertain whether or no it was already executed, and that his feelings were roused by the intelligence. It was perhaps owing to his activity and representations that her life was at this time saved. She determined to continue to exist."

This event sobered both Imlay and Mary. They saw the danger they were in, and the consequent necessity of forming a definite conclusion as to the nature of their future relations. They must either live together in perfect confidence, or else they must separate. "My friend, my dear friend," she wrote him, "examine yourself well,—I am out of the question; for, alas! I am nothing,—and discover what you wish to do, what will render you most comfortable; or, to be more explicit, whether you desire to live with me, or part forever! When you can ascertain it, tell me frankly, I conjure you! for, believe me, I have very involuntarily interrupted your peace." The determination could not be made in a hurry. In the meantime Mary knew it would be unwise to remain idle, meditating upon her wrongs. Forgetfulness of self in active work appeared the only possible means of living through the period of uncertainty. Imlay had business in Norway and Sweden which demanded the personal superintendence either of himself or of a trustworthy agent. He gave it in charge to Mary, and at the end of May she started upon this mission. That Imlay still looked upon her as his wife, and that his confidence in her was unlimited, is shown by the following document in which he authorizes her to act for him:—

May 19, 1795.

Know all men by these presents that I, Gilbert Imlay, citizen of the United States of America, at present residing in London, do nominate, constitute, and appoint Mary Imlay, my best friend and wife, to take the sole management and direction of all my affairs, and business which I had placed in the hands of Mr. Elias Bachman, negotiant, Gottenburg, or in those of Messrs. Myburg & Co., Copenhagen, desiring that she will manage and direct such concerns in such manner as she may deem most wise and prudent. For which this letter shall be a sufficient power, enabling her to receive all the money or sums of money that may be recovered from Peter Ellison or his connections, whatever may be the issue of the trial now carrying on, instigated by Mr. Elias Bachman, as my agent, for the violation of the trust which I had reposed in his integrity.

Considering the aggravated distresses, the accumulated losses and damages sustained in consequence of the said Ellison's disobedience of my injunctions, I desire the said Mary Imlay will clearly ascertain the amount of such damages, taking first the advice of persons qualified to judge of the probability of obtaining satisfaction, or the means the said Ellison or his connections, who may be proved to be implicated in his guilt, may have, or power of being able to make restitution, and then commence a new prosecution for the same accordingly....

Respecting the cargo of goods in the hands of Messrs. Myburg and Co., Mrs. Imlay has only to consult the most experienced persons engaged in the disposition of such articles, and then, placing them at their disposal, act as she may deem right and proper....

Thus confiding in the talent, zeal, and earnestness of my dearly beloved friend and companion, I submit the management of these affairs entirely and implicitly to her discretion.

Remaining most sincerely and affectionately hers truly,

G. IMLAY.

Witness, J. SAMUEL.

Unfortunately for Mary, she was detained at Hull, from which town she was to set sail, for about a month. She was thus unable immediately to still the memory of her sorrows. It is touching to see how, now that she could no longer doubt that Imlay was made of common clay, she began to find excuses for him. She represented to herself that it was her misfortune to have met him too late. Had she known him before dissipation had enslaved him, there would have been none of this trouble. She was, furthermore, convinced that his natural refinement was not entirely destroyed, and that if he would but make the effort he could overcome his grosser appetites. To this effect she wrote him from Hull:—

"I shall always consider it as one of the most serious misfortunes of my life, that I did not meet you before satiety had rendered your senses so fastidious as almost to close up every tender avenue of sentiment and affection that leads to your sympathetic heart. You have a heart, my friend; yet, hurried away by the impetuosity of inferior feelings, you have sought in vulgar excesses for that gratification which only the heart can bestow.

"The common run of men, I know, with strong health and gross appetites, must have variety to banish ennui, because the imagination never lends its magic wand to convert appetite into love, cemented by according reason. Ah! my friend, you know not the ineffable delight, the exquisite pleasure, which arises from an unison of affection and desire, when the whole soul and senses are abandoned to a lively imagination, that renders every emotion delicate and rapturous. Yes; these are emotions over which satiety has no power, and the recollection of which even disappointment cannot disenchant; but they do not exist without self-denial. These emotions, more or less strong, appear to me to be the distinctive characteristics of genius, the foundation of taste, and of that exquisite relish for the beauties of nature, of which the common herd of eaters and drinkers and child-begetters certainly have no idea. You will smile at an observation that has just occurred to me: I consider those minds as the most strong and original whose imagination acts as the stimulus to their senses.

"Well! you will ask what is the result of all this reasoning. Why, I cannot help thinking that it is possible for you, having great strength of mind, to return to nature and regain a sanity of constitution and purity of feeling which would open your heart to me. I would fain rest there!

"Yet, convinced more than ever of the sincerity and tenderness of my attachment to you, the involuntary hopes which a determination to live has revived are not sufficiently strong to dissipate the cloud that despair has spread over futurity. I have looked at the sea and at my child, hardly daring to own to myself the secret wish that it might become our tomb, and that the heart, still so alive to anguish, might there be quieted by death. At this moment ten thousand complicated sentiments press for utterance, weigh on my heart, and obscure my sight."

After almost a month of inactivity, the one bright spot in it being a visit to Beverly, the home of her childhood, she sailed for Sweden, with Fanny and a maid as her only companions. Her "Letters from Sweden, Norway, and Denmark," with the more personal passages omitted, were published in a volume by themselves shortly after her return to England. Notice of them will find a more appropriate place in another chapter. All that is necessary here is the very portion which was then suppressed, but which Godwin later included with the "Letters to Imlay." The northern trip had at least this good result. It strengthened her physically. She was so weak when she first arrived in Sweden that the day she landed she fell fainting to the ground as she walked to her carriage. For a while everything fatigued her. The bustle of the people around her seemed "flat, dull, and unprofitable." The civilities by which she was overwhelmed, and the endeavors of the people she met to amuse her, were fatiguing. Nothing, for a while, could lighten her deadly weight of sorrow. But by degrees, as her letters show, she improved. Pure air, long walks, and rides on horseback, rowing and bathing, and days in the country had their beneficial effect, and she wrote to Imlay on July 4, "The rosy fingers of health already streak my cheeks; and I have seen a physical life in my eyes, after I have been climbing the rocks, that resembled the fond, credulous hopes of youth."

But even a sound body cannot heal a broken heart. Mary could not throw off her troubles in a day. She after a time tried to distract her mind by entering into the amusements she had at first scorned, but it was often in vain. "I have endeavored to fly from myself," she said in one letter, "and launched into all the dissipation possible here, only to feel keener anguish when alone with my child." There was a change for the better, however, in her mental state, for though her grief was not completely cured, she at least voluntarily sought to recover her emotional equilibrium. Self-examination showed her where her weakness lay, and she resolved to conquer it. With but too much truth, she told Imlay:—

"Love is a want of my heart. I have examined myself lately with more care than formerly, and find that to deaden is not to calm the mind. Aiming at tranquillity I have almost destroyed all the energy of my soul, almost rooted out what renders it estimable. Yes, I have damped that enthusiasm of character, which converts the grossest materials into a fuel that imperceptibly feeds hopes which aspire above common enjoyment. Despair, since the birth of my child, has rendered me stupid; soul and body seemed to be fading away before the withering touch of disappointment."

Despite her endeavors, her spiritual recovery was slow. A cry of agony still rang through her letters. But she had at least one pleasure that helped to soften her cares. This was her love for her child, which, always great, was increased by Imlay's cruelty. The tenderness which he by his indifference repulsed, she now lavished upon Fanny. She seemed to feel that she ought to make amends for the fact that her child was, to all intents and purposes, fatherless. In the same letter from which the above passage is taken, there is this little outburst of maternal affection:—

"I grow more and more attached to my little girl, and I cherish this affection with fear, because it must be a long time before it can become bitterness of soul. She is an interesting creature. On ship-board how often, as I gazed at the sea, have I longed to bury my troubled bosom in the less troubled deep; asserting, with Brutus, 'that the virtue I had followed too far was merely a name!' and nothing but the sight of her—her playful smiles, which seemed to cling and twine round my heart—could have stopped me."

It so happened that at one time she was obliged to leave her child with her nurse for about a month. Business called her to Toensberg in Norway, and the journey would have been bad for Fanny, who was cutting her teeth. "I felt more at leaving my child than I thought I should," she wrote to Imlay, "and whilst at night I imagined every instant that I heard the half-formed sounds of her voice, I asked myself how I could think of parting with her forever, of leaving her thus helpless." Here indeed was a stronger argument against suicide than Christianity or its "aftershine." This absence stimulated her motherly solicitude and heightened her sense of responsibility. In her appeals to Imlay to settle upon his future course in her regard, she now began to dwell upon their child as the most important reason to keep them together. On the 30th of July she wrote from Toensberg:—

"I will try to write with a degree of composure. I wish for us to live together, because I want you to acquire an habitual tenderness for my poor girl. I cannot bear to think of leaving her alone in the world, or that she should only be protected by your sense of duty. Next to preserving her, my most earnest wish is not to disturb your peace. I have nothing to expect, and little to fear, in life. There are wounds that can never be healed; but they may be allowed to fester in silence without wincing."

On the 7th of August she wrote again in the same strain:—

"This state of suspense, my friend, is intolerable; we must determine on something, and soon; we must meet shortly, or part forever. I am sensible that I acted foolishly, but I was wretched when we were together. Expecting too much, I let the pleasure I might have caught, slip from me. I cannot live with you, I ought not, if you form another attachment. But I promise you, mine shall not be intruded on you. Little reason have I to expect a shadow of happiness, after the cruel disappointments that have rent my heart; but that of my child seems to depend on our being together. Still, I do not wish you to sacrifice a chance of enjoyment for an uncertain good. I feel a conviction that I can provide for her, and it shall be my object, if we are indeed to part to meet no more. Her affection must not be divided. She must be a comfort to me, if I am to have no other, and only know me as her support. I feel that I cannot endure the anguish of corresponding with you, if we are only to correspond. No; if you seek for happiness elsewhere, my letters shall not interrupt your repose. I will be dead to you. I cannot express to you what pain it gives me to write about an eternal separation. You must determine. Examine yourself. But, for God's sake! spare me the anxiety of uncertainty! I may sink under the trial; but I will not complain."

He seems to have written to her regularly. At times she reproached him for not letting her hear from him, but at others she acknowledged the receipt of three and five letters in one morning. If these had been preserved, hers would not seem as importunate as they do now, for he gave her reason to suppose that he was anxious for a reunion, and wrote in a style which she told him she may have deserved, but which she had not expected from him. She also referred to his admission that her words tortured him; and there was talk of a trip together to Switzerland. But at the same time his proofs of indifference forced her to declare that she and pleasure had shaken hands. "How often," she breaks out in her agony, "passing through the rocks, I have thought, 'But for this child, I would lay my head on one of them, and never open my eyes again!'" The only particular in which he remained firm was his unwillingness to give a final decision in what, to her, was the one all-important matter. His vacillating behavior was heartless in the extreme. Her suspense became unbearable, and all her letters contained entreaties for him to relieve it. She was ready, once he said the word, to undertake to support her child and herself. But the fiat must come from him. Had it remained entirely with her she would have returned to him. But this she could not do unless he would receive her as his wife and promise loyalty to her. "I do not understand you," she wrote on the 6th of September, in answer to one of his letters. "It is necessary for you to write more explicitly, and determine on some mode of conduct. I cannot endure this suspense. Decide. Do you fear to strike another blow? We live together, or eternally apart! I shall not write to you again till I receive an answer to this."

Finally, after allowing her to suffer three months of acute agony, he summoned up resolution enough to write and tell her he would abide by her decision. Her business in the North had been satisfactorily settled, for which she was, alas! to receive but poor thanks; and the welfare of the child having now become the pivot of her actions, she returned to England. From Dover she sent him a letter informing him that she was prepared once more to make his home hers:—

You say I must decide for myself. I have decided that it was most for the interest of my little girl, and for my own comfort, little as I expect, for us to live together; and I even thought that you would be glad some years hence, when the tumult of business was over, to repose in the society of an affectionate friend, and mark the progress of our interesting child, whilst endeavoring to be of use in the circle you at last resolved to rest in, for you cannot run about forever.

From the tenor of your last letter, however, I am led to imagine that you have formed some new attachment. If it be so, let me earnestly request you to see me once more, and immediately. This is the only proof I require of the friendship you profess for me. I will then decide, since you boggle about a mere form.

I am laboring to write with calmness; but the extreme anguish I feel at landing without having any friend to receive me, and even to be conscious that the friend whom I most wish to see will feel a disagreeable sensation at being informed of my arrival, does not come under the description of common misery. Every emotion yields to an overwhelming flood of sorrow, and the playfulness of my child distresses me. On her account I wished to remain a few days here, comfortless as is my situation. Besides, I did not wish to surprise you. You have told me that you would make any sacrifice to promote my happiness—and, even in your last unkind letter, you talk of the ties which bind you to me and my child. Tell me that you wish it, and I will cut this Gordian knot.

I now most earnestly entreat you to write to me, without fail, by the return of the post. Direct your letter to be left at the post-office, and tell me whether you will come to me here, or where you will meet me. I can receive your letter on Wednesday morning.

Do not keep me in suspense. I expect nothing from you, or any human being; my die is cast! I have fortitude enough to determine to do my duty; yet I cannot raise my depressed spirits, or calm my trembling heart. That being who moulded it thus knows that I am unable to tear up by the roots the propensity to affection which has been the torment of my life,—but life will have an end!

Should you come here (a few months ago I could not have doubted it) you will find me at ——. If you prefer meeting me on the road, tell me where.

Yours affectionately, MARY.

The result of this letter was that Imlay and Mary tried to retie the broken thread of their domestic relations. The latter went up to London, and they settled together in lodgings. It would have been better for her had she never seen him again. The fire of his love had burnt out. No power could rekindle it. His indifference was hard to bear; but so long as he assured her that he had formed no other attachment, she made no complaint. For Fanny's sake she endured the new bitterness, and found such poor comfort as she could in being with him. It was but too true that the constancy of her affection was the torment of her life. In spite of everything, she still loved him. Before long, however, she discovered through her servants that he was basely deceiving her. He was keeping up a separate establishment for a new mistress. Mary, following the impulse of the moment, went at once to this house, where she found him. The particulars of their interview are not known; but her wretchedness during the night which followed maddened her. His perfidy hurt her more deeply than his indifference. Her cup of sorrow was filled to overflowing, and for the second time she made up her mind to fly from a world which held nothing but misery for her. It may be concluded that for the time being she was really mad. It will be remembered that troubles of a kindred nature had driven Mrs. Bishop to insanity. All the Wollstonecrafts inherited a peculiarly excitable temperament. Mary, had she not lost all self-control, would have been deterred from suicide, as she had been from thoughts of it in Sweden, by her love for Fanny. But her grief was so great it drowned all memory and reason. The morning after this night of agony she wrote to Imlay:—

"I write you now on my knees, imploring you to send my child and the maid with —— to Paris, to be consigned to the care of Madame ——, Rue ——, Section de ——. Should they be removed, —— can give their direction.

"Let the maid have all my clothes, without distinction.

"Pray pay the cook her wages, and do not mention the confession which I forced from her; a little sooner or later is of no consequence. Nothing but my extreme stupidity could have rendered me blind so long. Yet, whilst you assured me that you had no attachment, I thought we might still have lived together.

"I shall make no comments on your conduct or any appeal to the world. Let my wrongs sleep with me! Soon, very soon, I shall be at peace. When you receive this, my burning head will be cold.

"I would encounter a thousand deaths, rather than a night like the last. Your treatment has thrown my mind into a state of chaos; yet I am serene. I go to find comfort; and my only fear is that my poor body will be insulted by an endeavor to recall my hated existence. But I shall plunge into the Thames where there is the least chance of my being snatched from the death I seek.

"God bless you! May you never know by experience what you have made me endure. Should your sensibility ever awake, remorse will find its way to your heart; and, in the midst of business and sensual pleasures, I shall appear before you, the victim of your deviation from rectitude."

Then she left her house to seek refuge in the waters of the river. She went first to Battersea Bridge, but it was too public for her purpose. She could not risk a second frustration of her designs. There was no place in London where she could be unobserved. With the calmness of despair, she hired a boat and rowed to Putney. It was a cold, foggy November day, and by the time she arrived at her destination the night had come, and the rain fell in torrents. An idea occurred to her: if she wet her clothes thoroughly before jumping into the river, their weight would make her sink rapidly. She walked up and down, up and down, the bridge in the driving rain. The fog enveloped the night in a gloom as impenetrable as that of her heart. No one passed to interrupt her preparations. At the end of half an hour, satisfied that her end was accomplished, she leaped from the bridge into the water below. Despite her soaked clothing, she did not sink at once. In her desperation she pressed her skirts around her; then she became unconscious. She was found, however, before it was too late. Vigorous efforts were made to restore life, and she was brought back to consciousness. She had met with the insult she most dreaded, and her disappointment was keen. Her failure only increased her determination to destroy herself. This she told Imlay in a letter written shortly after, dated November, 1795:—

"I have only to lament that, when the bitterness of death was past, I was inhumanly brought back to life and misery. But a fixed determination is not to be baffled by disappointment: nor will I allow that to be a frantic attempt which was one of the calmest acts of reason. In this respect I am only accountable to myself. Did I care for what is termed reputation, it is by other circumstances that I should be dishonored.

"You say 'that you know not how to extricate ourselves out of the wretchedness into which we have been plunged.' You are extricated long since. But I forbear to comment. If I am condemned to live longer it is a living death.

"It appears to me that you lay much more stress on delicacy than on principle; for I am unable to discover what sentiment of delicacy would have been violated by your visiting a wretched friend, if indeed you have any friendship for me. But since your new attachment is the only sacred thing in your eyes, I am silent. Be happy! My complaints shall never more damp your enjoyment; perhaps I am mistaken in supposing that even my death could, for more than a moment. This is what you call magnanimity. It is happy for yourself that you possess this quality in the highest degree.

"Your continually asserting that you will do all in your power to contribute to my comfort, when you only allude to pecuniary assistance, appears to me a flagrant breach of delicacy. I want not such vulgar comfort, nor will I accept it. I never wanted but your heart. That gone, you have nothing more to give. Had I only poverty to fear, I should not shrink from life. Forgive me, then, if I say that I shall consider any direct or indirect attempt to supply my necessities as an insult which I have not merited, and as rather done out of tenderness for your own reputation than for me. Do not mistake me. I do not think that you value money; therefore I will not accept what you do not care for, though I do much less, because certain privations are not painful to me. When I am dead, respect for yourself will make you take care of the child.

"I write with difficulty; probably I shall never write to you again. Adieu!

"God bless you!"

Imlay, whose departure to his other house Mary construed into abandonment of her, made, in spite of this letter, many inquiries as to her health and tranquillity, repeated his offers of pecuniary assistance, and, at the request of mutual acquaintances, even went to see her. But a show of interest was not what she wanted, and her thanks for it was the assurance that before long she would be where he would be saved the trouble of either talking or thinking of her. Fortunately Mr. Johnson and her other friends interfered actively in her behalf, and by their arguments and representations prevailed upon her to relinquish the idea of suicide. Through their kindness, the fever which consumed her was somewhat abated. Her temporary madness over, she again remembered her responsibility as a mother, and realized that true courage consists in facing a foe, and not in flying from it. Of the change in her intentions for the future she informed Imlay:—

LONDON, November, 1795.

Mr. Johnson having forgot to desire you to send the things of mine which were left at the house, I have to request you to let Marguerite bring them to me.

I shall go this evening to the lodging; so you need not be restrained from coming here to transact your business. And whatever I may think and feel, you need not fear that I shall publicly complain. No! If I have any criterion to judge of right and wrong, I have been most ungenerously treated; but wishing now only to hide myself, I shall be silent as the grave in which I long to forget myself. I shall protect and provide for my child. I only mean by this to say that you have nothing to fear from my desperation.

Farewell.

Godwin makes the incredible statement that Imlay refusing to break off his new connection, though he declared it to be of a temporary nature, Mary proposed that she should live in the same house with his mistress. In this way he would not be separated from his child, and she would quietly wait the end of his intrigue. Imlay, according to Godwin, consented to her suggestion, but afterwards thought better of it and refused. There is not a word in her letters to confirm this extraordinary story. It is simply impossible that at one moment she should have been driven to suicide by the knowledge that he had a mistress, and that at the next she should take a step which was equivalent to countenancing his conduct. It is more rational to conclude that Godwin was misinformed, than to believe this.

Towards the end of November Imlay went to Paris with the woman for whom he had sacrificed wife and child. Mary felt that the end had now really come, as is seen in the few letters which still remain. Once the first bitterness of her disappointment had been mastered, the old tenderness revived, and she renewed her excuses for him. "My affection for you is rooted in my heart," she wrote fondly and sadly. "I know you are not what you now seem, nor will you always act and feel as you now do, though I may never be comforted by the change." And in another letter she said, "Resentment and even anger are momentary emotions with me, and I wish to tell you so, that if you ever think of me, it may not be in the light of an enemy." Writing to him, however, was more than she could bear. Each letter reopened the wound he had inflicted, and inspired her with a wild desire to see him. She therefore wisely concluded that all correspondence between them must cease. In December, 1795, while he was still in Paris, she bade him her last farewell, though in so doing she was, as she says, piercing her own heart. She refused to hold further communication with him or to receive his money, but she told him she would not interfere in anything he might wish to do for Fanny. Here it may be said that, though Imlay declared that a certain sum should be settled upon the latter, not a cent of it was ever paid. This is Mary's last letter to him:—

LONDON, December, 1795.

You must do as you please with respect to the child. I could wish that it might be done soon, that my name may be no more mentioned to you. It is now finished. Convinced that you have neither regard nor friendship, I disdain to utter a reproach, though I have had reason to think that the "forbearance" talked of has not been very delicate. It is, however, of no consequence. I am glad you are satisfied with your own conduct.

I now solemnly assure you that this is an eternal farewell. Yet I flinch not from the duties which tie me to life.

That there is "sophistry," on one side or other, is certain; but now it matters not on which. On my part it has not been a question of words. Yet your understanding or mine must be strangely warped, for what you term "delicacy" appears to me to be exactly the contrary. I have no criterion for morality, and have thought in vain, if the sensations which lead you to follow an ankle or step be the sacred foundation of principle and affection. Mine has been of a very different nature, or it would not have stood the brunt of your sarcasms.

The sentiment in me is still sacred. If there be any part of me that will survive the sense of my misfortunes, it is the purity of my affections. The impetuosity of your senses may have led you to term mere animal desire the source of principle; and it may give zest to some years to come. Whether you will always think so, I shall never know.

It is strange that, in spite of all you do, something like conviction forces me to believe that you are not what you appear to be.

I part with you in peace.

She saw him once or twice afterwards. When he came to London again, Godwin says that "she could not restrain herself from making another effort, and desiring to see him once more. During his absence, affection had led her to make numberless excuses for his conduct, and she probably wished to believe that his present connection was, as he represented it, purely of a casual nature. To this application she observes that he returned no other answer, except declaring, with unjustifiable passion, that he would not see her."

They did meet, however, but their meeting was accidental. Imlay was one day paying a visit to Mr. Christie, who had returned to London, and with whom he had business relations. He was sitting in the parlor, when Mary called. Mrs. Christie, hearing her voice, and probably fearing an embarrassing scene, hurried out to warn her of his presence, and to advise her not to come in the room. But Mary, not heeding her, entered fearlessly, and, with Fanny by the hand, went up and spoke to Imlay. They retired, it seems, to another room, and he then promised to see her again, and indeed to dine with her at her lodgings on the following day. He kept his promise, and there was a second interview, but it did not lead to a reconciliation. The very next day she went into Berkshire, where she spent the month of March with her friend, Mrs. Cotton. She never again made the slightest attempt to see him or to hear from him. There was a limit even to her affection and forbearance. One day, after her return to town, she was walking along the New Road when Imlay passed her on horseback. He jumped off his horse and walked with her for some little distance. This was the last time they met. From that moment he passed completely out of her life.

And so ends the saddest of all sad love stories.



CHAPTER X.

LITERARY WORK.

1793-1796.

The first volume of "An Historical and Moral View of the Origin and Progress of the French Revolution, and the Effect it has produced in Europe," which Mary wrote during the months she lived in France, was published by Johnson in 1794. It was favorably received and criticised, especially by that portion of the public who had sympathized with the Revolutionists in the controversy with Burke. One admirer, in 1803, declared it was not second even to Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." It went very quickly through two editions, surest proof of its success. The "Analytical Review" called it

"... a work of uncommon merit, abounding with strong traits of original genius, and containing a great variety of just and important observations on the recent affairs of France and on the general interests of society at the present crisis."

Mary had apparently spent in idleness the years which had elapsed since the "Rights of Women" had taken England by storm. But in reality she must have made good use of them. This new book marks an enormous advance in her mental development. It is but little disfigured by the faults of style, and is never weakened by the lack of method, which detract from the strength and power of the work by which she is best known. In the "French Revolution" her arguments are well weighed and balanced, and flowers of rhetoric, with a few exceptions, are sacrificed for a simple and concise statement of facts. Unfortunately the first volume was never followed by a second. Had Mary finished the book, as she certainly intended to do when she began it, it probably would still be ranked with the standard works on the Revolution.

As the title demonstrates, her object in writing this history was to explain the moral significance, as well as the historical value, of the incidents which she recorded. This moral element is uppermost in every page of her book. The determination to discover the truth at all hazards is its key-note. This end Mary hoped to accomplish, first by tracing the French troubles to their real causes, and then by giving an unprejudiced account of them. The result of a thorough study and investigation of her subject was the formation of doctrines which are in close sympathy with those of the evolutionists of to-day. Nothing strikes the reader so much as her firm belief in the theory of development, and her conclusion therefrom that progress in government consists in the gradual substitution of altruistic principles for the egotism which was the primal foundation of law and order. Profession of this creed is at once made in both the preface and first chapter of the "French Revolution." In the former, she writes:—

"By ... attending to circumstances, we shall be able to discern clearly that the Revolution was neither produced by the abilities or the intrigues of a few individuals, nor was the effect of sudden and short-lived enthusiasm; but the natural consequence of intellectual improvement, gradually proceeding to perfection in the advancement of communities from a state of barbarism to that of polished society."

In considering this subject, she concludes that the civilization of the ancients was deficient because it paid more attention to the cultivation of taste in the few than to the development of understanding in the many, and that that of the moderns is superior to it because of the more general diffusion of knowledge which followed the invention of printing. Her arguments in support of her theories are excellent.

"When," she writes, "learning was confined to a small number of the citizens of a state, and the investigation of its privileges was left to a number still smaller, governments seem to have acted as if the people were formed only for them; and ingeniously confounding their rights with metaphysical jargon, the luxurious grandeur of individuals has been supported by the misery of the bulk of their fellow-creatures, and ambition gorged by the butchery of millions of innocent victims."

This despotism, she further asserts, always continues so long as men are unqualified to judge with precision of their civil and political rights. But once they begin to think, and hence to learn the true facts of history, they must discover that the first social systems were founded on passion,—"individuals wishing to fence round their own wealth or power, and make slaves of their brothers to prevent encroachment,"—and that the laws of society could not have been originally "adjusted so as to take in the future conduct of its members, because the faculties of man are unfolded and perfected by the improvements made by society." This knowledge necessarily destroys belief in the sanctity of prescription, and when once it is made the basis of government, the ruling powers will have as much consideration for the rights of others as for their own.

"When society was first subjugated to laws," she writes, "probably by the ambition of some, and the desire of safety in all, it was natural for men to be selfish, because they were ignorant how intimately their own comfort was connected with that of others; and it was also very natural that humanity, rather the effect of feeling than of reason, should have a very limited range. But when men once see clear as the light of heaven—and I hail the glorious day from afar!—that on the general happiness depends their own, reason will give strength to the fluttering wings of passion, and men will 'do unto others what they wish they should do unto them.'"

One of the first means, therefore, by which this much-to-be-desired end is to be attained, is the destruction of blind reverence of the past.

With uncompromising honesty, she says:—

"We must get entirely clear of all the notions drawn from the wild traditions of original sin: the eating of the apple, the theft of Prometheus, the opening of Pandora's box, and the other fables too tedious to enumerate, on which priests have erected their tremendous structures of imposition to persuade us that we are naturally inclined to evil. We shall then leave room for the expansion of the human heart, and, I trust, find that men will insensibly render each other happier as they grow wiser."

After a brief analysis of the laws of progress in general, Mary proceeds to their special application in the case of France. The illumination of the French people she believes was hastened by the efforts of such men, on the one hand, as Rousseau and Voltaire, who warred against superstition, and on the other, as Quesnay and Turgot, who opposed unjust taxation. It was through them that the nation awoke to a consciousness of its wrongs, and saw for the first time, in the clear light of truth, the inveterate pride of the nobles, the rapacity of the clergy, and the prodigality of the court. The farmer then realized to the full the injustice of a government which could calmly allow taxes and feudal claims to swallow all but the twentieth part of the profit of his labor. Citizens discovered the iniquity of laws which gave so little security to their lives and property, that these could be sported with impunity by the aristocracy. In a word, the people found that without a pretext of justice, they were forced to be hewers of wood and drawers of water for a chosen few. Once enlightened they rebelled against the nobles who treated them as beasts of burden and trod them under foot with the mud; and they boldly demanded their rights as human beings and as citizens.

Having thus given the raison d'etre of the great French crisis, she describes with striking energy the events which ensued. She makes manifest the folly and blindness of the court, the shortcomings and vile intrigues of ministers, the duplicity and despotism of the parliaments, which prevented the petitions and demands of the people from receiving the attention and consideration which alone could have satisfied them. That there were evils in the French government, not even its friends could deny. The recognition of them necessitated their being done away with. There were but two methods by which this could be accomplished: they must either be reformed or destroyed. The government refused to accept the first course; the people resolved to adopt the second. Mary's treatment of this question is interesting. The following passage contains her chief arguments upon the subject, and the conclusion she drew from them, so very different from the result of Burke's reasoning on the same point in the "Reflections." This passage is an excellent specimen of the style in which the book is written. The hasty measures of the French, she says, being worthy of philosophical investigation, fall into two distinct inquiries:—

"First, if from the progress of reason we be authorized to infer that all governments will be meliorated, and the happiness of man placed on the solid basis gradually prepared by the improvement of political science; if the degrading distinctions of rank, born in barbarism and nourished by chivalry, be really becoming in the estimation of all sensible people so contemptible, that a modest man, in the course of fifty years, would probably blush at being thus distinguished; if the complexion of manners in Europe be completely changed from what it was half a century ago, and the liberty of its citizens tolerably secured; if every day extending freedom be more firmly established in consequence of the general dissemination of truth and knowledge,—it then seems injudicious for statesmen to force the adoption of any opinion, by aiming at the speedy destruction of obstinate prejudices; because these premature reforms, instead of promoting, destroy the comfort of those unfortunate beings who are under their dominion, affording at the same time to despotism the strongest arguments to urge in opposition to the theory of reason. Besides, the objects intended to be forwarded are probably retarded, whilst the tumult of internal commotion and civil discord leads to the most dreadful consequence,—the immolating of human victims.

"But, secondly, it is necessary to observe, that, if the degeneracy of the higher orders of society be such that no remedy less fraught with horror can effect a radical cure; and if, enjoying the fruits of usurpation, they domineer over the weak, and check, by all the means in their power, every humane effort to draw man out of the state of degradation into which the inequality of fortune has sunk him; the people are justified in having recourse to coercion to repel coercion. And, further, if it can be ascertained that the silent sufferings of the citizens of the world are greater, though less obvious, than the calamities produced by such violent convulsions as have happened in France, which, like hurricanes whirling over the face of nature, strip off all its blooming graces, it may be politically just to pursue such measures as were taken by that regenerating country, and at once root out those deleterious plants which poison the better half of human happiness."

Among the most remarkable passages in the book are those relating to Marie Antoinette. As was the case when she wrote her answer to Burke, the misery of millions unjustly subjected moved Mary more than the woes of one woman justly deprived of an ill-used liberty. Her love and sympathy for the people made her perhaps a little too harsh in her judgment of the queen. "Some hard words, some very strong epithets, are indeed used of Marie Antoinette," Mr. Kegan Paul says in his short but appreciative criticism of this book, "showing that she, who could in those matters know nothing personally, could not but depend on Paris gossip; but this is interesting, as showing what the view taken of the queen was before passion rose to its highest, before the fury of the people, with all the ferocity of word and deed attendant on great popular movements, had broken out." The following lines, therefore, reflecting the feelings and opinions of the day, must be read with as much, if not more interest than those of later and better-informed historians:—

"The unfortunate Queen of France, beside the advantages of birth and station, possessed a very fine person; and her lovely face, sparkling with vivacity, hid the want of intelligence. Her complexion was dazzlingly clear; and when she was pleased, her manners were bewitching; for she happily mingled the most insinuating voluptuous softness and affability with an air of grandeur bordering on pride, that rendered the contrast more striking. Independence also, of whatever kind, always gives a degree of dignity to the mien; so that monarchs and nobles with most ignoble souls, from believing themselves superior to others, have actually acquired a look of superiority.

"But her opening faculties were poisoned in the bud; for before she came to Paris she had already been prepared, by a corrupt, supple abbe, for the part she was to play; and, young as she was, became so firmly attached to the aggrandizement of her house, that, though plunged deep in pleasure, she never omitted sending immense sums to her brother on every occasion. The person of the king, in itself very disgusting, was rendered more so by gluttony, and a total disregard of delicacy, and even decency, in his apartments; and when jealous of the queen, for whom he had a kind of devouring passion, he treated her with great brutality, till she acquired sufficient finesse to subjugate him. Is it then surprising that a very desirable woman, with a sanguine constitution, should shrink, abhorrent, from his embraces; or that an empty mind should be employed only to vary the pleasures which emasculated her Circean court? And, added to this, the histories of the Julias and Messalinas of antiquity convincingly prove that there is no end to the vagaries of the imagination, when power is unlimited, and reputation set at defiance.

"Lost, then, in the most luxurious pleasures, or managing court intrigues, the queen became a profound dissembler; and her heart was hardened by sensual enjoyments to such a degree that, when her family and favorites stood on the brink of ruin, her little portion of mind was employed only to preserve herself from danger. As a proof of the justness of this assertion, it is only necessary to observe that, in the general wreck, not a scrap of her writing has been found to criminate her; neither has she suffered a word to escape her to exasperate the people, even when burning with rage and contempt. The effect that adversity may have on her choked understanding, time will show [this was written some months before the death of the queen]; but, during her prosperity, the moments of languor that glide into the interstices of enjoyment were passed in the most childish manner, without the appearance of any vigor of mind to palliate the wanderings of the imagination. Still, she was a woman of uncommon address; and though her conversation was insipid, her compliments were so artfully adapted to flatter the person she wished to please or dupe, and so eloquent is the beauty of a queen, in the eyes even of superior men, that she seldom failed to carry her point when she endeavored to gain an ascendency over the mind of an individual. Over that of the king she acquired unbounded sway, when, managing the disgust she had for his person, she made him pay a kingly price for her favors. A court is the best school in the world for actors; it was very natural then for her to become a complete actress, and an adept in all the arts of coquetry that debauch the mind, whilst they render the person alluring."

Mary's inflexible hatred of the cruelty of the court and the nobility, which had led to the present horrors, though great, did not prevent her from seeing the tyranny and brutality in which the people indulged so soon as they obtained the mastery. Her treatment of the facts of the Revolution is characterized by honesty. She is above all else an impartial historian and philosopher. She distinguishes, it is true, between the well-meaning multitude—those who took the Bastille, for example—and the rabble composed of the dregs of society,—those who headed the march to Versailles. She declares, "There has been seen amongst the French a spurious race of men, a set of cannibals, who have gloried in their crimes; and, tearing out the hearts that did not feel for them, have proved that they themselves had iron bowels." But while she makes this distinction, she does not hesitate to admit that the retaliation of the French people, suddenly all become sovereigns, was as terrible as that of slaves unexpectedly loosed from their fetters. It is but fair, after quoting her denunciations of Marie Antoinette, to show how far the new rule was from receiving her unqualified approbation. Describing the silence and ruin which have succeeded the old-time gayety and grandeur of Versailles, she exclaims:—

"Weeping, scarcely conscious that I weep, O France! over the vestiges of thy former oppression, which, separating man from man with a fence of iron, sophisticated all, and made many completely wretched, I tremble, lest I should meet some unfortunate being, fleeing from the despotism of licentious freedom, hearing the snap of the guillotine at his heels, merely because he was once noble, or has afforded an asylum to those whose only crime is their name; and, if my pen almost bound with eagerness to record the day that levelled the Bastille with the dust, making the towers of despair tremble to their base, the recollection that still the abbey is appropriated to hold the victims of revenge and suspicion palsies the hand that would fain do justice to the assault, which tumbled into heaps of ruins, walls that seemed to mock the resistless force of time. Down fell the temple of despotism; but—despotism has not been buried in its ruins! Unhappy country! when will thy children cease to tear thy bosom? When will a change of opinion, producing a change of morals, render thee truly free? When will truth give life to real magnanimity, and justice place equality on a stable seat? When will thy sons trust, because they deserve to be trusted; and private virtue become the guarantee of patriotism? Ah! when will thy government become the most perfect, because thy citizens are the most virtuous?"

The same impartiality is preserved in the relation of even the most exciting and easily misconceived incidents of the Revolution. The courageous and resolute resistance of the Third Estate to the clergy and nobility is described with dignified praise which never descends into fulsome flattery. The ignorance, vanity, jealousy, disingenuousness, self-sufficiency, and interested motives of members of the National Assembly are unhesitatingly exposed in recording such of their actions as, examined superficially, might seem the outcome of a love of freedom. In giving the details of the taking of the Bastille, and the women's march on Versailles, Mary becomes really eloquent. Mr. Kegan Paul's opinion may be here advantageously cited. "Her accounts of the Bastille siege and of the Versailles episode," he says, "are worth reading beside those of the master to whose style they are so great a contrast. Carlyle has seized on the comic element in the march to Versailles, Mary Wollstonecraft on the tragic; and hers seems to me the worthier view."

Many of the remarks upon civilization and the influence of the cultivation of science on the understanding, with which the book is interspersed, are full of wisdom and indicative of deep thought and careful research. Hers was, to use with but slight change the words with which she concludes, the philosophical eye, which, looking into the nature and weighing the consequence of human actions, is able to discern the cause which has produced so many dreadful effects.

Notwithstanding its excellence and the reputation it once had, this work is now almost unknown. But few have ever heard of it, still fewer read it; a fact due, of course, to its incompleteness. The first and only volume ends with the departure of Louis from Versailles to Paris, when the Revolution was as yet in its earliest stages. This must ever be a matter of regret. That succeeding volumes, had she written them, would have been even better is very probable. There was marked development in her intellectual powers after she published the "Rights of Women." The increased merit of her later works somewhat confirms Southey's declaration, made three years after her death, that "Mary Wollstonecraft was but beginning to reason when she died."

The last book she finished and published during her life-time was her "Letters Written during a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark." Her journey, as has been explained in the last chapter, was undertaken to attend to certain business affairs for Imlay. Landing in Sweden, she went from there to Norway, then again to Sweden, and finally to Denmark and Hamburg, in which latter places she remained a comparatively short period. Not being free to go and come as she chose, she was sometimes detained in small places for two or three weeks, while she could stay but a day or two in large cities. But she had letters of introduction to many of the principal inhabitants of the towns and villages to which business called her, and was thus able to see something of the life of the better classes. The then rough mode of travelling also brought her into close contact with the peasantry. As the ground over which she travelled was then but little visited by English people, she knew that her letters would have at least the charm of novelty.

They were published by her friend Johnson in 1796. Hitherto, her work had been purely of a philosophical, historical, or educational nature. The familiar epistolary style in which she had begun to record her observations of the French people had been quickly changed for the more formal tone of the "French Revolution." These travels, consequently, marked an entirely new departure in her literary career. Their success was at once assured. Even the fastidious Godwin, who had condemned her other books, could find no fault with this one. Contemporary critics agreed in sharing his good opinion.

"Have you ever met with Mary Wollstonecraft's 'Letters from Sweden and Norway'?" Southey asked in a letter to Thomas Southey. "She has made me in love with a cold climate and frost and snow, with a northern moonlight." The impression they produced was lasting. When, several years later, he wrote an "Epistle" to A. S. Cottle to be published in the latter's volume of "Icelandic Poetry," he again alluded to them. In referring to the places described in northern poems he declared,—

"... Scenes like these Have almost lived before me, when I gazed Upon their fair resemblance traced by him Who sung the banished man of Ardebeil, Or to the eye of Fancy held by her, Who among Women left no equal mind When from the world she passed; and I could weep To think that She is to the grave gone down!"

The "Annual Register" for 1796 honored the "Letters" by publishing in its columns a long extract from them containing a description of the Norwegian character. The "Monthly Magazine" for July of the same year concluded that the book, "though not written with studied elegance, interests the reader in an uncommon degree by a philosophical turn of thought, by bold sketches of nature and manners, and above all by strong expressions of delicate sensibility." The verdict of the "Analytical Review" was as follows:—

"A vigorous and cultivated intellect easily accommodates itself to new occupations. The notion that individual genius can only excel in one thing is a vulgar error. A mind endued by nature with strong powers and quick sensibility, and by culture furnished in an uncommon degree with habits of attention and reflection, wherever it is placed will find itself employment, and whatever it undertakes will execute it well. After the repeated proofs which the ingenious and justly admired writer of these letters has given the public, that her talents are far above the ordinary level, it will not be thought surprising that she could excel in different kinds of writing; that the qualifications which have enabled her to instruct young people by moral lessons and tales, and to furnish the philosopher with original and important speculations, should also empower her to entertain and interest the public in a manner peculiarly her own by writing a book of travels.

"We have no hesitation in assuring our readers that Mrs. Wollstonecraft has done this in the present volume."

The qualities most desirable in a writer of travels are quickness of perception, active interest in the places and people described, appreciation of local color, a nice sense of discrimination, and a pleasant, simple style. It is true that occasionally affected and involved phrases occur in Mary's letters from the North, and that the tone of many passages is a trifle too sombre. But the former defects are much less glaring and fewer in number than those of her earlier writings; while, when it is remembered that during her journey her heart was heavy-laden with disappointment and despair, her melancholy reflections must be forgiven her. With the exception of these really trifling shortcomings, she may be said to have ably fulfilled the required conditions. It may be asserted of her, in almost the identical words which Heine uses in praise of Goethe's "Italian Journey," that she, during her travels, saw all things, the dark and the light, colored nothing with her individual feelings, and pictured the land and its people in the true outlines and true colors in which God clothed it.

Determined to avoid the mistake common to most travellers, of speaking from feeling rather than from reason, she shows her readers the virtues and faults of the people among whom she travelled, without overestimating the former or exaggerating the latter. She found Swedes and Norwegians unaffected and hospitable, but sensual and indolent. Both good and evil she attributes to the influence of climate and to the comparatively low stage of culture attained in these northern countries. The long winter nights, she explains in her letters, have made the people sluggish. Their want of interest in politics, literature, and scientific pursuits have concentrated their attention upon the pleasures of the senses. They are hospitable because of the excitement and social amusements hospitality insures. They care for the flesh-pots of Egypt because they have not yet heard of the joys of the Promised Land. The women of the upper classes are so indolent that they exercise neither mind nor body; consequently the former has but a narrow range, the latter soon loses all beauty. The men seek no relaxation from their business occupations save in Brobdingnagian dinners and suppers. If they are godly, they are never cleanly, cleanliness requiring an effort of which they are incapable. Indolence and indifference to culture throughout Sweden and Norway are the chief characteristics of the natives.

To Mary the coarseness of the people seemed the more unbearable because of the wonderful beauty of their country as she saw it in midsummer. She could not understand their continued indifference to its loveliness. Her own keen enjoyment of it shows itself in all her letters. She constantly pauses in relating her experiences to dwell upon the grandeur of cliffs and sea, upon the impressive wildness of certain districts, full of great pine-covered mountains and endless fir woods, contrasting with others more gentle and fertile, which are covered with broad fields of corn and rye. She loves to describe the long still summer nights and the gray dawn when the birds begin to sing, the sweet scents of the forest, and the soft freshness of the western breeze. The smallest details of the living picture do not escape her notice. She records the musical tinkling of distant cow-bells and the mournful cry of the bittern. She even tells how she sometimes, when she is out in her boat, lays down her oars that she may examine the purple masses of jelly-fish floating in the water. Truly, her ways were not as those of the Philistines around her.

The following extract from a letter written from Gothenburg gives a good idea of the impression made upon her by the moral ugliness and natural beauty which she met wherever she went. The passage is characteristic, since its themes are the two to which she most frequently recurs:—

"... Every day, before dinner and supper, even whilst the dishes are cooling on the table, men and women repair to a side-table, and, to obtain an appetite, eat bread and butter, cheese, raw salmon or anchovies, drinking a glass of brandy. Salt fish or meat then immediately follows, to give a further whet to the stomach. As the dinner advances,—pardon me for taking up a few minutes to describe what, alas! has detained me two or three hours on the stretch, observing,—dish after dish is changed, in endless rotation, and handed round with solemn pace to each guest; but should you happen not to like the first dishes, which was often my case, it is a gross breach of politeness to ask for part of any other till its turn comes. But have patience, and there will be eating enough. Allow me to run over the acts of a visiting day, not overlooking the interludes.

"Prelude, a luncheon; then a succession of fish, flesh, and fowl for two hours; during which time the dessert—I was sorry for the strawberries and cream—rests on the table to be impregnated by the fumes of the viands. Coffee immediately follows in the drawing-room, but does not preclude punch, ale, tea and cakes, raw salmon, etc. A supper brings up the rear, not forgetting the introductory luncheon, almost equalling in removes the dinner. A day of this kind you would imagine sufficient—but a to-morrow and a to-morrow. A never-ending, still-beginning feast may be bearable, perhaps, when stern Winter frowns, shaking with chilling aspect his hoary locks; but during a summer sweet as fleeting, let me, my kind strangers, escape sometimes into your fir groves, wander on the margin of your beautiful lakes, or climb your rocks to view still others in endless perspective; which, piled by more than giant's hand, scale the heavens to intercept its rays, or to receive the parting tinge of lingering day,—day that, scarcely softened into twilight, allows the freshening breeze to wake, and the moon to burst forth in all her glory to glide with solemn elegance through the azure expanse.

"The cow's bell has ceased to tinkle the herd to rest; they have all paced across the heath. Is not this the witching time of night? The waters murmur, and fall with more than mortal music, and spirits of peace walk abroad to calm the agitated breast. Eternity is in these moments; worldly cares melt into the airy stuff that dreams are made of; and reveries, mild and enchanting as the first hopes of love, or the recollection of lost enjoyment, carry the hapless wight into futurity, who, in bustling life, has vainly strove to throw off the grief which lies heavy at the heart. Good-night! A crescent hangs out in the vault before, which wooes me to stray abroad: it is not a silvery reflection of the sun, but glows with all its golden splendor. Who fears the falling dew? It only makes the mown grass smell more fragrant."

As might be expected, judging from Mary's natural benevolence, the poverty and misery she saw during her journey awakened feelings of deep compassion. She describes in tones of pity the wretched condition of the lower classes in Sweden. Servants, she writes, are no better than slaves. They are beaten and maltreated by their masters, and are paid so little that they cannot afford to wear sufficient clothing or to eat decent food. Laborers live in huts wretched beyond belief, and herd together like animals. They have so accustomed themselves to a stifling atmosphere, that fresh air is never let into their houses even in summer, and the mere idea of cleanliness is beyond their comprehension. Indolence is their failing as well as that of their superiors in rank. Many in their brutishness refuse to exert themselves save to find the food absolutely necessary to support life, and are too sluggish to be curious. It is pleasant to know that they have at least one good quality, in the exercise of which they surpass the rich. This is politeness, the national virtue. Mary observes:—

"The Swedes pique themselves on their politeness; but far from being the polish of a cultivated mind, it consists merely of tiresome forms and ceremonies. So far indeed from entering immediately into your character, and making you feel instantly at your ease, like the well-bred French, their over-acted civility is a continual restraint on all your actions. The sort of superiority which a fortune gives when there is no superiority of education, excepting what consists in the observance of senseless forms, has a contrary effect than what is intended; so that I could not help reckoning the peasantry the politest people of Sweden, who, only aiming at pleasing you, never think of being admired for their behavior."

Mary found the condition of the Norwegians somewhat better. The lower classes were freer, more industrious, and more opulent. She describes their inns as comfortable, whereas those of the Swedes had not been even inhabitable. The upper classes, though, like the Swedes, over-fond of the pleasures of the table, narrow in their range of ideas, and wholly without imagination, at least gave some signs of better days in their dawning interest in culture. She writes:—

"The Norwegians appear to me a sensible, shrewd people, with little scientific knowledge, and still less taste for literature; but they are arriving at the epoch which precedes the introduction of the arts and sciences.

"Most of the towns are seaports, and seaports are not favorable to improvement. The captains acquire a little superficial knowledge by travelling, which their indefatigable attention to the making of money prevents their digesting; and the fortune that they thus laboriously acquire is spent, as it usually is in towns of this description, in show and good living. They love their country, but have not much public spirit. Their exertions are, generally speaking, only for their families; which I conceive will always be the case, till politics, becoming a subject of discussion, enlarges the heart by opening the understanding. The French Revolution will have this effect. They sing at present, with great glee, many republican songs, and seem earnestly to wish that the republic may stand; yet they appear very much attached to their prince royal; and, as far as rumor can give an idea of character, he appears to merit their attachment."

She remained in Copenhagen and Hamburg but a short time. Imlay's unkindness and indecision had, by the time she reached Holland, so increased her melancholy that the good effect of the bracing northern air was partially destroyed. She lost her interest in the novelty of her surroundings, and as she says in one of her last letters, stayed much at home. But her perceptive faculties were not wholly deadened. She notes with her usual precision the indolence and dulness of the Danes, and the unwavering devotion of the Hamburgers to commerce, and describes the towns of Hamburg and Copenhagen with graphic force. These descriptions are well worth reading.

It was always impossible for Mary not to reflect and moralize upon what passed around her. She not only wanted to examine and record phenomena and events, but to discover a reason for their existence. She invariably sought for the primal causes and the final results of the facts in which she was interested. The civilization of the northern countries through which she travelled, so different from the culture of England and France, gave her ample food for thought. The reflections it aroused found their way into her letters. Some of them are really remarkable, as for example, the following:—

"Arriving at Sleswick, the residence of Prince Charles of Hesse-Cassel, the sight of the soldiers recalled all the unpleasing ideas of German despotism, which imperceptibly vanished as I advanced into the country. I viewed, with a mixture of pity and horror, these beings training to be sold to slaughter, or be slaughtered, and fell into reflections on an old opinion of mine, that it is the preservation of the species, not of individuals, which appears to be the design of the Deity throughout the whole of nature. Blossoms come forth only to be blighted; fish lay their spawn where it will be devoured; and what a large portion of the human race are born merely to be swept prematurely away! Does not this waste of budding life emphatically assert, that it is not men, but man, whose preservation is so necessary to the completion of the grand plan of the universe? Children peep into existence, suffer, and die; men play like moths about a candle, and sink into the flame; war and the 'thousand ills which flesh is heir to' mow them down in shoals, whilst the more cruel prejudices of society palsy existence, introducing not less sure, though slower decay."

Had Mary Wollstonecraft lived in the present time, she too would have written hymns to Man. This is another of the many strange instances in her writings of the resemblance between theories which she evolved for herself and those of modern philosophers. She lived a century too soon.

The "Letters" were published in the same year, 1796, in Wilmington, Delaware. A few years later, extracts from them, translated into Portuguese, together with a brief sketch of their author, were published in Lisbon, while a German edition appeared in Hamburg and Altona. The book is now not so well known as it deserves to be. Mary's descriptions of the physical characteristics of Norway and Sweden are equal to any written by more recent English travellers to Scandinavia; and her account of the people is valuable as an unprejudiced record of the manners and customs existing among them towards the end of the eighteenth century. But though so little known, it is still true that, as her self-appointed defender said in 1803, "Letters so replete with correctness of remark, delicacy of feeling, and pathos of expression, will cease to exist only with the language in which they were written."

Shortly after her death, Godwin published in four volumes all Mary's unprinted writings, unfinished as well as finished. This collection, which is called simply "Posthumous Works of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin," may most appropriately be noticed here in connection with the more complete productions of her last years.

Of the "Letters to Imlay," which fill the third and a part of the fourth volume, nothing more need be said. They have been fully explained, and sufficient extracts from them have been made in the account of that period of her life during which they were written. The next in importance of these writings is "Maria; or, The Wrongs of Woman," a novel. It is but a fragment. Mary intended to revise the first chapters carefully, and of the last she had written nothing but the headings and a few detached hints and passages. Godwin, in his Preface, says, "So much of it as is here given to the public, she was far from considering as finished; and in a letter to a friend directly written on this subject, she says, 'I am perfectly aware that some of the incidents ought to be transposed and heightened by more luminous shading; and I wished in some degree to avail myself of criticism before I began to adjust my events into a story, the outline of which I had sketched in my mind.'" It therefore must be more gently criticised than such of her books as were published during her life-time, and considered by her ready to be given to the public. But, as the last work upon which she was engaged, and as one which engrossed her thoughts for months, and to which she devoted, for her, an unusual amount of labor, it must be read with interest.

The incidents of the story are, in a large measure, drawn from real life. Her own experience, that of her sister, and events which had come within her actual knowledge, are the materials which she used. These served her purpose as well as, if not better than, any she could have invented. The only work of her imagination is the manner in which she grouped them together to form her plot. The story is, briefly, as follows: Maria, the heroine, whose home-life seems to be a description of the interior of the Wollstonecraft household, marries to secure her freedom, rather than from affection for her lover, as was probably the case with "poor Bess." Her husband, who even in the days of courtship had been a dissolute rascal, but hypocrite enough to conceal the fact, throws off his mask after marriage. He speculates rashly, drinks, and indulges in every low vice. All this she bears until he, calculating upon her endurance, seeks to sell her to a friend, that her dishonor may be his gain financially. Then he learns that he has gone too far. She flies from his house, to which she refuses, on any consideration, to return. All attempts to bring her back having failed, he, by a successful stratagem, seizes her as she is on her way to Dover with her child, and, taking possession of the latter, has his wife confined in an insane asylum. Here, after days of horror, Maria succeeds in softening the heart of her keeper, Jemima by name, and through her makes the acquaintance of Henry Darnford, a young man who, like her, has been made a prisoner under the false charge of lunacy. Jemima's friendship is so completely won that she allows these two companions in misery to see much of each other. She even tells them her story, which, as a picture of degradation, equals that of some of Defoe's heroines. Darnford then tells his, and the reader at once recognizes in him another Imlay. Finally, by a lucky accident the two prisoners make their escape, and Jemima accompanies them. The latter part of the story consists of sketches and the barest outlines; but these indicate the succession of its events and its conclusion. Maria and Darnford live together as husband and wife in London. The former believes that she is right in so doing, and cares nothing for the condemnation of society. She endures neglect and contumely because she is supported by confidence in the rectitude of her conduct. Her husband now has her lover tried for adultery and seduction, and in his absence Maria undertakes his defence. Her separation from her husband is the consequence, but her fortune is thrown into chancery. She refuses to leave Darnford, but he, after a few years, during which she has borne him two children, proves unfaithful. In her despair, she attempts to commit suicide, but fails. When consciousness and reason return, she resolves to live for her child.