To Munroe I went, and learn that he has bought the stereotype- plates of the New York pirate edition of Sartor, and means to print it immediately. He is willing to stop if W. & P. will buy of him his plates at their cost. I wrote so to them, but they say no. And I have not spoken again with Munroe. I was in town yesterday, and carried the copy of the Covenant to E.P. Clark, and read him your message. His Bank occupies him entirely just now, for his President is gone to Europe, and Clark's duties are the more onerous. But finding that the new responsibilities delegated to him are light and tolerable, and, at any rate, involve no retrospection, he very cheerfully signified his readiness to serve you, and I graciously forbore all allusions to my heap of booksellers' accounts which he has had in keeping now —for years, I believe. He told me that he hopes at no distant day to have a house of his own,—he and his wife are always at board,—and, whenever that happens, he intends to devote a chamber in it to his "Illustrations of Mr. Carlyle's Writings," which, I believe, I have told you before, are a very large and extraordinary collection of prints, pictures, books, and manuscripts. I sent you the promised Daguerrotype with all unwillingness, by the steamer, I think of 16 June. On 1 August, Margaret Fuller goes to England and the Continent; and I shall not fail to write to you by her, and you must not fail to give a good and faithful interview to this wise, sincere, accomplished, and most entertaining of women. I wish to bespeak Jane Carlyle's friendliest ear to one of the noblest of women. We shall send you no other such.

I was lately inquired of again by an agent of a huge Boston society of young men, whether Mr. Carlyle would not come to America and read Lectures, on some terms which they could propose. I advised them to make him an offer, and a better one than they had in view. Joy and Peace to you in your new freedom.

—R.W.E.



CXIV. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 17 July, 1846

Dear Emerson,—Since I wrote last to you, I think, with the Wiley-and-Putnam Covenant enclosed,—the Photograph, after some days of loitering at the Liverpool Custom-house, came safe to hand. Many thanks to you for this punctuality: this poor Shadow, it is all you could do at present in that matter! But it must not rest there, no. This Image is altogether unsatisfactory, illusive, and even in some measure tragical to me! First of all, it is a bad Photograph; no eyes discernible, at least one of the eyes not, except in rare favorable lights then, alas, Time itself and Oblivion must have been busy. I could not at first, nor can I yet with perfect decisiveness, bring out any feature completely recalling to me the old Emerson, that lighted on us from the Blue, at Craigenputtock, long ago,—eheu! Here is a genial, smiling, energetic face, full of sunny strength, intelligence, integrity, good humor; but it lies imprisoned in baleful shades, as of the valley of Death; seems smiling on me as if in mockery. "Dost know me, friend? I am dead, thou seest, and distant, and forever hidden from thee;—I belong already to the Eternities, and thou recognizest me not!" On the whole, it is the strangest feeling I have:—and practically the thing will be, that you get us by the earliest opportunity some living pictorial sketch, chalk- drawing or the like, from a trustworthy hand; and send it hither to represent you. Out of the two I shall compile for myself a likeness by degrees: but as for this present, we cannot put up with it at all; to my Wife and me, and to sundry other parties far and near that have interest in it, there is no satisfaction in this. So there will be nothing for you but compliance, by the first fair chance you have: furthermore, I bargain that the Lady Emerson have, within reasonable limits, a royal veto in the business (not absolute, if that threaten extinction to the enterprise, but absolute within the limits of possibility); and that she take our case in hand, and graciously consider what can and shall be done. That will answer, I think.

Of late weeks I have been either idle, or sunk in the sorrowfulest cobbling of old shoes again; sorrowfully reading over old Books for the Putnams and Chapmans, namely. It is really painful, looking in one's own old face; said "old face" no longer a thing extant now!—Happily I have at last finished it; the whole Lumber-troop with clothes duly brushed (French Revolution has even got an Index too) travels to New York in the Steamer that brings you this. Quod faustum sit:—or indeed I do not much care whether it be faustum or not; I grow to care about an astonishingly small number of things as times turn with me! Man, all men seem radically dumb; jabbering mere jargons and noises from the teeth outwards; the inner meaning of them,— of them and of me, poor devils,—remaining shut, buried forever. If almost all Books were burnt (my own laid next the coal), I sometimes in my spleen feel as if it really would be better with us! Certainly could one generation of men be forced to live without rhetoric, babblement, hearsay, in short with the tongue well cut out of them altogether,—their fortunate successors would find a most improved world to start upon! For Cant does lie piled on us, high as the zenith; an Augean Stable with the poisonous confusion piled so high: which, simply if there once could be nothing said, would mostly dwindle like summer snow gradually about its business, and leave us free to use our eyes again! When I see painful Professors of Greek, poring in their sumptuous Oxfords over dead Greek for a thousand years or more, and leaving live English all the while to develop itself under charge of Pickwicks and Sam Wellers, as if it were nothing and the other were all things: this, and the like of it everywhere, fills me with reflections! Good Heavens, will the people not come out of their wretched Old-Clothes Monmouth-Streets, Hebrew and other; but lie there dying of the basest pestilence,—dying and as good as dead! On the whole, I am very weary of most "Literature":—and indeed, in very sorrowful, abstruse humor otherwise at present.

For remedy to which I am, in these very hours, preparing for a sally into the green Country and deep silence; I know not altogether how or whitherward as yet; only that I must tend towards Lancashire; towards Scotland at last. My Wife already waits me in Lancashire; went off, in rather poor case, much burnt by the hot Town, some ten days ago; and does not yet report much improvement. I will write to you somewhere in my wanderings. The address, "Scotsbrig, Ecclefechan, N.B.," if you chance to write directly or soon after this arrives, will, likely, be the shortest: at any rate, that, or "Cheyne Row" either, is always sure enough to find me in a day or two after trying.

By a kind of accident I have fallen considerably into American History in these days; and am even looking out for American Geography to help me. Jared Sparks, Marshall, &c. are hickory and buckskin; but I do catch a credible trait of human life from them here and there; Michelet's genial champagne froth,—alas, I could find no fact in it that would stand handling; and so have broken down in the middle of La France, and run over to hickory and Jared for shelter! Do you know Beriah Green?* A body of Albany newspapers represent to me the people quarreling in my name, in a very vague manner, as to the propriety of being "governed," and Beriah's is the only rational voice among them. Farewell, dear Friend. Speedy news of you!

—T. Carlyle

————- * The Reverend Beriah Green, President for some years of Oneida Institute, a manual-labor school at Whitesboro, N.Y. He was an active reformer, and a leading member of the National Convention which met in Philadelphia, December 4th, 1833, to form the American Antislavery Society. He died in 1874, seventy-nine years old. ————-



CXV. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 31 July, 1846

My Dear Friend,—The new edition of Cromwell in its perfect form and in excellent dress, and the copy of the Appendix, came munificently safe by the last steamer. When thought is best, then is there most,—is a faith of which you alone among writing men at this day will give me experience. If it is the right frankincense and sandal-wood, it is so good and heavenly to give me a basketful and not a pinch. I read proudly, a little at a time, and have not yet got through the new matter. But I think neither the new letters nor the commentary could be spared. Wiley and Putnam shall do what they can, and we will see if New England will not come to reckon this the best chapter in her Pentateuch.

I send this letter by Margaret Fuller, of whose approach I believe I wrote you some word. There is no foretelling how you visited and crowded English will like our few educated men or women, and in your learned populace my luminaries may easily be overlooked. But of all the travelers whom you have so kindly received from me, I think of none, since Alcott went to England, whom I so much desired that you should see and like, as this dear old friend of mine. For two years now I have scarcely seen her, as she has been at New York, engaged by Horace Greeley as a literary editor of his Tribune newspaper. This employment was made acceptable to her by good pay, great local and personal conveniences of all kinds, and unbounded confidence and respect from Greeley himself, and all other parties connected with this influential journal (of 30,000 subscribers, I believe). And Margaret Fuller's work as critic of all new books, critic of the drama, of music, and good arts in New York, has been honorable to her. Still this employment is not satisfactory to me. She is full of all nobleness, and with the generosity native to her mind and character appears to me an exotic in New England, a foreigner from some more sultry and expansive climate. She is, I suppose, the earliest reader and lover of Goethe in this Country, and nobody here knows him so well. Her love too of whatever is good in French, and specially in Italian genius, give her the best title to travel. In short, she is our citizen of the world by quite special diploma. And I am heartily glad that she has an opportunity of going abroad that pleases her.

Mr. Spring, a merchant of great moral merits, (and, as I am informed, an assiduous reader of your books,) has grown rich, and resolves to see the world with his wife and son, and has wisely invited Miss Fuller to show it to him. Now, in the first place, I wish you to see Margaret when you are in special good humor, and have an hour of boundless leisure. And I entreat Jane Carlyle to abet and exalt and secure this satisfaction to me. I need not, and yet perhaps I need say, that M.F. is the safest of all possible persons who ever took pen in hand. Prince Metternich's closet not closer or half so honorable. In the next place, I should be glad if you can easily manage to show her the faces of Tennyson and of Browning. She has a sort of right to them both, not only because she likes their poetry, but because she has made their merits widely known among our young people. And be it known to my friend Jane Carlyle, whom, if I cannot see, I delight to name, that her visitor is an immense favorite in the parlor, as well as in the library, in all good houses where she is known. And so I commend her to you.

Yours affectionately, R.W. Emerson



CXVI. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 18 December, 1846

Dear Emerson,—This is the 18th of the month, and it is a frightful length of time, I know not how long, since I wrote to you,—sinner that I am! Truly we are in no case for paying debts at present, being all sick more or less, from the hard cold weather, and in a state of great temporary puddle but, as the adage says, "one should own debt, and crave days";—therefore accept a word from me, such as it may be.

I went, as usual, to the North Country in the Autumn; passed some two extremely disconsolate months,—for all things distress a wretched thin-skinned creature like me,—in that old region, which is at once an Earth and a Hades to me, an unutterable place, now that I have become mostly a ghost there! I saw Ireland too on my return, saw black potato-fields, a ragged noisy population, that has long in a headlong baleful manner followed the Devil's leading, listened namely to blustering shallow- violent Impostors and Children of Darkness, saying, "Yes, we know you, you are Children of Light!"—and so has fallen all out at elbows in body and in soul; and now having lost its potatoes is come as it were to a crisis; all its windy nonsense cracking suddenly to pieces under its feet: a very pregnant crisis indeed! A country cast suddenly into the melting-pot,—say into the Medea's-Caldron; to be boiled into horrid dissolution; whether into new youth, into sound healthy life, or into eternal death and annihilation, one does not yet know! Daniel O'Connell stood bodily before me, in his green Mullaghmart Cap; haranguing his retinue of Dupables: certainly the most sordid Humbug I have ever seen in this world; the emblem to me, he and his talk and the worship and credence it found, of all the miseries that can befall a Nation. I also conversed with Young Ireland in a confidential manner; for Young Ireland, really meaning what it says, is worth a little talk: the Heroism and Patriotism of a new generation; welling fresh and new from the breasts of Nature; and already poisoned by O'Connellism and the Old Irish atmosphere of bluster, falsity, fatuity, into one knows not what. Very sad to see. On the whole, no man ought, for any cause, to speak lies, or have anything to do with lies; but either hold his tongue, or speak a bit of the truth: that is the meaning of a tongue, people used to know!—Ireland was not the place to console my sorrows. I returned home very sad out of Ireland;—and indeed have remained one of the saddest, idlest, most useless of Adam's sons ever since; and do still remain so. I care not to write anything more,—so it seems to me at present. I am in my vacant interlunar cave (I suppose that is the truth);—and I ought to wrap my mantle round me, and lie, if dark, silent also. But, alas, I have wasted almost all your poor sheet first!—

Miss Fuller came duly as you announced; was welcomed for your sake and her own. A high-soaring, clear, enthusiast soul; in whose speech there is much of all that one wants to find in speech. A sharp, subtle intellect too; and less of that shoreless Asiatic dreaminess than I have sometimes met with in her writings. We liked one another very well, I think, and the Springs too were favorites. But, on the whole, it could not be concealed, least of all from the sharp female intellect, that this Carlyle was a dreadfully heterodox, not to say a dreadfully savage fellow, at heart; believing no syllable of all that Gospel of Fraternity, Benevolence, and new Heaven-on-Earth, preached forth by all manner of "advanced" creatures, from George Sand to Elihu Burritt, in these days; that in fact the said Carlyle not only disbelieved all that, but treated it as poisonous cant,—sweetness of sugar-of-lead,—a detestable phosphorescence from the dead body of a Christianity, that would not admit itself to be dead, and lie buried with all its unspeakable putrescences, as a venerable dead one ought!—Surely detestable enough.—To all which Margaret listened with much good nature; though of course with sad reflections not a few.*—She is coming back to us, she promises. Her dialect is very vernacular,—extremely exotic in the London climate. If she do not gravitate too irresistibly towards that class of New-Era people (which includes whatsoever we have of prurient, esurient, morbid, flimsy, and in fact pitiable and unprofitable, and is at a sad discount among men of sense), she may get into good tracks of inquiry and connection here, and be very useful to herself and others. I could not show her Alfred (he has been here since) nor Landor: but surely if I can I will,—that or a hundred times as much as that,—when she returns.—They tell me you are about collecting your Poems. Well, though I do not approve of rhyme at all, yet it is impossible Emerson in rhyme or prose can put down any thought that was in his heart but I should wish to get into mine. So let me have the Book as fast as may be. And do others like it if you will take circumbendibuses for sound's sake! And excuse the Critic who seems to you so unmusical; and say, It is the nature of beast! Adieu, dear Friend: write to me, write to me.

Yours ever, T. Carlyle

———— * Miss Fullers impressions of Carlyle, much to this effect, may be found in the "Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli," Boston, 1852, Vol. II. pp. 184-190. ————-



CXVII. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 31 January, 1847

My Dear Carlyle,—Your letter came with a blessing last week. I had already learned from Margaret Fuller, at Paris, that you had been very good and gentle to her;—brilliant and prevailing, of course, but, I inferred, had actually restrained the volleys and modulated the thunder, out of true courtesy and goodness of nature, which was worthy of all praise in a spoiled conqueror at this time of day. Especially, too, she expressed a true recognition and love of Jane Carlyle; and thus her visit proved a solid satisfaction; to me, also, who think that few people have so well earned their pleasures as she.

She wrote me a long letter; she has been very happy in England, and her time and strength fully employed. Her description of you and your discourse (which I read with lively curiosity also) was the best I have had on that subject.

I tried hard to write you by the December steamer, to tell you how forward was my book of Poems; but a little affair makes me much writing. I chanced to have three or four items of business to despatch, when the steamer was ready to go, and you escaped hearing of them. I am the trustee of Charles Lane, who came out here with Alcott and bought land, which, though sold, is not paid for.

Somebody or somebodies in Liverpool and Manchester* have proposed once or twice, with more or less specification, that I should come to those cities to lecture. And who knows but I may come one day? Steam is strong, and Liverpool is near. I should find my account in the strong inducement of a new audience to finish pieces which have lain waiting with little hope for months or years.

————— * Mr. Alexander Ireland, who had made the acquaintance of Emerson at Edinburgh, in 1833, was his Manchester correspondent. His memorial volume on Emerson contains an interesting record of their relations. —————

Ah then, if I dared, I should be well content to add some golden hours to my life in seeing you, now all full-grown and acknowledged amidst your own people,—to hear and to speak is so little yet so much. But life is dangerous and delicate. I should like to see your solid England. The map of Britain is good reading for me. Then I have a very ignorant love of pictures, and a curiosity about the Greek statues and stumps in the British Museum. So beware of me, for on that distant day when I get ready I shall come.

Long before this time you ought to have received from John Chapman a copy of Emerson's Poems, so called, which he was directed to send you. Poor man, you need not open them. I know all you can say. I printed them, not because I was deceived into a belief that they were poems, but because of the softness or hardness of heart of many friends here who have made it a point to have them circulated.* Once having set out to print, I obeyed the solicitations of John Chapman, of an ill-omened street in London, to send him the book in manuscript, for the better securing of copyright. In printing them here I have corrected the most unpardonable negligences, which negligences must be all stereotyped under his fair London covers and gilt paper to the eyes of any curious London reader; from which recollection I strive to turn away.

————- * In the rough draft the following sentence comes in here "I reckon myself a good beginning of a poet, very urgent and decided in my bent, and in some coming millennium I shall yet sing." ————-

Little and Brown have just rendered me an account, by which it appears that we are not quite so well off as was thought last summer, when they said they had sold at auction the balance of your books which had been lying unsold. It seems now that the books supposed to be sold were not all taken, and are returned to them; one hundred Chartism, sixty-three Past and Present. Yet we are to have some eighty-three dollars ($83.68), which you shall probably have by the next steamer.

Yours affectionately, R.W. Emerson



CXVIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, London, 2 March, 1847

Dear Emerson,—The Steamer goes tomorrow; I must, though in a very dim condition, have a little word for you conveyed by it. In the miscellaneous maw of that strange Steamer shall lie, among other things, a friendly word!

Your very kind Letter lay waiting me here, some ten days ago; doubly welcome, after so long a silence. We had been in Hampshire, with the Barings, where we were last year;—some four weeks or more; totally idle: our winter had been, and indeed still is, unusually severe; my Wife's health in consequence was sadly deranged; but this idleness, these Isle-of-Wight sea- breezes, have brought matters well round again; so we cannot grudge the visit or the idleness, which otherwise too might have its uses. Alas, at this time my normal state is to be altogether idle, to look out upon a very lonely universe, full of grim sorrow, full of splendor too; and not to know at all, for the moment, on what side I am to attack it again!—I read your Book of Poems all faithfully, at Bay House (our Hampshire quarters); where the obstinate people,—with whom you are otherwise, in prose, a first favorite,—foolishly refused to let me read aloud; foolishly, for I would have made it mostly all plain by commentary:—so I had to read for myself; and can say, in spite of my hard-heartedness, I did gain, though under impediments, a real satisfaction and some tone of the Eternal Melodies sounding, afar off, ever and anon, in my ear! This is fact; a truth in Natural History; from which you are welcome to draw inferences. A grand View of the Universe, everywhere the sound (unhappily far of, as it were) of a valiant, genuine Human Soul: this, even under rhyme, is a satisfaction worth some struggling for. But indeed you are very perverse; and through this perplexed undiaphanous element, you do not fall on me like radiant summer rainbows, like floods of sunlight, but with thin piercing radiances which affect me like the light of the stars. It is so: I wish you would become concrete, and write in prose the straightest way; but under any form I must put up with you; that is my lot.—Chapman's edition, as you probably know, is very beautiful. I believe there are enough of ardent silent seekers in England to buy up this edition from him, and resolutely study the same: as for the review multitude, they dare not exactly call it "unintelligible moonshine," and so will probably hold their tongue. It is my fixed opinion that we are all at sea as to what is called Poetry, Art, &c., in these times; laboring under a dreadful incubus of Tradition, and mere "Cant heaped balefully on us up to the very Zenith," as men, in nearly all other provinces of their Life, except perhaps the railway province, do now labor and stagger;—in a word, that Goethe-and- Schiller's "Kunst" has far more brotherhood with Pusey-and- Newman's Shovelhattery, and other the like deplorable phenomena, than it is in the least aware of! I beg you take warning: I am more serious in this than you suppose. But no, you will not; you whistle lightly over my prophecies, and go your own stiff-necked road. Unfortunate man!—

I had read in the Newspapers, and even heard in speech from Manchester people, that you were certainly coming this very summer to lecture among us: but now it seems, in your Letter, all postponed into the vague again. I do not personally know your Manchester negotiators, but I know in general that they are men of respectability, insight, and activity; much connected with the lecturing department, which is a very growing one, especially in Lancashire, at present;—men likely, for the rest, to fulfil whatsoever they may become engaged for to you. My own ignorant though confident guess, moreover, is, that you would, in all senses of the word, succeed there; I think, also rather confidently, we could promise you an audience of British aristocracy in London here,—and of British commonalty all manner of audiences that you liked to stoop to. I heard an ignorant blockhead (or mainly so) called —- bow-wowing here, some months ago, to an audience of several thousands, in the City, one evening,—upon Universal Peace, or some other field of balderdash; which the poor people seemed very patient of. In a word, I do not see what is to hinder you to come whenever you can resolve upon it. The adventure is perfectly promising: an adventure familiar to you withal; for Lecturing is with us fundamentally just what it is with you: Much prurient curiosity, with some ingenuous love of wisdom, an element of real reverence for the same: everywhere a perfect openness to any man speaking in any measure things manful. Come, therefore; gird yourself together, and come. With little or no peradventure, you will realize what your modest hope is, and more;—and I, for my share of it, shall see you once again under this Sun! O Heavens, there might be some good in that! Nay, if you will travel like a private quiet person, who knows but I, the most unlocomotive of mortals, might be able to escort you up and down a little; to look at many a thing along with you, and even to open my long- closed heart and speak about the same?—There is a spare-room always in this House for you,—in this heart, in these two hearts, the like: bid me hope in this enterprise, in all manner of ways where I can; and on the whole, get it rightly put together, and embark on it, and arrive!

The good Miss Fuller has painted us all en beau, and your smiling imagination has added new colors. We have not a triumphant life here; very far indeed from that, ach Gott!—as you shall see. But Margaret is an excellent soul: in real regard with both of us here. Since she went, I have been reading some of her Papers in a new Book we have got: greatly superior to all I knew before; in fact the undeniable utterances (now first undeniable to me) of a true heroic mind;—altogether unique, so far as I know, among the Writing Women of this generation; rare enough too, God knows, among the writing Men. She is very narrow, sometimes; but she is truly high: honor to Margaret, and more and more good-speed to her.—Adieu dear Emerson. I am ever yours,

—T.C.



CXIX. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 18 March, 1847

Dear Emerson,—Yesterday morning, setting out to breakfast with Richard Milnes (Milnes's breakfast is a thing you will yet have to experience) I met, by the sunny shore of the Thames, a benevolent Son of Adam in blue coat and red collar, who thrust into my hand a Letter from you. A truly miraculous Son of Adam in red collar, in the Sunny Spring Morning!—The Bill of Seventeen Pounds is already far on its way to Dumfries, there to be kneaded into gold by the due artists: today is American Post- day; and already in huge hurry about many things, I am scribbling you some word of answer.... The night before Milnes's morning, I had furthermore seen your Manchester Correspondent, Ireland,—an old Edinborough acquaintance too, as I found. A solid, dark, broad, rather heavy man; full of energy, and broad sagacity and practicality;—infinitely well affected to the man Emerson too. It was our clear opinion that you might come at any time with ample assurance of "succeeding," so far as wages went, and otherwise; that you ought to come, and must, and would,—as he, Ireland, would farther write to you. There is only one thing I have to add of my own, and beg you to bear in mind,—a date merely. Videlicet, That the time for lecturing to the London West-End, I was given everywhere to understand, is from the latter end of April (or say April altogether) to the end of May: this is a fixed Statistic fact, all men told me: of this you are in all arrangements to keep mind. For it will actually do your heart good to look into the faces, and speak into minds, of really Aristocratic Persons,— being one yourself, you Sinner,—and perhaps indeed this will be the greatest of all the novelties that await you in your voyage. Not to be seen, I believe, at least never seen by me in any perfection, except in London only. From April to the end of May; during those weeks you must be here, and free: remember that date. Will you come in Winter then, next Winter,—or when? Ireland professed to know you by the Photograph too; which I never yet can.—I wrote by last Packet: enough here. Your friend Cunningham has not presented himself; shall be right welcome when he does,—as all that in the least belong to you may well hope to be. Adieu. Our love to you all.

Ever Yours, T. Carlyle



CXX. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 30 April, 1847

My Dear Carlyle,—I have two good letters from you, and until now you have had no acknowledgment. Especially I ought to have told you how much pleasure your noble invitation in March gave me. This pleasing dream of going to England dances before me sometimes. It would be, I then fancy, that stimulation which my capricious, languid, and languescent study needs. At home, no man makes any proper demand on me, and the audience I address is a handful of men and women too widely scattered than that they can dictate to me that which they are justly entitled to say. Whether supercilious or respectful, they do not say anything that can be heard. Of course, I have only myself to please, and my work is slighted as soon as it has lost its first attraction. It is to be hoped, if one should cross the sea, that the terror of your English culture would scare the most desultory of Yankees into precision and fidelity; and perhaps I am not yet too old to be animated by what would have seemed to my youth a proud privilege. If you shall fright me into labor and concentration, I shall win my game; for I can well afford to pay any price to get my work well done. For the rest, I hesitate, of course, to rush rudely on persons that have been so long invisible angels to me. No reasonable man but must hold these bounds in awe:—I— much more,—who am of a solitary habit, from my childhood until now.—I hear nothing again from Mr. Ireland. So I will let the English Voyage hang as an afternoon rainbow in the East, and mind my apples and pears for the present.

You are to know that in these days I lay out a patch of orchard near my house, very much to the improvement, as all the household affirm, of our homestead. Though I have little skill in these things, and must borrow that of my neighbors, yet the works of the garden and orchard at this season are fascinating, and will eat up days and weeks, and a brave scholar should shun it like gambling, and take refuge in cities and hotels from these pernicious enchantments. For the present, I stay in the new orchard.

Duyckinck, a literary man in New York, who advises Wiley and Putnam in their publishing enterprises, wrote me lately, that they had $600 for you, from Cromwell. So may it be.

Yours, R.W.E.



CXXI. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 18 May, 1847

Dear Emerson,—....My time is nearly up today; but I write a word to acknowledge your last Letter (30 April), and various other things. For example, you must tell Mr. Thoreau (is that the exact name? for I have lent away the printed pages) that his Philadelphia Magazine with the Lecture* in two pieces was faithfully delivered here, about a fortnight ago; and carefully read, as beseemed, with due entertainment and recognition. A vigorous Mr. Thoreau,—who has formed himself a good deal upon one Emerson, but does not want abundant fire and stamina of his own;—recognizes us, and various other things, in a most admiring great-hearted manner; for which, as for part of the confused voice from the jury bog (not yet summed into a verdict, nor likely to be summed till Doomsday, nor needful to sum), the poor prisoner at the bar may justly express himself thankful! In plain prose, I like Mr. Thoreau very well; and hope yet to hear good and better news of him:—only let him not "turn to foolishness"; which seems to me to be terribly easy, at present, both in New England and Old! May the Lord deliver us all from Cant; may the Lord, whatever else he do or forbear, teach us to look Facts honestly in the face, and to beware (with a kind of shudder) of smearing them over with our despicable and damnable palaver, into irrecognizability, and so falsifying the Lord's own Gospels to his unhappy blockheads of children, all staggering down to Gehenna and the everlasting Swine's-trough for want of Gospels.—O Heaven, it is the most accursed sin of man; and done everywhere, at present, on the streets and high places, at noonday! Very seriously I say, and pray as my chief orison, May the Lord deliver us from it.—

————— * On Carlyle, published in Graham's Magazine in March and April, 1847. —————

About a week ago there came your neighbor Hoar; a solid, sensible, effectual-looking man, of whom I hope to see much more. So soon as possible I got him under way for Oxford, where I suppose he was, last week;—both Universities was too much for the limits of his time; so he preferred Oxford;—and now, this very day, I think, he was to set out for the Continent; not to return till the beginning of July, when he promises to call here again. There was something really pleasant to me in this Mr. Hoar: and I had innumerable things to ask him about Concord, concerning which topic we had hardly got a word said when our first interview had to end. I sincerely hope he will not fail to keep his time in returning.

You do very well, my Friend, to plant orchards; and fair fruit shall they grow (if it please Heaven) for your grandchildren to pluck;—a beautiful occupation for the son of man, in all patriarchal and paternal times (which latter are patriarchal too)! But you are to understand withal that your coming hither to lecture is taken as a settled point by all your friends here; and for my share I do not reckon upon the smallest doubt about the essential fact of it, simply on some calculation and adjustment about the circumstantials. Of Ireland, who I surmise is busy in the problem even now, you will hear by and by, probably in more definite terms: I did not see him again after my first notice of him to you; but there is no doubt concerning his determinations (for all manner of reasons) to get you to Lancashire, to England;—and in fact it is an adventure which I think you ought to contemplate as fixed,—say for this year and the beginning of next? Ireland will help you to fix the dates; and there is nothing else, I think, which should need fixing.— Unquestionably you would get an immense quantity of food for ideas, though perhaps not at all in the way you anticipate, in looking about among us: nay, if you even thought us stupid, there is something in the godlike indifference with which London will accept and sanction even that verdict,—something highly instructive at least! And in short, for the truth must be told, London is properly your Mother City too,—verily you have about as much to do with it, in spite of Polk and Q. Victory, as I had! And you ought to come and look at it, beyond doubt; and say to this land, "Old Mother, how are you getting on at all?" To which the Mother will answer, "Thankee, young son, and you?"—in a way useful to both parties! That is truth.

Adieu, dear Emerson; good be with you always. Hoar gave me your American Poems: thanks. Vale et me ama.

—T. Carlyle



CXXII. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 4 June, 1847

Dear Carlyle,—I have just got your friendliest letter of May 18, with its varied news and new invitations. Really you are a dangerous correspondent with your solid and urgent ways of speaking. No affairs and no studies of mine, I fear, will be able to make any head against these bribes. Well, I will adorn the brow of the coming months with this fine hope; then if the rich God at last refuses the jewel, no doubt he will give something better—to both of us. But thinking on this project lately, I see one thing plainly, that I must not come to London as a lecturer. If the plan proceed, I will come and see you,— thankful to Heaven for that mercy, should such a romance looking reality come to pass,—I will come and see you and Jane Carlyle, and will hear what you have to say. You shall even show me, if you will, such other men and women as will suffer themselves to be seen and heard, asking for nothing again. Then I will depart in peace, as I came.

At Mr. Ireland's "Institutes," I will read lectures; and possibly in London too, if, when there, you looking with your clear eyes shall say that it is desired by persons who ought to be gratified. But I wish such lecturing to be a mere contingency, and nowise a settled purpose. I had rather stay at home, and forego the happiness of seeing you, and the excitement of England, than to have the smallest pains taken to collect an audience for me. So now we will leave this egg in the desert for the ostrich Time to hatch it or not.

It seems you are not tired of pale Americans, or will not own it. You have sent our Country-Senator* where he wanted to go, and to the best hospitalities as we learn today directly from him. I cannot avoid sending you another of a different stamp. Henry Hedge is a recluse but Catholic scholar in our remote Bangor, who reads German and smokes in his solitary study through nearly eight months of snow in the year, and deals out, every Sunday, his witty apothegms to the lumber-merchants and township-owners of Penobscot River, who have actually grown intelligent interpreters of his riddles by long hearkening after them. They have shown themselves very loving and generous lately, in making a quite munificent provision for his traveling. Hedge has a true and mellow heart,... and I hope you will like him.

———— * The Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar. ————

I have seen lately a Texan, ardent and vigorous, who assured me that Carlyle's Writings were read with eagerness on the banks of the Colorado. There was more to tell, but it is too late.

Ever yours, R.W. Emerson



CXXIII. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 31 July, 1847

Dear Carlyle,—In my old age I am coming to see you. I have written this day, in answer to sundry letters brought me by the last steamer, from Mr. Ireland and Mr. Hudson of Leeds, that I mean in good earnest to sail for Liverpool or for London about the first of October; and I am disposing my astonished household—astonished at such a Somerset of the sedentary master —with that view.

My brother William was here this week from New York, and will come again to carry my mother home with him for the winter; my wife and children three are combining for and against me; at all events, I am to have my visit. I pray you to cherish your good nature, your mercy. Let your wife cherish it,—that I may see, I indolent, this incredible worker, whose toil has been long since my pride and wonder,—that I may see him benign and unexacting,— he shall not be at the crisis of some over-labor. I shall not stay but an hour. What do I care for his fame? Ah! how gladly I hoped once to see Sterling as mediator and amalgam, when my turn should come to see the Saxon gods at home: Sterling, who had certain American qualities in his genius;—and now you send me his shade. I found at Munroe's shop the effigy, which, he said, Cunningham, whom I have not seen or heard from, had left there for me; a front face, and a profile, both—especially the first —a very welcome satisfaction to my sad curiosity, the face very national, certainly, but how thoughtful and how friendly! What more belongs to this print—whether you are editing his books, or yourself drawing his lineaments—I know not.

I find my friends have laid out much work for me in Yorkshire and Lancashire. What part of it I shall do, I cannot yet tell. As soon as I know how to arrange my journey best, I shall write you again.

Yours affectionately, R.W. Emerson



CXXIV. Carlyle to Emerson

Rawdon, Near Leeds, Yorkshire 31 August, 1847

Dear Emerson,—Almost ever since your last Letter reached me, I have been wandering over the country, enveloped either in a restless whirl of locomotives, view-hunting, &c., or sunk in the deepest torpor of total idleness and laziness, forgetting, and striving to forget, that there was any world but that of dreams; —and though at intervals the reproachful remembrance has arisen sharply enough on me, that I ought, on all accounts high and low, to have written you an answer, never till today have I been able to take pen in hand, and actually begin that operation! Such is the naked fact. My Wife is with me; we leave no household behind us but a servant; the face of England, with its mad electioneerings, vacant tourist dilettantings, with its shady woods, green yellow harvest-fields and dingy mill-chimneys, so new and old, so beautiful and ugly, every way so abstruse and unspeakable, invites to silence; the whole world, fruitful yet disgusting to this human soul of mine, invites me to silence; to sleep, and dreams, and stagnant indifference, as if for the time one had got into the country of the Lotos-Eaters, and it made no matter what became of anything and all things. In good truth, it is a wearied man, at least a dreadfully slothful and slumberous man, eager for sleep in any quantity, that now addresses you! Be thankful for a few half-dreaming words, till we awake again.

As to your visit to us, there is but one thing to be said and repeated: That a prophet's chamber is ready for you in Chelsea, and a brotherly and sisterly welcome, on whatever day at whatever hour you arrive: this, which is all of the Practical that I can properly take charge of, is to be considered a given quantity always. With regard to Lecturing, &c., Ireland, with whom I suppose you to be in correspondence, seems to have awakened all this North Country into the fixed hope of hearing you,—and God knows they have need enough to hear a man with sense in his head;—it was but the other day I read in one of their Newspapers, "We understand that Mr. Emerson the distinguished &c. is certainly &c. this winter," all in due Newspaper phrase, and I think they settled your arrival for "October" next. May it prove so! But on the whole there is no doubt of your coming; that is a great fact. And if so, I should say, Why not come at once, even as the Editor surmises? You will evidently do no other considerable enterprise till this voyage to England is achieved. Come therefore;—and we shall see; we shall hear and speak! I do not know another man in all the world to whom I can speak with clear hope of getting adequate response from him: if I speak to you, it will be a breaking of my silence for the last time perhaps,—perhaps for the first time, on some points! Allons. I shall not always be so roadweary, lifeweary, sleepy, and stony as at present. I even think there is yet another Book in me; "Exodus from Houndsditch" (I think it might be called), a peeling off of fetid Jewhood in every sense from myself and my poor bewildered brethren: one other Book; and, if it were a right one, rest after that, the deeper the better, forevermore. Ach Gott!—

Hedge is one of the sturdiest little fellows I have come across for many a day. A face like a rock; a voice like a howitzer; only his honest kind gray eyes reassure you a little. We have met only once; but hope (mutually, I flatter myself) it may be often by and by. That hardy little fellow too, what has he to do with "Semitic tradition" and the "dust-hole of extinct Socinianism," George-Sandism, and the Twaddle of a thousand Magazines? Thor and his Hammer, even, seem to me a little more respectable; at least, "My dear Sir, endeavor to clear your mind of Cant." Oh, we are all sunk, much deeper than any of us imagines. And our worship of "beautiful sentiments," &c., &c. is as contemptible a form of long-ears as any other, perhaps the most so of any. It is in fact damnable.—We will say no more of it at present. Hedge came to me with tall lank Chapman at his side,—an innocent flail of a creature, with considerable impetus in him: the two when they stood up together looked like a circle and tangent,—in more senses than one.

Jacobson, the Oxford Doctor, who welcomed your Concord Senator in that City, writes to me that he has received (with blushes, &c.) some grand "Gift for his Child" from that Traveler; whom I am accordingly to thank, and blush to,—Jacobson not knowing his address at present. The "address" of course is still more unknown to me at present: but we shall know it, and the man it indicates, I hope, again before long. So, much for that.

And now, dear Emerson, Adieu. Will your next Letter tell us the when? O my Friend! We are here with Quakers, or Ex-Quakers rather; a very curious people, "like water from the crystal well"; in a very curious country too, most beautiful and very ugly: but why write of it, or of anything more, while half asleep and lotos-eating! Adieu, my Friend; come soon, and let us meet again under this Sun.

Yours, T. Carlyle



CXXV. Emerson to Carlyle

Concord, 30 September, 1847

My Dear Carlyle,—The last steamer brought, as ever, good tidings from you, though certainly from a new habitat, at Leeds, or near it. If Leeds will only keep you a little in its precinct, I will search for you there; for it is one of the parishes in the diocese which Mr. Ireland and his friends have carved out for me on the map of England.

I have taken a berth in the packet-ship "Washington Irving," which leaves Boston for Liverpool next week, 5 October; having decided, after a little demurring and advising, to follow my inclination in shunning the steamer. The owners will almost take oath that their ship cannot be out of a port twenty days. At Liverpool and Manchester I shall take advice of Ireland and his officers of the "Institutes," and perhaps shall remain for some time in that region, if my courage and my head are equal to the work they offer me. I will write you what befalls me in the strange city. Who knows but I may have adventures—I who had never one, as I have just had occasion to write to Mrs. Howitt, who inquired what mine were?

Well, if I survive Liverpool, and Manchester, and Leeds, or rather my errands thither, I shall come some fine day to see you in your burly city, you in the centre of the world, and sun me a little in your British heart. It seems a lively passage that I am entering in the old Dream World, and perhaps the slumbers are lighter and the Morning is near. Softly, dear shadows, do not scatter yet. Knit your panorama close and well, till these rare figures just before me draw near, and are greeted and known.

But there is no more time in this late night—and what need? since I shall see you and yours soon.

Ever yours, R.W.E.



CXXVI. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 15 October, 1847

My Dear Emerson,—Your Letter from Concord, of the 31st of July, had arrived duly in London; been duly forwarded to my transient address at Buxton in Derbyshire,—and there, by the faithless Postmaster, retained among his lumber, instead of given to me when I called on him! We staid in Buxton only one day and night; two Newspapers, as I recollect, the Postmaster did deliver to me on my demand; but your Letter he, with scandalous carelessness, kept back, and left me to travel forwards without: there accordingly it lay, week after week, for a month or more; and only by half-accident and the extraordinary diligence and accuracy of our Chelsea Postman, was it recovered at all, not many days ago, after my Wife's return hither. Consider what kind of fact this was and has been for us! For now, if all have gone right, you are approaching the coast of England; Chelsea and your fraternal House hidden under a disastrous cloud to you; and I know not so much as whitherward to write, and send you a word of solution. It is one of the most unpleasant mistakes that ever befell me; I have no resource but to enclose this Note to Mr. Ireland, and charge him by the strongest adjurations to have it ready for you the first thing when you set foot upon our shores.*

—————— * Mr. Ireland, in his Recollections of Emerson's Visit to England, p. 59, prints Carlyle's note to himself, enclosing this letter, and adds: "The ship reached Liverpool on the 22d of October, and Mr. Emerson at once proceeded to Manchester. After spending a few hours in friendly talk, he was 'shot up,' as Carlyle had desired, to Chelsea, and at the end of a week returned to Manchester, to begin his lectures." ————-

Know then, my Friend, that in verity your Home while in England is here; and all other places, whither work or amusement may call you, are but inns and temporary lodgings. I have returned hither a day or two ago, and free from any urgent calls or businesses of any kind; my Wife has your room all ready;—and here surely, if anywhere in the wide Earth, there ought to be a brother's welcome and kind home waiting you! Yes, by Allah!—An "Express Train" leaves Liverpool every afternoon; and in some six hours will set you down here. I know not what your engagements are; but I say to myself, Why not come at once, and rest a little from your sea-changes, before going farther? In six hours you can be out of the unstable waters, and sitting in your own room here. You shall not be bothered with talk till you repose; and you shall have plenty of it, hot and hot, when the appetite does arise in you. "No. 5 Great Cheyne Row, Chelsea": come to the "London Terminus," from any side; say these magic words to any Cabman, and by night or by day you are a welcome apparition here,—foul befall us otherwise! This is the fact: what more can I say? I make my affidavit of the same; and require you in the name of all Lares and Penates, and Household Gods ancient and modern which are sacred to men, to consider it and take brotherly account of it!—

Shall we hear of you, then, in a day or two: shall we not perhaps see you in a day or two! That depends on the winds and the chances; but our affection is independent of such. Adieu; au revoir, it now is! Come soon; come at once.

Ever yours, T. Carlyle



Extracts from Emerson's Diary

October, 1847

"I found at Liverpool, after a couple of days, a letter which had been seeking me, from Carlyle, addressed to 'R.W.E. on the instant when he lands in England,' conveying the heartiest welcome and urgent invitation to house and hearth. And finding that I should not be wanted for a week in the Lecture-rooms I came down to London on Monday, and, at ten at night, the door was opened by Jane Carlyle, and the man himself was behind her with a lamp in the hall. They were very little changed from their old selves of fourteen years ago (in August), when I left them at Craigenputtock. 'Well,' said Carlyle, 'here we are shoveled together again.' The floodgates of his talk are quickly opened, and the river is a plentiful stream. We had a wide talk that night until nearly one o'clock, and at breakfast next morning again. At noon or later we walked forth to Hyde Park and the Palaces, about two miles from here, to the National Gallery, and to the Strand, Carlyle melting all Westminster and London into his talk and laughter, as he goes. Here, in his house, we breakfast about nine, and Carlyle is very prone, his wife says, to sleep till ten or eleven, if he has no company. An immense talker, and altogether as extraordinary in that as in his writing; I think, even more so; you will never discover his real vigor and range, or how much more he might do than he has ever done, without seeing him. My few hours discourse with him, long ago, in Scotland, gave me not enough knowledge of him; and I have now at last been taken by surprise by him."

"C. and his wife live on beautiful terms. Their ways are very engaging, and, in her bookcase, all his books are inscribed to her, as they came from year to year, each with some significant lines."

"I had a good talk with C. last night. He says over and over, for months, for years, the same thing. Yet his guiding genius is his moral sense, his perception of the sole importance of truth and justice; and he, too, says that there is properly no religion in England. He is quite contemptuous about 'Kunst,' also, in Germans, or English, or Americans;* and has a huge respect for the Duke of Wellington, as the only Englishman, or the only one in the Aristocracy, who will have nothing to do with any manner of lie."

————— * See English Traits, Ch. XVI.; and Life of Sterling, Part II. Ch. VII. "Among the windy gospels addressed to our poor century there are few louder than this of Art." —————

The following sentences are of later date than the preceding:—

"Carlyle had all the kleinstadtlich traits of an islander and a Scotsman, and reprimanded with severity the rebellious instincts of the native of a vast continent which made light of the British Islands."

"Carlyle has a hairy strength which makes his literary vocation a mere chance, and what seems very contemptible to him. I could think only of an enormous trip-hammer with an 'Aeolian attachment."'

"In Carlyle as in Byron, one is more struck with the rhetoric than with the matter. He has manly superiority rather than intellectuality, and so makes good hard hits all the time. There is more character than intellect in every sentence, herein strongly resembling Samuel Johnson."

"England makes what a step from Dr. Johnson to Carlyle! what wealth of thought and science, what expansion of views and profounder resources does the genius and performance of this last imply! If she can make another step as large, what new ages open!"



CXXVII. Emerson to Carlyle

Mrs. Massey's, Manchester, 2 Fenny Place, Fenny St. November 5, 1847

Ah! my dear friend, all these days have gone, and you have had no word from me, when the shuttles fly so swiftly in your English loom, and in so few hours we may have tidings of the best that live. At last, and only this day for the first day, I am stablished in my own lodgings on English ground, and have a fair parlor and chamber, into both of which the sun and moon shine, into which friendly people have already entered.

Hitherto I have been the victim of trifles,—which is the fate and the chief objection to traveling. Days are absorbed in precious nothings. But now that I am in some sort a citizen, of Manchester, and also of Liverpool (for there also I am to enter on lodgings tomorrow, at 56 Stafford Street, Islington), perhaps the social heart of this English world will include me also in its strong and healthful circulations. I get the best letters from home by the last steamers, and was much occupied in Liverpool yesterday in seeing Dr. Nichol of Glasgow, who was to sail in the "Acadia," and in giving him credentials to some Americans. I find here a very kind reception from your friends, as they emphatically are,—Ireland, Espinasse, Miss Jewsbury, Dr. Hodgson, and a circle expanding on all sides outward,—and Mrs. Paulet at Liverpool. I am learning there also to know friendly faces, and a certain Roscoe Club has complimented me with its privileges. The oddest part of my new position is my alarming penny correspondence, which, what with welcomes, invitations to lecture, proffers of hospitality, suggestions from good Swedenborgists and others for my better guidance touching the titles of my discourses, &c., &c., all requiring answers, threaten to eat up a day like a cherry. In this fog and miscellany, and until the heavenly sun shall give me one beam, will not you, friend and joy of so many years, send me a quiet line or two now and then to say that you still smoke your pipe in peace, side by side with wife and brother also well and smoking, or able to smoke? Now that I have in some measure calmed down the astonishment and consternation of seeing your dreams change into realities, I mean, at my next approximation or perihelion, to behold you with the most serene and sceptical calmness.

So give my thanks and true affectionate remembrance to Jane Carlyle, and my regards also to Dr. Carlyle, whose precise address please also to send me.

Ever your loving R.W.E.

The address at the top of this note is the best for the present, as I mean to make this my centre.



CXXVIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 13 November, 1847

Dear Emerson,—Your Book-parcels were faithfully sent off, directly after your departure: in regard to one of them I had a pleasant visit from the proprietor in person,—the young Swedenborgian Doctor, whom to my surprise I found quite an agreeable, accomplished secular young gentleman, much given to "progress of the species," &c., &c.; from whom I suppose you have yourself heard. The wandering umbrella, still short of an owner, hangs upon its peg here, without definite outlook. Of yourself there have come news, by your own Letter, and by various excerpts from Manchester Newspapers. Gluck zu!—

This Morning I received the Enclosed, and send it off to you without farther response. Mudie, if I mistake not, is some small Bookseller in the Russell-Square region; pray answer him, if you think him worthy of answer. A dim suspicion haunts me that perhaps he was the Republisher (or Pirate) of your first set of Essays: but probably he regards this as a mere office of untutored friendship on his part. Or possibly I do the poor man wrong by misremembrance? Chapman could tell.

I am sunk deep here, in effete Manuscripts, in abstruse meditations, in confusions old and new; sinking, as I may describe myself, through stratum after stratum of the Inane,— down to one knows not what depth! I unfortunately belong to the Opposition Party in many points, and am in a minority of one. To keep silence, therefore, is among the principal duties at present.

We had a call from Bancroft, the other evening. A tough Yankee man; of many worthy qualities more tough than musical; among which it gratified me to find a certain small under-current of genial humor, or as it were hidden laughter, not noticed heretofore.

My Wife and all the rest of us are well; and do all salute you with our true wishes, and the hope to have you here again before long. Do not bother yourself with other than voluntary writing to me, while there is so much otherwise that you are obliged to write. If on any point you want advice, information, or other help that lies within the limits of my strength, command me, now and always. And so Good be with you; and a happy meeting to us soon again.

Yours ever truly, T. Carlyle



CXXIX. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 30 November, 1847

Dear Emerson,—Here is a word for you from Miss Fuller; I send you the Cover also, though I think there is little or nothing in that. It contained another little Note for Mazzini; who is wandering in foreign parts, on paths unknown to me at present. Pray send my regards to Miss Fuller, when you write.

We hear of you pretty often, and of your successes with the Northern populations. We hope for you in London again before long.—I am busy, if at all, altogether inarticulately in these days. My respect for silence, my distrust of Speech, seem to grow upon me. There is a time for both, says Solomon; but we, in our poor generation, have forgotten one of the "times."

Here is a Mr. Forster* of Rawdon, or Bradford, in Yorkshire; our late host in the Autumn time; who expects and longs to be yours when you come into those parts.

I am busy with William Conqueror's Domesday Book and with the commentaries of various blockheads on it:—Ah me!

All good be with you, and happy news from those dear to you.

Yours ever, T. Carlyle

—————- * Now the Rt. Hon. W E. Forster, M.P. —————-



CXXX. Emerson to Carlyle

2 Fenny Street, Higher Broughton, Manchester 28 December, 1847

Dear Carlyle,—I am concerned to discover that Margaret Fuller in the letter which you forwarded prays me to ask you and Mrs. Carlyle respecting the Count and Countess Pepoli, who are in Rome for the winter, whether they would be good for her to know?—That is pretty nearly the form of her question. As one third of the winter is gone, and one half will be, before her question can be answered, I fear, it will have lost some of its pertinence. Well, it will serve as a token to pass between us, which will please me if it do not Margaret.—I have had nothing to send you tidings of. Yet I get the best accounts from home of wife and babes and friends. I am seeing this England more thoroughly than I had thought was possible to me. I find this lecturing a key which opens all doors. I have received everywhere the kindest hospitality from a great variety of persons. I see many intelligent and well-informed persons, and some fine geniuses. I have every day a better opinion of the English, who are a very handsome and satisfactory race of men, and, in the point of material performance, altogether incomparable. I have made some vain attempts to end my lectures, but must go on a little longer. With kindest regards to the Lady Jane,

Your friend, R.W.E.

Margaret Fuller's address, if anything is to be written, is, Care of Maquay, Pakenham & Co., Rome.



CXXXI. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 30 December, 1847

My Dear Emerson,—We are very glad to see your handwriting again, and learn that you are well, and doing well. Our news of you hitherto, from the dim Lecture-element, had been satisfactory indeed, but vague. Go on and prosper.

I do not much think Miss Fuller would do any great good with the Pepolis,—even if they are still in Rome, and not at Bologna as our advices here seemed to indicate. Madam Pepoli is an elderly Scotch lady, of excellent commonplace vernacular qualities, hardly of more; the Count, some years younger, and a much airier man, is on all sides a beautiful Dilettante,—little suitable, I fear, to the serious mind that can recognize him as such! However, if the people are still in Rome, Miss Fuller can easily try: Bid Miss Fuller present my Wife's compliments, or mine, or even yours (for they know all our domesticities here, and are very intimate, especially Madam with My dame); upon which the acquaintance is at once made, and can be continued if useful.

This morning Richard Milnes writes to me for your address; which I have sent. He is just returned out of Spain; home swiftly to "vote for the Jew Bill"; is doing hospitalities at Woburn Abbey; and I suppose will be in Yorkshire (home, near Pontefract) before long. See him if you have opportunity: a man very easy to see and get into flowing talk with; a man of much sharpness of faculty, well tempered by several inches of "Christian fat" he has upon his ribs for covering. One of the idlest, cheeriest, most gifted of fat little men.

Tennyson has been here for three weeks; dining daily till he is near dead;—setting out a Poem withal. He came in to us on Sunday evening last, and on the preceding Sunday: a truly interesting Son of Earth, and Son of Heaven,—who has almost lost his way, among the will-o'-wisps, I doubt; and may flounder ever deeper, over neck and nose at last, among the quagmires that abound! I like him well; but can do next to nothing for him. Milnes, with general co-operation, got him a Pension; and he has bread and tobacco: but that is a poor outfit for such a soul. He wants a task; and, alas, that of spinning rhymes, and naming it "Art" and "high Art," in a Time like ours, will never furnish him.

For myself I have been entirely idle,—I dare not even say, too abstrusely occupied; for I have merely been looking at the Chaos even, not by any means working in it. I have not even read a Book,—that I liked. All "Literature" has grown inexpressibly unsatisfactory to me. Better be silent than talk farther in this mood.

We are going off, on Saturday come a week, into Hampshire, to certain Friends you have heard me speak of. Our address, till the beginning of February, is "Hon. W.B. Baring, Alverstoke, Gosport, Hants." My Wife sends you many kind regards; remember us across the Ocean too;—and be well and busy till we meet.

Yours ever, T. Carlyle

Last night there arrived No. 1 of the Massachusetts Review: beautiful paper and print; and very promising otherwise. In the Introduction I well recognized the hand; in the first Article too,—not in any of the others. Faustum sit.



CXXXII. Emerson to Carlyle

Ambleside, 26 February, 1848

My Dear Carlyle,—I am here in Miss Martineau's house, and having seen a good deal of England, and lately a good deal of Scotland too, I am tomorrow to set forth again for Manchester, and presently for London. Yesterday, I saw Wordsworth for a good hour and a half, which he did not seem to grudge, for he talked freely and fast, and—bating his cramping Toryism and what belongs to it—wisely enough. He is in rude health, and, though seventy-seven years old, says he does not feel his age in any particular. Miss Martineau is in excellent health and spirits, though just now annoyed by the hesitations of Murray to publish her book;* but she confides infinitely in her book, which is the best fortune. But I please myself not a little that I shall in a few days see you again, and I will give you an account of my journey. I have heard almost nothing of your late weeks,—but that is my fault,—only I heard with sorrow that your wife had been ill, and could not go with you on your Christmas holidays. Now may her good days have come again! I say I have heard nothing of your late days; of your early days, of your genius, of your influence, I cease not to hear and to see continually, yea, often am called upon to resist the same with might and main. But I will not pester you with it now.—Miss Martineau, who is most happily placed here, and a model of housekeeping, sends kindest remembrances to you both.

Yours ever, R. W. Emerson.

————- * "Eastern Life, Past and Present." ————-



CXXXIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 28 February, 1848

Dear Emerson,—We are delighted to hear of you again at first hand: our last traditions represented you at Edinburgh, and left the prospect of your return hither very vague. I have only time for one word tonight: to say that your room is standing vacant ever since you quitted it,—ready to be lighted up with all manner of physical and moral fires that the place will yield; and is in fact your room, and expects to be accounted such.—I know not specially what your operations in this quarter are to be; but whatever they are, or the arrangements necessary for them, surely it is here that you must alight again in the big Babel, and deliberately adjust what farther is to be done. Write to us what day you are to arrive; and the rest is all already managed.

Jane has never yet got out since the cold took her; but she has at no time been so ill as is frequent with her in these winter disorders; she is now steadily improving, and we expect will come out with the sun and the green leaves,—as she usually does. I too caught an ugly cold, and, what is very uncommon with me, a kind of cough, while down in Hampshire; which, with other inarticulate matters, has kept me in a very mute abstruse condition all this while; so that, for many weeks past, I have properly had no history,—except such as trees in winter, and other merely passive objects may have. That is not an agreeable side of the page; but I find it indissolubly attached to the other: no historical leaf with me but has them both! Reading does next to nothing for me at present, neither will thinking or even dreaming rightly prosper; of no province can I be quite master except of the silent one, in such a case. One feels there, at last, as if quite annihilated; and takes up arms again (the poor goose-quill is no great things of a weapon to arm with!) as if in a kind of sacred despair.

All people are in a sort of joy-dom over the new French Republic, which has descended suddenly (or shall we say, ascended alas?) out of the Immensities upon us; showing once again that the righteous Gods do yet live and reign! It is long years since I have felt any such deep-seated pious satisfaction at a public event. Adieu: come soon; and warn us when.

Yours ever, T. Carlyle



CXXXIV. Emerson to Carlyle

2 Fenny St., Manchester, 2 March, Thursday [1848]

Dear Friend,—I hope to set forward today for London, and to arrive there some time tonight. I am to go first to Chapman's house, where I shall lodge for a time. If it is too noisy, I shall move westward. But I hope you are to be at home tomorrow, for if I prosper, I shall come and beg a dinner with you,—is it not at five o'clock? I am sorry you have no better news to tell me of your health,—your own and your wife's. Tell her I shall surely report you to Alcott, who will have his revenge. Thanks that you keep the door so wide open for me still. I shall always come in.

Ever yours, R.W.E.



CXXXV. Emerson to Carlyle Monday, P.M., 19 June, 1848

Dear Carlyle,—Mrs. Crowe of Edinburgh, an excellent lady, known to you and to many good people, wishes me to go to you with her.

I tell her that I believe you relax the reins of labor as early as one hour after noon, and I propose one o'clock on Thursday for the invasion. If you are otherwise engaged, you must send me word. Otherwise, we shall come.

It was sad to hear no good news last evening from Jane Carlyle. I heartily hope the night brought sleep, and the morning better health to her.

Yours always, R.W. Emerson



CXXXVI. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 20 June, 1848

Dear Emerson,—We shall be very glad to become acquainted with Mrs. Crowe, of whom already by report we know many favorable things. Brown (of Portobello, Edinburgh) had given us intimation of her kind purposes towards Chelsea; and now on Thursday you (please the Pigs) shall see the adventure achieved. Two o'clock, not one, is the hour when labor ceases here,—if, alas, there be any "labor" so much as got begun; which latter is often enough the sad case. But at either hour we shall be ready for you.

I hope you penetrated the Armida Palace, and did your devoir to the sublime Duchess and her Luncheon yesterday! I cannot without a certain internal amusement (foreign enough to my present humor) represent to myself such a conjunction of opposite stars! But you carry a new image off with you, and are a gainer, you. Allons.

My Papers here are in a state of distraction, state of despair! I see not what is to become of them and me.

Yours ever truly, T. Carlyle

My Wife arose without headache on Monday morning; but feels still a good deal beaten;—has not had "such a headache" for several years.



CXXXVII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, Friday [23 June, 1848]

Dear Emerson,—I forgot to say, last night, that you are to dine with us on Sunday; that after our call on the Lady Harriet* we will take a stroll through the Park, look at the Sunday population, and find ourselves here at five o'clock for the above important object. Pray remember, therefore, and no excuse! In haste.

Yours ever truly, T. Carlyle

——————- * Lady Ashburton ——————-



CXXXVIII. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 6 December, 1848

Dear Emerson,—We received your Letter* duly, some time ago, with many welcomes; and have as you see been too remiss in answering it. Not from forgetfulness, if you will take my word; no, but from many causes, too complicated to articulate, and justly producing an indisposition to put pen to paper at all! Never was I more silent than in these very months; and, with reason too, for the world at large, and my own share of it in small, are both getting more and more unspeakable with any convenience! In health we of this household are about as well as usual;—and look across to the woods of Concord with more light than we had, realizing for ourselves a most mild and friendly picture there. Perhaps it is quite as well that you are left alone of foreign interference, even of a Letter from Chelsea, till you get your huge bale of English reminiscences assorted a little. Nobody except me seems to have heard from you; at least the rest, in these parts, all plead destitution when I ask for news. What you saw and suffered and enjoyed here will, if you had once got it properly warehoused, be new wealth to you for many years. Of one impression we fail not here: admiration of your pacific virtues, of gentle and noble tolerance, often sorely tried in this place! Forgive me my ferocities; you do not quite know what I suffer in these latitudes, or perhaps it would be even easier for you. Peace for me, in a Mother of Dead Dogs like this, there is not, was not, will not be,—till the battle itself end; which, however, is a sure outlook, and daily growing a nearer one.

————— * The letter is missing, but a fragment of the rough draft of it exists, dated Concord, 2 October, 1848. Emerson had returned home in July, and he begins: "'T is high time, no doubt, long since, that you heard from me, and if there were good news in America for you, you would be sure to hear. All goes at heavy trot with us... I fell again quickly into my obscure habits, more fit for me than the fine things I had seen. I made my best endeavor to praise the rich country I had seen, and its excellent, energetic, polished people. And it is very easy for me to do so. England is the country of success, and success has a great charm for me, more than for those I talk with at home. But they were obstinate to know if the English were superior to their possessions, and if the old religion warmed their hearts, and lifted a little the mountain of wealth. So I enumerated the list of brilliant persons I had seen, and the [break in MS.]. But the question returned. Did you find kings and priests? Did you find sanctities and beauties that took away your memory, and sent you home a changed man with new aims, and with a discontent of your old pastures?"

Here the fragment ends. Emerson's answer to these questions may be found in the chapter entitled "Results," in his English Traits. —————

Nay, there is another practical question,—but it is from the female side of the house to the female side,—and in fact concerns Indian meal, upon which Mrs. Emerson, or you, or the Miller of Concord (if he have any tincture of philosophy) are now to instruct us! The fact is, potatoes having vanished here, we are again, with motives large and small, trying to learn the use of Indian meal; and indeed do eat it daily to meat at dinner, though hitherto with considerable despair. Question first, therefore: Is there by nature a bitter final taste, which makes the throat smart, and disheartens much the apprentice in Indian meal;—or is it accidental, and to be avoided? We surely anticipate the latter answer; but do not yet see how. At first we were taught the meal, all ground on your side of the water, had got fusty, raw; an effect we are well used to in oaten and other meals but, last year, we had a bushel of it ground here, and the bitter taste was there as before (with the addition of much dirt and sand, our millstones I suppose being too soft);— whereupon we incline to surmise that there is, perhaps, as in the case of oats, some pellicle or hull that ought to be rejected in making the meal? Pray ask some philosophic Miller, if Mrs. Emerson or you do not know;—and as a corollary this second question: What is the essential difference between white (or brown-gray-white) Indian Meal and yellow (the kind we now have; beautiful as new Guineas, but with an ineffaceable tastekin of soot in it)?—And question third, which includes all: How to cook mush rightly, at least without bitter? Long-continued boiling seems to help the bitterness, but does not cure it. Let some oracle speak! I tell all people, our staff of life is in the Mississippi Valley henceforth;—and one of the truest benefactors were an American Minerva who could teach us to cook this meal; which our people at present (I included) are unanimous in finding nigh uneatable, and loudly exclaimable against! Elihu Burritt had a string of recipes that went through all newspapers three years ago; but never sang there oracle of longer ears than that,—totally destitute of practical significance to any creature here!

And now enough of questioning. Alas, alas, I have a quite other batch of sad and saddest considerations,—on which I must not so much as enter at present! Death has been very busy in this little circle of ours within these few days. You remember Charles Buller, to whom I brought you over that night at the Barings' in Stanhope Street? He died this day week, almost quite unexpectedly; a sore loss to all that knew him personally, and his gladdening sunny presence in many circles here; a sore loss to the political people too, for he was far the cleverest of all Whig men, and indeed the only genial soul one can remember in that department of things.* We buried him yesterday; and now see what new thing has come. Lord Ashburton, who had left his mother well in Hampshire ten hours before, is summoned from poor Buller's funeral by telegraph; hurries back, finds his mother, whom he loved much, already dead! She was a Miss Bingham, I think, from Pennsylvania, perhaps from Philadelphia itself. You saw her; but the first sight by no means told one all or the best worth that was in that good Lady. We are quite bewildered by our own regrets, and by the far painfuler sorrow of those closely related to these sudden sorrows. Of which let me be silent for the present;—and indeed of all things else, for speech, inadequate mockery of one's poor meaning, is quite a burden to me just now!

————- * The reader of Carlyle's Reminiscences, and of Froude's volumes of his biography, is familiar with the close relations that had existed between Buller and Carlyle. —————

Neuberg* comes hither sometimes; a welcome, wise kind of man. Poor little Espinasse still toils cheerily at the oar, and various friends of yours are about us. Brother John did send through Chapman all the Dante, which we calculate you have received long ago: he is now come to Town; doing a Preface, &c., which also will be sent to you, and just about publishing.— Helps, who has been alarmingly ill, and touring on the Rhine since we were his guests, writes to me yesterday from Hampshire about sending you a new Book of his. I instructed him How.

Adieu, dear Emerson; do not forget us, or forget to think as kindly as you can of us, while we continue in this world together.

Yours ever affectionately, T. Carlyle

————- * Mr. Ireland, in his Recollections, p. 62, gives an interesting account of Mr. Neuberg,—a highly cultivated German, who assisted Carlyle in some of the later literary labors of his life. Neuberg died in 1867, and in a letter to his sister of that year Carlyle says: "No kinder friend had I in this world; no man of my day, I believe, had so faithful, loyal, and willing a helper as he generously was to me for the last twenty or more years." —————-



CXXXIX. Emerson to Carlyle

Boston, 28 January, 1849

My Dear Carlyle,—Here in Boston for the day, though in no fit place for writing, you shall have, since the steamer goes tomorrow, a hasty answer to at least one of your questions....

You tell me heavy news of your friends, and of those who were friendly to me for your sake. And I have found farther particulars concerning them in the newspapers. Buller I have known by name ever since he was in America with Lord Durham, and I well remember his face and figure at Mr. Baring's. Even England cannot spare an accomplished man.

Since I had your letter, and, I believe, by the same steamer, your brother's Dante,* complete within and without, has come to me, most welcome. I heartily thank him. 'T is a most workmanlike book, bearing every mark of honest value. I thank him for myself, and I thank him, in advance, for our people, who are sure to learn their debt to him, in the coming months and years. I sent the book, after short examination, the same day, to New York, to the Harpers, lest their edition should come out without Prolegomena. But they answered, the next day, that they had already received directly the same matter;—yet have not up to this time returned my book. For the Indian corn,—I have been to see Dr. Charles T. Jackson (my wife's brother, and our best chemist, inventor of etherization), who tells me that the reason your meal is bitter is, that all the corn sent to you from us is kiln-dried here, usually at a heat of three hundred degrees, which effectually kills the starch or diastase (?) which would otherwise become sugar. This drying is thought necessary to prevent the corn from becoming musty in the contingency of a long voyage. He says, if it should go in the steamer, it would arrive sound without previous drying. I think I will try that experiment, shortly on a box or a barrel of our Concord maize, as Lidian Emerson confidently engages to send you accurate recipes for johnny-cake, mush, and hominy.

————- * The Inferno of Dante, a translation in prose by John Carlyle; an excellent piece of work, still in demand. ————-

Why did you not send me word of Clough's hexameter poem, which I have now received and read with much joy.* But no, you will never forgive him his metres. He is a stout, solid, reliable man and friend,—I knew well; but this fine poem has taken me by surprise. I cannot find that your journals have yet discovered its existence. With kindest remembrances to Jane Carlyle, and new thanks to John Carlyle, your friend,

—R.W. Emerson

————— * "The Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich." —————



CXL. Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 19 April, 1849

My Dear Emerson,—Today is American Postday; and by every rule and law,—even if all laws but those of Cocker were abolished from this universe,—a word from me is due to you! Twice I have heard since I spoke last: prompt response about the Philadelphia Bill; exact performance of your voluntary promise,—Indian Corn itself is now here for a week past....

Still more interesting is the barrel of genuine Corn ears,— Indian Cobs of edible grain, from the Barn of Emerson himself! It came all safe and right, according to your charitable program; without cost or trouble to us of any kind; not without curious interest and satisfaction! The recipes contained in the precedent letter, duly weighed by the competent jury of housewives (at least by my own Wife and Lady Ashburton), were judged to be of decided promise, reasonable-looking every one of them; and now that the stuff itself is come, I am happy to assure you that it forms a new epoch for us all in the Maize department: we find the grain sweet, among the sweetest, with a touch even of the taste of nuts in it, and profess with contrition that properly we have never tasted Indian Corn before. Millers of due faculty (with millstones of iron) being scarce in the Cockney region, and even cooks liable to err, the Ashburtons have on their resources undertaken the brunt of the problem one of their own Surrey or Hampshire millers is to grind the stuff, and their own cook, a Frenchman commander of a whole squadron, is to undertake the dressing according to the rules. Yesterday the Barrel went off to their country place in Surrey,— a small Bag of select ears being retained here, for our own private experimenting;—and so by and by we shall see what comes of it.—I on my side have already drawn up a fit proclamation of the excellences of this invaluable corn, and admonitions as to the benighted state of English eaters in regard to it;—to appear in Fraser's Magazine, or I know not where, very soon. It is really a small contribution towards World-History, this small act of yours and ours: there is no doubt to me, now that I taste the real grain, but all Europe will henceforth have to rely more and more upon your Western Valleys and this article. How beautiful to think of lean tough Yankee settlers, tough as gutta-percha, with most occult unsubduable fire in their belly, steering over the Western Mountains, to annihilate the jungle, and bring bacon and corn out of it for the Posterity of Adam! The Pigs in about a year eat up all the rattlesnakes for miles round: a most judicious function on the part of the Pigs. Behind the Pigs comes Jonathan with his all-conquering ploughshare,—glory to him too! Oh, if we were not a set of Cant-ridden blockheads, there is no Myth of Athene or Herakles equal to this fact;—which I suppose will find its real "Poets" some day or other; when once the Greek, Semitic, and multifarious other Cobwebs are swept away a little! Well, we must wait.—For the rest, if this skillful Naturalist and you will make any more experiments on Indian Corn for us, might I not ask that you would try for a method of preserving the meal in a sound state for us? Oatmeal, which would spoil directly too, is preserved all year by kiln-drying the grain before it is ground,—parching it till it is almost brown, sometimes the Scotch Highlanders, by intense parching, can keep their oatmeal good for a series of years. No Miller here at present is likely to produce such beautiful meal as some of the American specimens I have seen:—if possible, we must learn to get the grain over in the shape of proper durable meal. At all events, let your Friend charitably make some inquiry into the process of millerage, the possibilities of it for meeting our case;—and send us the result some day, on a separate bit of paper. With which let us end, for the present.