LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF
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UNIVERSITY OF
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MADAME NECKER.
UNHAPPY LOVES
OF
MEN OF GENIUS
BY
THOMAS HITCHCOCK
NEW YORK
HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE
1891
Copyright, 1891, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
All right* ruentd.
TO
CHARLES A. DANA
WHOSE GENEROUS ENCOURAGEMENT
AND
FRIENDLY CRITICISMS
HAVE HELPED ME DURING MANY YEARS
OF LITERARY LABOR
PREFACE.
IN this volume the author has collected
some sketches heretofore published separate-
ly of experiences in love by men of genius
which have not had happy conclusions. Ex-
cept in the case of Cavour and the Unknown,
the leading incidents narrated have long been
familiar to the public, and it is only for their
new arrangement and treatment that any pre-
tence to originality is made.
The feature of these affairs which has most
interested the author is that the women con-
cerned in them were, equally with the men,
distinguished by their gifts and their accom-
plishments. Madame Necker was one of the
intellectual queens of her day. Mrs. Thrale
possessed uncommon literary and conversa-
tional talent. Charlotte von Stein was Goethe's
VI PREFACE.
companion in his studies and in his literary
work, as well as in his leisure hours. Aloysia
Weber was a musical artist of the highest or-
der; the few letters remaining of Cavour's
Unknown prove that she possessed a highly
poetical nature, while Mrs. Carlyle's wit and
acquirements were, from her earliest years, the
admiration of all who knew her. Some of
these women had beauty, but it was their
mental charms and not their beauty which
captivated their lovers.
The sketches, therefore, apart from the com-
mon human interest which they possess, will
serve as materials for the study of love in its
more refined and elevated form. And if any
one who takes up this book is disposed to
smile at its contents, let him remember these
words of Dr. Johnson : " We must not ridicule
a passion which he who never felt never was
happy; and he who laughs at never deserves
to feel — a passion which has caused the change
of empires and the loss of worlds — a passion
which has inspired heroism and subdued ava-
rice."
NEW YORK, May, 1891.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER i
Gibbon at Lausanne, 2. — His own story of
his love, 4. — Madame Necker's girlhood, 7. —
Her personal appearance, 8. — Gibbon's first
letters, II. — His lukewarm passion, 13. —
His return to England, 15. — His farewell
letter, 16. — Her expostulations, 18. — Rous-
seau's opinion of Gibbon, 21. — The final
rupture, 23. — Madame Necker's marriage,
24. — Her social success, 25. — Monsieur
Necker, 29. — Gibbon's character, 31. — The
"Decline and Fall," 32. — Correspondence
renewed, 35. — A regretful letter, 37. — Mat-
rimonial longings, 39. — Lady Elizabeth
Foster, 41. — An undying friendship, 42.
DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE 45
Boswell's slanders, 47. — Piozzi, 49. — Doctor
Collier, 51. — Mrs. Thrale's attractions, 52.
— Johnson's repulsiveness, 54. — Conversa-
tional ability, 57. — Fascination for women,
Vlll CONTENTS.
PAGE
58. — Appreciation of beauty, 60. — Delicacy
of feeling, 62. — Thrale's coarseness, 65. —
Johnson's love, 67. — Bitter disappointment,
69. — Talk with Madame d'Arblay, 71. — A
brutal letter, 72. — Love turned to hatred, 75.
GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN 77
Charlotte's character, 80. — Unhappy child-
hood, 81. — Goethe's beauty, 83. — Numerous
love affairs, 85. — A new experience, 86. —
Charlotte's fascinations, 89. — Letter-writing,
91. — Unromantic topics, 93. — Charlotte's
piety, 95. — A passionate outburst, 97. — A
despairing appeal, 99. — Wild longing, 101.
— A peaceful record, 103. — Ecstasy, 105. —
A lover's quarrel, 107. — Musical illustra-
tions, 109. — Quiet happiness, in. — Letters
in French, 112. — Flight to Italy, 114. —
Opinion of Weimar, 117. — A new theory,
119. — What Goethe expected, 121. — Last
words of love, 123. — Christiane Vulpius,
125. — End of the romance, 127. — Resent-
ment and reconciliation, 129.
MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER 131
Mozart's character. 132. — Romantic ideas,
134. — Personal appearance, 137. — Mann-
heim, 139. — Aloysia's talent, 141. — Mozart's
admiration, 143. — Planning a tour, 145. —
Musical ambition, 147. — Paternal remon-
strances, 149. — Filial submission, 150. — A
sorrowful parting, 153. — Aloysia's incon-
stancy, 154. — Wonderful voice, 157. — Tardy
regret, 159.
CONTENTS. ix
PAGE
« CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN 161
Intellectual sympathy, 163. — A long separa-
tion, 165. — An ecstatic meeting, 167. —
Vows of fidelity, 169. — An epistolary out-
pour, 170. — Religious sentiments, 173. —
Disinterested love, 175. — Patient submis-
sion, 177. — A pathetic farewell, 179. — A
lonely life, 181.
' IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE 183
Mrs. Carlyle as a girl, 185. — Precocious
talent, 187. — Irving's personal beauty, 189.
— Bodily and mental vigor, 191. — Teacher
and pupil, 193. — A thoughtless engagement,
195. — Dawning love, 197. — Intercourse with
Carlyle, 199. — Irving's farewell, 200. — Ca-
reer in London, 203. — Carlyle as a lover,
205. — Intellectual mastery, 207. — Unhappy
married life, 209. — Irving's last visits, 211.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Drawn expressly for this work by H. D. Nicholt.
I. MADAME NECKER (after an old print). .
Frontispiece.
II. EDWARD GIBBON ( after the portrait by
Sir Joshua Reynolds) Facing page i
III. DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON (after the portrait
by Sir Joshua Reynolds painted in
1773) Facing page 45
IV. MRS. THRALE (after the figure in " The
Lady's Last Stake," for which she sat
as model, painted by William Hogarth
in 1756) Facing page 51
V. GOETHE (after the portrait painted by
May in 1779) Facing page 77
VI. CHARLOTTE VON STEIN (after a sketch
made by herself in 1790). .Facing page 81
VII. CHRISTIANS VULPIUS, Goethe's wife
( after a crayon portrait taken in
1800) Facing page 125
VIII. MOZART (from the family group painted
by Delia Croce in 1780). . .Facing page 131
Xll ILLUSTRATIONS.
IX. COUNT CAVOUR (after a photograph from
life) Facing page 161
X. JANE WELSH CARLYLE (after a minia-
ture* in the possession of Mr. Froude) . .
Facing page 183
XI. EDWARD IRVING (after the portrait pre-
fixed to Mrs. Oliphant's biography). . . .
Facing page 189
XII. THOMAS CARLYLE (after a portrait by
Samuel Lawrence) Facing page 199
EDWARD GIBBON.
GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
EDWARD GIBBON, the author of the " His-
tory of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire," was, so far as any record shows,
only once seriously in love. If, like other
men, he had occasional fancies for women,
they ended as quickly as they began, and left
no trace behind ; but for Suzanne Curchod,
afterwards Madame Necker, he experienced
a passion which was as ardent as his nature
would permit, and which, in a feeble, flicker-
ing way, endured till the end of his life.
In 1753, when Gibbon was a student at
Oxford, and but sixteen years of age, he was
induced by one of those caprices to which
youth, and especially the youth of a gen-
ius, is liable, to become a Roman Catholic.
His father, on learning of his apostasy, at
2 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
once denounced it to the authorities of his
college, which, as a matter of course, led to
his expulsion, and then, both by way of pun-
ishment and for the purpose of reclaiming
him from his error, he sent him to live at
Lausanne, in Switzerland, as the pupil of a
Protestant pastor in that town. The reme-
dy was efficacious. In a few months Gib-
bon abjured his new faith as lightly as he
had adopted it, and was formally received
back into the Protestant communion. His
tutor attributed this result to his polemic
skill, but Gibbon himself asserts that it came
from his own reading and reflection, which
is probably true. Certainly, his subsequent
career shows that he was not of the stuff
out of which Roman Catholics are usually
made, and that his Protestantism was rather
negative than positive — more the want of
all religious convictions than the possession
of those he nominally professed.
This, however, was not the only important
consequence of Gibbon's exile to Lausanne.
It transformed his habits and his character,
as well as his religion. Lamenting at first
the loss of the comforts of his English home,
GIBBON AT LAUSANNE. 3
and revolting at the strangeness of Swiss
ways, he quickly adapted himself to his new
conditions, and became, as he ever after con-
tinued to be, more of a foreigner than an
Englishman. He learned in the course of
two or three years to read, speak, and even
to write French, as if it had been his mother
tongue. So accustomed, indeed, was he to
its use that his earliest production, at the
age of twenty-four, " On the Study of Liter-
ature," was written in French ; and when, at
a later date, he undertook a history of the
Swiss republics, he composed the first chap-
ters of it in that language. Fortunately, the
condemnation of this work, as far as it had
proceeded, by the literary friends to whom
he submitted it, prevented its completion,
and the remonstrances of his fellow histo-
rian, David Hume, against the employment
of French by an English author, induced
him to adopt English when he came to write
his monumentaP " Decline and Fall." But
he kept his journal and made his literary
notes always in French, and carried on in it
his correspondence with his foreign friends,
who complimented him upon the purity and
4 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
the elegance of his style, and begged him to
write in French altogether.
Being thus well equipped for Swiss socie-
ty, Gibbon found his way into that of Lau-
sanne, and there, at the commencement of
his twenty-first year, he saw and loved Mad-
emoiselle Curchod. His own account of
the affair, as he gives it in the " Memoirs "
written by himself thirty years afterwards, is
as follows :
' ' I hesitate, from the apprehension of ridicule, when
I approach the delicate subject of my early love. By
this word I do not mean the polite attention, the
gallantry, without hope or design, which has origi-
nated in the spirit of chivalry, and is interwoven with
the texture of French manners. I understand by
this passion the union of desire, friendship, and ten-
derness, which is inflamed by a single female, which
prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks
her possession as the supreme or the sole happiness
of our being. I need not blush at recollecting the
object of my choice ; and though my love was disap-
pointed of success, I am rather proud that I was once
capable of feeling such a pure and exalted sentiment.
The personal attractions of Mademoiselle Susan Cur-
chod were embellished by the virtues and talents of
the mind. Her fortune was humble, but her family
was respectable. Her mother, a native of France,
HIS OWN STORY OF HIS LOVE. 5
had preferred her religion to her country. The pro-
fession of her father did not extinguish the modera-
tion and philosophy of his temper, and he lived con-
tent with a small salary and laborious duty in the
obscure lot of minister of Grassy, in the mountains
that separate the Pays de Vaud from the county of
Burgundy. In the solitude of a sequestered village
he bestowed a liberal, and even learned, education on
his only daughter. She surpassed his hopes by her
proficiency in the sciences and languages ; and in her
short visits to some relatives at Lausanne, the wit,
the beauty, and erudition of Mademoiselle Curchod
were the theme of universal applause. The report
of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity. I saw and
loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively
in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in
manners ; and the first sudden7 emotion was fortified
by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar ac-
quaintance. She permitted me to make her two or
three visits at her father's house. I passed some
happy days there, in the mountains of Burgundy, and
her parents honorably encouraged the connection.
In a calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no
longer fluttered in her bosom ; she listened to the
voice of truth and passion, and I might presume to
hope that I had made some impression on a virtuous
heart. At Grassy and Lausanne I indulged my
dream of felicity ; but on my return to England I
soon discovered that my father would not hear of
this strange alliance, and that without his consent I
6 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
was myself destitute and helpless. After a painful
struggle I yielded to my fate : I sighed as a lover, I
obeyed as a son ; my wound was insensibly healed by
time, absence, and the habits of a new life. My
cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tran-
quillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my
love subsided in friendship and esteem. The minis-
ter of Grassy soon afterward died ; his stipend died
with him ; his daughter retired to Geneva, where, by
teaching young ladies, she earned a hard subsistence
for herself and her mother ; but in her lowest distress
she maintained a spotless reputation and a dignified
behavior. A rich banker of Paris, a citizen of Ge-
neva, had the good fortune and good sense to dis-
cover and possess this inestimable treasure ; and in
the capital of taste and luxury she resisted the temp-
tations of wealth, as^she had sustained the hard-
ships of indigence. The genius of her husband has
exalted him to the most conspicuous station in
Europe. In every change of prosperity and disgrace
he has reclined on the bosom of a faithful friend ;
and Mademoiselle Curchod is now the wife of M.
Necker, the minister, and perhaps the legislator, of
the French monarchy."
To this narrative, Lord Sheffield, the editor
of the " Memoirs," has added, in a note, the
following extracts from Gibbon's journal :
"June, 1757. — I saw Mademoiselle Curchod. Omnia
vincit amor et nos cedamus amori.
MADAME NECKER'S GIRLHOOD. 7
" August. — I went to Grassy, and staid two days.
" Sept. 15. — I went to Geneva.
"Oct. 15. — I came back to Lausanne, having passed
through Grassy.
" Nov. I. — I went to visit M. de Watteville at Loin,
and saw Mademoiselle Curchod on my way
through Rolle.
" Nov. 17. — I went to Grassy and staid there six days."
This is all that Gibbon himself has re-
corded of the affair, and his account is sub-
stantially correct. Still, owing to the lapse
of time and the resulting errors of memory,
it contains several inaccuracies and omits
many important details. Mademoiselle Cur-
chod was, as Gibbon relates, the only daugh-
ter of the Protestant minister of Grassier, or,
as he writes it, Grassy, a village near Lau-
sanne and a little way from the Lake of Ge-
neva. She was born in 1737, and was,
therefore, of nearly the same age as Gib-
bon. Contemporary accounts prove that he
has not exaggerated her beauty and her ac-
complishments, nor the admiration that she
excited wherever she appeared. While yet
living at Grassy, she was courted by the
ministers, young and old, who came to visit
8 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
her father ; and when she removed to Lau-
sanne she became the acknowledged queen
both of fashionable and of intellectual so-
ciety there. She was made president of a
literary organization called the Academic des
JSaux, in which questions of sentiment as
well as of letters were discussed ; she shone
at social gatherings, and, as often happens
in little towns, she was followed in the
streets by crowds of admirers, and by peo-
ple, who said : " That is the pretty Mad-
emoiselle Curchod." In a paper written
for her Academic she gives the following
description of herself :
" MY PORTRAIT.
' ' A face exhibiting youth and gayety ; hair and
complexion of a blonde, animated by blue, laughing,
bright, and soft eyes ; a small, but neat-shaped nose ;
a curling lip, whose smile accompanies that of the
eyes with something of grace ; a large and well-pro-
portioned figure ; but wanting in that enchanting
elegance which augments its value, a rustic air in the
deportment, and a certain brusqueness of movement,
which contrasts prodigiously with a sweet voice and
modest physiognomy. Such is the sketch of a pict-
ure which you may perhaps think to be too flatter-
ing."
HER PERSONAL APPEARANCE. 9
That the picture was not more flattering
than the truth appears from another descrip-
tion of Madame Necker, given by Sainte-
Beuve in his "Galerie des Femmes Cele-
bres." Sainte-Beuve says of her that " she
was beautiful, with that pure, virginal beau-
ty which demands the freshness of youth.
Her long and rather straight face was ani-
mated with a dazzling clearness and softened
by her blue eyes, full of candor. Her slen-
der waist had as yet only decent dignity,
without stiffness and without training."
Naturally, this charming and accomplished
Swiss girl made a profound impression upon
an English youth like Gibbon, who was able
to appreciate the beauty of her mind no less
than the attractions of her person. It was
equally natural that she should prefer him
to her Swiss admirers. His external ap-
pearance, indeed, could scarcely have been
prepossessing, for in his later years he is
described as short in stature, fat to obesity,
and with a face almost comical from its pro-
tuberant cheeks and little nose. His man-
ners were ungraceful, and he confesses to
small success in fencing and dancing. Here
10 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
is a portrait of him from the pen of Mad-
emoiselle Curchod, which, apparently, she
forbore to complete :
"1 will touch lightly on the countenance of M.
G . He has nice hair, a pretty hand, and the
appearance of a man of good birth. His physiogno-
my is so intelligent and so remarkable that I do not
know any one who resembles him. It has so much
expression that one always discovers in it something
new. His gestures, too, are so well-timed that they
add a great deal to what he says. In a word, he has
one of those extraordinary faces that one is never tired
of examining, of picturing to one's self, and of mim-
icking. He knows the respect which is due to ladies.
His politeness is easy, without being familiar. He
dances passably. In a word, I recognize in him few
of the charms which constitute the merit of a dandy.
His talent varies prodigiously." . . .
But Gibbon, being a foreigner, had the
advantage of a foreigner's distinction, and
his intellectual ability compensated for his
lack of the graces. Certain it is, that he
was beloved, not, as he would lead his read-
ers to infer, with a transient, superficial love,
but with one that took a firm hold of Mad-
emoiselle Curchod's heart. The proof of this
exists in papers recently discovered in the
GIBBON'S FIRST LETTERS. n
archives of Coppet, the home of the Neck-
ers after their exile from France, and they
place Gibbon in the unenviable light of a
man who did not know the value of the prize
he had won, and who, by relinquishing it in
tame submissiveness to his father, proved
that he was incapable of true manly feeling.
Among the other documents preserved at
Coppet are letters written by Gibbon to
Mademoiselle Curchod, and some by her to
him. The first from him has no special im-
portance, and gives no indication of the re-
lations of the pair ; but it is followed by two
which show clearly that something like an
engagement existed at an early date between
them. Of these letters, the first, written
apparently after the week spent at Grassy,
mentioned in the "Journal" under date of
Nov. 17, 1757, contains this passage:
" I have always esteemed you highly, but the hap-
py week which I spent at Grassier has given you a
prominence in my mind which you had not before.
I then saw all the treasures of the finest soul I know.
The intellect and the passions are always on a level,
and are proofs of a mind contented with itself. There
is dignity even in its banter, and charms even in its
12 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
seriousness. I saw you doing and saying the greatest
things without being more aware of it than was nec-
essary to enable you to do it intelligently. One sees
plainly enough that your dominant passion is the live-
liest tenderness towards the best of parents. It breaks
out everywhere ; and shows to all who come near you
how susceptible your heart is of the noblest feelings.
Every time this thought occurs to me it carries me far
beyond the objects which first gave rise to it. I am
at this moment reflecting upon the happiness of a man
who, the possessor of a similar heart, finds you sensi-
ble to his tenderness, who can tell you a thousand times
a day how much he loves you, and who never ceases
to do it but in ceasing to live. I then build up schemes
of happiness, fanciful perhaps, but which I would not
exchange for anything that average mortals esteem
greatest and most real. "
In the letter following this we read :
" I have known you, mademoiselle, and everything
has become changed to me. A felicity above that of
empire, above even philosophy, may await me. But,
alas, a punishment repeated every day, and each time
aggravated by the thought of what I have lost, may
fall to my lot. However, Socrates thanked the gods
that he was born a Greek ; and I, too, will thank
them that I was born in an age, that I came to a coun-
try, in which I knew a woman whom my mind must
always make me respect as the worthiest of her sex,
while my heart makes me feel that she is also the most
HIS LUKEWARM PASSION. 13
charming. ' O,' you will say, ' how serious he is !
how melancholy and how tragical ! What a tiresome
man he is ! Can I help yawning over his letter ?'
Yawn, mademoiselle, I feel that I have deserved it.
But I deserve, also, that you should add, ' I wish all
the preachers were as fully convinced of what they say
as he who is now boring me and preaching to me.' "
These passages, it must be acknowledged,
indicate anything but ardent passion. They
are the compositions rather of a pedant than
of a lover. Nor do some madrigals and son-
nets, addressed by Gibbon to his mistress
about this time, show anything more. They
are artificial and cold, and unworthy of re-
production. That Gibbon already feared
his father's disapproval of the match, and
had prepared himself to give it up if neces-
sary, appears from another letter, dated Feb-
ruary 9, 1758, in which he says :
" How could you doubt for one moment of my love
and my fidelity ? Have you not read to the bottom
of my soul a hundred times ? Did you not see in it
a passion as pure as it is strong ? Have you not felt
that your image would hold forever the first place in
that heart which you now despise, and that, in the
midst of pleasures, honors, and riches, I should enjoy
nothing without you ?
14 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
' ' While you were indulging in your suspicions, fort-
une was working for me — I do not dare to say for us.
I found here a letter from my father, who has been
expecting me a fortnight. He permits me to return
to England, and I hasten thither as soon as I hear the
zephyrs. It is true that, by a destiny peculiar to me,
I see in the midst of a calm a storm rising. My fa-
ther's letter is so kind, so affectionate ; he shows such
anxiety to see me again ; he enlarges with so much
pomp upon the projects that he has conceived for me,
that it makes me imagine a thousand obstacles to my
happiness, of a different nature and a different kind
from those of the inequality of fortune, which alone
formerly presented themselves to my mind.
" The condition, which the noblest principle made
you exact, and which the tenderest motive led me to
accept with pleasure, to take up my residence in this
country — will with difficulty be listened to by my fa-
ther, whose paternal love and whose ambition for his
son will be equally shocked by it. Still, I do not yet
despair of convincing him. Love will make me elo-
quent. He will desire my happiness ; and if he does,
he will not seek to separate me from you. My phi-
losophy, or, rather, my temperament, makes me in-
different to riches. Honor is nothing to one who is
not ambitious. If I know myself, I have never yet
felt the attacks of this fatal passion. The love of
study was my only passion until you made me feel
that the heart has its needs as well as the mind, and
that they consist in a reciprocal love. I learned to
HIS RETURN TO ENGLAND. 15
love, and you have not forbidden me to hope. What
happier lot could I have than to see the time arrive
when I can tell you, each instant, how much I love
you, and to hear you say sometimes that I do not love
an ingrate."
Mademoiselle Curchod's reply to this omi-
nous communication was tender and wom-
anly. She disclaims all desire to marry her
lover against his father's wishes, but will
wait for mitigating circumstances (quelque
espece de palliatif} to change the situation.
To a hint in his letter that she was perhaps
tired of the engagement, she replies that
"this idea was too far removed from my
heart to be present to my mind."
Two months after this, in April, 1758,
Gibbon left Lausanne, and went to Eng-
land for a protracted visit. His account of
his intercourse with Mademoiselle Curchod
conveys the impression that it ertfled with
this departure, but it was not so. It is true
that he never mentions her name in his jour-
nal, and that for four years there is no trace
of any communicatfon between him and
her, except that he sent her a copy of his
" Study of Literature," published in 1761.
1 6 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
By the death of her father, in 1760, she and
her mother were left with no pecuniary re-
sources beyond the trifling pension paid
to the widow of a clergyman, and she was
obliged to teach for a living ; but though
Gibbon knew this, there is no evidence that
he ever rendered her assistance, or showed
the slightest interest in her welfare. Still,
that she must have written to him appears
from a letter which he evidently intended
should terminate their relations :
"MADEMOISELLE, — I cannot begin! and yet I
must. I take up my pen. I put it down and take it
up again. You perceive from this beginning what I
am going to say. Spare me the rest. Yes, mademoi-
selle, I must renounce all thought of you forever.
The decree is issued ; my heart groans under it. But
before my duty everything else must be silent."
He then repeats his father's objections to
his marrying a foreigner and living abroad,
and relates how he debated with himself for
two hours before yielding. The letter con-
tinues :
" May you, mademoiselle, be more happy than I
can ever hope to be. This will always be my prayer,
it will even be my consolation. Would that I could
HIS FAREWELL LETTER. 17
contribute towards it by my wishes ! I tremble to
learn your fate ; but, still, do not keep me in ig-
norance of it. It will be a cruel moment for me.
Assure M. and Mme. Curchod of my respect, of my
regard, and of my regrets. Adieu, mademoiselle. I
shall always remember Mile. Curchod as the noblest
and most charming of women. May she never alto-
gether forget a man who did not deserve the despair
to which he is a victim !
"Adieu, mademoiselle. This letter may well ap-
pear strange to you, for it is the picture of my heart.
' ' I have written you twice on my way : at a village
in Lorraine, once at Maestricht, likewise once from
London. You have not received the letters. I do
not know whether I may hope that this will reach
you. I have the honor to be, with feelings that make
the torment of my life, and an esteem that nothing
can change, mademoiselle,
"Your very humble and very obedient servant,
" GIBBON.
"BURITON, AugUSt 24, 1762."
Explicit as this letter is in words, and
equally decisive in its tone, it was not ac-
cepted as final by the loving woman to whom
it was addressed. She hoped that something
might yet happen to render her marriage
with Gibbon possible, and she refused to
believe that he had completely renounced
her. When, therefore, a few months later,
2
l8 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
he came to Lausanne, she addressed to him
a pathetic communication, the original of
which is in the archives of Coppet, with the
seal broken, as if it had been read by Gib-
bon and returned. At the bottom, in Made-
moiselle Curchod's handwriting, are these
words, in English : " A thinking soul is pun-
ishment enough, and every thought draws
blood." The contents are these :
"MONSIEUR, — I blush at the step I am about
to take. I would hide it from you. I would also
hide it from myself. Is it possible, great God ! that
an innocent heart should so degrade itself ? What a
humiliation ! I have had more terrible sorrows, but
never one that I have felt more keenly. No matter,
I am carried away in spite of myself. My own peace
of mind demands this effort, and if I lose this present
opportunity no peace will remain for me. Could I
have it since the moment my heart, ever ingenious in
tormenting itself, interpreted your marks of coldness
as only proofs of your delicacy of feeling ? For five
whole years I have been sacrificing to this chimera by
a unique and inconceivable conduct, but at last my
mind, romantic as it is, has become convinced of its
error. Upon my knees I beseech you to dissuade a
maddened heart. Make a frank avowal of your com-
plete indifference to me. My soul will adapt itself to
the situation. Certainty will bring with it the tran-
HER EXPOSTULATIONS. 19
quillity for which I sigh. If you refuse me this act
of frankness, you will be the most contemptible of
men, and God, who sees my heart, and who doubt-
less loves me, though he so sorely tries me — God, I
say, will punish you in spite of my prayers, if there is
the slightest evasion in your answer, or if, by your
silence, you make a plaything of my peace.
" If you ever disclose this shameful step to any one
in the world, were it my dearest friend, the horror of
my punishment will condemn me for my fault. I
shall look upon it as a fearful crime of which I did
not know the atrociousness. Even now I feel it to
be a baseness which outrages my modesty, my past
conduct, and my present sentiments.
"GENEVA, 3oth May."
What answer Gibbon made to this appeal
beyond returning it nothing remains to show.
But that Mademoiselle Curchod was in some
way at last convinced of his faithlessness is
proved by a subsequent letter from her, dated
June 4, 1763, which commences :
"MONSIEUR, — Five years of absence could not
have produced the change that I have just experienced.
I could have wished that you had written me sooner,
or that your last letter but one had been couched
in a different style. Exalted ideas, supported by an
appearance of virtue, lead one to commit great errors.
You ought to have spared me five or six irreparable
20 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
ones, which will forever determine my lot in life. I
know as well as you that this remark may seem to
you neither tender nor delicate. For a long time past
I have forgotten my pride, but I am delighted to re-
gain enough of it to feel what I now reproach you
with. Pardon me, however, and shed no tear over
the hardships of my lot. My parents are dead ; what
is fortune to me ? Besides, it was not to you that I
sacrificed it, but to an imaginary creature who never
existed save in a mind romantically distraught. For,
as soon as your letter undeceived me, you became to
me no more than any other man, and after having
been the only one whom I could ever love, you be-
came one of those for whom I had the least inclina-
tion, because you resemble the least my celadonic
chimera. It remains only for you to make amends.
Follow the plan of which you have given me the out-
lines. Join your attachment to that which my other
friends show me. You will find me as confiding, as
tender, and at the same time as indifferent, as I am
for them."
She then communicates to him the dis-
tressed condition in which she was left by
the death of both her father and her moth-
er, and asks his advice about seeking em-
ployment in England as a lady's companion.
That she still cherished a hope of winning
him back appears both from what she says
ROUSSEAU'S OPINION OF GIBBON. 21
above about retaining him for a friend, and
from a letter written with her approval, a
few days before, by the pastor Moultou to
the celebrated Rousseau, begging him to
use his influence with Gibbon in her behalf.
In this letter, a copy of which he seems to
have sent to Mademoiselle Curchod, Moul-
tou says to Rousseau : " How I pity this
poor Mademoiselle Curchod. Gibbon, whom
she loves, to whom she has sacrificed, I know,
very good offers, has come to Lausanne, but
cold, insensible, and as much cured of his
old love as Mademoiselle C. is far from
being. She has written me a letter which
wrings my heart." He attributes Gibbon's
coldness to some slanders of Mademoiselle
Curchod, spread by a disappointed suitor,
and asks Rousseau to contradict them, and
to eulogize Mademoiselle Curchod to Gib-
bon. Rousseau took a common-sense view
of the matter, and declined the commission.
In his reply to Moultou, also dated June 4,
1763, he says, after unfavorably criticising
Gibbon's writings, " Mr. Gibbon is no man
for me. I cannot think him well adapted
to Mademoiselle Curchod. He that does
22 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
not know her value is unworthy of her ; he
that knows it and can desert her, is a man-
to be despised. She does not know what
she is about. The man serves her more
effectually than her own heart." Rousseau's
letter was published during Gibbon's life-
time, and it appears to have annoyed him,
for, in a note to his " Memoirs," he says :
" As an author, I shall not appeal from the
judgment or taste or caprice of Jean Jacques;
but that extraordinary man, whom I admire
and pity, should have been less precipitate
in condemning the moral character and con-
duct of a stranger."
Nineteen days elapsed before Gibbon re-
plied to Mademoiselle Curchod :
"LAUSANNE, 230! June, 1763.
"MADEMOISELLE, — Must you still continue to
offer me happiness which reason compels me to
renounce? I have lost your affection, though your
friendship remains to me, and it does me too much
honor for me to hesitate. I accept it, mademoiselle,
as a precious exchange for mine, which is most per-
fectly yours, and as a treasure whose value I know
too well ever to lose it. But this correspondence,
mademoiselle, I feel its attractions, but, at the same
time, I perceive all its dangers. I know it, as regards
THE FINAL RUPTURE. 23
myself, and I fear for both of us. Pray, let silence
protect me. Excuse my fears, mademoiselle ; they
are founded on esteem,"
He proceeds to discourage her from carry-
ing out her project of going to England for
employment, and ends with thanking her for
a criticism of his " Study of Literature," say-
ing that his delay in answering her had been
occasioned by his desire to consider it.
Subsequently to this correspondence, the
pair met at Voltaire's house at Ferney, and
Gibbon seems to have angered Mademoiselle
Curchod into a renewed expression of her
opinion of his baseness. She wrote him a
long letter, recounting the history of their
engagement, and ended it by saying :
" I repeat, sir, that any heart which has once known
mine and has ceased for one moment to love it was
not worthy of it, and will never have my esteem. If
I have otherwise expressed myself in speech or in
writing, I now blush at it. It was the result of an
indefinable sentiment, of a calmness, and of a dis-
gusted indifference, and, above all, of the repugnance
which one always feels at overthrowing one's idol.
"My conduct, you say, belies my words. In what ? I
ask. I am acting towards you as towards an honorable
man of the world who is incapable of breaking his
24 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
word, of seducing, or of betraying ; but who has been
amusing himself with lacerating my heart by the best
contrived and most skilfully managed tortures. I do
not now threaten you with the anger of Heaven — an
expression which escaped me, impulsively, but, with-
out having the gift of prophecy, I can assure you
that you will one day regret the irreparable loss you
have suffered in alienating forever the too tender and
the too open heart of S. C.
"GENEVA, Sept. 21."
With this explosion of outraged affection
and injured dignity Mademoiselle Curchod
resigned herself to her fate, and in a little
mote than a year afterwards she married,
as Gibbon tells us, Jacques Necker, then a
partner in the great Paris banking firm of
Thelusson & Necker, and subsequently min-
ister of finance to Louis XVI. The mar-
riage was brought about in a rather singular,
though not unprecedented, manner. Made-
moiselle Curchod, soon after her final rupture
with Gibbon, despairing of all other means
of livelihood, accepted the situation of com-
panion to a rich young French widow, whom
she met in Geneva, named De Vermenoux,
and early in 1764 went to Paris with her.
M. Necker, who was a native of Geneva, had
MADAME NECKER'S MARRIAGE. 25
been long a suitor for the hand of Madame
de Vermenoux, and continued to pay her
attention for some time after Mademoiselle
Curchod became her companion. To re-
lieve herself of his importunities, Madame
de Vermenoux used her arts to make him
marry Mademoiselle Curchod, saying, it is
reported, "They will bore each other to
death : that will give them something to do."
At all events, she succeeded in making the
match. Monsieur Necker fell in love with
Mademoiselle Curchod, she accepted him,
and the wedding was celebrated towards
the end of the year.
As the wife of the wealthy and influen-
tial banker, Madame Necker at once took
a prominent position in Paris society. Her
house became famous. On Fridays she en-
tertained artists and men of letters at din-
ner, which began at half -past four o'clock,
and on Tuesdays she received her more
fashionable friends. Among her regular
Friday visitors were Marmontel, the jour-
nalist, poet, and playwright; Grimm, Did-
erot, and Morellet, the Encyclopaedists;
Suard, the Academician ; the poet Dorat,
26 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
the Abbe Galiani, St. Pierre, the author of
" Paul et Virginie," which was read in manu-
script in her salon before it was published ;
D'Alembert, the mathematician, and the
naturalist Buffon. On Tuesdays she was
visited by the poetess, Madame Geoffrin ;
the blind octogenarian beauty, Madame du
Deffand ; the Duchess de Lauzun ; the Mar-
quise de Crequy; the Marechale de Lux-
embourg ; Madame de Vermenoux, her old
patroness ; Madame de Marchais, Rous-
seau's beloved ; the Countess d'Houdetot,
and, in a word, by all the women in Paris
worth knowing for their rank, beauty, wit,
and accomplishments. Over this social and
intellectual kingdom she reigned a queen,
and like a queen, commanded respect as
well as admiration. Her beauty, though not
remarkable, was sufficient to produce a fa-
vorable first impression, and this impression
she made permanent by the charm of her
simple unaffected kindness of heart and of
manner. Loving devotedly a husband who
loved her as devotedly in return, the pair
presented, in the midst of the corruption of
Paris, a splendid example of conjugal fidel-
HER SOCIAL SUCCESS. 27
ity, and, preserving the religious convictions
of her childhood, she restrained by example
and, when necessary, by rebuke, the auda-
cious infidelity of both the men and the
women by whom she was surrounded. A
little tract by her in defence of Christianity,
" Les Opinions Religieuses," had great suc-
cess, and she wrote another against the lax
views of marriage and divorce which char-
acterized the times. Many other works pro-
ceeded from her pen, and a collection of
them, embracing a copious journal kept by
her, which was published after her death by
her celebrated daughter, Madame de Stae'l,
fills several volumes.
Among her admirers there were some
whom Madame Necker inspired with an af-
fection amounting almost to idolatry. The
pastor Moultou, the friend of her youth,
continued to be faithful to her. Thomas, a
rough, self-educated peasant from Auvergne,
was for twenty years her adoring slave, and
the great Buffon, who made her acquaint-
ance at the age of sixty-seven, five years af-
ter the death of a wife to whom he was ten-
derly attached, found in her society consola-
28 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
tion for his widowed life, and often wrote to
her expressing his admiration and affection.
One of his letters commences thus :
" I have too deliciously enjoyed your letter, my
adorable friend, to delay long imparting these delights
of my heart. I could not get tired of reading and
re-reading it. Lofty thoughts and profound senti-
ments are found in every line and are expressed in a
manner so noble and so touching that not only am I
impressed with them, but warmed, lifted to a point
from whence I get a loftier idea of the nature of
friendship. Ah, gods ! it is not a sentiment without
fire ; on the contrary, it is a true warmth of soul, an
emotion, a movement gentler but also livelier than
that of any other passion ; it is an untroubled enjoy-
ment, a happiness rather than a pleasure ; it is a com-
munication of existence purer and yet more real than
the sentiment of love ; the union of souls is a mingling
(pJn/tration) ; that of bodies is a simple contact."
This charming relation between Buff on
and Madame Necker continued for thirteen
years, and when her venerable friend fell
dangerously ill, Madame Necker hastened
to his bedside, and staid by it till his death.
For five days she never left him, wiping
from his face, with her own hands, the cold
perspiration which his agony brought out on
MONSIEUR NECKER. 29
it, and rendering to him all the services of a
daughter to a father.
Madame Necker's social reign in Paris
lasted more than a quarter of a century.
Monsieur Necker, who, when he married his
wife, was simply a rich banker and a mana-
ger of the French East India Company, was
made in 1777 director -general, or finance
minister, by Louis XVI., and held the post
until 1781, when he resigned because a seat
in the royal council was denied him on ac-
count of his being a Protestant. Recalled
in 1788, he held office until 1789, when his
dismissal by the king having provoked a
popular uprising, he was again reinstated ;
but, losing all hope of saving the monarchy,
and becoming unpopular because of his ef-
forts in its behalf, he finally withdrew from
Paris in 1790, and took up his residence
at his chateau of Coppet, in Switzerland,
where he spent the remainder of his life.
Not the least gratifying advantage which
Madame Necker derived from her elevated
position was the means it afforded her of
proving to Gibbon how great a mistake he
had made in not securing her for himself.
30 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
Her prophetic last words to him, "You will
one day regret the irreparable loss you have
suffered in alienating forever the too tender
and the too open heart of S. C.," were now
fulfilled. In the autumn of 1765, Gibbon
came over to visit her at Paris, and she had
the gratification of being able to write to a
friend :
" I do not know whether I told you that I have seen
Gibbon. I cannot express the pleasure it gave me,
not that I have any remains of sentiment for a man
whom I believe to be unworthy of it, but my femi-
nine vanity never had a more complete and honorable
triumph. He staid two weeks in Paris. I had him
every day at my house. He had become gentle,
submissive, and decent even to prudery. Continual
witness of my husband's tenderness, of his talent and
his devotion, a zealous admirer of wealth, he caused
me to notice for the first time that which surrounds
me, and which, if it had impressed me at all, had
impressed me only disagreeably."
That this burst of exultation was justified
appears from Gibbon's own account. Of
this same visit he writes to his friend Hol-
royd, afterwards Lord Sheffield :
"The Curchod (Madame Necker) I saw at Paris.
GIBBON'S CHARACTER. 31
She was very fond of me, and the husband particu-
larly civil. Could they insult me more cruelly ? Ask
me every evening to supper, go to bed, and leave me
alone with his wife — what an impertinent security !
It is making an old lover of mighty little consequence.
She is as handsome as ever and much genteeler ; seems
pleased with her fortune rather than proud of it."
We have, probably, in these two bits of
concurrent testimony, the key to Gibbon's
otherwise inexplicable behavior towards
Mademoiselle Curchod. He was luxurious,
self-indulgent, and a worshipper of wealth,
not as mere wealth, but for the comforts
which it commands. His complaints of
Swiss living and cooking, his eulogy of Eng-
lish housekeeping, the keenness he shows
in making bargains and his frequent refer-
ences, in his correspondence with Lord
Sheffield, to his investments, all prove this,
while his timidity of character appears from
his own confession that he never had the
courage to speak in Parliament. That such
a man, not certain of his own worldly fut-
ure, should shrink from marriage with a
poor Swiss girl was only natural ; and when
he found her rich, influential, and admired
32 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
in the foremost city of Europe, it was equal-
ly natural that his esteem for her, if not his
affection, should revive.
Gibbon, on his part, was destined to a
career no less brilliant than Madame Neck-
er's. His first published work, the " Study
of Literature," had little -success, and he
abandoned, as we have seen, his projected
history of the Swiss republics after writ-
ing the first few chapters. But in his twenty-
eighth year, sitting, as he tells us, " amidst
the ruins of the Capitol at Rome, while the
barefooted friars were singing vespers in
the temple of Jupiter transformed into a
Christian church," the idea of describing
the decline and fall of the city entered his
mind, though it was not until 1768, four
years later, when he had finally renounced
his Swiss history, that he seriously under-
took the task. Preliminary study and re-
search, interrupted by the death of his fa-
ther and the labor required to settle his
deeply embarrassed estate, consumed four
years more, and only in 1772, when he had
reached the age of thirty-four, was he able
to begin the work of composition. It took
THE "DECLINE AND FALL." 33
another four years to complete the first vol-
ume. " Many experiments were made," he
says, " before I could hit the middle tone
between a dull chronicle and a rhetorical
declamation. Three times did I compose
the first chapter and twice the second and
third, before I was tolerably satisfied with
their effect." His practice was " to cast a
long paragraph in a single mould, to try it by
my ear, to deposit it in my memory, but to
suspend the action of the pen till I had given
the last polish to the work." When he had
thus laboriously perfected his composition
he was satisfied with it, and sent it directly
to the printer without submitting to the
criticism of others, because, as he says,
" The author is the best judge of his own
performance. No one has so deeply medi-
tated on the subject ; no one is so sincerely
interested in the event."
The success which the book had, is par-
alleled only by that of Macaulay's " History
of England," a century afterwards. The first
edition was exhausted in a few days, a sec-
ond and a third were as quickly disposed
of, and its author was overwhelmed with
3
34 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
praise, not only from his personal friends,
but from other historians, like Hume and
Robertson. His treatment of the Christian
religion provoked a swarm of attacks, only
one of which he found it necessary to an-
swer, and that merely because the writer had
impugned his literary honesty. The fame
he acquired led to political promotion. He
was already a member of Parliament, but
now he was employed by the ministry to
defend their measures with his pen, and as
a reward for his efforts was made by Lord
North one of the Lords of Trade, an office
which he retained until the fall of his patron
in 1783, when he retired altogether from po-
litical life.
It thus became Gibbon's turn to show
Madame Necker that she, too, had lost
something in losing him for a husband.
The first volume of his " History " had ap-
peared in March, 1776, and in May the
Neckers came over to London on a visit.
Gibbon devoted himself to entertaining
them, but his attitude towards them was no
longer so humble as it had been in 1765.
He wrote to his friend Holroyd :
CORRESPONDENCE RENEWED. 35
" At present I am very busy with the Neckers. I
live with her just as I used to do twenty years ago,
laugh at her Paris varnish and oblige her to become
a simple, reasonable Suissesse. The man, who might
read English husbands lessons of proper and dutiful
behaviour, is a sensible, good-natured creature."
On her part, Madame Necker seems to
have experienced a revival of affection for
her quondam lover, and upon her return to
Paris she wrote to him :
' ' You ought not to doubt of the pleasure which I
take in your success, for I have long been warned of
my amour propre only by my sensibility. I will not
give you advice. I could only criticise your opinions or
your sentiments, and no advice could change them.
Besides, you have a style of writing peculiar to yourself.
You must follow the promptings of your genius, and
whoever would risk advising you to do anything but
giving up to yourself, would be unworthy of admir-
ing you, and of feeling the inestimable value of a
sublime singularity."
A month later she writes again, praising
his history, and begging him to come and
take up his residence in Paris as the only
place worthy to be honored by his presence.
She adds :
36 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
" You, who have transferred to English all the del-
icacy, the finesse, and at the same time the lucidity
of our tongue, will transfer to French the richness
and strength of yours, and you will write both with
that harmonious pen which seems to place words only
to charm the ear, as a skilful hand touches the keys of
a harpsichord.
' ' But when will you come ? Monsieur, fix for us the
precise day that we may enjoy it in advance. Mon-
sieur Necker and I both present to you the assurance
of the distinguished sentiments which we have vowed
to you for life."
Madame du Deffand also wrote to him
about this time a letter in which she says :
" I have seen very little of M. and Mme.
Necker since your departure. I supped
once as a third with them, and Madame
Necker has supped once with me. We talk
of M. Gibbon, and of what else? Of M.
Gibbon, always of M. Gibbon."
The invitation so flatteringly given was
accepted the following year, and Gibbon
was highly delighted with the treatment he
received. He writes to Lord Sheffield :
1 ' You remember that the Neckers were my princi-
pal dependence, and the reception which I have met
with from them very far surpassed my most sanguine
A REGRETFUL LETTER. 37
expectations. I do not indeed lodge in this house
(as it might incite the jealousy of . the husband and
procure me a lettre de cachet), but I live very much
with them, and dine and sup whenever they have
company, which is almost every day, and whenever I
like it, for they are not in the least exigeans."
After his return to England Gibbon must
have been absorbed in his work and the
Neckers occupied with the political troubles
of France, for no correspondence seems to
have passed between them until 1781, when
he sent to Madame Necker the second and
the third volume of his history with a letter,
in which, referring to their early love affair,
he says :
" I am sufficiently punished by the reflection that
my conduct may have laid me open to a reproach
which my heart alone can contradict. No, madame,
I shall never forget the dearest moments of my youth,
and its pure and indelible memory is now lost in the
truest and most unalterable friendship. After a long
separation I had the happiness of being able to spend
six months in your company. Every day added to
the feelings of respect and of gratitude with which
you inspired me, and I quitted Paris with the firm
but vain resolution always to keep up a correspond-
ence which alone could compensate me for what I
had lost"
38 GIBBON- AND MADAME NECKER.
Madame Necker's reply is most affec-
tionate. Gently chiding Gibbon for hav-
ing so long neglected to write to her, she
says :
"Although I am concentrated in the objects of
my tenderest attachment, the sensibility which I have
received from nature suffices for other ties. My soul
exists only when it loves, and when it still lacks new
means of existence outside of its centre. I want you
to bestow on me the sentiments you promised. I
reckoned on them in making up my sum of happi-
ness. I know you ; you will have affection for me
when you see me again, and you will not be con-
scious of your faults until you have them no longer."
Two years later, on his retirement from
politics, Gibbon removed permanently from
England to Switzerland, and took up his
residence in Lausanne, in a house which he
occupied jointly with his friend Deyverdun.
Here, in full view of the beautiful Lake of
Geneva and of the Savoy Alps, he remained
several years, engaged upon his " Decline
and Fall," the last volume of which he com-
pleted in 1787, and in enjoying the society
of his friends. That in this paradise his
loneliness, like that of Adam, began to
MATRIMONIAL LONGINGS. 39
weary him, appears from what he says in
1784 in a letter to Lord Sheffield :
" Should you be very much surprised to hear of my
being married ? Amazing at it may seem, I do as-
sure you that the event is less improbable than it
would have appeared to myself a twelvemonth ago.
Deyverdun and I have often agreed, in jest and in
earnest, that a house like ours would be regulated,
graced, and enlivened by an agreeable female com-
panion ; but each of us seems desirous that his friend
should sacrifice himself for the public good."
Again, in 1790, he writes to the same
friend :
*" Sometimes, in a solitary mood, I have fancied my-
self married to one or another of those whose society
and conversation are the most pleasing to me ; but
when I have painted in my fancy all the probable
consequences of such a union, I have started from
my dream, rejoiced in my escape, and ejaculated a
thanksgiving that I was still in the possession of my
natural freedom. Yet I feel, and I shall continue to
feel, that domestic solitude, however it may be alle-
viated by work, by study, and even by friendship,
is a comfortless state, which will grow more pain-
ful as I descend in the vale of years."
And again in 1791 :
"I wish it were in my power to give you an ad-
4O GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
equate idea of the conveniency of my house and the
beauty of my garden, both of which I have improved
at a considerable expense since the death of poor
Deyverdun. But the loss of a friend is indeed ir-
reparable. Were I ten years younger, I might pos-
sibly think of a female companion ; but the choice is
difficult, the success doubtful, the engagement per-
petual, and at fifty-four a man should never think of
altering the whole system of his life and habits."
The storm that burst upon the French
monarchy drove, as we have seen, the Neck-
ers into exile, and Coppet, where they went
to live, was not far from Lausanne. Mad-
ame Necker, preserving her tenderness for
the object of her early attachment, sought
by every feminine art to lure him to her
side, and in a measure succeeded. Here is
what she writes to him in 1792, referring to
a visit he had made her :
" We think often of the days, full of charms, which
we passed with you at Geneva. I felt during all this
time a sentiment that was new to me, perhaps it
would be also new to many people. By a rare favour
of Providence I reunited in one and the same spot
one of the sweet and pure affections of my youth and
also that which now constitutes my lot upon earth,
and which makes it so enviable. This peculiarity,
LADY ELIZABETH FOSTER. 41
joined with the pleasures of an incomparable conver-
sation, formed for us a sort of enchantment, and the
connection of the past with the present made all my
days appear like a dream, proceeding from the ivory
gate for the consolation of mortals. Will you not
help us to prolong it ?"
At the same time she could not resist the
temptation to unsheathe the claw beneath
the velvet, and to give him a peculiarly
feminine scratch. We have seen how, in
the loneliness of his bachelor home, Gib-
bon's thoughts turned towards matrimony,
and there is an unverified legend that he
actually once offered himself at Lausanne
to an English woman, Lady Elizabeth Fos-
ter, afterwards Duchess of Devonshire, who,
like many of her countrywomen, had called
to pay her respects to the celebrated his-
torian. The legend narrates that he got
upon his knees to make his offer, and when,
upon being rejected, he attempted to rise,
he was so fat and infirm that he was unable
to do it, and had to be helped up by his
servants. Referring to this matrimonial in-
clination, Madame Necker goes on to say :
" Monsieur de Germain has thought fit to marry,
42 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
and he has had to renounce much of his attentions.
Beware, monsieur, of these late bonds. The mar-
riage which makes one happy in ripe age is that
which was contracted in youth. Then only is the
union perfect, tastes are shared, sentiments expand,
ideas become common, the intellectual faculties mu-
tually shape themselves. All life is double, and all
life is a prolongation of youth, for the impressions of
the soul govern the eyes, and the beauty which has
passed away preserves its empire, but for you, mon-
sieur, in all the vigour of thinking, when your whole
existence is fixed, a worthy wife could not be found
without a miracle, and an imperfect association re-
calls always Horace's statue in which a beautiful
head is joined to the body of a stupid fish."
Her other letters to him written about
this time also manifest a lively interest in
his welfare. Here are some extracts :
" You have always been dear to me, but the friend-
ship you show to M. Necker increases that which
you inspire in me for so many other reasons, and I
love you at present with a double affection."
' ' Your words are for me the .milk and honey of the
promised land, and I seem to hear their sweet mur-
mur. Still, I yet regret the pleasure that I had of
entertaining you during the day with my thoughts of
the day before. I lived thus with you, doubly, in
the past and in the present, and the one embellished
AN UNDYING FRIENDSHIP. 43
the other. May I flatter myself that I shall find
again this happiness in our avenues of Coppet ?"
"What price does not my heart attach to your
health, and the interest which your friendship sheds
upon our retreat ! On arriving here, on finding only
the tombs of those whom I so much loved, you were
to me a solitary tree, whose shade still covers the
desert which separates me from the past years of my
life.
"You promised me to read ' Les Opinions Reli-
gieuses,' and whatever may be your metaphysical
opinions, I am sure you will be struck by the chap-
ter on happiness. The touching word which ends
your letter convinces me of it. I want to add to it
these lines of Zaire :
' Genereux, bienfaisant, juste, plein de vertus.
S'il etait ne Chretien, que serait-il de plus.'
" Return to us when you are left to yourself. It is
the moment which ought always to belong to your
first and to your last friend. I cannot discover which
of these titles is the sweetest, and the dearest to my
heart."
This affectionate intercourse appears to
have been kept up both in person and by
correspondence until the end. Madame
Necker's last letter to- Gibbon is dated Dec.
9, 1793, and he died Jan. 16, 1794. She,
44 GIBBON AND MADAME NECKER.
too, died the following May, after months of
suffering which incapacitated her for writ-
ing. It would have been romantic, if it
could be said that her last thoughts were
of Gibbon, but, in truth, they were exclu-
sively of her husband, whom she loved to
the day of her death as truly and as tender-
ly as she had loved him from the beginning
of their married life. Her body was in-
terred at Coppet, where it has ever since re-
mained. Gibbon's was entombed in Lord
Sheffield's family vault in England. The
pair were thus divided in death as they
were in early life, the native country of
each claiming and receiving its own.
DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.
DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
DR. JOHNSON'S acquaintance with Mrs.
Thrale began in January, 1765, when he was
fifty-six years of age and she was twenty-
four. Mr. Thrale was a wealthy brewer,
who had received a liberal education, and,
as well as his wife, had a fondness for the
society of literary men and of artists. The
couple, who had been married only a few
months, took such a liking to Johnson that
they made him their intimate friend, and
for the remaining sixteen years of Mr.
Thrale's life he lived for the greater part of
the time at their villa at Streatham, near
London. A chamber was set apart for him,
which he occupied for several days of every
week, his tastes in eating and drinking were
sedulously consulted, conveniences were pro-
46 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
vided for his experiments in chemistry, the
library was put under his care, with a liberal
allowance of money for the purchase of
books, he was consulted in the management
of Mr. Thrale's business affairs, and, in
short, he became an integral member of
the family. His fame and the hospitality
of the Thrales made the house the favorite
resort of the finest minds in London, and
as Abraham Hayward says in his memoirs
of Mrs. Thrale : *' Holland House, alone and
in its best days, would convey to persons
living in our time an adequate conception
of the Streatham circle when it comprised
Burke, Reynolds, Garrick, Goldsmith, Bos-
well, Murphy, Dr. Burney and his daughter,
Mrs. Montague, Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs. Crewe,
Lord Loughborough, Dunning (afterwards
Lord Ashburton), Lord Mulgrave, Lord
Westcote, Sir Lucas, and Mr. (afterwards Sir
William) Pepys, Major Holroyd (afterwards
Lord Sheffield), the Bishop of London and
Mrs. Porteous, the Bishop of Peterborough
and Mrs. Hinchcliff, Miss Gregory, Miss
Streatfield, etc." In this literary elysium
Johnson's life, as may well be imagined.
BOSWELL'S SLANDERS. 47
passed most agreeably. His health and his
spirits improved, and he enjoyed himself to
the full. Mr. Thrale's death in 1781 put an
end to it all. The Streatham establishment
was broken up, and though Dr. Johnson oc-
casionally visited Mrs. Thrale at her town
residence, and continued to correspond with
her, the intimacy gradually lessened, until,
upon her marriage to Gabriel Piozzi in 1784,
six months before Johnson's death, it ceased
altogether.
Mrs. Thrale, like Dr. Johnson, is best
known to the world through the medium of
Boswell's life of the distinguished scholar.
That incomparable work, unique among
biographies, has probably a hundred readers
where any other on the same subject has
one, and naturally it has had a predominant
influence in shaping public opinion. Bos-
well, who was an admiring worshipper of
Johnson and a jealous rival of Mrs. Thrale,
hated her because Johnson liked her, and
because he foresaw that she, too, would
write a memoir of his hero in competition
with his own. Hence he persistently repre-
sents her in the most unfavorable light, and
48 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
impugns both the soundness of her under-
standing and the accuracy of her recollec-
tions. Above all, he has succeeded in es-
tablishing the belief that, after the death of
her husband, she treated Dr. Johnson with
ingratitude, and that her marriage with
Piozzi was a sacrifice of self-respect to an
unworthy passion. The truth is that Dr.
Johnson was indebted to Mrs. Thrale, not
only for the kindness which, as he himself
acknowledged in the very paroxysm of his
anger at her re-marriage, "soothed twenty
years of a life radically wretched," but for
an intellectual companionship and stimulus
which materially assisted in making his rep-
utation. Even Boswell has the candor to
say : " The vivacity of Mrs. Thrale's literary
talk aroused him to cheerfulness and exer-
tion, even when they were alone. But this
was not. often the case; for he found
here a constant succession of what gave
him the highest enjoyment; the society
of the learned, the witty, and the eminent
in every way, who were assembled in nume-
rous companies, called forth his wonder-
ful powers, and gratified him with admira-
PIOZZI. 49
tion, to which no man could be insensi-
ble."
Johnson, therefore, owed Mrs. Thrale
quite as much as she owed him, and that,
after her husband's death, her intimacy
with him came to an end, was no proof of
ingratitude. Nor was her marriage with
Piozzi at all deserving of censure. Piozzi,
though only an Italian music master, was
in every way as worthy a man as Thrale,
and made a much better husband. In the
light that modern inquiry has thrown upon
the subject, the conviction cannot be avoid-
ed that Mrs. Thrale's real offence was pre-
ferring the younger and handsomer Italian
to her elderly admirer, and that Johnson's
resentment was merely the commonplace
effect of a lover's rejection. He was,
probably, not himself aware of the nature
of his feelings, nor does it appear that any
of his friends suspected it. If they did,
they did not choose to say so. Nor did
Mrs. Thrale ever suggest this explanation
of Johnson's conduct, and in the two vol-
umes of correspondence with him which she
published after his death, nothing is found
4
50 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
to support it. By common consent it seems
to have been agreed to represent the quar-
rel as having had reference solely to Piozzi's
position and character, and to leave every-
thing else out of consideration. This is
done by even so. well-informed a writer as
Lord Macaulay, and the only eminent au-
thor who has expressed a different opinion
is Lord Brougham, who, in his " Lives of
Men of Letters," ventures the surmise that
" Johnson was, perhaps unknown to himself,
in love with Mrs. Thrale."
All accounts agree in depicting Mrs.
Thrale as a woman in every way deserving
of admiration. Though not positively beau-
tiful, she was pretty enough at the age of
fourteen to be selected by Hogarth to sit
for the principal figure in his picture " The
Lady's Last Stake," while the vivacity of
her countenance and the graciousness of
her manners rendered her otherwise attrac-
tive. Her intellectual gifts were uncom-
mon. When she was thirteen her parents,
who were in comfortable circumstances,
thought not wealthy, placed her under the
tuition of the learned Dr. Arthur Collier,
MRS. THRALE.
DOCTOR COLLIER. 51
and by him she was taught Latin, Spanish,
and Italian, besides other branches of
knowledge. Moreover, notwithstanding his
sixty odd years, he inspired in her, as he
did in another of his girl pupils, Sophy
Streatfield, a romantic affection. She says
of him : " A friendship more tender, or more
unpolluted by interest or by vanity, never
existed; love had no place at all in the con-
nection, nor had he any rival but my moth-
er." Whether from jealousy or from pru-
dence, her mother, however, thought it best
to part her from her adored preceptor, lest
his influence over her should prevent her
marriage. As for Miss Streatfield, she took
him, when he became so old as to be in-
firm, into her -own home, he died in her
arms, and for years she marked the anni-
versary of his death by wearing black.
How Mrs. Thrale profited by Dr. Collier's
instruction is proved by her subsequent ca-
reer. Besides her familiarity with English
literature and a knowledge of French, Ital-
ian, and Spanish, the Rev. E. Mangin, who
knew her during the last eight or ten years
of her life, says that "she not only read and
52 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
wrote Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, but had
for sixty years constantly and ardently stud-
ied the Scriptures and the works of com-
mentators in the original languages." This
is an exaggeration, but that her learning
was considerable and her information varied
and extensive, Boswell's reports of her dis-
putes with Dr. Johnson abundantly show.
On several occasions she proved her knowl-
edge of Latin by translating it into English
offhand, and Dr. Johnson did not disdain
her co-operation in making a series of Eng-
lish versions of the Latin odes of Boethius,
which are printed with her second volume
of his letters. After one of their frequent
intellectual contests, he said to her, in reply
to an apologetic remark, " Madam, you nev-
er talk nonsense. You have as much sense
and more wit than any woman I know."
Miss Reynolds has also left the following
testimony to his appreciation of her :
" On the praises of Mrs. Thrale he used to dwell
with a peculiar delight, a paternal fondness, expres-
sive of conscious exultation in being so intimately
acquainted with her. One day, in speaking of her to
Mr. Harris, author of ' Hermes,' and expatiating on
MRS. THRALE'S ATTRACTIONS. 53
her various perfections — the solidity of her virtues,
the brilliancy of her wit, and the strength of her un-
derstanding, etc. — he quoted some lines, with which
he concluded his most eloquent eulogium, of which
I retained but the two last :
" Virtues of such a generous kind,
Good in the last recesses of the mind."
Madame d' Arblay (Fanny Burney), the fa-
mous author of " Evelina," also wrote of her
after her death :
"She was, in truth, a most wonderful character
for talents and eccentricity, for wit, genius, gener-
osity, spirit, and powers of entertainment. She had
a great deal both of good and not good, in com-
mon with Mme. de Stael Holstein. They had the
same sort of highly superior intellect, the same depth
of learning, the same general acquaintance with
science, the same ardent love of literature, the same
thirst for universal knowledge, and the same buoyant
animal spirits, such as neither sickness, sorrow, nor
even terror could subdue. Their conversation was
equally luminous from the sources of their own fer-
tile minds and from their splendid acquisitions from
the acquirements of others."
From other sources we learn that in con-
versation she was accounted a formidable
rival to the celebrated blue-stocking, Mrs.
54 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
Montague, and the verses, letters, and oth-
er productions she left behind her evince
more than ordinary literary skill.
Johnson, on his part, was remarkable for
his repulsive person and uncouth manners.
Boswell says : " Miss Porter told me that
when he was first introduced to her mother
his appearance was very forbidding. He
was then lean and lank, so that his im-
mense structure of bones was hideously
striking to the eye, and the scars of scrofula
were deeply visible. He also wore his hair,
which was straight and stiff, separated be-
hind, and he often had seemingly convul-
sive starts and odd gesticulations, which
tended to excite at once surprise and ridi-
cule." Madame d'Arblay,who first saw him
when he was sixty, also speaks of his "per-
petual convulsive movements, either of his
hands, lips, feet, and knees, and sometimes
of all together." His behavior at table was
what we should call disgusting. He ate
ravenously, like a half-famished man, and,
while making pretence to nicety, he preferred
quantity to quality. Lord Chesterfield, in
one of his letters to his son, describes him,
JOHNSON'S REPULSIVENESS. 55
without mentioning his name, as "a re-
spectable Hottentot," and, after speaking
of the defects of his person already men-
tioned, goes on to say : " He throws any-
where but down his throat whatever he
means to drink, and only mangles what he
means to carve. Inattentive to all the re-
gards of social life, he mistimes or misplaces
everything. He disputes with heat and in-
discriminately, mindless of the rank, char-
acter, and situation of those with whom he
disputes, absolutely ignorant of the several
gradations of familiarity or respect." An
Irish clergyman, Dr. Campbell, who dined
with Johnson at Mrs. Thrale's in 1775,
writes of him : " He has the aspect of an
idiot, without the faintest ray of sense
gleaming from any one feature — with the
most awkward gait, an unpowdered gray wig
on one side of his head — he is forever danc-
ing the devil's jig, and sometimes he makes
the most drivelling effort to whistle some
thought in his absent paroxysms."
All this is confirmed by Boswell, who re-
counts numerous instances of Johnson's
slovenliness, rudeness, and general ill man-
56 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
ners. Yet his colossal stature, great physi-
cal strength, and manly courage impressed
his female friends with that sense of power
which is so attractive to their sex. On the
one occasion when he followed the hounds,
his fearless riding elicited general admira-
tion, and when two large dogs were fighting
in his presence, he separated them by tak-
ing one in each hand and holding them
apart at arm's-length. At another time,
merely to display his agility, he climbed over
a high gate which came in his way; and
Foote, the actor, having announced that he
would caricature him on the stage, he pre-
vented it by the significant purchase of a
stout oaken stick.
In spite, therefore, of his repulsive ap-
pearance and behavior, Johnson had com-
pensating physical advantages, and these
were amply re-enforced by his intellectual
gifts. Like ugly John Wilkes, he was " only
half an hour behind the handsomest man in
England." Mrs. Porter, whom he married,
remarked after her first interview with him :
"Mr. J. is the most sensible man that I ever
saw in my life." Mrs. Kitty Clive, the fa-
CONVERSATIONAL ABILITY. 57
mous actress, said : " I love to sit by Dr.
Johnson; he always entertains me." The
aged Countess of Eglintoune was so pleased
with him that she gave this message to Bos-
well : " Tell Johnson I love him exceeding-
ly." Miss Adams, a daughter of Dr. Adams
of Pembroke College, Oxford, writes to a
friend in the last year of Johnson's life:
" Dr. Johnson, though not in good health,
is in general very talkative, and infinitely
agreeable and entertaining." Mrs. Cotton
testifies that : " Dr. Johnson, despite his
rudeness, was at all times delightful, having
a manner peculiar to himself in relating
anecdotes that could not fail to attract both
old and young." Mr. Langton told Boswell
of an evening gathering, where ladies of the
highest rank and fashion gathered round
Johnson's chair, four and five deep, to hear
him talk. Madame d'Arblay had for him
a feeling bordering upon idolatry. Her
diary abounds in expressions like these :
" My dear, dear Dr. Johnson ! what a charm-
ing man you are !" " But Dr. Johnson's ap-
probation ! it almost crazed me with agree-
able surprise." " I have so true a venera-
58 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
tion for him that the very sight of him
inspires me with delight and reverence."
" But how grateful do I feel to this dear Dr.
Johnson." " Dear, dear, and much rever-
enced Dr. Johnson !" " This day was the
ever - honored, ever -lamented Dr. Johnson
committed to the earth. Oh, how sad a
day to me! I could not keep my eyes dry
all day! Nor can I now in the recollect-
ing." And four years afterwards she says of
a conversation about him with Mr. Wynd-
ham : " My praise of him was of a more
solid kind — his principles, his piety, his
kind heart under all its rough coating ; but
I need not repeat what I said. My dear
friends know every word."
Women liked also in Johnson his delicate
gallantry. He had a tender, respectful love
for them, and succeeded in making them
feel it. Mrs. Thrale once said to him :
"Your compliments, sir, are made seldom,
but when they are made, they have an ele-
gance unequalled." To her, assuredly, he
paid homage in the most flattering manner,
wrote sonnets in her honor, both in English
and in Latin ; when he was absent he kept
FASCINATION FOR WOMEN. 59
up a constant correspondence with her, and
he contrived even in the violence of his
contradiction to make that contradiction a
tribute to her understanding. Goldsmith,
who knew him well, and who, as often as
anybody, suffered from his rudeness, said of
him : " He has nothing of the bear but his
skin."
It was not without reason, therefore, that
Boswell writes :
"Let not my readers smile to think of Johnson's
being a candidate for female favor. Mr. Pete* Gar-
rick assured me that he was told by a lady that in
her opinion Johnson was 'a very seducing man.'
Disadvantages of person and manner may be forgot-
ten where intellectual pleasure is communicated to a
susceptible mind, and Johnson was capable of feel-
ing the most delicate and disinterested attachment."
That Dr. Johnson was indeed capable of
ardent love for women there is no doubt.
Boswell strives to portray him as a man of
mighty intellect, raised by it above ordinary
human weaknesses. But even Boswell, with
the unconscious fidelity of a photographer,
has incidentally preserved many traits of
Johnson's character which redeem it from
60 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
being that of a faultless monster, and ex-
hibit it in a more human aspect. He ad-
mits that " Johnson had from his youth been
sensible to the influence of female charms;"
and specifying several of the objects of his
boyish love, he introduces the account of
his early marriage with this remark : " In a
man whom religious education has secured
from licentious indulgences, the passion of
love, when it once has seized him, is ex-
ceedingly strong, being unimpaired by dis-
sipation and totally concentrated in one ob-
ject. This was experienced by Johnson
when he became the fervent admirer of
Mrs. Porter after her first husband's death."
Johnson's impressibility by feminine
charms and his own consciousness of it are
evinced by a remark he made at the age of
forty to his friend and former pupil, David
Garrick ; " I'll come no more behind your
scenes, David ; for the silk stockings and
white bosoms of your actresses excite my
amorous propensities." After the famous
dinner at Mr. Dilly's, to which Johnson was
inveigled to meet Mr. Wilkes, Boswell
records that a pretty Quakeress, Mrs.
APPRECIATION OF BEAUTY. 6l
Knowles, being present, " Mr. Wilkes held
a candle to show a fine print of a beautiful
female figure which hung in the room, and
pointed out the elegant contour of the bosom
with the finger of an arch connoisseur. He
afterwards, in a conversation with me, wag-
gishly insisted that all the time Johnson
showed visible signs of a fervent admiration
of the corresponding charms of the fair
Quaker." At seventy-two he. remarked to
Boswell : " Sir, it is a very foolish resolution
to resolve not to marry a pretty woman.
Beauty is of itself very estimable. No, sir,
I would prefer a pretty woman unless there
are objections to her."
Elsewhere Boswell says :
"When I told him that a young and handsome
countess had said to me : ' I should think that to be
praised by Dr. Johnson would make one a fool all
one's life,' and that I answered, ' Madam, I shall
make him a fool to-day by repeating this to him.' He
said, ' I am too old to be made a fool, but if you say I
am made a fool I shall not deny it. I am much pleased
with a compliment, especially from a pretty woman.' "
And again, speaking of a visit to a Heb-
rides chief, Boswell records :
62 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
" This evening, one of our married ladies, a lively,
pretty little woman, good humoredly sat down upon
Dr. Johnson's knee, and. being encouraged by some
of the company, put her hands round his neck and
kissed him. ' Do it again,' said he, ' and let us see
who will tire first." He kept her on his knee some
time, while he and she drank tea."
Another acquaintance of Johnson's relates
that " Two young women from Staffordshire
visited him when I was present to consult
him on the subject of Methodism, to which
they were inclined. 'Come,' said he, 'you
pretty fools, dine with me and Maxwell at
the "Mitre, and we will talk over that sub-
ject,' which they did, and after dinner he
took one of them upon his knee and fondled
her for half an hour together."
It would be a mistake, nevertheless, to
infer from these anecdotes that Johnson, as
regards women, was coarse and sensual. He
appreciated more the finer elements of the
feminine character, and took delight in the
society of cultivated ladies. Mrs. Thrale
herself relates that " when Mr. Thrale once
asked Johnson which had been the happiest
period of his life, he replied : ' It was that
DELICACY OF FEELING. 63
year in which he spent one whole evening
with Molly Aston. That, indeed,' he said,
' was not happiness, it was rapture, but the
thought of it sweetened the whole year.'
I must add that the evening alluded to was
not passed tete-a-tete, but in a select com-
pany of which the present Lord Kilmorey
was one." Of another lady, Miss Boothby,
Mrs. Thrale writes : " Johnson told me she
pushed her piety to bigotry, her devotion to
enthusiasm ; that she somewhat disqualified
herself for the duties of this life by her
perpetual aspirations after the next. Such,
however, was the purity of her mind, he
said, and such the graces of her manner,
that he and Lord Lyttelton used to strive
for her preference with an emulation that oc-
casioned hourly disgust and ended in last-
ing animosity." His romantic love for his
wife while she lived and his devotion to her
memory long after her death, are frequently
mentioned in Boswell's pages. His affec-
tion for Mrs. Thrale was evidently inspired
by her mind rather than by her person,
and all the letters he wrote to her are
most chivalrous. Of ladies' dress he was,
64 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
notwithstanding his nearsightedness, an ap-
preciative critic. Boswell relates that on
one occasion he was greatly displeased be-
cause Mrs. Thrale appeared before him in
a dark-colored gown. " You little creat-
ures," he said, "should not wear those
sort of colors; they are unsuitable in every
way. What ! have not all insects gay col-
ors?" When none of the ladies could ex-
plain why a pale lilac should be called a
soupir etouffe, he was ready with the answer :
"It is called a stifled sigh because it is
checked in its progress, and is only half a
color." Elsewhere Mrs. Thrale informs us :
"It was indeed astonishing how he could remark
with a sight so miserably imperfect ; but no acci-
dental position of a riband escaped him, so nice was
his observation and so rigorous his demands of pro-
priety. When I went with him to Lichfield, and
came down stairs to breakfast at the inn, my dress
did not please him, and he made me alter it entire-
ly before he would stir a step with me about the
town."
In like manner Madame d'Arblay says
he once refused to go to church at Streat-
ham with her mother until she had changed
THRALE'S COARSENESS. 65
a hat which he disliked for one that suited
him better.
There was enough, therefore, in the char-
acters of both Mrs. Thrale and Dr. John-
son, notwithstanding their disparity of age,
to make them pleased with each other. The
same intellectual strength and cultivation
which rendered Dr. Collier so dear to her
in her girlhood she found in a larger degree
in the person of her new friend, while he in
turn was flattered by her admiration and
grateful for her affection. Besides this, she
had a special reason for drawing close to
him. Her husband, though he was possess-
ed of superior abilities, and had been edu-
cated at Oxford in the society of young men
of good family, yet lacked the refinement
necessary to preserve her love. A wife was
to him a companion and a housekeeper and
the mother of his children, and that was all.
He treated her as a despot treats a slave.
" I know no man," said Johnson to Boswell,
" who is more master of his wife and family
than Thrale. If he holds up a finger he is
obeyed." He introduced into his house
as a constant guest an illegitimate son, and
5
66 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
appointed him one of his executors. He
made love to a pretty girl, the Sophy Streat-
field already mentioned, before his wife's
face ; and at a time when, if ever, she de-
served consideration, he made her exchange
seats at table with her rival, who occupied
one exposed to a draught.
Nor was he intellectually so superior to
her as to justify this domination. Even in
business matters he committed many blun-
ders, which, with Dr. Johnson's counsel, she
aided him to repair, and she did her best to
repress in him the gluttony, the indulgence
of which eventually caused his death. John-
son, on the other hand, as all the evidence
shows, was tender and sympathetic. He
took an interest in her little ambitions,
shared her sorrows, and consoled her in
her afflictions, of which the frequent loss of
children was not the least.
Given thus, on the one hand, a man of
vigorous intellect, strong, though controlled
passions, and fascinating conversation, and,
on the other, a woman of talent, able and
quick to appreciate his merits, and let the
two be thrown together intimately for the
JOHNSON'S LOVE. 67
period of sixteen years, nothing would be
more natural than for a feeling to spring up,
at least on the part of the man, warmer than
mere friendship. Difference of age counts
for little in such cases, for it is a common
saying that the heart never grows old. A
man in Johnson's position readily forgets
how he actually appears to the woman who
flatters and pleases him, and, conscious only
of his own youthful feelings, is prone to im-
agine that he seems to her as young as
he does to himself. There is no proof that
Mrs. Thrale ever entertained any sentiment
for Johnson other than the esteem which in
Madame d'Arblay became reverent adora-
tion. Indeed, when spoken to about her
supposed passion for him some years after-
wards by Sir James Fellows, she ridiculed
the idea, saying that she always felt for
Johnson the same respect and veneration as
for a Pascal. But if the long-continued
manifestation of these sentiments, coupled
with the most assiduous devotion and ten-
der, wifelike care, had not awakened in him
some response beyond mere gratitude, he
would have been the most insensible of be-
68 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
ings. Love, moreover, is frequently the re-
sult of propinquity and habit, and to both
these influences Johnson was subjected for
more than sixteen years. If he misinterpret-
ed the attentions he received, and was em-
boldened by them to hope for a return of
the passion they aroused, he did only what
many a wise man has done under the same
circumstances, and will do again.
But, while both Johnson himself and all
his friends saw nothing like love in his re-
lations with Mrs. Thrale, the outside world
was convinced that it existed, and, upon
Mr. Thrale's death, fully expected Dr. John-
son to marry his widow. This belief pro-
duced a number of literary squibs ridiculing
the match, of which specimens are given by
Boswell, and others, too coarse for reproduc-
tion, are preserved in the library of the Brit-
ish Museum. It is certain, at least, that he
took her desertion of him very much to
heart, and suffered intensely from it. Bos-
well, in his animosity against Mrs. Thrale,
says this plainly, and descants upon the
pain which her remarriage caused him.
An anonymous friend, in a biography pub-
BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT. 69
lished the year following his death, also
writes :
" No event since the decease of Mrs. Johnson so
deeply affected him as the very unaccountable mar-
riage of Mrs. Thrale. This woman he had frequent-
ly mentioned as the ornament and pattern of her sex.
There was no virtue which she did not practise ; no
feminine accomplishment of which she was not a
mistress ; hardly any language or science or art
which she did not know. These various endow-
ments he considered as so many collateral securities
of her worth. They conciliated his confidence, at
least in what he thought she was. He consequently
entertained a sincere friendship for her and her
family. But her apostasy appeared to him an in-
sult on his discernment, and on all those valuable
qualities for which he had given her so much credit.
The uneasiness and regret which he felt on this oc-
casion was so very pungent that he could not con-
ceal it even from his servants. From that time he
was seldom observed to be in his usual easy good
humors. His sleep and appetite, and the satisfac-
tion he took in his study, obviously forsook him. He
even avoided that company which had formerly given
him the greatest pleasure. He often was denied to
his dearest friends, who declined mentioning her
name to him, and till the day of his death he could
not wholly dismiss her from his thoughts."
Mrs. Thrale married Piozzi July 25, 1784,
70 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
and Johnson died on Dec. 13 of the same
year. It would be unjust to say that his
death was caused by the marriage, because
he had long been the victim of a disease
which must, sooner or later, be fatal. But
a struggle had been going on in his mind
ever since Mr. Thrale's death, April 4, 1781,
or more than three years and a half. Mrs.
Thrale broke up the establishment at Streat-
ham in 1782, and in June, 1783, Johnson had
a stroke of paralysis, from which, however,
he recovered in a few weeks. A significant
extract from his diary, under date of April
15, 1783, is transcribed by his biographer,
Hawkins :
" I took leave of Mrs. Thrale. I was much moved.
I had some expostulations with her. She said that
she was likewise affected. I commended the Thrales
with great good will to God. May my petitions have
been heard !"
This proves that at this date differences
had arisen between the two which could
not have failed to produce an unfavorable
effect upon Johnson's health. An interview
between him and Madame d'Arblay, which
TALK WITH MADAME D'ARBLAY. 71
occurred Nov. 23, 1783, is thus described by
the lady:
"Nothing had yet publicly transpired with cer-
tainty or authority relative to the projects of Mrs.
Thrale, who had now been nearly a year at Bath,
though nothing was left unreported or unasserted
with respect to her proceedings. Nevertheless, how
far Dr. Johnson was himself informed, or was igno-
rant on the subject, neither Dr. Burney nor his daugh-
ter could tell, and each equally feared to learn.
" Scarcely an instant, however, was the latter left
alone at Bolt Court ere she saw the justice of her
long apprehensions, for while she planned speaking
upon some topics that might have a chance to catch
the attention of the Doctor, a sudden change from
kind tranquillity to strong austerity took place in his
altered countenance, and, startled and affrighted,
she held her peace. . . .
" Thus passed a few minutes in which she scarcely
dared breathe, while the respiration of the Doctor, on
the contrary, was of asthmatic force and loudness ;
then, suddenly turning to her with an air of mingled
wrath and woe, he hoarsely ejaculated, ' Piozzi !'
" He evidently meant to say more, but the effort
with which he articulated that name robbed him of
any voice for amplification, and his whole frame grew
tremulously convulsed.
"At length, and with great agitation, he broke
forth with : ' She cares for no one ! You, only —
72 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
you, she loves still ! but no one — and nothing else —
you she still loves — '
"A half-smile now, though of no very gay char-
acter, softened a little the severity of his features,
while he tried to resume some cheerfulness in ad-
ding: 'As ... she loves her little finger !' "
The fact was, that at this time Mrs.
Thrale, so far from being about to marry
Piozzi, whom she had begun to love even
before her husband's death, had resolved,
in deference to the opposition of her daugh-
ters and of her friends, to give him up. The
struggle cost her so dear, and had, visibly,
so bad an effect upon her health, that her
eldest daughter became alarmed, and in
May, 1784, of her own accord, begged her
mother to send for her lover. He arrived
on the ist of July, after an absence of four-
teen months, and as has been said, on the
25th the pair were married. She announced
her intention to Johnson, among the other
guardians of her children, by a circular let-
ter dated June 30, speaking of the marriage
as irrevocably settled. Johnson answered :
"MADAM, — If I interpret your letter right, you
are ignominiously married. If it is yet undone, let
A BRUTAL LETTER. 73
us once more talk together. If you have abandoned
your children and your religion, God forgive your
wickedness ; if you have forfeited your fame and
your country, may your folly do no further mischief.
If the last act is yet to do, I, who have loved you,
esteemed you, reverenced you, and served you, I,
who long thought you the first of womankind, en-
treat that before your fate is irrevocable I may once
more see you. I was, I once was, madam, most
truly yours, SAM. JOHNSON.
"Jutv, », 1784.
" I will come down if you will permit it."
To this brutal missive Mrs. Thrale replied
with becoming dignity, bidding Johnson
farewell until he should change his tone.
Her firmness elicited the following more
moderate and yet pathetic communica-
tion :
"LONDON, July 8, 1784.
" DEAR MADAM, — What you have done, however
I may lament it, I have no pretence to resent, as it
has not been injurious to me. I therefore breathe
out one sigh more of tenderness, perhaps useless, but
at least sincere.
" I wish that God may grant you every blessing,
that you may be happy in this world for its short
continuance, and eternally happy in a better state,
and whatever I can contribute to your happiness I
74 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
am very ready to repay for that kindness which
soothed twenty years of a life radically wretched.
" Do not think slightly of the advice which I now
presume to offer. Prevail upon Mr. Piozzi to settle
in England. You may live here with more dignity
than in Italy, and with more security. Your rank
will be higher and your fortune more under your
own eyes. I desire not to detail all my reasons, but
every argument of prudence and of interest is for
England, and only some phantoms of imagination
seduce you to Italy.
" I am afraid, however, that my counsel is vain,
yet I have eased my heart by giving it.
" When Queen Mary took the resolution of shel-
tering herself in England, the Archbishop of St. An-
drew's, attempting to dissuade her, attended her on
her journey ; and when they came to the irremeable
stream that separated the two kingdoms, walked by
her side into the water, in the middle of which he
seized her bridle, and, with earnestness proportioned
to her danger and his own affection, pressed her to
return. The queen went forward. If the parallel
goes this far, may it go no further. The tears stand
in my eyes.
"I am going into Derbyshire, and hope to be
followed by your good wishes, for I am, with great
affection, Yours, &c.
"Any letters that come for me hither will be sent
to me."
LOVE TURNED TO HATRED. 75
In a memorandum endorsed on this letter
Mrs. Thrale says : " I wrote him a very kind
and affectionate farewell." How keenly he
felt her loss appears from the record which
Madame d'Arblay makes of her last visit to
him, Nov. 25, 1784, four months after Mrs.
Thrale's marriage, and only nineteen days
previous to his death :
' ' I had seen Miss Thrale the day before. ' So,
said he, ' did I.' ' Did you ever, sir, hear from her
mother?' 'No, 'cried he, ' nor write to her. If I
meet with one of her letters I burn it instantly. I
have burned all I can find. I never speak of her,
and I desire never to hear of her more. I drive her,
as I said, wholly from my mind.' "
Contrary to Johnson's gloomy forebod-
ings, Mrs. Thrale's marriage was eminently
happy. Her new husband was of her own
age, gentle in his manners, and sufficiently
intellectual and accomplished to be an
agreeable companion. She lived with him
awhile in Italy, and then returned to Lon-
don,where she was received in a friendly if
not in a cordial manner. In 1795 the couple
removed to Wales, and Piozzi died there in
March, 1809. In 1814 Mrs. Piozzi returned
76 DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. THRALE.
to England, residing, until her death, alter-
nately at Bath and at Clifton, with occasion-
al visits to her old home at Streatham. When
she was nearly eighty she took a fancy to an
actor named Conway, who was a handsome
man, six feet tall, but with little mind. Some
letters are extant purporting to have been
written by her to him, but their authenticity
is doubtful and their contents not remark-
able. On the ayth of January, 1820, she gave
at Bath, to between six and seven hundred
people, a concert, a ball, and a supper in cel-
ebration of her eightieth birthday, though,
unless all the records are wrong, she could
not on that day have been older than seven-
ty-nine. In May, 182 1, she died, having pre-
served her faculties to the last.
GOETHE.
GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON
STEIN.
AMONG the many love affairs in which the
poet Goethe was engaged during his long
and brilliant career, that between him and
Charlotte von Stein is distinguished by the
comparatively high social rank of the lady,
the depth, tenderness, and duration of her
lover's affection for her, the influence it had
upon him, the mystery attending its sudden
interruption, and the fact that the thousand
or so letters which he wrote to her during its
continuance were carefully preserved by her,
and since her death have been published.
Recently, also, an interesting controversy
took place in Germany over the nature of
the relations between the pair, some writers
insisting that they were criminal, but the
78 GOETHE AND CHARLO1TE VON STEIN.
great majority adhering to the opinion that
they were perfectly pure.
Goethe first became acquainted with Frau
von Stein on his arrival at Weimar towards
the close of the year 1775. She was then
thirty-three years of age, and had been mar-
ried eleven years, during the first nine of
which she had been the mother of seven
children. Of these children only three sons
had survived, the youngest, Fritz, who after-
wards became Goethe's pet, being then three
years old. Her husband, the Freiherr Fried-
rich von Stein, was Stallmeister, or Master
of the Horse, to the Duke of Weimar.
He was seven years older than his wife, and
is described as a handsome, well-made man,
of prepossessing appearance and manners,
and a perfect courtier, but dull and unim-
pressionable, and almost painfully pious.
His official duties kept him most of the time
at court, and he even took most of his meals
there, so that his wife and family saw but
little of him. Charlotte herself was famil-
iar with court life, having been for seven
years previous to her marriage maid-of-hon-
or to the duke's mother. Her husband's
CHARLOTTE'S CHARACTER. 79
title of " Freiherr " is usually translated in
English "baron," and hence she is called
by English writers " baroness," but in Ger-
many she is always spoken of simply as
" Frau " von Stein and " Goethe's Friend "
(Goethes Freundin). Her father, Wilhelm
von Schardt, occupied in the ducal court
the position of " Hofmarschall," or Intend-
ant of the Household. On her mother's
side she was of Scotch descent, being re-
lated to the Irvings of Drum, and it is worth
mentioning that her younger sister, Louise,
became the second wife of that Baron Im-
hof who accepted from Warren Hastings a
large sum of money for his consent to a di-
vorce from his first wife in order that Hast-
ings might marry her.
Of Frau von Stein's personal appearance
and characteristics our information is mea-
gre. Goethe himself nowhere praises her
beauty; and Schiller, writing in 1787, when
she was near forty-five, says that she could
never have had any. She suffered, more-
over, greatly from ill-health, the result of a
naturally weak constitution, frequent child-
bearing, and sorrow for the loss of all her
80 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
infant daughters. Goethe wrote under her
silhouette, taken in 1773, which he saw at
Strasburg in the possession of the famous
Dr. Zimmermann, author of the work on
" Solitude," in July, 1775, some months be-
fore he made her personal acquaintance :
" It were a glorious spectacle to observe how
the world mirrors itself in this soul. She
sees the world as it is, and yet through the
medium of love. So, gentleness is the gen-
eral impression." A month later he gave to
the physiognomist Lavater the following
analysis of the character indicated by the
same silhouette : " Firmness, pleased, un-
changed permanence of state, contentment
in self, lovable pleasingness, naivete', and
goodness, self-flowing speech, yielding firm-
ness, benevolence, constancy, conquers with
nets." Knebel, an intimate friend of Goethe,
writes of her, in a letter addressed to his sis-
ter about the same time : " She is without pre-
tension and affectation, straightforward, nat-
ural, free, not too heavy and not too light,
without enthusiasm and yet with spiritual
warmth, takes an interest in all rational and
human subjects, is well informed and has
CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
UNHAPPY CHILDHOOD. 8 1
fine tact and even aptitude for art." Schil-
ler, also, while denying to her the posses-
sion of beauty, calls her " a truly original,
interesting person." " Her countenance," he
says, " has a gentle earnestness and a very
peculiar openness. Sound understanding,
feeling, and truth lie in her being." Fritz
von Stolberg mentions among the "lovely
little women of the court " the " beautiful-
eyed, lovely, gentle Stein," and speaks of
her as "the beautiful Stein." Evidently her
eyes and her expression made up for her
physical defects, and produced at least the
impression of loveliness.
Charlotte's childhood and youth, appar-
ently, were not happy. Her mother was a
mild, earnest, and deeply pious woman, de-
voted to her household duties. Her fa-
ther was stern and hard, and, like her hus-
band, much of the time away from home,
absorbed in his official work. Her biog-
rapher, Duntzer, says that she never played
with a doll, and was, as a child, fond of gaz-
ing at the stars ! The means of the family
were limited, and she seems to have re-
ceived little education until after she be-
6
82 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
came, at the age of fifteen, maid-of-honor.
She then acquainted herself with French
literature, learned to play the piano and the
guitar, to draw, and to do various sorts of
women's work. In later life she cultivated
her talent for painting assiduously, and fre-
quent references to the fruits of her skill in
this art are made by Goethe in his letters.
She also wrote a number of poems, a collec-
tion of which was published, set to music,
and a tragedy called " Dido," which has con-
siderable merit. To women she seems to
have been especially attractive. The youth-
ful Duchess Louise contracted with her a
life-long intimacy, she deeply attached to
herself Schiller's wife, and the companions
of her old age spoke of her with affection-
ate tenderness. It is related that Knebel,
Goethe's friend, was so affected by her
death that he wept like a child.
When Goethe arrived at Weimar he was a
little more than twenty-six years old. His
literary reputation had been established by
the publication of " Gotz von Berlichingen,"
the " Sorrows of Werther," " Clavigo," " Stel-
la," " Erwin and Elmira," and countless lit-
GOETHE'S BEAUTY. 83
tie poems. Personally he was of almost god-
like beauty. Lewes, in his biography, says
of him that, at twenty, when he entered a
restaurant, people laid down their knives
and forks to look at him. His features re-
sembled those of the Vatican Apollo ; he
was above the middle height, strong, quick
in his movements, and versed in all kinds of
manly exercises. Of his appearance when
he was twenty-five, skating on the ice at
Frankfort, wrapped in a crimson cloak, his
delighted mother said : " Anything so beau-
tiful is not to be seen now. I clapped my
hands for joy. Never shall I forget him, as
he darted out from under one arch of the
bridge and in again under the other, the
wind carrying the train behind him as he
flew !" This personal beauty he retained till
his death, and his friend Eckermann says
of his corpse as it lay stretched out for bur-
ial- " I was astonished at the god-like splen-
doi of his limbs. The breast, above all,
mighty, broad, and arched. Arms and
thighs full and gently muscular, the feet ele-
gant and of the purest shape, and nowhere
in the whole body a trace either of fat or
84 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
leanness and falling away. A perfect man
lay in great beauty before me, and the de-
light that it gave me made me for a mo-
ment forget that the immortal soul had de-
parted from such an envelope." Nor were
his powers of pleasing inferior to his phys-
ical attractions. If his successes with wom-
en were not enough to prove this, we have
the favorable impression which he made
not only upon his patron, the Duke of Wei-
mar, but upon the whole court. The enthu-
siastic friendships which he aroused in men
also attest in him the possession of that
most desirable of all qualities, the ability to
bind the hearts of others to one's own.
It was not without reason, therefore, that
Dr. Zimmermann warned Frau von Stein
against the fascinations of this handsome
young genius. The doctor had attended
her at the baths of Pyrmont in 1773, and
obtained from her there the silhouette which
he showed to Goethe in 1775, and the sight
of which, he assured her, had cost Goethe
three sleepless nights. She, in return, hav-
ing expressed a wish to make Goethe's ac-
quaintance, the doctor wrote to her : " But,
NUMEROUS LOVE AFFAIRS. 85
my poor friend, you do not reflect. You
desire to see him, and you do not know how
dangerous to you this lovable and charm-
ing man may become." Goethe's loves had
been notorious, and his engagement to Anna
Schonemann (Lili) which had just then been
broken off, was only the last of a series of
like affairs which began when he was but
fifteen years of age. But his sweethearts had
all been of his -own citizen rank. Gretchen,
the first, was scarcely respectable, Katharina
Schonkopf was the daughter of a tavern-
keeper, and Charity Meixner of a merchant
in Worms. Then followed his entanglement
with his dancing -master's daughter, and
next, that with Frederika Brion, the daugh-
ter of the pastor of Sesenheim. In Wetzlar
he fell in love with Charlotte Buff, the orig-
inal of Werther's Charlotte, who was the
daughter of a law official. Next came Max-
imiliane Laroche, afterwards Madame Bren-
tano, whose father and husband were both
merchants. Anna Sybilla Munch was of a
Frankfort citizen family, and Lili, whom he
came so near to marrying, had a rich bank-
er for father. In Frau von Stein he loved
86 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
for the first time in his life a woman of the
world and a lady of rank. Her birth, her
connections, her training, and her manners
were all superior Jo those of the women to
whom he had been accustomed, and must
have impressed his artistic sense with a new
idea of femininity. It is difficult for us
Americans to conceive of the gulf which
existed in Germany a century ago, and
which has not yet been obliterated, between
patricians and plebeians, the noble and the
citizen. It was not merely a matter of birth
and position, but one of breeding, manners,
and habits. Goethe himself was conscious
of his deficiencies in this respect, and took
great pains to repair them. So late as 1782,
when he had been six years living at court
in Weimar, he writes to Frau von Stein, who
had undertaken to form him : "I strive after
all that we last discussed concerning con-
duct, life, demeanor, and elegance, let myself
go, am always attentive, and I can assure
you that all whom I observe play more their
own parts than I do mine." Two years later
he makes Wilhelm Meister * discuss the dif-
* Lehrjahre, Book V. , chap. 3.
A NEW EXPERIENCE. 87
ference between citizens and nobles in a
way which evidently expresses his own ideas
on the subject. " I know not how it is in
foreign lands, but in Germany only to a no-
bleman is a certain universal, so to speak,
personal education possible. A citizen may
gain merit for himself and at most educate
his mind, but his personality is lost, present
himself as ke will, whereas it is the duty of
a nobleman, who deals with the elegant, to
give himself an elegant -demeanor, while this
demeanor, since no door is shut to him, be-
comes free, and, since he must pay with his
figure and with his person, be it in the court
or in the army, he has a reason for thinking
something of himself, and for showing that
he thinks something of himself." Indeed,
although early ennobled by patent, Goethe,
to the end of his life, never became a thor-
ough patrician. The etiquette of the Wei-
mar court, the observance of which to Frau
von Stein was second nature, wearied him
immensely. He hated the entertainments
which he was obliged to attend, and was ir-
ritated because his beloved took pleasure
in them and was gracious and complaisant
88 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
to the men she met at them. His great
delight was to steal off from time to time
to Jena, and there join in revelry with the
students, and, as we shall see hereafter, his
coarseness in dealing with women ultimately
led to a breach between him and the object
of his adoration.
Precisely when and where Goethe first
met Frau von Stein face to face does not
anywhere appear, nor is it known what im-
pression each then made upon the other.
Goethe reached Weimar Nov. 7, 1775, and
the records of the court make no mention
of Frau von Stein at any of the entertain-
ments at which he was present about that
time. She was, however, well acquainted
with the family of which he was the guest,
and that within a month he paid her a
visit at her husband's country-seat, Koch-
berg, appears from an inscription on a writ-
ing-table still preserved there, "Goethe
den 6 Dcbr. 75." Ten years later he re-
minded his beloved of this first visit in a let-
ter written on the same spot : " I think of
thee, my love, in the old castle, where, ten
years ago, I first visited thee, and where
CHARLOTTE'S FASCINATIONS. 89
them heldest me so fast through thy love."
This indicates that even at that time he
was enamoured of his new acquaintance, and
then, or very soon thereafter, began the ro-
mance in action between the pair which is
the most remarkable in Goethe's career.
He had just broken off his engagement with
Lili, and his susceptible heart abhorred a
vacuum. He was therefore prepared for the
installation of a new idol, and he found one
in Frau von Stein. He had come to Wei-
mar for a visit to the young duke of only a
few weeks, but her fascinations kept him
there, first, during the winter, then for an-
other year, until finally he became a per-
manent resident of the place and died in it.
Indeed, he repeatedly says, as he does in
the letter just above quoted, that Frau von
Stein was the tie which held him, and but
for which he would have soon departed.
The ten years and eight months which
elapsed between Goethe's first acquaint-
ance with Frau von Stein at the end of
1775, and his departure for Italy in Sep-
tember, 1786, may be called the golden pe-
riod .of their intercourse. Of his 965 pub-
90 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
lished letters to her, 821 were written dur-
ing this period, and, as the few extracts
hereafter given will show, they embody the
most ardent emotions of which a lover's
soul is capable. It is, indeed, comforting to
ordinary men, who are aware that, at some
time or other in their lives, love has made
fools of them, to find that a great genius
like Goethe was also the victim of the same
and even greater madness. What the let-
ters fail to exhibit, however, is the gentle,
refining influence which Frau von Stein ex-
ercised upon her lover. It was under the
sway of his intercourse with her that he
wrote his " Iphigenia," " Tasso," " Egmont,"
and the first part of "Wilhelm Meister," be-
sides a number of graceful little plays and
spectacles for the Weimar theatre, and
many dainty short poems, like the " Wan-
derer's Night Song " and " Ueber alle Gip-
fel," which are printed with the letters. In
her companionship, also, he practised draw-
ing and painting, studied English, Dutch,
and Italian, and experimented with the mi-
croscope. Her children were frequent vis-
itors at his house. He played with them,
LETTER- WRITING. 91
told them stories, and sometimes kept them
with him overnight. The youngest, Fritz,
he, in a manner, adopted, took him with
•him on his journeys to the neighboring
towns, helped to educate him, and, finally,
established him in an official position. His
letters indicate that his visits to her, except
when interrupted by her absence from Wei-
mar or his own, were made almost daily,
and that she, in turn, visited him as often.
In short, there was between the two that
freedom of thought and complete confi-
dence which is the ideal of friendship, if
not of love.
By the end of December, 1775, or early
in January, 1776, Goethe began to pour out
his feelings to Frau von Stein in the long
series of letters of which mention has been
made. As he jokingly warned her at the
outset : " If this goes on thus from morning
to night there will be a perfect disease of
notes between us." Some days he wrote
to her morning, noon, and night, and the
average of the letters for ten years is one
in four days. It is much to be regretted
that the corresponding letters from Frau
92 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
von Stein to him no longer exist, but, short-
ly before her death, she made him return
them to her, and remorselessly destroyed
them, together with the autograph manu-
scripts of a number of poems which he had
sent her. There is a pretty legend that
Goethe retained one of her notes, burned
it, and preserved the ashes as a memorial,
but this is unsupported by evidence. She,
on her part, carefully kept his letters to her,
and they are now in the possession of her
descendants. The first edition of them
appeared about 1850, and a second, in two
large octavo volumes, corrected and im-
proved, and enriched with a mass of valu-
able notes, was published in 1883.
The total number of the letters in the
manuscript collection is 1624, including
some from others than Goethe. Those
published are numbered up to 965. The
originals are described by the editor as be-
ing mostly on paper of letter and of note size
of various colors, with printed borders, and
written partly in ink and partly in pencil.
Others are on leaves torn out of note books,
and on scraps evidently caught up in haste
UNROMANTIC TOPICS. 93
from the desk or table at which Goethe was
sitting, engaged in his official duties. Many
of them were sent unsealed, and carelessly
folded, as if there was no desire to conceal
their contents. Some of them bear no date,
and, although Frau von Stein had put them
in order, yet, during the plunder of her
house by the French in 1806, they were
mixed up, and now their true succession is
in many cases a matter of conjecture. Still,
by patient labor and research, an arrange-
ment of them has been made which for
practical purposes is sufficient.
Unromantically enough, the very first
of the letters, presumably written early in
January, 1776, begins with thanks for the
gift of — a sausage ! and details of a hurt
to Goethe's eye, caused by the blow of a
whip lash. Likewise, all through the letters
frequent mention is made of presents of
fruit, vegetables, game, and even cooked
dishes, with an abundance of details re-
specting the bodily health of both the lov-
ers. The next letter is more sentimental,
and the next, dated Jan. 15, begins: "I am
glad that I am coming away, to wean my-
94 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
self from you." Other like expressions in-
dicate a passion that had already reached
a high pitch. A day or two after this he
calls Charlotte his "soother" (JBesatiftig-
eriri). By the 28th of January he became
bolder :
" DEAR ANGEL, — I shall not come to the concert,
for I am so well that I cannot see people. Dear
angel, I sent for my letters, and it vexed me that
there was not among them one word from thee, not
even in pencil — no good-night. Dear lady, suffer it
that I hold thee so dear. If I can love any one
more, I will tell thee, will leave thee in peace.
Adieu, Gold, thou comprehendest not how I love
thee."
It will be observed that in this letter
Goethe drops from the formal " you " into
the familiar " thou," a liberty in Germany,
as in France and Italy, permissible only
to an intimate friend. On Feb. 12 he ad-
dresses to his lady-love his "Wanderer's
Night Song," which closes with the words,
" Sweet peace, come, oh, come, into my
heart!" This little poem Frau von Stein
must have shown to her mother, for on the
back of it are written in that pious lady's
CHARLOTTE'S PIETY. 95
hand these words from the Gospel of St.
John : " Peace I leave with you, my peace
I give unto you. Not as the world giveth
give I unto you. Let not your heart be
troubled, neither let it be afraid." Frau
von Stein herself, also, from first to last ex-
hibited a religious turn of mind. She went
to church regularly every Sunday, and, al-
though neglected by her husband and sore-
ly pressed by her impetuous young lover,
she never for a moment, except perhaps
at the very last, faltered in the observance
of her wifely obligations. She seems even
at times to have regarded her acceptance
of Goethe's devotion as a sin, and, as we
shall see further on, speaks of it as such.
Towards the end of February Goethe
writes : " O, that my sister had a brother
such as I in thee have a sister ! Think of
me, and press thy hand to thy lips, for thou
will never wean Gusteln from his naughti-
ness, which will only end with his unrest
and love in the grave." A month later
he says : " I see well, dear lady, when
one loves thee it is as if seed were sown,
and springs unnoticed, unfolds and stands
96 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
there — and God give his blessing to it.
Amen !"
On the 1 4th of April Goethe sends a long
poem, in which occur the lines :
' ' Ah ! thou wert in a former life
Either my sister or my wife."
And again, on the i6th, he writes : "Adieu,
dear sister, since so it must be." Evidently
Frau von Stein had sought to repress the
ardor of her young admirer, and, as other
women have tried to do in like circum-
stances, to keep his passion within the
bounds of a sisterly affection. As usual,
too, she failed at an early stage of the
game. On May i her lover breaks out
with : " To-day will I not see you. Your
presence yesterday made such a wonderful
impression on me that I do not know
whether it be weal or woe with me in the
affair. Farewell, dearest lady."
Failing to check him otherwise, Frau von
Stein must soon after this have appealed
to his regard for her reputation, and have
begged him to consider what the world
would say of his attentions. In reply he
A PASSIONATE OUTBURST. 97
writes May 24, falling back partially into
the formal " you :"
"And so, a relation, the purest, the most beauti-
ful, the truest that I have ever had with any woman,
except my sister, that also is interrupted ! I was
prepared for it. I suffered infinitely for the past
and the future, and for the poor child who went
forth, and whom I devoted that moment to such
suffering. I will not see you. Your presence would
make me sad. If I cannot live with you, your love
helps me as little as the love of my absent ones in
which I am so rich. Presence in the moment of
need decides all, assuages all, strengthens all. The
absent comes with his fire hose when the fire is un-
der. And all that on account of the world. The
world, which can be nothing to me, will not allow
thee to be anything to me. You do not know what
you do. The hand of the lonely prisoner, who
hears not the voice of love, presses hard where it
rests. Adieu, best one."
To this passionate outburst she must
have replied soothingly, for the next day
he writes : " You are always the same, al-
ways endless love and goodness. Forgive
that I make you suffer. I will hereafter
strive to learn to bear it alone." On the
ist of June he becomes sarcastic. "I am
7
98 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
here again, and have come as willingly as I
live — but it must not be — my absence will
have consoled the world somewhat."
For some weeks after this things ran on
smoothly, and the letters indicate more
tranquillity in the writer. July 9 he says :
" Last night I lay in bed half asleep. Philip [his
servant] brought me a letter. I read it in a doze —
that Lilli is betrothed ! turned over and slept on.
How I prayed destiny to deal so with me ! So all
in good time. Dear angel, good-night."
Early in September his beloved seems to
have been again obliged to repress his de-
monstrations, and again he bursts out :
' ' Why shall I plague thee, dearest creature ?
Why cheat myself and plague thee, and so on?
We can be nothing to one another, and are too much
to one another. Believe me, if I spoke as plain as
a string, thou art at one with me in all. But just
because I see things as they are, that makes me
wild. Good-night, angel, and good-morning. I
will not see thee again. Only — thou knowest all —
I have my heart. It is all stupid what I could say.
I see thee henceforth as one sees a star. Think on
that."
A little later he writes : " You have a
A DESPAIRING APPEAL. 99
way of giving pain, as fate has. One can-
not complain of it, however much it hurts."
Again, on the yth of October, he utters this
passionate cry :
" Farewell, best one ! You go, and God knows
what will happen. 1 ought to have been thankful
to Fate, which let me clearly feel the first moment I
saw you again how dear I held you. I ought to
have been satisfied with it and never have seen you
more. Forgive me ; I see now how my presence
plagues you ; how pleasing it is to me that you go.
In the same city I cannot endure it. Yester-
day I brought you flowers and peaches, but could
not give them to you as you were, and so I gave
them to your sister. You seem to me at times like
the Madonna ascending to heaven. In vain the
bereaved one stretches out his arms to her ; in vain
his piercing, tearful sight wishes his own down
again, she has vanished in the glory which sur-
rounds her, full of eagerness for the crown which
floats over her head. Yet, adieu, my love."
Frau von Stein, touched by this de-
spairing appeal, and apparently conscious
of the impression which her ardent young
lover had made upon her heart, wrote
on the back of the paper the following
lines :
100 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
' ' Whether what I feel be wrong,
And if I must expiate my sin so dear,
My conscience will not say to me,
Cancel it, thou, O Heaven ! if ever it accuses me."
After this the intercourse between the
pair seems to have settled down into a
quiet, confidential friendship, which lasted
many months. Goethe's letters contain fre-
quent inquiries after his beloved's health,
written mostly on rising in the morning
and going to bed at night, with informa-
tion concerning his own condition and
feelings, besides references to his literary
work.
In the winter of 1777-8, Goethe made an
expedition into the Harz Mountains, dur-
ing which he wrote almost daily to Frau
von Stein. In September, 1779, he went
on a trip to Switzerland, and on the way
stopped at Sesenheim, where he saw again
his old love Frederika Brion, the pastor's
daughter. He writes a full account of the
interview to Frau von Stein, and assures her,
as he did Frederika, that no trace of his
former passion remained in his heart. The
rest of 1779 he devoted to the Swiss tour,
WILD LONGING. IOI
sending a full narrative of it to Frau von
Stein in letters which he afterwards worked
over and published under the title " Letters
from Switzerland." After returning to Wei-
mar he resumed the customary tenor of his
life, but it was again disturbed by outbreaks
of wild longing. Thus, June 24, 1780, he
writes :
" From my unutterable desire to see you again I
just begin to feel how I love you. Things hang
wonderfully together in men. This craving for you
hits exactly the nerve where the old pain, caused
by not seeing you in Kochberg the first year, had
healed itself ; brings the very sensation forth, and
reminds me, like an old melody, of that time."
Some time in September, 1780, he gave
vent to his feelings in the beautiful song
commencing " Ueber alle Gipfel findest du
Ruh," which Frau von Stein copied on the
back of one of his letters. In October we
find him breaking out once more into a
passionate complaint, almost untranslatable
into English, so confused and involved is
its language :
' ' What you last said to me early this morning has
pained me deeply, and if the duke had not gone
102 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
with me up the mountain I should have wept bit-
terly. One trouble follows another. Yes ; it is a
rage against one's own flesh, when an unhappy one,
to get air for himself, strives through it to injure his
dearest, and, if it were only a paroxysm of temper
and I could be conscious of it ! But I am by my
thousand thoughts so reduced again to a child, un-
acquainted with the moment, doubtful of myself,
that I consume the belongings of another as with a
blazing fire.
' ' I shall never give myself peace until you render
me a verbal account of the past, and for the future
endeavor to persuade yourself into so sisterly a state
that nothing of the kind can again affect it. Other-
wise, I must avoid you in the very moments when I
have most need of you. It seems horrible to me to
spoil the best hours of life, the moments of our com-
panionship ; with you, for whom I would willingly
pull every hair from my head, if I could change it
into a pleasure, and yet to be so blind, so dumb !
Have pity on me ! That all came to the state
of my soul, in which it seemed a pandemonium
filled with invisible spirits, and to the spectator,
fearful as he was, presented only an infinite, empty
vault."
A day or two afterwards he writes : " It
is wonderful, and yet it is so, that I am
jealous and stupid, like a boy, when you
meet others in a friendly manner," which
A PEACEFUL RECORD. 103
may possibly indicate that his trouble was
caused by her favorable treatment of some
other admirer.
The following months exhibit a peaceful
record, and how sweet and soothing her in-
fluence upon him was, during this period,
appears from the concluding paragraph of
a long letter written by him from Neunhei-
ligen, March n, 1781 :
"Adieu, sweet support of my inmost heart. I
see and hear nothing good that I do not at the same
moment share with thee. And all my observations
of the world, and of myself, direct themselves, like
Mark Antony, not to my own, but to my second
self. By means of this dialogue, in which, in re-
spect of everything, I think what you would say to
it, all becomes brighter and worthier to me."
The next day he continues the strain :
" My soul has grown fast to thine. I will make
no word. Thou knowest that I am inseparable from
thee, and that neither height nor depth can sunder
me from thee. I would that there were some vow
or sacrament that would make me thine, visibly and
lawfully. What would it be worth to me ! And
my novitiate has been long enough to make it worth
thinking of. I can no longer write ' you,' as I
could not for a long time say ' thou.'
104 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
' ' On my knees I beg thee to end thy work and to
make me quite good. Thou canst, not only if thou
lovest me ; but thy power is infinitely increased
when thou knowest that I love thee. Farewell."
March 22, he writes :
"Thy love is like the morning and the even-
ing star — it sets after the sun and rises before it.
Rather, it is like the pole star, which never sets,
and which weaves over our heads an ever-living
garland. I pray that the gods may never dim it for
me over the path of my life."
On the 27th of March :
" The openness and peace of my heart which
thou hast again given me be for thee alone, and all
good to others and to myself which springs from it
be also thine. Believe me, I feel quite changed ;
my old benevolence comes back, and with it the joy
of my life. Thou hast given me delight in good,
which I had quite lost."
Again, April 22 :
' ' Last night I had a great mind to throw my ring
into the water, like Polycrates, for I counted up my
happiness in the stillness and found a monstrous
sum."
May 30, he says : " My heart hath hid
ECSTASY. 105
nothing from thine, and when I conceal
faults from thee it is in order not to dis-
tress thy love." Again, Oct. 29 : " Thy
love is the beauteous light of all my days,
thy applause my best renown, and if I
prize a good name abroad it is for thy
sake, that I may not shame thee."
Later, this feeling swelled to a state re-
sembling ecstasy, as the following extracts
will show :
" Feb. ii, 1782. — Say one word to me, Lotte. It is
with me in thy love, as if I dwelt no longer in tents
and huts, but as if I had received the gift of a well-
founded house in which to live and die and keep all
my possessions. Before ten I will see thee a mo-
ment. I cannot say farewell, for I never leave thee."
"March 20. — O, thou best one! All my life I
have had an ideal wish how I would fain be loved,
and have ever sought its fulfilment in vain in dreams
of fancy. Now that the world daily becomes bright-
er to me, I find it at last in thee, in a manner that
I never can lose it."
"March 22. — Farewell, dear life. When thou
writest me that thou hast slept well, it gives me
new strength for the whole day. God keep thee.
Since 1 have had in thy love rest and an abiding
106 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
place, the world is so bright and so dear to me !
Among people I name thy name silently to myself,
and I live away from thee only for thy sake."
"April 9. — Over thy last letter I have had many
sad thoughts, and one night 1 wept bitterly as I
figured to myself that I might lose thee. Against
all which can probably happen to me I have a
counterpoise in myself, but against this one thing
nothing. Hope helps us to live, and I think again
thou art well and will be well when thou receivest
this."
" May 12. — Thou hast set in my eyes and in my
ears little sprites who from all that I see and hear
exact a tribute of reverence for thee."
"June 5. — Tell me, my best, if thou art well. I
have no joyous hour so long as thou art ill."
The month of July, 1782, seems to have
been troubled by a lovers' quarrel, the nat-
ure of which does not appear. The refer-
ences to it in the letters are these :
"July 19. — Tell me, dear Lotte, how wert thou
on getting up. Tell me, is it physical, or hast
thou something on thy soul which makes thee ill ?
Thou dost not believe how thy condition yesterday
pained me. The only interest of my life is that you
should be open with me. I cannot endure reserve."
A LOVERS' QUARREL. 1 07
"July 22. — I will not be troublesome, but only
say this much, that I have not deserved it. That I
feel, and keep silence."
"July 23. — So, thank God, it was a misunder-
standing that led thee to write thy note. I am still
stunned by it. It was like death. There is only
one word and no idea for such a thing."
"July 24. — I hope it will be so, yet I sit and look
before me. It is like a void in my whole being. A
thousand thanks for thy love. I cannot collect my-
self. Do not worry. Thou canst do anything. Oh,
beloved, I will come as soon as 1 can."
" July 25. — I slept long and well ; thy early mes-
sage has been received, and is the first greeting of
the new day. I am a deal better, yet feel lame,
like one struck by lightning, but this will soon pass
off if the one medicine is employed. When I think
of it I shudder again, and I shall never rest until I
am safe for the future."
Then came another tranquil period :
" Aug. 23. — Whatever I write to thee, my pen will
say only, I love ! I love !"
"Aug. 24. — Thou knowest, Lotte, how I love
thee. Thanks for thy note. Good-night. My
thoughts never leave thee."
io8 'GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
"Aug. 25. — At last I get thy leaflet. O, thou
love ! I believe and feel that I am ever in thy
presence."
''Nov. 17. — I roamed over my deserted house as
Melusina did over hers, to which she was not to
return, and I thought of the past, of which I un-
derstand nothing, and of the future, of which I
know nothing. How much I have lost since I had
to leave that quiet abode ! It was the second tie
that held me ; now I hang on thee alone, and,
thank God, this is the strongest. For some days
I have been looking over the letters which have
been written to me the last ten years, and I com-
prehend less and less what I am and what I ought
to be.
'' Abide with me, dear Lotte, thou art my anchor
between these reefs."
"Nov. 21. — Farewell, thou sweet dream of my
life, thou anodyne of my sorrows."
" Nov. 28. — I wish to be only where thou art, for
where thou art there is my heaven."
"Dec. 26. — Adieu, my inmost beloved, to whom
I turn all my thoughts, to whom I refer everything."
" Dec. 29. — O, dear Lotte, I am indebted to thee
for my happiness at home and my pleasure abroad.
The peace, the equanimity with which I accept and
give, rests on the foundation of thy love."
MUSICAL ILLUSTRATIONS. 109
"April 8, 1783. — Farewell, thou sweet joy of my
life, thou only desire of my whole being."
"April 16. — How I think of thee, how present
thou art to me, how thy love guides me like a famil-
iar star, I will not tell thee. I would not increase my
longing while I write to thee. The skies brighten,
and I hope for some good days. I am busy and
employ myself with earthly things on earthly ac-
counts. My inner life is with thee, and my king-
dom not of this world. Adieu, best one."
Here are some musical illustrations, of
various dates :
' ' Thou art heartily good and dear, and yet thou
canst not do too much. For, only a breath, only a
sound which comes over from thee to me, out of
tune, changes the whole atmosphere around me."
"As music is nothing without the human voice,
so would my life be nothing without thy love."
"As a sweet melody lifts us on high, and forms
under our cares and sorrow a soft cloud, so is to me
thy being and thy love."
" The very sight of the Imhof [Charlotte's sister]
gave me pain. She is like the seventh, which makes
the ear long for the chord. "
About the beginning of May, 1783, the
110 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
serenity of the poet's mind seems to have
been again troubled by some occurrence
which, owing to the loss of Frau von Stein's
letters, cannot be now explained. May 4 he
writes :
' ' The way in which thou saidst to me yesterday
evening that thou hadst a story to tell me worried
me a moment. I feared it was something referring
to our love, and I know not why. I have been for
some time in anxiety. How wonderful that the
entire weight of one's happiness should hang on
a single thread like this."
Peace seems to have been restored to
him soon after, and he writes :
"July 3. — The memory of thy love is ever with
me, and my inclination to thee, like the fear of God^
is the beginning of wisdom."
" Sept. 9. — I wish you could be with me all day
invisibly, and in the evening when I am alone step
forth out of the wall. Thou wouldst feel what I feel
with so much joy, that I am and can be thine alone.
How I hope to see thee again a moment. Thou
hast bound me to thee with every bond."
This happy state continued to the end of
1783 and through the first half of 1784 :
QUIET HAPPINESS. Ill
"Jan. 24, 1784. — Yesterday evening I sat up late,
and restrained my longing to be with thee. I thank
thee that thou dost possess so much love for me. It
is my best fortune."
" March 8. — Surely thou must have thought of me
on awaking as I did on thee, for such a love cannot
be one-sided."
"June 5. — Since I am away from thee I have no
object in life. I know not what use to make of
a day when I do not see thee. It pains me most
when I enjoy something good without sharing it with
thee."
"June 12. — I would like to talk to thee always
only of my love. How lonely I am words cannot
express. I see nobody, and when I see anybody I
see only one form before me in the company."
"June 17. — I continually feel my nearness to
thee, thy presence never leaves me. In thee I have
a standard for all women, yea, for all human beings,
and in thy love a standard for every lot. Not that
it makes the rest of the world seem dark, it rather
brightens it. I see right plainly what people are,
what they wish to think, do, and enjoy. I grant
them what is theirs, and delight myself secretly in
comparing my possession of so indestructible a
treasure."
"June 28. — Yes, dear Lotte, now is it first plain
112 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
how thou hast become and remainest my own half.
I am no individual, independent being. All my
weaknesses have I hung upon thee, have protected
my vulnerable points by thee, have supplied by thee
all my defects. When I am far from thee my con-
dition is a strange one. On one side I am armored
and weaponed, on the other like a raw egg, for I
have neglected to harness myself where thou art
shield and shelter. I delight in belonging entirely
to thee, and in soon seeing thee again. I love every-
thing about thee, and everything makes me love thee
more."
In August, 1784, Goethe accompanied the
duke on a short visit to Brunswick ; and as
French was the language used at that court,
his beloved imposed on him the task of
writing to her in that language. He obeyed
reluctantly, saying that he could not bring
himself to express his true sentiments in a
foreign tongue. "Nevertheless," he says,
" I will persevere, for if I ever learn that
language which every one thinks he knows,
it will be by thee, and I shall take pleasure
in owing to thee this talent, as I owe thee so
many things worth much more." A dozen
long letters in French were the result, and
in the course of them he says :
LETTERS IN FRENCH. 113
"Aug. 21. — Ah, my only friend, dear confidante
of all my thoughts, how I feel the need of talking to
thee and communicating all my reflections ! Thou
hast isolated me in the world. I have nothing to say
to anybody. I talk, not to be silent, and that is all."
" Aug. 30. — No ! My love for thee is no longer a
passion ; it is a disease — a disease dearer to me than
the most perfect health, and of which I wish not to
be cured."
This characterization of love as a disease
has been adopted by Stendhal in his
"L' Amour," and he is generally supposed
to have originated it.
The letters continue in a strain of intense
devotion all through 1785 and the first half
of 1786. Goethe was busy with his official
duties, with his literary work, and with su-
perintending the theatrical entertainments
of the court. June 25, 1786, he writes : " Do,
my love, whatever seems best, and it will be
so to me also. Keep only love for me, and let
us at least preserve a good which we shall
never find again, although there be mo-
ments when we cannot enjoy it." In August
he spent a fortnight with his beloved at
Carlsbad, in the same house with her, and
8
114 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
accompanied her to Schneeberg, returning
alone to Carlsbad. From this place he de-
parted suddenly and secretly for Italy on
Sept. 3, under an assumed name, and Frau
von Stein did not hear again from him un-
til she got his letter from Verona dated
Sept. 18.
Endless speculation, in the absence of
positive knowledge, is, of course, possible
as to the causes which led to this sudden
interruption of the lovers' relations. Among
others the celebrated critic, Adolf Stahr, in-
sists that it resulted from Frau von Stein's
tyranny. A review of Goethe's letters,
which he wrote upon their appearance in
1851, he heads with this quotation from
"Vanity Fair:" "She -did not wish to mar-
ry him, but she wished to keep him. She
wished to give him nothing, but that he
should give her all : a bargain not infre-
quently levied in love," and he goes on to
intimate that Goethe, like Dobbin, finally
became impatient of the yoke which Frau
von Stein had imposed upon him :
" It was not Goethe's fault that his love for Frau
von Stein did not find its natural and reasonable re-
FLIGHT TO ITALY. 115
suit and conclusion. From the very first, he sought
and strove for this only true moral conclusion with
all his strength. Charlotte von Stein ought to have
been his wife, the sole companion of his entire ex-
istence. That she did not bring herself to this,
that the strength of her love was not equal to what,
in her case, the duty of true morality commanded,
was, if she shared Goethe's love in full measure,
either a weakness of character, which set form above
substance, worldly appearance above the essence of
morality, or it was a sin against her lover. It was a
sin if her soul entirely belonged to him, and not less
a sin if, as it seems to me, she wanted to be at once
the virtuous spouse of an unloved and insignificant
husband, and the beloved, the soul-friend, the queen
of the greatest genius of his time. It was a sin also
against his future, against his destiny, against his
happiness, against the happiness which he so ar-
dently desired, and which he knew, like few, hpw
to appreciate ; against the happiness which the pos-
session of a home and a family assures in marriage.
If Goethe's development here exhibits a gap, his fate
here a dark place, yea, in his later career a heart-
breaking tragedy, a portion of the blame can never
be removed from a woman who was too petty for
the fortune which the favor of destiny offered her in
preference to so many thousands."
This means — if it means anything — that
Frau von Stein ought to have obtained a
Il6 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
divorce from her husband, and to have
married Goethe, as the first wife of Baron
Imhof was divorced from him and mar-
ried to Warren Hastings ! With notable
inconsistency the same critic a few years
later advanced the opinion that Frau von
Stein had all the while maintained criminal
relations with Goethe, and, as has been
said, a controversy thereupon sprang up,
in which several prominent writers took
part. Unless we mistake greatly, the read-
er who has paid attention to . the facts
which have been presented and has pe-
rused the extracts given from Goethe's let-
ters will have no difficulty in coming to a
conclusion entirely acquitting both him
and his beloved of the offence imputed to
them. If direct testimony were needed,
that of Schiller ought to be decisive, and
he, writing from Weimar in 1787, the
year after Goethe's departure for Italy,
says of Frau von Stein : " This lady pos-
sesses over a thousand letters from Goethe,
and he has written to her from Italy every
week. They say that their intercourse
(umgang) is entirely pure and blameless."
OPINION OF WEIMAR. 117
This being the verdict, on the spot and
at the time, of a little gossipy town like
Weimar, where everybody knew everything
about everybody else, it is idle to seek to
reverse it at this late day. Certainly the
letters of Goethe express the feelings, not
of a triumphant seducer, but of a humble and
unsuccessful suppliant, and show that the ob-
ject of his passion, so far from yielding to it,
checked and resisted it to the utmost.
In confirmation of this view, it may be
further remarked that up to the commence-
ment of his acquaintance with Frau von
Stein all Goethe's love affairs, so far as
anything is known of them, had been pure-
ly romantic. Women loved him devotedly,
but he never took advantage of their love
to do them a wrong. Nearly all of them
married, as Lili did, respectable husbands,
which could not have been the case if they
had fallen from virtue. To suppose that a
lady in Frau von Stein's position should
have been Goethe's first victim is to violate
all probability. The fact that, subsequent-
ly, Christiane Vulpius became his mistress,
proves nothing, since he always treated her
Il8 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
as his wife, and finally married her in due
legal form.
The truth, probably, is that the love of
Frau von Stein for Goethe, sincere as it
may have been, was not that which a wom-
an should feel for a man with whom she is
to hold wifely relations. She was seven
years his senior. His youth and beauty
aroused her maternal instincts, his devo-
tion flattered her vanity, and, proud of his
genius and his reputation, she was willing
to have her name linked with his in public
fame. Goethe, on his part, saw her "through
the medium of love." His fervid imagina-
tion, like that of all lovers, invested her with
charms of his own creation, and the disen-
chantment which finally came would have
come earlier if she had yielded herself to
him. De Musset is right when he says,
" La f emme qui aime un peu, et qui resiste,
n'aime pas assez," but he is not right when
he adds, " et celle qui aime assez et qui
resiste, sait qu'elle est moins aime'e." Love,
like gratitude, is a lively sense of favors ex-
pected. It is but a step from satisfaction
to satiety, and satiety is the grave of love.
A NEW THEORY. 119
Whether she loved little or much, Frau von
Stein, if she had not resisted Goethe, would
not only have been loved less by him, but
soon would not have been loved at all.
That she did that which Stahr blames her
for doing was the reason why she kept
her lover's affection so long, and if she had
not done it his character would never have
been refined and improved as it was.
It is, nevertheless, possible, but, as the
hypothesis has never before been advanced
by any one who has written upon the sub-
ject, it is submitted here with diffidence,
that Frau von Stein, worn out with Goethe's
importunities, or perhaps, yielding to the
passion which his ardent devotion kindled
in her heart, had, during his stay with her in
Carlsbad in August, 1786, consented to fly
with him to Italy, and there spend the rest
of her days with him. At the last moment,
however, she repented of her promise, and
refused to keep it. Goethe, none the less
loving her, would not and did not change
his plans, and, since she would not accom-
pany him, he went without her. It was an
act of revolt against her on his part, which
120 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
she felt to be the beginning of his emanci-
pation from her influence, as, in fact, it was.
Hence her grief at his going, and hence the
accepted opinion that his projected journey
was as much a secret to her as it was to the
rest of the world. But she knew of his
plans and was informed by him of his in-
tended departure. It was no surprise to
her, and the pain it caused her arose not
from his want of confidence, but from the
fact that he left her at all.
The proof that Goethe once expected
Frau von Stein to accompany him to Italy
is found in his letter to her dated at Carls-
bad, Aug. 23, 1776, which, in the collection
as originally published, is the last written
before he went away. In this letter the
following passage occurs :
"In any event, I must stay another week, but
then, also, all will gently come to an end and the
fruit fall ripe. And then will I live with thee in
the free world, and, in happy solitude, without name
and rank, come nearer to the earth out of which we
were taken."
The obvious meaning of this language is
that Frau von Stein was to go with Goethe.
WHAT GOETHE EXPECTED. 121
In his previous letters he had frequently, as
we have seen, expressed his overwhelming
desire to have her with him constantly, and
he again and again laments the necessity of
being separated from her even for a few
days. It is true that he made his prepara-
tions for the journey to Italy with great se-
crecy and started upon it under an assumed
name. But that Frau von Stein did not
know that he was going, letters from Goethe
to her, first published by the Goethe Gesell-
schaft in 1886, show to be an error. These
letters appear to have been sent back to
Goethe along with the rest of his letters
from Italy to enable him to make up his
" Italian Journey," and thus were not print-
ed with the others. In that dated Aug. 30,
1776, a week after the letter last above
mentioned, he wrote from Carlsbad :
" Now, dearest, the end approaches. Sunday, the
3d September, I think I shall get away from here.
' ' When shall I hear from thee again ? I am thine
with my whole soul, and enjoy life only in thee.
From here I will write once again. "
On Sept. i he writes from the same place :
122 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
"Yet one more farewell from Carlsbad. Mrs.
Waldner will bring this with her. Of all that she
can tell, I say nothing, but I repeat to thee that I
love thee heartily, that our last journey to Schnee-
berg made me right happy, and that only thy assur-
ance that joy comes to thee from my love can bring
joy to my life. I have hitherto borne much in si-
lence, and have desired nothing so longingly as that
our relation may put'itself upon such a footing that
no power can affect it. Else I will not dwell near
thee, and will rather remain lonely in the world into
which I am now going forth. If I am not out in
my calculation, thou canst, by the end of Septem-
ber, secure a roll of drawings from me, but which
thou must show to no one in the world. Then shall
thou learn whither thou canst write to me.
' ' Thou shalt soon hear from me. Adieu. "
Finally, on Sept. 2, he writes :
"At last, at last, I am ready, and yet not ready,
for properly I have eight days' work to do here, but
I will away, and say to thee once more adieu ! Fare-
well, thou sweet heart. I am thine.
" Night. To-morrow, Sunday, Sept. 3, 1 go from
here. No one knows it yet ; no one guesses my de-
parture to be so near."
These same letters contain instructions
to Frau von Stein respecting the use of
those which he was to write to her from
LAST WORDS OF LOVE. 123
Italy and of the diary of his travels which he
promised to send to her from time to time.
That he had no idea of escaping from her
is shown by his first letter from Italy dated
at Verona, Sept. 18 :
"On a little leaflet give I my beloved a sign of
life, without yet telling her where I am. I am well,
and wish to share with thee every good that I enjoy,
a wish which often comes over me with longing.
" Tell nobody anything of what you receive. It
is for the present for thee alone.
" Greet me Fritz. It troubles me often that he
is not with me. Had I known what I now know I
had brought him with me."
From Venice, in October, he writes in a
similar strain, and then, in the original pub-
lished collection, we find the following, dat-
ed at Terni, Oct. 27 :
' ' Again sitting in a cavern which a year ago suf-
fered an earthquake, I direct my prayer to thee, my
dear guardian angel. I feel now for the first time
how spoiled I have been living ten years with thee,
loved by thee, and now in a strange world. I fore-
saw it, and only the highest necessity could compel
me to make the decision.
"Let us have no other thought than to end our
lives together."
124 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
This last sentence indicates that he had
not yet given up hope of persuading his
beloved to link herself to him permanent-
ly, and in all the other letters which he
wrote to her from Italy similar expressions
of devotion abound.
But Goethe, as Frau von Stein seems to
have felt, had, unconsciously to himself, en-
tered upon an experience which was des-
tined to produce a fundamental, revolution
in his character, and to break up forever
his tender relations with her. His stay in
Italy, which was originally intended to last
only six months, was prolonged to a year,
and finally to nearly two years. He visited
picture-galleries, palaces, and cities, he stud-
ied art, music, and science, he became ac-
quainted with distinguished men and wom-
en, and, what was more destructive than
anything else to Frau von Stein's dominion
over him, he fell desperately in love with a
pretty girl from Milan. When, therefore, in
June, 1788, he returned to Weimar, he was
no longer the same Goethe that he was
when he went away. His twenty -two
months of absence had done the work of
CHRISTIANE VULPIUS.
CHRISTIANE VULPIUS. 125
many years. His friends noticed the
change, and, as was natural, he thought it
had taken place in them. Frau von Stein
especially, who during his absence had
been saddened by the death of her son
Ernest, he reproached with receiving him
coldly, and he was particularly offended
because she refused to listen to the rev-
elations which, with a singular want of
delicacy, he offered to make her concern-
ing his Italian love affair. He could not
comprehend how repulsive to a woman of
refinement such stories are, and she, on
her part, was properly disgusted with his
coarseness. He proceeded to justify her
opinion of his deterioration by taking, in
practical though not formal marriage,
Christiane Vulpius, a curly - haired, red-
cheeked, plump young damsel, whose only
merits were her health, physical beauty,
and skill in housekeeping. Within less
than a month he had installed this female
in his house, and was living with her as
his wife. Frau von Stein did not learn
of the relation between the pair until the
following year, and then, although Goethe
126 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
' blunderingly tried to convince her that it
would not conflict with his devotion to
her, she insisted that he must give up
either Christiane or herself. He, man-like,
stood by his new love, and, thereafter, for
years, his intercourse with Frau von Stein
was purely casual. She refused to answer
his letters, and had his portrait taken down
from the wall of her room. He met her
at court and at friends' houses, but she
treated him as a stranger.
How keenly Frau von Stein felt Goethe's
defection may be imagined. It was to her
a calamity worse than his death. The
dead are buried out of sight, and their
memory is refined and glorified by the very
affection which they inspired. But the liv-
ing, fallen in our esteem, and, as it were,
degrading the ideal we once had of them,
are a constant thorn in the flesh. What
they are reminds us only too painfully of
what they once were, and does not allow
the wounded heart to heal. This was the
effect produced upon Frau von Stein by
the presence of Goethe after his return
from Italy. Caroline von Beulwitz writes
END OF THE ROMANCE. 127
of her to Schiller in 1789 : " She was sunk in
silent grief over her relations with Goethe,
and, so, appeared to me truer and more
harmonious than in unnatural indifference
or contempt." In 1791 Frau von Stein
herself writes to her son Fritz : " Write to
Goethe ; there are already letters from the
living to the dead." In 1795 she says to
Schiller's wife : " It seems to me as if I had
for some years been shut up in a South
Sea island, and had only just begun to
think of the way home." In another letter
to Schiller's wife in 1796 she says, refer-
ring to Herder's cynicism : " Nothing cures
one of such a condition like having a real-
ly painful experience. Thus was I, by
Goethe's departure, cured of all my pre-
vious sorrows. I can bear everything and
forgive everything." With all this she
evinced a certain degree of feminine pique.
Her friend the Duchess Louise had to
chide her for the bitterness with which she
spoke of her old lover, and her resentment
against the woman who had taken him
from her knew no bounds. She called her
" that creature," Goethe's " demoiselle," and
128 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
as late as 1801 she wrote to her son Fritz
that Goethe had passed her in the park
with his " chambermaid " at his side, and
that she put up her parasol to avoid salut-
ing him. She even ridiculed Goethe's own
personal appearance, saying in a letter to
Fritz, in 1796, that he seemed to her to
have grown " horribly fat," and, referring
to his own phrase in his letter from Carls-
bad of Aug. 23, 1776, before quoted, she
remarks : " He has, indeed, gone back to
the earth from whence we were taken."
Elsewhere she calls him " poor Goethe "
and "the fat privy -councillor," and says
that she pities him. His literary produc-
tions she depreciates in the same way.
She finds them inferior in refinement and
elevation to his earlier works, remarking of
" Hermann and Dorothea," which appeared
in 1797 : "It is a pity that the illusion of
the wife who cooks at the cleanly hearth
should be destroyed by Miss Vulpius."
Speaking also of the second part of "Wil-
helm Meister," published in 1796, she char-
acterizes the female personages in it as
"women of indecent behavior," and says
RESENTMENT AND RECONCILIATION. 129
that "where noble feelings in human nat-
ure are occasionally brought into action
the whole is daubed with mud, in order to
leave nothing heaven-like, and as if the
devil wished to show that the world is not
mistaken in him, and that no one should
believe him to be better than he is."
But time, which deadens all passions,
finally allayed much of the irritation which
Frau von Stein felt towards Goethe, while
his uniform good-nature and the kindness
with which he cared for her son Fritz
helped to soften her feelings towards him.
His friendship with Schiller, whose wife
was also her intimate friend, created an
additional bond of union ; his dangerous
illness in 1801 revealed to her how dear
he was still to her at the bottom of her
heart, and thus, step by step, something
like affection was restored between the
pair. But the charm of the old days was
gone, the formal "you" appears in his
letters to her in place of the " thou " which
marks those of the former years, and they
were no longer the impetuous autographs
sent two or three times a day, but were
9
130 GOETHE AND CHARLOTTE VON STEIN.
written at great intervals and by the hand
of a secretary.
Frau von Stein died peacefully of old age
in 1827, five years before Goethe, having
left instructions that, in order to avoid giv-
ing him pain, her coffin should not be car-
ried past his dwelling. He himself did not
attend her funeral, but sent his son to rep-
resent him. Since her burial a new path
has been laid out in the cemetery over her
grave, and nothing now marks the spot
where her remains repose.
MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
LIKE all men of artistic temperament,
Mozart was extremely impressible by the
charms of women. His love affairs, which
commenced early, were many and frequent,
but only one of them, the last before his
marriage, was at all serious, or productive
of any great effect upon his character. The
object of his passion in this instance was
Aloysia Weber, a cousin of the composer,
Carl Maria von Weber, and the elder sister
of the Constance Weber who afterwards be-
came his wife.
Mozart's wonderful musical genius and
the surpassing excellence of his produc-
tions have quite overshadowed, in common
estimation, his personal merit. Indeed, a
conviction prevails that his intellectual abil-
132 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
ities were inferior, his character weak, and
his habits dissipated. The truth, on the
contrary, is that he was extremely intelli-
gent, his weakness was nothing but the
necessary accompaniment of a warm and
affectionate temper, and his dissipation al-
most entirely imaginary. He was, indeed,
fond of wine, as he was of women, but he
was as far from being a drunkard as he
was from being a libertine. All the evi-
dence goes to show that his conduct was,
from first to last, morally irreproachable,
and that his misfortunes came from his un-
selfishness, and from the too great confi-
dence which he placed in those who pre-
tended to be his friends. As is not un-
common with men of genius, he lacked
worldly wisdom, and had little of the busi-
ness talent requisite for worldly success.
Mozart as a child was distinguished
not more by his precocious musical tal-
ents than by his loving disposition. An-
dreas Schlachtner, the court trumpeter,
who was an intimate friend of the Mozart
family and a constant companion of the
little boy, says that "Ten times a day at
MOZART'S CHARACTER. 133
least he would ask me whether I loved
him, and when I sometjjnes said, for fun,
that I did not, tears sprang to his eyes, so
tender and kindly was his good heart."
Every night before he went to bed he
would stand on a chair and sing with his
father a little tune which he had himself
composed to some nonsense words resem-
bling Italian, and during the singing and
after it he would kiss his father on the tip
of his nose. When he was ten years old
he happened to make a visit to a convent,
and to find there a former friend to whom
he was much attached. He immediately
climbed upon him, patted his cheeks, and
greeted him in a brief chant, which he af-
terwards wrote out into an offertory and
sent to his friend as a birthday gift. For
his father and mother and only sister his
love knew no bounds, and he used as a
child to say that when his father grew to
be old he would put him in a glass case to
keep him safe and have him always with
him. His generosity made him a constant
victim of those with whom he had dealings.
He gave away some of his finest composi-
134 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
tions, was defrauded of his copyright on
many others, and he did an endless amount
of work for which he received no compen-
sation.
This natural lovingness and confiding-
ness were encouraged rather than repressed
by his education. His father, though
stern, was most affectionate, and his moth-
er was as devoted to him as he was to her.
Both parents were pious Roman Catholics,
and brought up their son in the strictest
religious and moral principles. The fa-
ther's letters to him, long after he was
grown up, contain frequent injunctions to
observe his devotional duties, and his an-
swers show that these injunctions were
heeded. His filial respect and obedience
were as remarkable as his filial affection.
His favorite saying was, " Next to God,
papa," and, as we shall see, he never let his
own inclinations stand in the way of the
parental commands. Of his principles in
regard to women, he says himself, writing
to his father at the age of twenty-two : " Be-
lieve what you please of me, only nothing
bad. There are people who think no one
ROMANTIC IDEAS. 135
can love a poor girl without evil designs.
But I am no Brunetti, no Misliweczeck. I
am a Mozart, and though young, still a
high - principled Mozart." His lofty and
romantic ideas of marriage are likewise
charmingly exhibited in another letter to
his father, in which he says :
" Mr. von Scheidenhofen might have let me know,
through you, that his wedding was soon to take place,
and I would have composed a new minuet for the oc-
casion. I cordially wish him joy ; but his is, after all,
only one of those money matches, and nothing else !
I hope never to marry in this way. I wish to make
my wife happy, but not to become rich by her means ;
so I will let things alone, and enjoy my golden free-
dom till I am so well off that I can support both wife
and children. Mr. von Scheidenhofen was forced to
marry a rich wife : his rank imposed this on him.
The nobility must never marry from liking and love,
but from interest and various other considerations.
It would not at all suit a grandee to love his wife af-
ter she had done her duty and brought into the world
an heir to the property. But we poor humble people
are privileged not only to choose a wife who loves us
and whom we love, but we may, can, and do take
such a one because we are neither noble nor high
born nor rich, but, on the contrary, lowly, humble,
and poor. We therefore need no wealthy wife, for
our riches, being in our heads, die with us, and these
136 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
no man can deprive us of unless he cut them off, in
which case we need nothing more. "
While intellectually, apart from his musi-
cal endowments, Mozart was not a great
man, his letters and all the anecdotes re-
lated of him show him to have been lively,
witty, and agreeable. He could read, write,
and speak Italian and French as well as he
could German, and on occasion could turn
out rhymes with great facility. In society,
he was noted for his rollicking fun and gay-
ety, and his remarks were often irresistibly
droll. These qualities, and his convivial
habits, are what gave him the reputation of
being dissipated, but unjustly so. He was
also a good dancer, and played billiards and
skittles with great zeal and skill.
Though Mozart was extremely susceptible
of love for women, and his talents should
have commended him to their favor, his ex-
ternal appearance rather interfered with his
success with them. His father and mother
were reputed to be the handsomest couple
in Salzburg, where they lived, but they failed
to transmit to him their advantages. He
was, indeed, slim and well proportioned, but
PERSONAL APPEARANCE. 137
his stature was small and his figure insignif-
icant. His complexion was pale, and his
face in no respect striking, except when it
was illuminated by the fire of his genius in
playing or in composing. His eyes were
well formed and of a good size, with fine eye-
brows and lashes, but as a rule they looked
languid, and his gaze was restless and ab-
sent. Like all little men, he was very par-
ticular about his dress, and wore a great
deal of embroidery and jewelry.
Until he was twenty- one Mozart seems
never to have been allowed to go out into
the world alone. In all his professional
travels he was accompanied by his father,
who did not leave him for a moment. At
last, in September, 1777, the anxious parent
reluctantly consented to remain in Salz-
burg, while his son went with his mother on
a tour to Munich and other cities, with the
purpose of ultimately visiting Paris. He
bore up bravely till the travellers actually
started, and then went to his bedroom ex-
hausted with the anguish of parting. Sud-
denly he remembered that in his distress
he had forgotten to give his son his bless-
138 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
ing. He rushed to the window with out-
stretched hand, but the carriage was al-
ready out of sight.
How Mozart enjoyed his newly acquired
liberty, and the use he made of it, espe-
cially with reference to the fair sex, are
summed up by his father in a letter which
he wrote to him at Mannheim in February,
1778. The details given in this letter pre-
sent an accurate picture of Mozart's charac-
ter as it appeared to one who knew him best.
" Your journey led you to Munich ; you know the
purpose ; it was not to be accomplished. Well-
meaning friends wished to have you there ; you want-
ed to stay there. You fell into the notion of bring-
ing a company together. I cannot repeat the par-
ticulars. At that moment you thought the project
feasible. I did not ; read over what I said in an-
swer to you. You are a man of honor ; would it
have done you honor to depend upon ten persons
and their monthly charity? Then, you were won-
derfully captivated by a little singer of the theatre,
and wanted nothing better than to help the German
stage. Then, you explained that you could never
write a comic opera ! No sooner were you outside
of the gate of Munich than your whole friendly com-
pany of subscribers forgot you, and what would have
happened in Munich now ?
MANNHEIM. 139
"In the end God's providence showed itself. In
Augsburg you had another little scene — a merry
time with my brother's daughter, who must needs
send you her portrait. The rest I wrote you in my
first letter to Mannheim. In Wallerstein you
cracked a thousand jokes, danced here and there,
so that people thought you a jolly, merry, foolish,
occasionally absent-minded creature, which gave Mr.
Beecke the opportunity of depreciating your merit,
which by your compositions and by the playing of
your sister had been set in another light with the
two gentlemen, for she always said: ' I am only my
brother's pupil,' so that they had the greatest re-
spect for your skill, and preferred it to the bad work
of Beecke.
" In Mannheim you did nicely, to ingratiate your-
self with Mr. Cannabich ! It would have been fruit-
less if he had not sought a twofold end. The rest I
have already written to you. The daughter of Mr.
Cannabich was overwhelmed with praises, the picture
of her temperament expressed in the adagio of the
sonata ; in short, she was now the favorite person.
Then you made the acquaintance of Mr. Wendling.
He, now, was the noblest friend, and what happened
I need not repeat. In a moment comes the acquaint-
ance with Mr. Weber. Everything else passes away;
this family is now the honestest, Christianest family,
and the daughter is the chief person of the tragedy
to be enacted between her family and yours, and all
that you, in the giddiness in which your good heart,
140 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
open to everybody, has put you, imagine her without
sufficient consideration to be."
Mozart had been at Mannheim since the
end of October, 1777. The city was the
capital of the Palatinate, the elector of
which, Charles Theodore, was a noted pa-
tron of both music and literature, and had
gathered at his court, besides writers like
Lessing, Wieland, and Klopstock, some of
the finest musicians and composers in Ger-
many. Among them were Schweitzer, who
set to music Wieland's "Alceste;" the pian-
ist Vogler, the celebrated tenor Raaff, for
whom Mozart wrote some beautiful airs ;
the singers Dorothea Wendling and Fran-
cisca Danzi, the violinists Cannabich and
Cramer, the flutist Wendling, the oboists
Le Brun and Raum, the bassoonist Ritter,
and the horn-player Lang. Mozart, indeed,
complains in one of his letters that the
elector's orchestra surpassed his singers so
much that he had to write his music more
for the instruments than for the voices.
That he enjoyed staying in the place im-
mensely appears not only from his father's
account just quoted, but from his own. The
ALOYSIA'S TALENT. 141
Cannabich of whom his father speaks was
the leader of the orchestra as well as a
violinist, and to his daughter Mozart gave
lessons on the piano, besides writing for
her a sonata. He next met Wendling, the
flute-player, who also had a daughter, Rosa,
who played the piano, and for her, too, he
composed a sonata.
Finally, about the beginning of the year
1778 Mozart was introduced to the Weber
family and became captivated with the sing-
ing of the second daughter, Aloysia, a girl
of only fifteen, who inspired him, first by
her musical talent, and afterwards by her
personal charms, with profound affection.
His biographer, Jahn, calls it " a passionate
love," and Nohl, " his first true love." The
beginning of their acquaintance and of his
attachment to her, Mozart describes in a
letter dated Jan. 17, 1778 :
" Next Wednesday I am going for some days to
Kirchheim-Poland, the residence of the Princess of
Orange. I have heard so much praise of her here
that at last I have resolved to go. A Dutch officer,
a particular friend of mine, was much upbraided for
not bringing me with him when he went to offer his
142 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
New- Year's congratulations. I expect to receive at
least eight louis d'or, for as she has a passionate ad-
miration of singing, I have had four airs copied out for
her. I will also present her with a symphony, for she
has a very nice orchestra and gives a concert every day.
' ' Besides, the copying of the airs will not cost me
much, for a certain Mr. Weber, who is going there
with me, has copied them. He has a daughter who
sings admirably and has a lovely pure voice. She is
only fifteen. She fails in nothing but stage action ;
were it not for that she might be the prima-donna of
any theatre. Her father is a downright honest Ger-
man, who brings up his children well, for which very
reason the girl is presented here. He has six chil-
dren, five girls and a son. He and his wife and
children have been obliged to live for the last four-
teen years on an income of 200 florins, but, as he has
always done his duty well, and has lately provided a
very accomplished lady singer for the elector, he has
now, actually, 400 florins. My aria for De Amicis
she sings to perfection, with all its tremendous pas-
sages. She is to sing it in Kirchheim-Poland."
The visit to Kirchheim was made as in-
tended, and by Feb. 2, 1778, Mozart was
writing to his father from Mannheim an ac-
count of it. The party left Mannheim, he
says, on a Friday morning in a covered
carriage, and reached Kirchheim at four in
MOZART S ADMIRATION. 143
the afternoon. On Saturday evening Miss
Weber sang at court, and again on Tues-
day and Wednesday, besides playing the
piano twice. Of her performance on this
instrument Mozart speaks in high praise,
and adds: "What surprises me most is that
she reads music so well. Only think of her
playing my difficult sonatas at sight, slowly,
but without missing a single note. I give
you my honor I would rather hear my sona-
tas played by her than by Vogler." For his
services and for the four symphonies which
he presented to the princess he received
seven louis d'or, and Aloysia, for her sing-
ing, five, which disappointed him, as he had
expected that each of them would get eight
louis d'or. With characteristic cheerfulness
he adds : " We were not, however, losers, for
I have a profit of forty-two florins, and the
inexpressible pleasure of becoming better
acquainted with worthy, upright Christian
people and good Catholics. I regret much
not having known them long ago."
What attractions Aloysia possessed be-
yond her musical gifts is unknown. She
never became celebrated for her beauty, and
144 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
her character, at her age, must have been
still undeveloped. Mozart himself, writing
of her three years after, says she was un-
grateful to her parents and left them with-
out assistance when she was making money
for herself as a singer, and a little later,
when he had fallen in love with her sister,
he speaks of her as "false, unprincipled,
and a coquette." But of her excellent sing-
ing and playing there was no question, and
in listening to her, teaching her, and com-
posing for her Mozart was enraptured.
One consequence of this attachment was
to put an end to a project which Mozart
had formed, with the approval of his moth-
er, of proceeding to Paris in company with
the flute-player, Wendling, and his daugh-
ter Rosa, Ramm, the oboist, and Ritter, the
bassoonist. Wendling was to direct the
party, as he professed to have a thorough
knowledge of Paris and its ways. How
completely Mozart's opinion of him had
changed will appear from what he writes
soon after the trip to Kirchheim :
" Now comes something urgent, about which I re-
quest an answer. Mamma and I have discussed the
PLANNING A TOUR. 145
matter, and we agree that we do not like the sort of
life the Wendlings lead. Wendling is a very honor-
able and kind man, but, unhappily, devoid of re-
ligion, and the whole family are the same. I say
enough when I tell you his daughter was a most dis-
reputable character. Ramm is a good fellow, but a
libertine. I know myself, and I have such a sense
of religion that I shall never do anything which I
would not do before the whole world ; but I am
alarmed even at the very thought of being in the so-
ciety of people whose mode of thinking is so entirely
different from mine (and from that of all good peo-
ple). But, of course, they must do as they please. I
have no heart to travel with them, nor could I enjoy
one pleasant hour, nor know what to talk about, for,
in short, I have no great confidence in them. Friends
who have no religion cannot be long our friends. I
have already given them a hint of this by saying
that during my absence three letters had arrived, of
which I could divulge nothing further than that it
was unlikely I should be able to go with them to
Paris, but that perhaps I might come later, or possi-
bly go elsewhere ; so they must not depend on me.
I shall be able to finish my music now quite at
my ease for De Jean, who is to give me 200 florins
for it.
" I can remain here as long as I please, and neither
board nor lodging costs me anything. In the mean-
time Mr. Weber will endeavor to make various en-
gagements for concerts with me, and then we shall
IO
146 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
travel together. If I am with him it is just as if I
were with you. This is the reason that I like him
so much ; except in personal appearance he resem-
bles you in all respects, and has exactly your charac-
ter and mode of thinking. If my mother were not, as
you know, too comfortably lazy to write, she would
say precisely what I do. I must confess that I much
enjoyed my excursion with them. We were pleased
and merry. I heard a man converse just like you. I
had no occasion to trouble myself about anything ;
what was torn I found repaired. In short, I was
treated like a prince.
"I am so attached to this oppressed family that
my greatest wish is to make them happy, and per-
haps I may be able to do so. My advice is that they
should go to Italy, so I am all anxiety for you to
write to our good friend Lugiati, and the sooner the
better, to inquire what are the highest terms given to
a prima-donna in Verona ; the more the better, for it
is always easy to accept lower terms. Perhaps it
would be possible to obtain the Ascensa in Venice.
I will be answerable with my life for her singing and
her doing credit to my recommendation. She has
even during this short period derived much profit
from me, and how much further progress she will
have made by that time ! I have no fears, either, with
regard to her acting.
"If this plan be realized, Mr. Weber, his two
daughters, and I will have the happiness of visiting
my dear papa and sister for a fortnight on our way
MUSICAL AMBITION. 147
through Salzburg. My sister will find a friend and
companion in Miss Weber, for, like my sister in Salz-
burg, she enjoys the best reputation here, owing to
the careful way in which she has been brought up ;
the father resembles you, and the whole family that
of Mozart. They have, indeed, detractors, as with us,
but when it comes to the point they must confess the
truth, and truth lasts longest. I should be glad to go
with them to Salzburg, that you might hear her. My
air that De Amicis used to sing, and the bravura air
Parto m'affretto, and Dalla sponda tenebrosa, she
sings splendidly. Pray do all you can to insure our
going to Italy together. You know my greatest de-
sire is to write operas.
" I will gladly write an opera for Verona for thirty
zecchini, solely that Miss Weber may acquire fame
by it ; for if I do not I fear she may be sacrificed.
Before then I hope to make so much money by visit-
ing different places that I shall be no loser. I think
we shall go to Switzerland, perhaps also to Holland:
pray write me soon about this. Should we stay long
anywhere the eldest daughter would be of the great-
est use to us ; for we could have our own manage, as
she understands cooking.
"Send me an answer soon, I beg. Don't forget
my. wish to write an opera. I could almost weep
from vexation when I hear or see an aria. But Ital-
ian, not German — stria, not buff a ! I have not writ-
ten you all that is in my heart. My mother is satis-
fied with my plan."
148 MOZART AND ALOYSlA WEBER.
Mozart was mistaken about his mother's
approval, for she adds to his letter this
postscript :
1 ' No doubt you perceive by the accompanying
letter that when Wolfgang makes new friends he
would give his life for them. It is true that she
does sing incomparably ; still we ought not to lose
sight of our own interests. I never liked his being
in the society of Wendling and Ramm, but I did
not venture to object to it, nor would he have list-
ened to me, but no sooner did he know these We-
bers than he instantly changed his mind. In short,
he prefers other people to me, for I remonstrate
with him sometimes, and that he does not like. I
write this quite secretly, while he is at dinner, for
I don't wish him to know it."
The project which Mozart had formed of
giving up his proposed visit to Paris and of
attempting instead to establish his beloved
as a prima-donna in an Italian town seemed
to his father sheer lunacy. He took time
to prepare himself, and in two long letters,
one dated Feb. 12 and the other Feb. 16,
he went over the ground carefully, and ex-
hausted every argument of prudence, rea-
son, and affection to defeat the scheme.
He recounted his own privations, the per-
PATERNAL REMONSTRANCES. 149
sonal sacrifices he had made to educate
his son, and the dependence of the entire
family upon his success in his career. "The
future destiny of your old parents and of
your loving sister is in your hands." " I
place in your filial love all my confidence
and all my hope." " It depends on your
decision whether you shall be a common
musician whom the world forgets, or a re-
nowned composer of whom posterity and
history shall speak ; whether, infatuated
with a pretty face, you one day breathe
your last upon straw, your wife and chil-
dren starving, or whether, after a happy,
Christianly spent life, you die in honor and
wealth, respected, as well as your family,
by the whole world." And he ends with
this touching appeal :
1 ' I know that you love me not alone as your fa-
ther, but as your truest and surest friend ; that you
know and consider that our fortune and misfortune,
yes, my longer life or early death, are, so to speak,
under God, in your hands. If I know you, I have
nothing but happiness to expect, which in your ab-
sence, which robs me of the fatherly pleasure of see-
ing you and embracing you, is my only comfort.
150 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
Live as a good Catholic Christian, love and fear God,
pray to Him with devotion and faith and full earnest-
ness, and conduct yourself in so Christian a manner
that if I never see you again my deathbed may not be
sorrowful. I give you from my heart my fatherly
blessing, and I am till death your faithful father and
surest friend."
The result to which all these affectionate
exhortations were directed was to induce
Mozart to quit Mannheim at once and start
for Paris. " Off with you to Paris, and that
soon ; put yourself into the company of
great people. Aut Cassar, aut nihil 7 The
single thought of seeing Paris ought to have
preserved you from passing fancies. From
Paris proceeds fame and name for a man of
great talent, over the whole world. The
nobility treat genius with the greatest con-
descension, esteem, and courtesy."
The appeal was successful. Mozart re-
plied on the i gth of February, submissively :
' ' I always thought that you would disapprove of my
journey with the Webers, but I never had any such
intentions — I mean, under present circumstances. I
gave them my word of honor to write to you to that
effect. Mr. Weber does not know how we stand,
FILIAL SUBMISSION. 151
and I certainly shall tell it to no one. I wish my
position had been such that I had no cause to
consider any one else, and that we were all inde-
pendent ; but in the intoxication of the moment I
forgot the present impossibility of the affair, and also
to tell you what I had done. The reasons of my not
being now in Paris must be evident to you from my
last two letters. If my mother had not first begun
on this subject I certainly should have gone with my
friends ; but when I saw that she did not like it I
began to dislike it also. When people lose confi-
dence in me I am apt to lose confidence in myself.
The days when, standing on a chair, I sang Oragna
fiagata fa, and kissed the tip of your nose, are in-
deed gone by ; but still, have my reverence, love, and
obedience towards yourself ever failed on that ac-
count ? I say no more."
The surrender cost Mozart an illness
which for two days confined him to the
house, and on the 22d of February he
writes : " You must forgive my not writing
much at this time. But I really cannot. I
am so afraid of bringing back my headache,
and besides I feel no inclination to write to-
day. It is impossible to write all we think,
at least I find it to be so. I would rather
say it than write it. My last letter told you
the whole thing just as it stands." The
152 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
next week he devoted to composing an aria
suited to Aloysia's voice, and gave it to her
as a farewell present. On the 7th of March
he writes to his father again :
' ' I have received your letter of the 26th February,
and am much obliged to you for all the trouble you
have taken about the arias, which are quite accurate
in every respect. ' Next to God, papa, ' was my
motto when a child, and I still think the same. You
are right when you say that ' knowledge is power ; '
besides, except your trouble and fatigue, you will
have no cause for regret, and Miss Weber certainly
deserves your kindness. I only wish that you could
hear her sing my new aria, which I lately mentioned
to you. I say hear her sing it, because it seems made
expressly for her ; a man like you, who really un-
derstands what portamento in singing means, would
certainly feel the most intense pleasure in hearing
her."
Having taken his resolution, Mozart lost
no time in executing it. He went around
and bade adieu to his friends, ending with
the Webers. He describes his parting visit
to them in the first letter which he wrote to
his father from Paris. After recounting
how Mrs. Weber knitted two pairs of mit-
tens for him, and how Mr. Weber gave him
A SORROWFUL PARTING. 153
a copy of Moliere's plays, saying to his
mother that he was the family's benefactor
and best friend, he concludes :
"The day before I set off they would insist on my
supping with them, but I managed to give them two
hours before supper instead. They never ceased
thanking me and saying they only wished they were
in a position to testify their gratitude, and when I
went away they all wept Pray forgive me, but real-
ly tears come to my eyes when I think of it. Weber
came down-stairs with me, and remained standing
at the door till I turned the corner and called out
'Adieu.' "
Mozart arrived in Paris with his mother
March 13, 1778, and immediately set about
visiting great people, giving concerts, and
writing music. He gained reputation by
his efforts, but not much money, and had
besides to suffer the affliction of losing his
mother by death, about the end of July.
At last, weary, sad, and hopeless of suc-
cess, he gave up, at the beginning of Octo-
ber, and turned his face homeward. Dur-
ing his stay in Paris he had but little cor-
respondence with Miss Weber, though he
frequently mentions her in his letters to his
154 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
father, and expresses his satisfaction with
her success in her profession. The elector
of the Palatinate had early in the year be-
come elector of Bavaria, and had removed
his court from Mannheim to Munich, which,
naturally, compelled the removal with him
of all the artists dependent upon his pat-
ronage, the Webers among them. This was
the cause of the final catastrophe. Mo-
zart's beloved had obtained the appoint-
ment of court singer at Munich, with a lib-
eral salary, and in her new surroundings
had ceased to love the man whose depart-
ure she had wept over a few months be-
fore. He arrived at Munich on the 25th
of December, full of eagerness to see her,
and hastened to call upon her. She re-
ceived him like a stranger, and the story
goes that, immediately on perceiving the
alteration in her sentiments, he sat down
at a piano in the room and sang aloud the
song, " I gladly leave the maid who will
have none of me." But that her incon-
stancy deeply affected him appears from
the letter he wrote to his father a day or
two afterwards :
ALOYSIA'S INCONSTANCY. 155
" I write from the house of Mr. Becke. I ar-
rived here safely, God be praised, on the 25th, but
I have been unable to write to you till now. I re-
serve everything till our glad, joyous meeting, when
I can once more have the happiness of conversing
with you, for to-day I can only weep. I have far
too sensitive a heart. In the meantime I must tell
you that the day before I left Kaisersheim I re-
ceived the sonatas ; so I shall be able to present
them myself to the electoress. I only delay leav-
ing here till the opera is given, when 1 intend im-
mediately to leave Munich, unless I were to find it
would be very beneficial and useful to remain here
for some time longer. In this case, I feel con-
vinced, quite convinced, that you would not only
be satisfied I should do so, but would yourself ad-
vise it.
" I naturally write very badly, for I never learned
to write ; still, in my whole life I never wrote worse
than this very day, for I am really unfit for any-
thing ; my heart is too full of tears. I hope you
will soon write to me and comfort me. Address me
paste restante and then I can fetch the letter myself.
I am staying with the Webers. I think, after all,
it would be better, far better, to enclose your letter
to our friend, Becke.
"I intend (I mention it to you in the strictest
secrecy) to write a mass here. All my best friends
advise my doing so. I cannot tell you what friends
Cannabich and Raaff have been to me. Now fare-
156 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
well, my kindest and most beloved father ! Write to
me soon.
' ' A happy new year ! More I cannot bring my-
self to write to-day."
Aloysia's conduct was not unnatural
nor inexplicable. She was but fifteen
years old, and, most probably, never had
any deeper feeling for Mozart than ad-
miration of his talents and gratitude for
his devotion to her. Had he remained
constantly in company with her he might
have retained his place in her heart, but
"out of sight out of mind.", A girl of
fifteen easily forgets and quickly changes.
Consequently, when Aloysia Weber saw
Mozart in December, he was to her quite
another being than the Mozart whom she
had loved, after a childish fashion, in
March. Years afterwards she confessed
that when he came to her at Munich all
she saw in him was that he was a little
man, and from other sources we learn that
she was displeased at his coat, which, as
he was in mourning for his mother, was, af-
ter the Paris fashion, black, with red but-
tons ! On such trifles hang men's success
WONDERFUL VOICE. 157
with women, and especially with women of
Aloysia's age and character.
Mozart seems to have made no effort to
recover his lost ground with Aloysia. Per-
haps he, too, was less deeply interested
than he thought he was, and enjoyed the
restoration of his freedom more than he
was pained by his beloved's faithlessness.
Notwithstanding his disappointment, he con-
tinued to cherish for her the admiration of
a musician, and in January, 1779, within a
fortnight after the painful interview with
her just mentioned, he composed for her a
florid air, specially adapted to show off the
capacities of her voice, which ranged from
G in the treble clef to the G two octaves
higher, and, as one of her critics says, was
like a Cremona violin. The accompani-
ment was also written for oboe and bas-
soon, obligati, to be played by his friends
Ramm and Ritter. The text was from
Gluck's "Alceste," and commences with the
words " Popoli di Tessaglia" That he did
not for a long time cease to love her ap-
pears from a passage in one of his letters
from Vienna, written in May, 1781, after her
158 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
marriage with the actor Lange : " With the
Lange . I was a fool, it is true ; what is a
man not when he is in love? Yet I loved
her really, and I feel that she is not yet
without interest to me, which is lucky for
me, because her husband is a jealous fool,
and allows her no freedom, and I am, there-
fore, seldom able to see her." He had the
satisfaction to find, as time went on, that his
opinion of her musical ability had been
sound, and not biassed by a lover's parti-
ality, and he continued to write music for
her, and to take pleasure in her triumphs.
From Munich she went to Vienna, be-
came there a prima-donna of the foremost
rank, and married, as has been said, an
actor. She did not live happily with her
husband, and Nohl, one of Mozart's biog-
raphers, speaks of her career as follows :
' ' Neither happiness nor riches brightened Aloy-
sia's life, nor the peace of mind arising from the
consciousness of purity of heart. Not till she was
an aged woman, and Mozart long dead, did she
recognize what he really had been. She liked to
talk about him and his friendship, and in thus re-
calling the brightest memories of her youth, some
TARDY REGRET. 159
of that lovable charm that Mozart had imparted to
her, as he did to all with whom he had intercourse,
seemed to revive. Every one was captivated by her
gay, unassuming manner, her freedom from all the
usual virtuoso caprices in society, and her readiness
to give pleasure by her talent to every one who had
any knowledge or love of music. It seems as if a
portion of the tender spirit with which Mozart once
loved her had passed into her soul and brought forth
fresh leaves from a withered stem."
Further evidence of Aloysia's tardy re-
gret for her youthful lover is found in some
words in Italian which she wrote at the end
of an autograph copy of an air composed
by him for her in Vienna in 1788. " In thy
happy days think sometimes of l Pop oh di
Tessaglia,"1 " referring to the composition at
Munich in '1779. She died in 1827.
After a year spent with his father in Salz-
burg, Mozart went back to Munich, and
thence to Vienna, to join his patron, the
Archbishop of Salzburg, who was in attend-
ance at the imperial court. Here he con-
tinued his intimacy with the Webers, and,
by a not uncommon metamorphosis of sen-
timent, transferred to Constance Weber the
love which he had formerly felt for her sis-
160 MOZART AND ALOYSIA WEBER.
ter. After much opposition, both from his
father and her mother, and the usual lovers'
quarrels, the couple were married in Au-
gust, 1782. Mozart died nine years later,
in November, 1791, at a little less than thir-
ty-six years of age. His trials and troubles,
his artistic achievements, and the vicissi-
tudes of his fortune hold a prominent place
in the records of the lives of men of genius.
His wife seems to have been more of a bur-
den than a help to him, yet he loved her
tenderly, and his letters to her are char-
acterized by the sweetest and most affec-
tionate spirit. For his old love, her sister,
he retained friendship to the last.
CAVOUK
CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
AMONG the private papers of the cele-
brated Italian statesman, Count Camillo di
Cavour, were found, after his death in 1861,
a series of letters from a lady, whose name
has never been divulged to the public, written
at various dates from 1830 to 1839, an<^ ^ec^
away by him as if for permanent preserva-
tion. In a diary he had kept from 1833 to
1835, were also found a number of entries
referring to the writer of the letters in ques-
tion. These documents, with many others,
were intrusted by his niece and represen-
tative, the Marchesa Giuseppina di Cavour,
to Domenico Berti, the historian, for the
preparation of a biography of her uncle
during his early years, which was published
at Rome in 1866, under the title of " II Conte
1 62 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
di Cavour avanti il 1848." One chapter of
this work is devoted to the narrative of Ca-
vour's connection with the lady whose letters
he had so carefully preserved, giving extracts
from them, and passages from his diary ex-
plaining them.
The first of the letters is dated about the
middle of the year 1830. Cavour was then
an officer of engineers, barely twenty years
of age, and was stationed at Genoa. His
acquaintance with the writer of the letters
apparently began at Turin the previous win-
ter. The lady was presumably nearly of Ca-
vour's own age, but who she was, except that
she was of noble family, we are not told.
Cavour calls her "L'Inconnue" (the Un-
known), and Berti adopts the appellation.
Whether, when Cavour first knew her she
was married or single, also does not appear,
but Berti, referring to events which took
place in 1835, speaks of her as then having
a husband. He begins his narrative ab-
ruptly :
' ' Camillo Cavour had not yet surrendered his
commission when he met a lady who was to make a
profound and permanent impression upon his heart.
INTELLECTUAL SYMPATHY. 163
" Sympathy and affection sprang up between the
two simultaneously. He loved in her the grace, the
charms of her person ; the sweetness, the elevation of
her soul ; the cultivation and the keenness of her in-
tellect. She loved in him his noble, generous, honest
nature, the vivacity of his person and fascinating
manners, and, above all, his vigorous genius. ' I
am sure,' she writes in her first letter, ' that the day
will come when your genius will be appreciated. My
warmest wishes are that everything may turn out as
you desire.' "
Of course, the youthful Cavour of 1830
was not the Cavour whose career as a jour-
nalist, a politician, and a statesman fairly
commenced only eighteen years afterwards ;
but he had already begun to manifest the
ability which in later years made him fore-
most among his countrymen. That the ob-
ject of his love was unusually intelligent, as
well as personally attractive, is plain both
from the portions of her letters which Berti
copies and from what is said of her in an
obituary notice which he appends to his
narrative. She cultivated her mind assid-
uously, could read, write, and speak Eng-
lish, German, Italian, and French, though,
like Cavour, who, born and educated in Sa-
164 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
voy, did not master Italian until he was thir-
ty, she usually employed French in conver-
sation and in her correspondence. She
wrote much which was never published,
among other things an essay on Shake-
speare's " Romeo and Juliet," which she
sent to Cavour, and which, as Berti tells us,
he set above Rousseau's "Julie." In pol-
itics she took a lively interest, and was a
more ardent republican than Cavour, who,
however, eventually converted her to his
less extreme views. Her temperament, nat-
urally melancholy, was rendered still more
so by ill-health, and, apparently, by unhap-
py family relations. As we shall see, she
was capable of the most passionate and ro-
mantic love, and she carried her devotion
to Cavour to a pitch that made her family at
one time think her reason was affected.
Whatever led to the first meeting of the
lovers, they soon separated, and Berti tells
us that among the lady's letters to Cavour
are found only one dated in 1830, one in
1831, two in 1832, one in 1833, an<^ nothing
in 1834 before June. Cavour takes upon
himself the blame for this estrangement.
A LONG SEPARATION. 165
" I preserved a tender and painful remem-
brance of her ; I found myself often regret-
ting that my own stupidity, coupled with
unfortunate circumstances, had prevented
my forming with this sweet and lovable
woman a connection which would have
thrown such a charm over my sad and
monotonous existence ; but, to tell the
truth, there remained in my heart for her
no sentiment of love nor of passion. All
my desire was limited to seeing her again,
to being useful to her, and to vowing to her
a sincere and disinterested friendship."
Whether this means he might have married
her but did not, or whether what he regret-
ted was something less honorable, is not
plain. Anyway, towards the end of June,
1834, when he was at Grinzane, a town half
a day's journey distant from Turin, he re-
ceived from her a little note saying she was
at Turin, and wanted to see him. He had
not heard from her since January, 1833,
when she answered a letter which he had
written her "to express to her," he says in
his diary, "the sympathy which her long
misfortunes had excited in me." He knew
l66 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
only that she had been living at Milan in a
continual state of suffering and sickness.
His diary continues :
" I cannot describe the sentiments which at this
moment agitated my heart. Uncertainty as to the
motives which led the Unknown to the step troubled
me cruelly. Was it a simple desire to explain her
past conduct, and to establish with .me amicable re-
lations in conformity with the sentiments she had
expressed to me in her last letter ? Or, had she sud-
denly succumbed to the passion against which she
had vainly so long struggled ? I fancied I could de-
tect in the few phrases of which her short note was
composed, desires, and an ill-repressed tenderness,
but this must have been only an illusion of my vani-
ty, for there was not one word which indicated a
change in my favor. I could not contain myself.
Tormented by the fear of finding her no longer in
Turin, by uncertainty as to the reception she had ar-
ranged for me, and by an irresistible desire to ex-
press to her all the gratitude, affection, and devotion
with which her behavior to me had inspired me, I
resolved to set out instantly. Abandoning fifty mat-
ters of business which remained for me to finish, and
braving the insupportable heat of the sun, I started
at one o'clock. Changing horses at Bra, without stop-
ping, I arrived at Turin at eight. I ran home, changed
my dress, and, without losing a moment, flew to the
hotel where the Unknown was staying. I was told
AN ECSTATIC MEETING. 167
that she had just gone to the opera. Without delay
I ran thither, plunged into the pit, ran my eye over
the boxes, and in the sixth from the left on the first
tier I perceived a lady in deep mourning, and wear-
ing on the sweetest of countenances the traces of
long and cruel suffering. It was she. She recog-
nized me at once ; she had followed me with her
eyes until I left the pit to come to her. God ! what
charm in her look ; how much tenderness and love !
Whatever I may do for her in future, I can never
repay her the happiness she made me feel in that
moment. Her box was full, and insupportable bores
overwhelmed my poor friend with the most vapid
and insipid talk. Vainly did our eyes endeavor to
express the sentiments of our hearts. We burned
with impatience. At last we were left alone a
moment, but the abundance of the things we had to
say choked the words in our throats. After a long
silence she said to me : ' What have you thought of
me ?' ' Can you ask me ?' I answered. ' You have
suffered a great deal.' ' Have I suffered ? Oh, yes !
I have suffered much." These are all the words I
remember." . . .
Cavour goes on to say that he quitted
the Unknown that evening full of hope,
love, regret, and remorse. He believed
in the sincerity of her passion, he was
proud to intoxication of a love so pure, so
constant, and so disinterested, but, on the
1 68 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
other hand, when he thought of his con-
duct towards her, and represented to him-
self the terrible sufferings which she had
endured because of him, and of which he
had always before his eyes the traces upon
her beautiful and sad countenance, he was
enraged with himself and accused himself
of insensibility, of cruelty, of infamy.
On returning home he learned that his
father, supposing him still to be at Grin-
zane, was coming to see him the next day.
In order to prevent this useless journey he
started off at midnight on foot, being un-
able to procure a conveyance, and arrived at
his father's house at three o'clock in the
morning. With the expansiveness of the
Latin races — it is said that a Frenchman,
if he cannot find any other confidant, will
tell of his bonnes fortunes to his mother, and
we shall see, later on, that Cavour actually
did this, and even confided in his brother —
he related to his father the whole story and
obtained from him permission to return to
Turin. At half-past eight in the evening
that same day he called on the Unknown
at her hotel in Turin and had the good
VOWS OF FIDELITY. 169
fortune to find her alone. Her depressed
air and sombre attire produced on him the
most painful impression. She was the im-
age of suffering, and who had caused that
suffering? Explanations were made on
both sides, and, finally, emboldened by the
sweetness of her looks, Cavour took her
hand and pressed it to his lips. " Do you
forgive me ?" he said. She could resist no
longer.- She bent her brow to his, and her
lips sought his in a kiss of love and of
peace. Then she told him the whole story
of her sad life, in doing which she endeav-
ored by all means, he says, to avoid re-
proaching him, but vividly portraying the
violence of her passion for him.
Cavour was transported. He writes in
his diary : " Unhappy man ! I am unworthy
of so much love ! How, how shall I recom-
pense it ? Ah ! I swear never, never to for-
get, never to abandon this celestial woman.
My existence shall be consecrated to her.
She shall be the purpose of my life, the
sole object of my care, of my efforts. May
the curse of Heaven smite my head if I
ever wilfully cause her the least pain or
170 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
offend the least sentiment of this perfect
and adorable heart." And for a few
months he makes only occasional refer-
ences to the political matters which had
previously engrossed his mind. Once he
says : " Lord Grey and his whole Ministry
have resigned without my paying attention
to it. It is astounding. I recognize my-
self no longer."
Four days after this interview the Un-
known left Turin for a bathing resort, but
she had hardly departed before Cavour
wrote her a fiery letter, expressing at length
his passion for her. Not getting an an-
swer so soon as he expected, he wrote in
the same strain a second letter, more pas-
sionate than the first, begging her to break
up her existing relations and fly with him
to another country. Upon reflection, how-
ever, he saw the -madness of this proposi-
tion, and confessed that he had done wrong
to ask the woman he loved to violate her
duty. Then came the answer to his first
letter, and the sweetness and tenderness of
its tone confirmed him in his good resolu-
tions. " My God," he writes in his diary,
AN EPISTOLARY OUTPOUR. 171
"turn away from this angel of grace and
affection the cup of bitterness and I will
drink it to the dregs !" Still he could not
refrain from joining her, and remaining in
her company three days, when she went
back to Turin.
The pair had hardly separated before the
Unknown wrote to her lover a letter, in the
course of which she says :
"I do not know why happiness leaves in me
more profound traces than unhappiness. These
three days, I assure you, have effaced the remem-
brance of many cruel years. I preserve them in
my memory as an inexhaustible treasure of consola-
tion for the days of sadness which await me. I shall
reflect, then, that time passes, but that love abides
forever. We know it will, we who, not content to
live here for fleeting years, dare look forward to an
endless future of love and of happiness. I have told
you, Camillo, my soul is only a reflection of thine ;
without thee I am nothing ; let the light be inter-
cepted, and I shall cease to exist. I shall follow
thee everywhere ; let no one hope to separate me
from thee. Relatives, friends, I renounce all rather
than cease to see thee and to write to thee. I shall
perhaps encounter opposition. I foresee it without
alarm. I feel my strength. I feel that nothing can
subdue me so long as I am as sure as I am of thy
172 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
love. Thy heart answers to mine, and between us
it is, as thy motto says : 'For life or for death.' If
I deceive myself may I fall to dust before being un-
deceived !"
She continues in this strain at length,
and two hours later she adds a postscript,
telling of an encounter in regard to him
she had with her mother in the presence of
her family. Her mother had reproached her
for her conduct, saying that it was useless
for her to love when her life was so soon to
end; to which she had answered that for
that very reason she ought to satiate her-
self with love.
Shortly after these events the Unknown
quitted Turin, taking with her Cavour's let-
ters, which she read over and over in her
carriage, writing to him whenever she halt-
ed. This epistolary outpour she kept up
after her arrival home, writing sometimes
thrice a day. She had nothing new to say,
but repeated the same sentiments of love in
various forms.
As Cavour had confided to his father the
renewal of his intimacy with the Unknown,
so, as his passion swelled in volume and
RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS. 173
intensity, his breast was unable to contain
it and it overflowed upon his mother. He
went to see her, opened his whole heart to
her, and gave her the letters of his beloved
to read. His mother, Berti tells us, was
moved to tears by them, and when Cavour
communicated this manifestation of ma-
ternal sympathy to the Unknown, she re-
sponded with an equal gush of affection :
" Oh, Camillo," she writes, " why cannot I
throw myself at thy mother's feet, and ex-
press to her all the gratitude, respect, and
love which are inspired by the tender in-
terest she takes in me !" And she adds
that she sees in the mother's approval an
excuse for a passion regarded by the world
as a fault.
A long letter from the Unknown is de-
voted to the subject of religion. She had
early discovered the emptiness of mere
religious formalities, but, as she says, with-
out losing her religious sentiments, her ad-
miration of the Scriptures — particularly the
Psalms and the Gospels — and her belief in
a life after death, " I perceived the absurdity
of the practices of Catholicism, and by the
174 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
greatest good fortune did not -cease to be-
lieve, so that my heart was not depressed.
Since then my religion has made me regard
death not only with joy as the end of my
sufferings, but also as the commencement
of an existence which shall fulfil my desire
at once of loving and of knowing."
In another letter she discusses the future
of the Roman Catholic Church, concluding
that it must become more free and liberal
if it would continue to exist.
As has been said before, the Unknown
was in politics more radical than Cavour.
She deified Armand Carrel and regarded
Raspail and Trelat as heroes, admired
Mazzini, and contributed money to the
support of the revolutionary journal, the
Giovane Italia. Cavour was willing that
she should worship Armand Carrel, but he
ridiculed all her other idols until she gave
them up, saying, "Thou hast only to tell
me what to will and to think, and I will will
and think it."
Though Cavour had not at this time en-
tered upon his active political career, he
was fitting himself for it by a careful study
DISINTERESTED LOVE. 175
of the history of Europe, of the institutions
and government of other countries, and of
social and educational science. The fruits
of his labors he occasionally embodied in
writing and submitted to his beloved. On
her part, she eagerly aided him by her
counsel and her criticisms, and she jealous-
ly insisted that she should be the first to
read his productions, reproaching him bit-
terly on one occasion for publishing an es-
say without first showing it to her. Every-
thing goes to prove that after the outburst
of passion which followed their meeting at
the opera in Turin, her relations with Ca-
vour were purely sentimental and intellect-
ual. Her beauty, according to all that we
are told, was not of the kind which creates
a desire for actual possession ; and even if
it had been, she was separated from her
lover too effectually by distance and by the
barriers interposed by her family for it to
exercise its power. Her love was purely
the desire of loving, coupled with admira-
tion for her lover's talents. She writes to
him : " To find a being who should accept
the wreck of my existence, partake my sor-
176 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
rows, love me, in a word, was a happiness
I had no right to expect. Fate has mark-
ed thee for my last support — thee, full of
strength, life, talent — thee, destined per-
haps to run the most brilliant career, to
contribute to the welfare of the world. I
am thine — dost thou comprehend it? — thine,
soul of my life ! It is my happiness, it is
all that I could dream of as the most beau-
tiful, the most brilliant. In return, O
Camillo, I ask nothing of thee ! Follow
only the dictates of thy heart. May they
lead thee to thy constant friend !" And to
the very end she protested that she desired
no more of him than this. His feelings
seem to have been those of pity and ten-
derness— not, perhaps, without some alloy
of gratified vanity — rather than those of vig-
orous manly affection.
That such was the case is proved by the
fact that at the end of six months passed
in this delightful epistolary intercourse, he
grew tired of it. His letters began to be
less frequent, and, finally, in the course of
1835, they ceased altogether. Engrossed
with his work, his studies, and the care of
PATIENT SUBMISSION. 177
his father's landed estates, he seems almost
entirely to have forgotten the woman to
whom he had, only the year before, vowed
to consecrate his life. On her part, though
she continued to cherish for him ardent at-
tachment, she meekly accepted her fate.
As Berti says, " Her very supreme sweet-
ness was more fitted to inspire respect and
friendship than to bind a man strongly to
her." The case was only one among many
exemplifications of the familiar lines in
" Don Juan :"
' ' Man's love is of man's life a thing apart ;
'Tis woman's whole existence."
When, after a while, her friends urged
upon the Unknown a reconciliation with
her family, Cavour sided with them, and
she obeyed him. For the next few years
nothing more is recorded of her. She re-
tired from the world and lived in seclusion,
with only two lady friends for companions.
Cavour set out upon a tour through France
and England, and Berti hints that other
objects received from him the adoration
he once so passionately bestowed upon the
12
178 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
Unknown, and that she knew it. But she
only buried her love more deeply in the re-
cesses of her heart, and kept it there.
At last, early in 1839, a slanderous attack
upon Cavour called forth a letter of sympa-
thy to him from the Unknown, to which he
must have replied, because she writes to
him on the 3d of March as follows, using
the formal "you" instead of the affection-
ate " thou " of her earlier epistles :
' ' I have not spoken of you for many years, and
this silence would perhaps have been prolonged to
the end of my life if a horrible letter which reached
me on Monday had not overthrown my most deter-
mined resolutions. Monsieur D. has, without doubt,
told you what took place.
' ' I thank you for the remembrance you have pre-
served of me. I should not answer you if I thought
my duty forbade it. But time and misfortune have
entirely restored to me my liberty. No bond forbids
me to assure you of my friendship. This letter I
might post at the street corner. As to the happiness
which you counsel me to seek, it is perhaps nearer at
hand than you imagine, for suffering and the very in-
justice I have endured have essentially destroyed my
peace of mind. Agitation fatigues me, wearies me.
My repose is, perhaps, sombre, but I am pleased
with it, because it is permanent. Long-continued
A PATHETIC FAREWELL. 179
solitude has made me discover that I do not need di-
version. I dare to say that I have learned to suffice
to myself. I have, however, a few lady friends ; one
of them has had the kindness to see Monsieur D., to
explain what had been written to me about you. The
other, who is more particularly, more intimately, the
confidant of my heart, is an angelic young person
named . It is she whom I love most in
the world.
" I do not ask you to write to me, but I thank you
for having written. It is sweet to be assured that
everything is not effaced on this earth."
It will be observed that in this letter the
Unknown hints both that she was a widow
and that her death was approaching. A
subsequent letter, the last of the series, ap-
parently intended to be delivered after the
catastrophe, conveys the announcement in
plain language, this time reverting to the
tender " thou."
"The woman who loved thee is dead. She was
not beautiful — she had suffered too much. What
she lacked she knew better than thou. She is dead,
I tell thee, and in the domain of death she has met
with former rivals.
" If she has yielded to them the palm of beauty in
this world, where the senses demand to be seduced.
l8o CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
here she excels them all. None has loved thee as
she did, none ! for, O Camillo, thou hast never ap-
preciated the vastness of her love. How could she
have revealed it to thee? Human words could not
express it ; no act, however devoted it appeared to
thee, was more than the shadow of what her heart
desired to produce for thee. So, thou hast often
seen me silent and concentrated, renouncing an in-
complete manifestation, and hoping within myself
that the truth would have its day. What ! does this
immense sentiment exist to be forever suppressed ?
Shall not this burning germ have its full develop-
ment ? Is so much love created but to consume the
bosom that harbors it ?
' ' Camillo ! farewell ! At the moment I write
these lines I am firmly resolved never to see thee
again. Thou wilt read them — I hope — but when an
insurmountable barrier shall have been raised up be-
tween us, when I shall have received the great in-
itiation into the secrets of the tomb, when perhaps —
I tremble in supposing it — thou shalt have forgot-
ten me."
How soon after this letter was written
the Unknown died is not told, but it
could not have been long. Cavour prob-
ably received no further communication
from her, for this one he seems to have
sent to his brother, or to some other inti-
A LONELY LIFE. l8l
mate friend, to read, with an endorse-
ment in his own handwriting : " If you
doubt read this letter. Return it to me
afterwards, for it is perhaps the last
souvenir which I shall have of her whom
I have caused to suffer so much, with-
out her ever complaining of me." At
all events, with it closes the story of the
affair, so far as it has been published.
Berti hints in a tantalizing way at a diary
kept by the lady, in which she wrote
down the details of her long and pain-
ful agony, but that is all. Cavour
showed no further interest in her be-
yond filing and keeping her letters. He
gradually became more and more im-
•mersed in political affairs, and, when the
revolutions of 1848 broke out, he enter-
ed upon the public career which made
him famous. He never married, for the
reason, he says himself, that his unequal
character would not permit him to make a
woman happy. It is more likely that ab-
sorption in his work and advancing years
rendered him less and less susceptible to
woman's charms, and that he finally be-
182 CAVOUR AND THE UNKNOWN.
came proof against them. Still, once in
his life, at least, he knew what it was to
be the subject of the tender passion, not-
withstanding that its reign in his heart
was brief, and that the impression it made
upon him was evanescent
,' . , •••':>jup
JANE WELSH CARLYLE.
IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
THE story of the Rev. Edward Irving's
love for Jane Baillie Welsh, afterwards the
wife of Thomas Carlyle, of her love for him,
and of the heroic sacrifice which both made
of their happiness to a lofty and perhaps
mistaken sense of duty, is one of the most
pathetic ever known.
Jane Baillie Welsh was born July 14,
1801, at Haddington, a small town lying
seventeen and a half miles east of Edin-
burgh. Her father was the leading physi-
cian of the place, a man of genial, kindly
character, and of considerable intellectual
force. Her mother was also possessed of
a good intellect, and, as Carlyle tells us,
"was unusually beautiful, but strangely sad.
Eyes bright, as if with many tears behind
them."
184 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
From both parents, therefore, Jane in-
herited talent, and from her mother beauty.
Of her appearance in childhood her friend,
Miss Jewsbury, says that "she was remark-
able for her large black eyes, with their
long, curved lashes; As a girl she was ex-
tremely pretty; a graceful and beautifully
formed figure, upright and supple ; a deli-
cate complexion of creamy white, with a
pale rose tint in the cheeks ; lovely eyes,
full of fire and softness, and with great
depths of meaning. Her head was finely
formed, with a noble arch and a broad
forehead. Her other features were not
regular, but they did not prevent her con-
veying all the impression of being beauti-
ful. Her voice was clear and full of subtle
intonations and capable of great variety of
expression. She had it under full control."
To this Mr. Froude, her friend and biog-
rapher, adds : " But beauty was only the
second thought which her appearance sug-
gested, the first was intellectual vivacity ;"
and speaking of her as he first saw her,
when she was forty-eight, he says : " Her
features were not regular, but I thought I
MRS. CARLVLE AS A GIRL. 185
had never seen a more interesting-looking
woman. Her hair was raven black, her
eyes dark, soft, sad, with dangerous light
in them." Her charms, whatever they were,
must have been great, to win for her as
they did the title of the " Flower of Had-
dington," and to captivate two such men
as Irving and Carlyle ; and Miss Jewsbury
says that "a relative of hers told me that
every man who spoke to her for five min-
utes felt impelled to make her an offer of
marriage."
Jane was an only child, and as it had
been a great disappointment to her father
that she was not a boy, he resolved to ed-
ucate her as a boy. In this purpose his
wife did not agree with him, and the pair
had frequent discussions of the subject, to
which the little girl listened attentively and
with a better comprehension than was sus-
pected. The result is thus told by Irving's
biographer, Mrs. Oliphant :
"Her ambition was roused ; to be educated like
a boy became the object of her entire thought, and
set her little mind working with independent proj-
ects of its own. She resolved to take the first step
186 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
in this awful but fascinating course on her own re-
sponsibility. Having already divined that Latin
was the first grand point of distinction, she made up
her mind to settle the matter by learning Latin. A
copy of the Rudiments was quickly found in the
lumber room of the house, and a tutor not much
further off in a humble student of the neighborhood.
The little scholar had a dramatic instinct. She did
not pour forth her first lesson as soon it was ac-
quired, or rashly betray her secret. She waited the
fitting place and moment. It was evening, when
dinner had softened out the asperities of the day ;
the doctor sat in luxurious leisure in his dressing-
gown and slippers, sipping his coffee, and all the
cheerful accessories of the fireside picture were com-
plete. The little, heroine had arranged herself un-
der the table, under the crimson folds of the cover,
which concealed her small person. All was still ;
the moment had arrived. ' Penna, penntz,pennam !'
burst forth the little voice in breathless steadiness.
The result may be imagined ; the doctor smothered
his child with kisses, and even the mother herself
had not a word to say ; the victory was complete."
Another account of the same incident,
substantially agreeing with Mrs. Oliphant's,
was given to Carlyle, shortly after his wife's
death, by Miss Jewsbury, as she heard it
from Mrs. Carlyle herself. Miss Jewsbury's
PRECOCIOUS TALENT. 187
version contains the further detail that, af-
ter reciting her noun, the little girl went up
to her father and said : " I want to learn
Latin ; please let me be a boy." At all
events, she carried her point. She had al-
ready, under her mother's supervision, ac-
quired proficiency in the usual accomplish-
ments of a girl, music, dancing, drawing,
and modern languages, and now she was
sent to the public school of Haddington for
more solid instruction. Besides Latin, she
studied arithmetic and algebra, the latter in
company with the boy pupils of the school,
who felt for her not only affection but a re-
spect which she is said to have enforced on
one occasion by striking with her fist the
nose of a boy who had been impertinent,
and making it bleed. The master happened
to see the gory results of the blow, and de-
manded who had inflicted it. The boys
were all chivalrously silent, and were
threatened with a flogging to make them
tell. Upon this Jane confessed her guilt, and
was punished by relegation to the girls'
room. Another story told of her is that,
emulating the boys in their difficult feats of
l88 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
strength and agility, she lay down on her
face and crawled from one end to the other
of a narrow parapet of a bridge at the im-
minent risk of either breaking her neck or
drowning. Exploits of this kind seem to
have made her famous in the town, for
when, some forty years afterwards, she re-
visited Haddington, and, too impatient to
wait for the sexton to come and unlock the
gate of the graveyard, she climbed over the
wall, the old man, on finding her inside,
and being told how she got in, exclaimed :
"Lord's sake, then, there is no end to you!"
Soon after little Jane began to attend the
school at Haddington, Irving was appointed
its master, and was engaged by Dr. Welsh as
private tutor for his daughter. This was
the beginning of their acquaintance. It was
in 1810, when Jane was nine years old, and
Irving, who was born in 1792, was eighteen.
Irving's father was a poor tanner in Annan,
a town on the shores of the broad Solway,
so graphically described by Walter Scott in
" Redgauntlet," and from whose swiftly ris-
ing tide Irving was once saved while a child,
together with his little brother, by an uncle
plti;
v iu*r / '
EDWARD IRVING.
IRVING'S PERSONAL BEAUTY. 189
on horseback, very much as Darsie Latimer
was saved by his uncle. After the usual
preliminary schooling the lad, at the age of
thirteen, went to Edinburgh to study at the
university, and four years later, in 1809, took
his degree. He then entered the Divinity
School, and, as was "usual for poor Scottish
theological students, began teaching for his
support while he was pursuing his studies.
It was thus, upon the recommendation of his
professors, that he obtained the appointment
as master of Haddington school.
In person, Irving was very handsome.
He was considerably more than six feet in
height and powerfully built; his forehead
was broad, deep, and expansive; his thick,
black, projecting eyebrows overhung dark,
small, and rather deep-set penetrating eyes,
one of which had an obliquity, the result of
long-continued exposure while an infant in
the cradle to a light from a side window,
but which did not materially detract from
his looks ; his nose and his mouth were
finely shaped, and his whole head nobly
cast, and covered with a profusion of black
curly hair. It is related of him that when
IQO IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
he was preaching at Glasgow, at the age of
twenty-seven, he called one day to see a
lady who had ordered her maid-servant to
tell all visitors she was engaged. The girl
broke in upon her in a state of great ex-
citement : " Mem ! there's a wonderful
grand gentleman called. I couldna say
you were engaged to him. I think he
maun be a Highland chief." " That Mr.
Irving !" exclaimed another person, " that
Dr. Chalmers's helper! I took him for a
cavalry officer!" A third told Dr. Chal-
mers himself that Irving looked like a
brigand chief. "Well," said Dr. Chal-
mers, " whatever they say, they never think
him like anything but a leader of men."
Irving's strength, courage, and proficien-
cy in athletics were also remarkable. While
master of Haddington school he frequently
walked with several of his scholars to Edin-
burgh and back the same evening, a distance
of thirty-five miles, to hear Dr. Chalmers
preach. At Kirkcaldy, two years later, his
feats of swimming were the admiration of
the beholders ; and when, on a pedestrian
excursion with a comrade, some tourists
BODILY AND MENTAL VIGOR. 19 1
once attempted to exclude the two from
the sitting-room of the inn where they had
ordered dinner, he calmly threw open the
window, and, turning to his companion,
said, " Will you toss out or knock down ?"
This remark, coupled with his powerful ap-
pearance and determined expression, imme-
diately procured him his rights. On anoth-
er occasion he had escorted some ladies to
a public meeting, where a bullying official
attempted to make them fall back from
where they stood. " Be quiet, sir, or I will
annihilate you," said Irving, raising in his
hand a great stick he carried. The crowd
burst into laughter, and Irving's party was
not further disturbed. With all this he had
great tenderness of heart, and a beautiful
story is told of him when he was preaching
in London. It was in the open air, and a
great crowd surrounded him. A child who
had been lost was held up by a person who
had found it, and who wanted to know what
he should do with it. " Give me the child,"
said the preacher, and it was passed along
to him. He stretched out his arms, and the
little waif nestled down upon his shoulder,
IQ2 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
perfectly happy. He then, with the child
in this position, went on with his sermon,
weaving into it the familiar narrative of the
Saviour's blessing of little children, and at
the end restored the lost one to its parents.
Witnesses of the incident say that they
could never think of it without its bringing
tears to their eyes. His pastoral ministra-
tions, both in Glasgow and in London, were
marked by the gentlest sympathy with the
poor and the suffering, and countless anec-
dotes are told of his generosity, his cour-
tesy, and his success in winning the hearts
of those with whom he came into contact.
The poet Procter (Barry Cornwall), who
saw much of him in London, pronounced
him " the most pure and hopeful spirit
surely that Scotland ever produced," and
wrote of him :
" If his manner had not been so unassuming I
might have felt humble before him. But he was so
amiable and simple that we all forgot that we stood
in the presence of a giant in stature, with mental
courage to do battle with any adversary, and who
was always ready to enter into any conflict on be-
half of his own peculiar faith.
TEACHER AND PUPIL. 193
" I never heard him utter a harsh or uncharitable
word. I never heard from him a word or a senti-
ment which a good man could have wished unsaid.
His words were at once gentle and heroic.
"No one who knew him intimately could help
loving him."
These physical and moral advantages,
joined to that intellectual ability for which
afterwards Irving was so distinguished,
could not fail to make a profound impres-
sion upon the susceptible and romantic girl
who became hisr pupil. Their hours of
study were from six to eight in the morn-
ing, and in winter, when the young tutor
arrived, it was still dark. His charge,
scarcely dressed, would be peeping out of
her room, and, snatching her up in his
arms, Irving would carry her to the door,
to name to her the stars still shining in the
sky. When her regular lessons were over
he would go on and teach her logic. She
was soon dux in mathematics, became famil-
iar with Virgil, and was carried away by the
reading of the ^Eneid to burn on a funeral
pyre her doll, as Dido, dissolving into a
flood of tears as she saw the last remnants
IQ4 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
of it blaze up and vanish. It was the rule
that her tutor should leave a daily report
in writing of her progress, and whenever the
report was bad she was punished. One
day, according to Mrs. Oliphant, he paused
long before putting his verdict on the pa-
per. The culprit sat at the table, small,
downcast, and conscious of failure. Irving
lingered remorsefully, wavering between jus-
tice and compassion. At last, looking at
her pitifully, he said, "Jane, my heart is
broken, but I must tell the truth," and
down went the dreaded condemnation.
This charming intercourse between the
youthful teacher and his precocious pupil
lasted two years. Irving was a favorite
guest at Dr. Welsh's house, and won the
affectionate respect both of him and of his
wife. He also made many other friends in
the town, among them Gilbert Burns, the
poet's brother, and Dr. Stewart of Erskine.
But Haddington was a small place, and
when, in 1812, the mastership of a newly
established academy at Kirkcaldy, eleven
miles north of Edinburgh, was offered him,
he accepted it, and abandoned his little
A THOUGHTLESS ENGAGEMENT. 195
darling, unconscious of the love which even
then had begun to knit their hearts to-
gether.
Irving's removal to Kirkcaldy led to two
important results. It was there that he
became engaged to the young lady whom
he ultimately married, and there he met
Thomas Carlyle and entered upon the in-
timacy with him which lasted during the
remainder of his life. The parish minister
of Kirkcaldy, the Rev. Mr. Martin, had
several daughters, the eldest of whom,
Isabella, Carlyle says, "was of bouncing,
frank, gay manners and talk, studious to
be amiable, but never quite satisfactory on
the side of genuineness. Something of af-
fected you feared always in these fine
spirits and smiling discourses, to which,
however, you answered with smiles. She
was very ill-looking withal ; a skin always
under blotches and discolorment ; muddy
gray eyes, which for their part never
laughed with the other features ; pock-
marked, ill-shapen, triangular kind of face,
with hollow cheeks and long chin ; de-
cidedly unbeautiful as a young woman."
196 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
In spite of all this, Carlyle adds, she man-
aged to charm poor Irving, "having per-
haps the arena all to herself," and he be-
came engaged to her, little foreseeing the
unhappy consequences of his thoughtless-
ness.
Irving remained at Kirkcaldy seven
years. During this period the little girl he
had taught at Haddington became a wom-
an. In 1818, when she was seventeen, he
met her again in Edinburgh, and then, for
the first time, he seems to have discovered
the real state of his heart. Mrs. Oliphant
says of this meeting, apparently blind to its
importance :
" He found her a beautiful and vivacious girl,
with an affectionate recollection of her old master,
and the young man found a natural charm in her
society. I record this only for a most 'characteristic
momentary appearance which he makes in the mem-
ory of his pupil. It happened that he, with natural
generosity, introduced some of his friends to the
same hospitable house. But the generosity of the
most liberal stops somewhere. When Irving heard
the praises of these same friends falling too warmly
from the young lady's lips, he could not conceal a
little pique and mortification, which escaped in
DAWNING LOVE. 197
spite of him. When this little ebullition was over
the fair culprit turned to leave the room, but had
scarcely passed the door when Irving hurried after
her and called, entreating her to return for a mo-
ment. When she came back she found the simple-
hearted giant standing penitent to make his confes-
sion. ' The truth is, I was piqued,' said Irving. ' I
have always been accustomed to fancy that I stood
highest in your good opinion, and I was jealous to
hear you praise another man. I am sorry for what
I said just now — that is the truth of it.' It is a fair
representation of his prevailing characteristic. He
could no more have retained what he felt to be a
meanness on his mind unconfessed than he could
have persevered in the wrong."
It is incomprehensible how Mrs. Oli-
phant,a woman, should not have discerned in
this burst of jealousy an indication of love;
and still more incomprehensible, in the
light of facts now known to every one, that
she should speak of Irving's meeting with
Miss Welsh on this occasion as " a most
characteristic momentary appearance which
he makes in the memory of his pupil." It
was, on the contrary, but the beginning of
an intercourse with her which lasted for
years, and during which not only did Irv-
198 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
ing become deeply enamoured of his former
pupil, but she, as she frankly confessed to
Carlyle seven years afterwards, learned to
love him "passionately" in return. He
frequently visited her at Haddington, and,
as everything goes to show, his visits were
those of an accepted suitor. It was just
after the meeting in 1818 that Carlyle first
heard of her from him, " some casual men-
tion, the loving and reverential tone of
which had struck me. Of the father he
spoke always as one of the wisest, truest,
and most dignified of men, of her as a
paragon of gifted young girls, far enough
from me both, and objects of distant rev-
erence and unattainable longing at that
time !"
The next year, 1819, Dr. Welsh died,
leaving to his daughter all his little proper-
ty, which, with characteristic generosity,
she made over to her mother, and the
household went on as before. Irving was
busy preaching at Glasgow, as assistant to
Dr. Chalmers ; but he came to Edinburgh
whenever he had a holiday, and from there
walked out to Haddington. On one of
THOMAS CARLYLE.
INTERCOURSE WITH CARLYLE. 199
these excursions, in June, 1821, he took
Carlyle with him to introduce him as a fit
person to superintend Miss Welsh's literary
studies, being himself either too much oc-
cupied or else not fully competent. Car-
lyle has left behind him this account of the
expedition and its results :
' ' The visit lasted three or four days, and included
Gilbert Burns and other figures, besides the one fair
figure most of all important to me. We were o'ten
in her mother's house ; sat talking with the two for
hours almost every evening. The beautiful, bright,
and earnest young lady was intent on literature as
the highest aim in life, and felt imprisoned in the
dull element which yielded her no commerce in that
kind, and would not even yield her books to read.
I obtained permission to send her at least books
from Edinburgh. Book parcels virtually included
bits of writing to and from, and thus an acquaint-
ance was begun which had hardly any interruption
and no break at all while life lasted. She was often
in Edinburgh on visit with her mother to ' Uncle
Robert,' in Northumberland Street, to 'old Mrs.
Bradfute, in George's Square,' and I had leave to
call on these occasions, which I zealously enough, if
not too zealously sometimes, in my awkward way,
took advantage of. I was not her declared lover,
nor could she admit me as such, in my waste and
200 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
uncertain posture of affairs and prospects ; but we
were becoming thoroughly acquainted with each
other, and her tacit, hidden, but to me visible, friend-
ship for me was the happy island in my other-
wise dreary, vacant, and forlorn existence in those
years."
Carlyle evidently had as yet got no idea
of the state of affairs between Irving and
Miss Welsh, being, like all incipient lovers,
thoroughly engrossed with his own feelings.
The truth was that Irving was negotiating,
with great hope of success, for a release
from his engagement to Miss 'Martin, which
in both his own and Miss Welsh's view of
duty constituted a bar to their marriage.
But when, in the following February, he re-
ceived a call from a Scottish church, Lon-
don, and it became necessary to have the
matter settled, Miss Martin held him to his
bond. After a struggle which, to use his
own words, had almost "made his faith and
principles to totter," he resigned himself to
his fate and bade farewell to Miss Welsh in
a characteristic letter :
"MY WELL-BELOVED FRIEND AND PUPIL : When
I think of you my mind is overspread with the most
IRVINGS FAREWELL. 2OI
affectionate and tender regard, which I neither know
how to name or to describe. One thing I know — it
would long ago have taken the form of the most de-
voted attachment, but for an intervening circumstance,
and showed itself and pleaded itself before your heart
by a thousand actions from which I must now restrain
myself. Heaven grant me its grace to restrain my-
self ; and, forgetting my own enjoyments, may I be
enabled to combine into your single self all that
duty and plighted faith leave at my disposal. When
I am in your company my whole soul would rush to
serve you, and my tongue trembles to speak my
heart's fulness. But I am enabled to forbear, and
have to find other avenues than the natural ones for
the overflowing of an affection which would hardly
have been able to confine itself within the avenues
of nature if they had all been opened. But I feel
within me the power to prevail, and at once to sat-
isfy duty to another and affection to you. I stand
truly upon ground which seems to shake and give
way beneath me, but my help is in Heaven. Bear
with thus much, my early charge and my pres-
ent friend, from one who loves to help and defend
you, who would rather die than wrong you or see
you wronged. Say that I shall speak no more of
the fearful struggle that I am undergoing, and I
shall be silent. If you allow me to speak, then I
shall reveal to you the features of a virtuous conten-
tion, to be crowned, I trust, with a Christian
triumph. It is very extraordinary that this weak
202 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
nature of mine can have two affections, both of so
intense a kind, and yet I feel it can. It shall feed
the one with faith and duty and chaste affection ; the
other with paternal and friendly love, no less pure,
no less assiduous, no less constant — in return seeking
nothing but permission and indulgence.
' ' 1 was little comforted by Rousseau's letters,
though holding out a most admirable moral ; but
much comforted and confirmed by the few words
which your noble heart dictated the moment before
I left you. Oh, persevere, my admirable pupil, in
the noble admirations you have taken up. Let af-
fectionateness and manly firmness be the qualities
to which you yield your love, and your life shall
be honorable ; advance your admiration somewhat
higher, and it shall be everlastingly happy. Oh ! do
not forbid me from rising in my communications
with one so capable of the loftiest conceptions. For-
bid me not to draw you upward to the love and
study of your Creator, which is the beginning of
wisdom. I have returned Rousseau. Count for-
ever, my dear Jane, upon my last efforts to minister
to your happiness, present and everlasting.
" From your faithful friend and servant,
"EDWARD IRVING."
The following June Irving took up his
residence in London, and on the second
Sunday of July began his labors there. Of
his subsequent career, at first brilliant, then
CAREER IN LONDON. 203
eccentric, and finally wildly erratic, ending
in a death preceded by something like in-
sanity, it is enough here to say that he rap-
idly became famous, and for a considera-
ble time preached to crowded audiences of
the most distinguished people in London.
Then, carried away by a fanciful theory of
prophecy, he was led to exalt into utter-
ances of the Holy Ghost the rhapsodies of
his more excitable hearers, and to ascrib-
ing them to the gift of tongues mentioned
in the New Testament. Of course he did
not long remain in connection with the
Church of Scotland, and he had to form
an ecclesiastical organization of his own,
fragments of which survive to the present
day. At last, worn out by excitement and
excessive work, he died in December, 1834,
a physical and intellectual wreck, at the
early age of forty-two.
The tender relations between Irving and
Miss Welsh did not entirely cease with his
farewell letter. Even after his marriage,
which took place Oct. 13, 1823, he retained
for her an affection which made him shrink
from meeting her. Mr. Froude, in his biog-
204 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
raphy of Carlyle, tells us that it had been
intended that she should pay Irving and his
wife a visit in London as soon as they were
settled, but Irving begged off. He wrote :
. " My dear Isabella has succeeded in healing the
wounds of my heart by her unexampled affection
and tenderness ; but I am hardly in a condition to
expose them. My former calmness and piety are
returning. I feel growing in grace and holiness,
and before another year I shall be worthy in the
eye of my own conscience to receive you into my
house and under my care, which, till then, I should
hardly be."
On her part, Miss Welsh, although Car-
lyle was urgently pressing his suit, seems
not to have dismissed Irving entirely from
her memory, and to have indulged a linger-
ing hope that she might yet be united to
him. Still, she encouraged Carlyle. As
Mr. Froude says : " She had no thought of
marrying him, but she was flattered by his
attachment. It amused her to see the
most remarkable person she had ever met
with at her feet. His birth and position
seemed to secure her against the possibility
of any closer connection between them.
CARLYLE AS A LOVER. 205
Thus he had a trying time of it. In se-
rious moments she would tell him that their
meeting had made an epoch in her history,
and had influenced her character and life.
When the humor changed, she would ridi-
cule his Annandale accent, turn his pas-
sionate expressions to scorn, and when she
had toned him down again she would smile
once more and enchant him back into illu-
sions. She played with him, frightened
him away, drew him back, quarrelled with
him, received him back again into favor,
as the fancy took her." Once, in the sum-
mer of 1823, he imagined that a letter which
she wrote him amounted to a promise to
become his wife, and she hastened to unde-
ceive him. She said :
" My friend, I love you. I repeat it, though I
find the expression a rash one. All the best feelings
of my nature are concerned in loving you. But were
you my brother I should love you the same. No.
Your friend I will be, your truest, most devoted
friend.while I breathe the breath of life. But your
wife never. Never, not though you were as rich
as Croesus, as honored and renowned as you yet
shall be."
206 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
At last, in April, 1824, six months after
Irving had been married, she consented to
a half engagement with Carlyle. He was
in Edinburgh busy bringing out his transla-
tion of Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister," and
she came to the city on a visit to a friend.
They met, and, as usual, quarrelled, and on
making up the quarrel she promised that
as soon as his fortune was made she would
share it with him. With this crumb of com-
fort he went to London to prosecute his
literary labors, and there continued his in-
timacy with Irving, in blissful ignorance of
the relations between him and Miss
Welsh, as his letters to her, full of details
about Irving, show. By the beginning of
1825 he saw his way clear to supporting a
wife in the modest style to which he had
himself been accustomed to live, and he be-
gan to urge upon Miss Welsh the fulfilment
of her promise. But she still hesitated.
She wrote to him : " In requiring you to
better your fortune I had some view to an
improvement in my sentiments. I am not
sure that they are proper sentiments for a
husband. They are proper for a brother, a
INTELLECTUAL MASTERY. 207
father, a guardian spirit, but a husband, it
seems to me, should be dearer still." At
the same time, when Carlyle offered to take
her at her word and to release her from her
promise, she was unwilling to give him up.
She said : " How could I part from the only
living soul that understands me ! I would
marry you to-morrow rather; our parting
would need to be brought about by death
or some dispensation of Providence. Were
you to will it, to part would no longer be
bitter. The bitterness would be in think-
ing you unworthy." And again, a little
later, she wrote to him : " I know not how
your spirit has gained such a mastery over
mine in spite of my pride and stubbornness.
But so it is. Though self-willed as a mule
with others, I am tractable and submissive
towards you. I hearken to your voice as
to the dictates of a second conscience,
hardly less awful to me than that which
nature has implanted in my breast. How
comes it, then, that you have this power
over me ? for it is not the effect of your
genius and virtue merely. Sometimes, in
my serious moods, I believe it is a charm
208 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
with which my good angel has fortified my
heart against evil."
The relations of the pair might have
continued on this footing indefinitely but
for the unexpected interference of a well-
meaning but imprudent friend of Irving's.
This was Mrs. Basil Montague, with whom
Irving had become intimate when he went
to London to live, in 1823, and to whom
he had confided the secret of the attach-
ment between himself and Miss Welsh.
Mrs. Montague opened a correspondence
both with Miss Welsh and with Carlyle, at
first with the ostensible purpose of putting
an end to any lingering love which Miss
Welsh might feel for Irving, and of recon-
ciling her to a marriage with Carlyle, but
finally writing to her a letter dissuading her
from the marriage. This letter Miss Welsh
at once indignantly enclosed to her suitor,
revealing to him, what she had hitherto con-
cealed, how much she had cared for Irving,
and throwing herself upon his generosity
to forgive her want of candor. His reply
was so affectionate and so self-depreciating
that it decided her. She went at once to
UNHAPPY MARRIED LIFE. 2OQ
pay his family a visit, and, after many de-
liberations and changes of plans, during
which she once more offered to release him
and he to release her, the final arrangements
were made. She accepted him bravely as
her husband, and they were married on the
1 7th of October, 1826.
• Mr. Froude has been severely censured
as painting in too dark colors Carlyle's
grim, savage humor, his thoughtless cruelty
to his wife, and her unhappiness ; but the
documentary evidence he has presented
fully justifies him. Mrs. Carlyle said herself,
not long before her death : " I married for
ambition. Carlyle has exceeded all that
my wildest hopes ever imagined of him ;
and I am miserable." Her husband, in-
deed, appreciated her talents and found
pleasure in her society, but he never seems
to have experienced for her the passion of
love as it is commonly understood. The
pair had no children, and, as Mr. Froude
tells us, when Carlyle was busy his wife
rarely so much as saw him save when she
would steal into his dressing-room in the
morning while he was shaving. That
14
210 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
mutual physical attraction, therefore, which,
in spite of all that may be said to the con-
trary, is essential to complete conjugal
union, was wanting to them, and intellect-
ual sympathy could not fill its place. In
other respects, too, the couple were un-
congenial. She had been the darling of
parents in easy circumstances, and had
been reared in luxury and accustomed to
all the refinements of life. He was the
son of a poor stonemason, and his habits
were those of a rough Scottish peasant.
Hardships which to him were natural and
customary were to her torture. After her
death, indeed, the truth burst upon him
and he was justly overwhelmed with re-
morse for his conduct. He saw, too late,
how cruel he had thoughtlessly been to
the delicate flower he had taken into his
keeping, and he vainly sought to atone for it
by lamentation and self-reproaches.
Irving appears to have met Mrs. Carlyle
only four times after her marriage. The
first was when she was living at Edinburgh
in 1827. His call lasted but half an hour,
and at the end of it he insisted, with more
IRVING'S LAST VISITS. 211
zeal than tact, on praying with her and her
husband. The next year Carlyle brought
him out to spend two or three days at his
Craigenputtoch farm, and he seemed cheer-
ful and happy. Again, when the Carlyles
went to London on a visit in 1831, Irving
came to see them one evening, and Mr.
Carlyle, in Mrs. Carlyle's presence, and
with her assent, essayed to extricate him
from the delusions into which he had
fallen. Her feelings may be guessed from
what she afterwards said : " There would
have been no tongues had Irving married
me." In 1834, the first year of her perma-
nent residence in London, and the last of
Irving's life, he called on her at her house
in Cheyne Row, and staid about twenty
minutes. " Ah, yes," he said to her, look-
ing round the room, " you are like an Eve ;
make every place you live in beautiful." In
less than two months afterwards he died.
Whether Mrs. Carlyle would have been
happier with Irving for a husband instead
of Carlyle is doubtful. That Irving would
have been to her most tender, loving, and
considerate, his treatment of the woman he
212 IRVING AND MRS. CARLYLE.
married, not from love, but from a sense of
duty, compels us to believe; but whether
his failure in his career, and the want of
that gratification of her pride and satisfac-
tion of her ambition which she got with
Carlyle, would not have been as sore a
trial to her as Carlyle's harshness is not
so sure. Irving, like Carlyle, was a man
of genius, but his genius was confined with-
in the narrow limits of religious enthu-
siasm, and he had little or no sympathy
for anything that lay outside. He was
even alarmed when Carlyle on undertak-
ing Miss Welsh's literary education in
1821, began to teach her German, and to
open to her the treasures of German litera-
ture. He feared, as he wrote to Carlyle,
that she would escape altogether out of
the region of his sympathies. The devel-
opment of their respective minds could,
therefore, scarcely have failed to result in
a radical disagreement, so that she would
have been, in a different way, as unhappy
with him as she was with Carlyle, without
the compensation that Carlyle's talents and
fame afforded.
W. D. HOWELLS.
CRITICISM AND FICTION. With Portrait. 16mo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1 00.
A BOY'S TOWN. Described for HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE.
Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.
In no novel of las are we more fusciuated from cover to cover than
in this truthful narration of a boy's life.— Hartford Courant.
THE SHADOW OF A DREAM. A Story. 12mo, Cloth, $1 00;
Paper, 50 cents.
A tale full of delicate genius, in the front rank among its kind. —
If. ¥. Sun.
A HAZARD OF NEW FORTUNES. 12rao, Cloth, 2 vols.,
$2 00 ; Paper, Illustrated, $1 00.
Never has Mr. Howells written more brilliantly, more clearly, more
grimly, or more attractively than in this instance.— y. Y. Tribune.
ANNIE KILBURN. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50; Paper, 75 ccms.
It certainly seems to ns the. very best book that Air. Howells has
written. — Spectator, London.
APRIL HOPES. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50; Paper, nearly ready.
A delightfully humorous and penetrating study of Boston society. —
Boston Transcript.
THE MOUSE-TRAP, AND OTHER FARCES. Illustrated.
12mo, Cloth, $1 00.
This charming volume has in it elements of perpetual delight
Boston Beacon.
MODERN ITALIAN POETS. Essays and Versions. With
Portraits. 12mo, Half Cloth, $2 00.
Mr. Howells has in this work enabled the general pnblic to obtain a
knowledge of modern Italian poetry which they could have acquired
in no other way. — N. Y. Tribune.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
#3* The above works will be »snt by mail, postage prepaid, to ani/ part
of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the price.
CHARLES DUDLEY WAKNER.
AS WE WERE SAYING. Illustrated. 16mo, Cloth, Orna-
mental. (Nearly ready.)
OUR ITALY. Illustrated. 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, Uncut
Edges and Gilt Top, $2 50.
Mr. Warner is a prince of travellers and sight-seers—so genial, so
kindly, so ready to be pleased, so imperturbable under discomfort, BO
full of interpretation, so prophetic in hope. . . . In this book are a
little history, a little prophecy, a few fascinating statistics, many in-
teresting facts, much practical suggestion, and abundant humor and
charm. —Evangelist, N. Y.
A LITTLE JOURNEY IN THE WORLD. A Novel. Post
8vo, Half Leather, $1 50.
The vigor and vividness of the tale and its sustained interest are not
its only or its chief merits. It is a study of American life of to-day,
possessed with shrewd insight and fidelity. — GEORGE WILLIAM COETIS.
A powerful picture of that phase of modern life in which unscrupu-
lously acquired capital is the chief agent.— Boston Post,
STUDIES IN THE SOUTH AND WEST, with Comments on
Canada. Post 8vo, Half Leather, $1 75.
Perhaps the most accurate and graphic account of these portions of
the country that has appeared, taken all in all. ... A book most
charming — a book that no American can fail to enjoy, appreciate, and
highly prize. — Boston Traveller.
THEIR PILGRIMAGE. Richly Illustrated by C. S. REINHART.
Post 8vo, Half Leather, $2 00.
Mr. Warner's pen-pictures of the characters typical of each resort,
of the manner of life followed at each, of the humor and absurdities
peculiar to Saratoga, or Newport, or Bar Harbor, as the case may be,
are as good-natured as they are clever. The satire, when there is any,
is of the mildest, and the general tone is that of one glad to look on
the brightest side of the cheerful, pleasure-seeking world with which
he mingles. — Christian Union, N. Y.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
&£= The above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part
of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the price.
BY CONSTANCE F. WOOLSON.
EAST ANGELS, pp. 592. 16rao, Cloth, f 1 25.
ANNE. Illustrated, pp. 540. 16mo, Cloth, $1 25.
FOR THE MAJOR, pp. 208. 16mo, Cloth, |1 00.
CASTLE NOWHERE, pp. 386. 16mo, Cloth, $1 00.
(A New Edition.)
RODMAN THE KEEPER. Southern Sketches, pp.
340. 16mo, Cloth, $1 00. (4 New Edition.)
There is a certain bright cheerfulness in Miss Woolson's writing
which invests all her characters with lovable qualities. — Jewish Advo-
cate, N. Y.
Miss Woolson is among onr few successful writers of interesting
magazine stories, and her skill and power are perceptible in the de-
lineation of her heroines no less than in the suggestive pictures of
local life.— Jewish Messenger, N. Y.
Constance Feniinore Woolson may easily become the norelist
laureate.— Boston Globe.
Miss Woolson has a graceful fancy, a ready wit, a polished style, and
conspicuous dramatic power ; while her skill in the development of a
story is very remarkable. — London Life.
Miss Woolson never once follows the beaten track of the orthodox
novelist, but strikes a new and richly loaded vein, which so far is all
her own ; and thus we feel, on reading one of her works, a fresh sen-
sation, and we put down the book with a sigh to think onr pleasant
task of reading it is finished. The author's lines must have fallen to
her in very pleasant places; or she has, perhaps, within herself the
wealth of womanly love and tenderness she pours so freely into all
she writes. Such books as hers do much to elevate the moral tone of
the day— a quality sadly wanting in novels of the time. — Whitehall
Review, London.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
ty The above works sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the
United States or Canada, on receipt of the price.
BY MARY E. WILKINS.
A NEW ENGLAND NUN, and Other Stories. 16mo,
Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.
A HUMBLE ROMANCE, and Other Stories. 16mo,
Cloth, Extra, $1 25.
Only an artistic hand could have written these stories, and they will
make delightful reading. —Evangelist, N. Y.
The simplicity, purity, and quaintness of these stories set them apart
in a niche of distinction where they have no rivals. — Literary World,
Boston.
The reader who buys this book and reads it will find treble his money's
worth in every one of the delightful stories. — Chicago Journal.
Miss Wilkins is a writer who has a gift for the rare art of creating the
short story which shall be a character study and a bit of graphic picturing
in one ; and all who enjoy the bright and fascinating short story will wel-
come this volume. —Boston Traveller.
The author has the unusual gift of writing a short story which is com-
plete in itself, having a real beginning, a middle, and an end. The volume
is an excellent one. — Observer, N. Y.
A gallery of striking studies in the humblest quarters of American
country life. No one has dealt with this kind of life better than Miss
Wilkins. Nowhere are there to be found such faithful, delicately drawn,
sympathetic, tenderly humorous pictures.— .iV. T. Tribune,
The charm of Miss Wilkins's stories is in her intimate acquaintance
and comprehension of humble life, and the sweet human interest she
feels and makes her readers partake of, in the simple, common, homely
people she draws. — Springfield Republican.
There is no attempt at fine writing or structural effect, but the tender
treatment of the sympathies, emotions, and passions of no very extraor-
dinary people gives to these little stories a pathos and human feeling quite
their own. — N. Y. Commercial Advertiser.
The author has given us studies from real life which must be the result
of a lifetime of patient, sympathetic observation. ... No one has done
the same kind of work so lovingly and so well.— Christian Register,
Boston.
PUBMSHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
JKS°The above works sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the
United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the price.
BY AMELIE RIVES.
A BROTHER TO DRAGONS, AND OTHER OLD-TIME
TALES. Post 8vo, Cloth, Extra, $1 00.
VIRGINIA OP VIRGINIA. A Story. Illustrated.
Post 8vo, Cloth, Extra, $1 00.
One is permitted to discover qualities of miud and u proficiency and
capacity in art from which something uew and distinctively the work
of genius may be anticipated in American literature. — Boston Globe.
Miss Rives has imagination, breadth, and a daring and courage
nftfiii'-t. spoken of as masculine. Moreover, she is exquisitely poet-
ical, and her ideals, with all the mishaps of her delineations, are of an
exalted order — X. Y. Star,
It was little more than two years ago that Miss Rives made her first
literary conquest, a conquest so complete and astonishing as at once
to give her fame. How well she has sustained and added to the repu-
tation she so suddenly won, we all know, and the permanency of that
reputation demonstrates conclusively that her success did not depend
upon the lucky striking of a popular fancy, but that it rests upon en-
during qualities that are developing more and more richly year by
year.— Richmond State.
It is evident that the author has imagination in an unusual degree,
much strength of expression, and skill in delineating character.— Bos-
ton Journal.
There are few yonng writers who begin a promising career with so
much spontaneity and charm of expression as is displayed by Miss
Rives. — Literary World, Boston.
The trait which the author seems to take the most pleasure in de-
picting is the passionate loyalty of a girl to her lover or of a yonng
wife to her husband, and her portrayal of this trait has feeling, and is
set off by an unconventional style and brisk movement. — The Book
Buyer, N. Y.
There is such a wealth of imagination, such an exuberance of strik-
ing language in the productions of this author, as to attract and hold
the reader. — Toledo Blade.
Miss Rives is essentially a teller of love stories, and relates them
with snch simple, straightforward grace that she at once captures the
sympathy and interest of the reader. . . . There is a freshness of feeling
and a mingling of pathos and humor which are simply delicious.— Sew
London Telegraph.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
HARPKR & BBOTIIKHS will send either of the above works by mail,
postage prepaid, to any part of the United States or Canada, on
receipt of the price.
BY MRS. BURTON HARRISON.
BAR HARBOR DAYS. A Tale of Mount Desert. II-
lustrated by Fenn and Hyde. 16mo, Cloth, $1 25.
A bright story of life at Mount Desert. ... It is exceedingly well
done, nud the scenery, the ways of the people, and the social methods
of the rusticators lend interest to the book. — Christian Advocate, N. Y.
The book is bright and readable. — Courier, Boston.
A delightful book about Mount Desert, its summer inhabitants,
their sayings and doings. — N. Y. Sun.
One of the most attractive books of the season, and will be in great
demand by readers who wish an original, captivating summer idyl.—
Hartford Post,
HELEN TROY 16mo, Cloth, $1 00.
It is a breezy little society novel, with a pretty plot and a number
of capitally drawn characters. . . It is always bright, fresh, and en-
tertaining, and has an element of naturalness that is particularly
pleasing. The descriptions are very spirited, the conversations are
full of point and often genuinely witty, and the tone of the whole is
both refined and delicate.— Saturd ay Evening Gazette, Boston.
The book is written with exceeding cleverness, and abounds in de-
lightful little pictures.— The Critic, N. Y.
Mrs. Harrison's style is crisp, epigrammatic, piquant ; she shades
her characters artistically, paints from real life, and, without hurrying
the reader along, never lets her story drag. . . . The merit of the work
lies in the fidelity of its portraiture and the felicity of its utterance. —
.V. Y. Herald.
GOLDEN ROD . AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT.
32mo, Paper, 25 cents ; Cloth, 40 cents.
A very sweet little story of a successful courtship, wrought into a
charming description of scenery and life on Mount Desert.— Spring-
field (111.) State Journal.
This is a most charming summer story— "An Idyl of Mount Des-
ert"— the mere reading of which makes yon long to be there, and to
feel sure you will find the delightful people, and just in the particular
nooks, you have been reading about. — Galesburg (111.) Republican
Register.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
iBf The above works sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the
United States or Canada, on receipt of the price.
BY HOWARD PYLE.
THE WONDER CLOCK ; OR, FOUR-AND-TWENTY MARVEL-
LOUS TALES: BEING ONE FOR EACH HOUR OP THE DAT.
Written and Illustrated by HOWARD PYLE. Embel-
lished with Verses by KATHARINE PYLE. Large 8vo,
Ornamental Half Leather, $3 00.
The illustrations fit the stories perfectly, and are as fantastic as the
warmest lovers of tales of magic can desire. The artist enters so
thoroughly into the spirit of the stories that his wonderful drawings
have an air of reality about them. Some are grotesque, some exqui-
sitely graceful ; all are so spirited, so vigorous, so admirable in design
and in the expression of the faces and figures, and so full of action,
that it is hard to say which is the best. — Boston Post.
"The Wonder Clock " is truly a monument to the genius and indus-
try of the author in his line of illustrated tales, and also to the enter-
prise of the publishers in producing choice children's books. — Brooklyn
Eagle.
THE ROSE OF PARADISE. Being a Detailed Account of cer-
tain Adventures that happened to Captain John Mackra,
in Connection with the famous Pirate, Edward England,
in the Year 1720, off the Island of Juanna, in the Mozam-
bique Channel, writ by himself, and now for the first
time published. By HOWARD PYLE. Illustrated by
the Author. Post 8vo, Ornamental Cloth, $1 25.
One of the most spirited and life-like stories of sen adventure that
we ever remember to have read. — If. Y. Mail and Express.
A charming story with an Old World flavor that no one who picks
it tip can lay down until it is finished. — St. Louis Republican.
PEPPER AND SALT; OR, SEASONING FOR YOUNG FOLK.
By HOWARD PYLE. Superbly illustrated by the Author.
4to, Ornamental Cloth, $2 00.
A quaint and charming book. . . . Mr. Pyle's wonderful versatility
is shown in the different kinds of subjects and the various periods he
treats, in every gradation of humor, mirth, and sly satire, with now
and then a touch of fine sadness.— The Critic, N. Y.
It is beyond compare the quaintest and most entertaining book of
the season. It is unique in style, and as unique in its contents, the
very turning over of its leaves being enough to transport one into
some unheard-of region of imagination.— Observer, N. Y.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
¥f Ant/ of the above works sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part
of the United States or Catiada, on receipt of the price.
THE ENTAILED HAT;
Or, Patty Cannon's Times. A Romance. By GEORGE
ALFRED TOWNSEND ("Gatn"). Pages x., 566. 16mo,
Cloth, $1 50.
Neither Hawthorne nor Dickens ever painted their characters more
vividly than has Mr. Townsend those of Vesta and Milbuni, the owner
of " Steeple Top." The events which led np to the fatal night when
Vesta was informed of the true condition of affairs are the creation of
genius. The entrance of Milburn into the aristocratic home of Judge
Custis, to plead his own case, and his manner of doing it, is an artistic
piece of literary work which will excite the admiration of the critical
reader. — Chicago Inter-Ocean.
The book is remarkable in its local color, its vigorously drawn char-
acters, and its peculiar originality of treatment. The interest is ex-
ceedingly dramatic, and there is enough of incident to furnish a half-
dozen ordinary novels. . . . The story is so well told, and with snch
picturesqueuess of effect generally, that the reader is carried unresist-
ingly along in the skilfully stimulated desire to know the final fate of
the actors iu the exciting drama. This romance is a remarkable one
in many respects.— Saturday Evening Gazette, Boston.
Vesta Custis and Hhoda test the power of the author in drawing
feminine characters, and he has more than met the demands made
upon him. They stand out from the pages like flesh-and-blood creat-
ures. Equally successful is the delineation of Patty Cannon and the
life of the negro kidnappers. The story moves rapidly, and the unflag-
ging interest of the reader is maintained almost to the end. It enti-
tles Mr. Townseud to a high place iu the ranks of American novelists,
and it would not be surprising if the "Entailed Hat" held a perma-
nent place iu American literature. We know of no story iu which
the details of American life have been so skilfully used, except iu the
novels of Hawthorue and Bayard Taylor. — Philadelphia Press.
It would be difficult to flud in recent fiction a lovelier woman than
Vesta, or a more touching one than the exquisite slave Virgie, or a
stronger one thau Milburu, or better portraits of the common life of
the time and place than Levin Dennis and Jimmy Phoebus aud Jack
Wonnell. . . . The story has decided power aud originality, and is a
marked contribution to our really native fiction. — Hartford Daily
Courant.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
The above work sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the
United Mates or Canada on receipt of the price.
THE BREAD-WINNERS.
A Social Study, pp. 320. 16mo, Cloth, $1 00.
One of the strongest and most striking: stories of the last ten
years. . . . The work of n very clever nuxn : it is told with many live-
ly strokes of humor ; it sparkles with epigram ; it is brilliant with
wit. . . . The chief characters in it are actually alive; they are really
flesh and blood; they are at once true and new; and they are em-
phatically and aggressively American. The anonymous author has a
firm grip on American character. He has seen, and he has succeeded
in making us see, facts and phases of American life which no one has
put into a book before. . . . Interesting, earnest, sincere ; fine in its
performance, and finer still in its promise.— Saturday Review, London.
A worthy contribution to that American novel-literature which is at
the present day, on the whole, ahead of our own.— Pall Mall Gazette,
London.
Praise, and unstinted praise, should be given to "The Bread-Win-
ners." — X. Y. Time*.
It is a novel with a plot, rounded and distinct, upon which every epi-
sode has a direct bearing. . . . The book is one to stand nobly the test
of immediate re-rending.— Critic, N. Y.
It is a truly remarkable book. — A". Y. Journal of Commerce.
A* a vigorous, virile- well-told American story, it is long since we
have had anything as good as "The Bread- Winners." — Philadelphia
Bulletin.
Every page of the book shows the practised hand of a writer to
whom long use has made exact literary expression as easy and spon-
taneous as the conversation of some of those gifted talkers who are
at once the delight and the envy of their associates. . . . We might
mention many scenes which seem to us particularly strong, but if we
IK-LMII snch a catalogue we should not know where to stop N. Y.
Tribune.
Within comparatively few pages a story which, as a whole, deserves
to be called vigorous, is tersely told. . . . The author's ability to de-
pict the mental and moral struggles of those who are poor, and who
believe themselves oppressed, is also evident in his management of
the strike and in his delineation of the characters of Sam Sleeny, a
carpenter's journeyman, and Ananias Offlt, the villain of the story.—
N. Y. Evening Telegram.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
The above nork sent by mail, pontage prepaid, to any part of the
United States or Canada, on receipt of the price.
BEN-HUE: A TALE OF THE CHKIST.
By LEW. WALLACE. New Edition from New Electrotype
Plates, pp. 560. 16mo, Cloth, $1 50; Half Calf, $3 00.
Anything so startling, new, and distinctive as the lending feature of
this romance does not often appear in works of fiction. . . . Some of
Mr. Wallace's writing is remarkable for its pathetic eloquence. The
scenes described in the New Testament are re-written with the power
and skill of an accomplished master of style. — A'. Y. Times.
Its real basis is a description of the life of the Jews and Romans at
the beginning of the Christian era, and this is both forcible and brill-
iant. . . . We are carried through a surprising variety of scenes ; we
witness a sea-fight, a chariot- race, the internal economy of a Roman
galley, domestic interiors at Antioch, at Jerusalem, and among the
tribes of the desert; palaces, prisons, the haunts of dissipated Roman
youth, the houses of pious families of Israel. There is plenty of ex-
citing incident; everything is animated, vivid, and glowing. — N. Y.
Tribune.
From the opening of the volume to the very close the reader's in-
terest will be kept at the highest pitch, and the novel will be pro-
nounced by all one of the greatest novels of the day. — Boston Post.
It is full of poetic beauty, as though born of an Eastern sage, and
there is sufficient of Oriental customs, geography, nomenclature, etc.,
to greatly strengthen the semblance. — Boston Commonwealth.
" Ben-Hur" is interesting, and its characterization is fine and strong.
Meanwhile it evinces careful study of the period in which the scene is
laid, and will help those who read it with reasonable attention to real-
ize the nature and conditions of Hebrew life in Jerusalem and Ro-
man life at Antioch at the time of our Saviour's advent. — Examiner,
N.Y.
It is really Scripture history of Christ's time, clothed gracefully and
delicately in the flowing and loose drapery of modern fiction. . . , Few
late works of fiction excel it in genuine ability and interest. — N. Y.
Graphic.
One of the most remarkable and delightful books. It is as real and
warm as life itself, and as attractive as the grandest and most heroic
chapters of history.— Indianapolis Journal.
The book is one of unquestionable power, and will be read with un-
wonted interest by many readers who are weary of the conventional
novel and romance.— Boston Journal.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
§3T~ The above work sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the.
United States or Canada, on receipt of the price.
A 000 759 225 6