"The writings of a young girl still on the threshold of life and still to be regarded as a bright, incarnate promise,—her writings are very graceful, very tender, and very beautiful, just what the flowers of life's spring should be."
"The writings of a young girl still on the threshold of life and still to be regarded as a bright, incarnate promise,—her writings are very graceful, very tender, and very beautiful, just what the flowers of life's spring should be."
The young author dedicated her book to her mother in tender phrase, and her artless "Preface" was one to disarm any adverse view.
In after years Mrs. Moulton smilingly replied to some questions regarding her initiation into authorship:
"I remember the huge posters with which they placarded the walls, headed, 'Read this book and see what a girl of eighteen can do.' I think I had the grace to be a little shocked at these posters, but the reviews were so kind, and said such lovely things that—Ah! shall I ever be so happy again as when I read them!"
"I remember the huge posters with which they placarded the walls, headed, 'Read this book and see what a girl of eighteen can do.' I think I had the grace to be a little shocked at these posters, but the reviews were so kind, and said such lovely things that—Ah! shall I ever be so happy again as when I read them!"
Edmund Clarence Stedman, who had just left Yale College and who, at the beginning of his literary career, was editing a country paper in Connecticut, greeted Miss Chandler's book with the ardent praise of youth and friendship; but these warm phrases of approval were also the almost unanimous expression of all the reviewers of the day. The twentieth century reader may smile at Mr. Stedman's youthful distrust of the "strong-minded woman," but his remarks are interesting. Of "This, That, and the Other," he wrote:
"'This, That, and the Other,' is a collection of prose sketches and verse from the pen of a young lady fast rising into a literaryreputation; a reputation which, though it is achieved in no 'Uncle Tom' or 'Fanny Fern' mode, is no less sure than that of Mrs. Stowe, or Sara Payson Willis, and will be more substantial, in that the works on which it is founded are more classic and in better taste.... Miss Chandler is a native of Pomfret in this state, and every denizen of Connecticut should be proud of her talents. She is beautiful and interesting; her manners are in marked distinction from the forwardness of the strong-minded woman of the day...."
"'This, That, and the Other,' is a collection of prose sketches and verse from the pen of a young lady fast rising into a literaryreputation; a reputation which, though it is achieved in no 'Uncle Tom' or 'Fanny Fern' mode, is no less sure than that of Mrs. Stowe, or Sara Payson Willis, and will be more substantial, in that the works on which it is founded are more classic and in better taste.... Miss Chandler is a native of Pomfret in this state, and every denizen of Connecticut should be proud of her talents. She is beautiful and interesting; her manners are in marked distinction from the forwardness of the strong-minded woman of the day...."
Epes Sargent, in theBoston Transcript, said:
"... The ladies have invaded the field of fiction and carried off its most substantial triumphs. Mrs. Stowe, Fanny Fern, and now another name, if the portents do not deceive us, is about to be added—that of Miss Chandler, who although the youngest of the band (she is not yet nineteen), is overflowing with genius and promise. Such tales as those of 'Silence Adams,' 'A Husking Party at Ryefield,' 'Agnes Lee,' and 'Only an Old Maid,' reveal the pathos, the beauty, the power, the depth and earnestness of emotion that Ellen Louise has the art of transfusinginto the humblest and most commonplace details.... But Ellen Louise must not be deceived by injudicious admiration. Her style, purified, chastened and subdued, would lose none of its attractiveness. She gives evidence of too noble a habit of thought to desire the success which comes of the hasty plaudits of the hour."
"... The ladies have invaded the field of fiction and carried off its most substantial triumphs. Mrs. Stowe, Fanny Fern, and now another name, if the portents do not deceive us, is about to be added—that of Miss Chandler, who although the youngest of the band (she is not yet nineteen), is overflowing with genius and promise. Such tales as those of 'Silence Adams,' 'A Husking Party at Ryefield,' 'Agnes Lee,' and 'Only an Old Maid,' reveal the pathos, the beauty, the power, the depth and earnestness of emotion that Ellen Louise has the art of transfusinginto the humblest and most commonplace details.... But Ellen Louise must not be deceived by injudicious admiration. Her style, purified, chastened and subdued, would lose none of its attractiveness. She gives evidence of too noble a habit of thought to desire the success which comes of the hasty plaudits of the hour."
The book reviewing of 1853 was apparently not unlike the spelling of George Eliot's poor Mr. Tulliver,—"a matter of private judgment." For although the stories of Ellen Louise were singularly sweet and winsome in their tone, with an unusual grasp of sentiment and glow of fancy for so youthful and inexperienced a writer, they could yet hardly claim to rank with the work of Mrs. Stowe. The leading papers of that day united, however, in an absolute chorus of praise for the young author, who is pronounced "charming," and "overflowing with talent"; the "refinement and delicacy" of her work, her "rare maturity of thought and style," and a myriad other literary virtues were discerned and celebrated to the extent that the resources of the language of the country would allow. A sonnet was written to her, signed "B.P.S.," which signature is easily translated to us in thesedays as that of B.P. Shillaber, the author of "Mrs. Partington." The sonnet is entitled:
TO ELLEN LOUISE
The succeeding year Miss Chandler passed at Mrs. Willard's Seminary in Troy, N.Y., and a classmate, who in after years became the wife of General Gillespie, thus describes her:
"My acquaintance with Louise Chandler began when she entered Mrs. Willard's Seminary in Troy, where we were both pupils. She was at once very much admired and beloved. Her first book, called 'This, That, and the Other,' had been published just before she came, and we were all very proudof her authorship. She had a lovely face, very fair, with beautiful, wavy, sunny hair, falling on either side the deep blue-gray eyes, with their dark, long lashes. Her voice was clear and sweet, with the most cultivated intonation."
"My acquaintance with Louise Chandler began when she entered Mrs. Willard's Seminary in Troy, where we were both pupils. She was at once very much admired and beloved. Her first book, called 'This, That, and the Other,' had been published just before she came, and we were all very proudof her authorship. She had a lovely face, very fair, with beautiful, wavy, sunny hair, falling on either side the deep blue-gray eyes, with their dark, long lashes. Her voice was clear and sweet, with the most cultivated intonation."
For the school Commencement Miss Chandler was chosen class poet, and produced the regulation poem, neither better nor worse than is usual on such occasions. Six weeks later, August 27, 1855, she married William Upham Moulton, editor and publisher ofThe True Flag, a Boston literary journal to which his bride had been a frequent contributor.
The journalists of the day made many friendly comments upon the marriage of their brother editor. Some of them ran thus:
"The possession of a noble and true heart in the one, and of a gentle and winning nature in the other, are presages of future bliss.""Mr. Moulton is a writer of much originality of style and great power; an independent thinker, shrewd in conclusions and fearless in expression. Miss Chandler overflows with kindness, geniality, appreciation of the lovely, and the power of description to a remarkable degree.""... Of his choice the world can speak. Her literary attainments have made their public mark, and her kindness of heart has won for her an eminent place in the affections of thousands. Our associate may well be congratulated on his acquisition of a new contributor to his happiness, and pardoned, in view of the richness of his prize, for leaving the fair of our own locality for more distant Connecticut."
"The possession of a noble and true heart in the one, and of a gentle and winning nature in the other, are presages of future bliss."
"Mr. Moulton is a writer of much originality of style and great power; an independent thinker, shrewd in conclusions and fearless in expression. Miss Chandler overflows with kindness, geniality, appreciation of the lovely, and the power of description to a remarkable degree."
"... Of his choice the world can speak. Her literary attainments have made their public mark, and her kindness of heart has won for her an eminent place in the affections of thousands. Our associate may well be congratulated on his acquisition of a new contributor to his happiness, and pardoned, in view of the richness of his prize, for leaving the fair of our own locality for more distant Connecticut."
Moulton age 18Louise Chandler Moulton, æt. 18Page 34
Moulton age 18
Louise Chandler Moulton, æt. 18
Page 34
One of the girlish pictures of Miss Chandler bears the inscription, in her own writing, "Taken the day I first saw my husband," but unfortunately, the date is not given. In a little sketch Harriet Prescott Spofford remarks that "Louise must have combined studying, writing, and love-making to a rather remarkable degree during her last year at school"; and adds in regard to her marriage:
"She was barely twenty when she married William Upham Moulton, a man of culture and of much personal attraction. Lingering a moment on the church porch in the sunset light, she has been described by one who saw her as a radiant being, in her bridal veil, blooming, blushing, full of life and joy and love. An exquisite skin, the 'rose crushed on ivory,' hazel eyes, with dark lashes andbrows, and a confiding, fearless glance, small white teeth, a delightful smile, cheek and chin having the antique line, all united to make a loveliness which no portrait has successfully rendered, and which tender consideration and grace of manner accented to wonderful charm."
"She was barely twenty when she married William Upham Moulton, a man of culture and of much personal attraction. Lingering a moment on the church porch in the sunset light, she has been described by one who saw her as a radiant being, in her bridal veil, blooming, blushing, full of life and joy and love. An exquisite skin, the 'rose crushed on ivory,' hazel eyes, with dark lashes andbrows, and a confiding, fearless glance, small white teeth, a delightful smile, cheek and chin having the antique line, all united to make a loveliness which no portrait has successfully rendered, and which tender consideration and grace of manner accented to wonderful charm."
Among her girlish treasures preserved for more than fifty years was a small blank book, on the fly-leaf of which she had written: "Ellen Louise Chandler Moulton, from my husband, Aug. 27, 1855, Elmwood Cottage, Pomfret, Conn."; and underneath in quotation, the lines:
Mr. Moulton brought his bride to Boston, where she was at once introduced into those literary circles made up of the chief men and women of letters. "Here," said one who remembers her entrance into Boston life, "the bright, quick, impassioned girlspeedily blossomed into the brilliant woman." In some reminiscences of her own in recalling this delightful period she said:
"Every one was very good to me—Dr. Holmes, Longfellow, Whittier—all those on whose work I had been brought up. And then the broader religious thought of Boston began to conquer the Puritanism in which I had been educated. Whittier was a Quaker, but he believed most of all in the loving Fatherhood of God,—the Divine care which would somehow, somewhere, make creation a blessing to all on whom had been bestowed the unsought gift of life. He told me once how this conviction first came to him. It was a touching anecdote of his childhood when his mother's tenderness to the erring aroused in him the perception of the goodness of God. Whittier was a singularly modest man; if one praised his work he would say, 'Yes, but there should be a perfection of form, and what I do is full of faults.' Once, at an evening party, he was vainly entreated to recite one of his poems. 'No,' he said, 'but I wish she would,' pointing to me. I then read 'The Swan Song of Parson Avery,' and when I had finished he came across the room and said, 'Why, thee has reallymade me think I've written a beautiful poem.'"No words could overpraise the sweet graciousness of Longfellow and Dr. Holmes to me, a new-comer into their world. I knew Ralph Waldo Emerson, also. The very last time I saw him he had just returned from California, and he crossed the Athenæum Library, where we chanced to be, to ask me if I had ever been there myself and had seen the big trees. 'Why,' he said, 'it took thirteen horses to go round one tree, the head of one touching the tail of another—what do you think of that?'"I remember once, when I was a guest in his house in Concord, his telling me that he had long wanted to make an anthology of the one-poem men. And he went on to speak of the poets who were remembered by only one poem. He never carried out his idea, but I wish some one else might."
"Every one was very good to me—Dr. Holmes, Longfellow, Whittier—all those on whose work I had been brought up. And then the broader religious thought of Boston began to conquer the Puritanism in which I had been educated. Whittier was a Quaker, but he believed most of all in the loving Fatherhood of God,—the Divine care which would somehow, somewhere, make creation a blessing to all on whom had been bestowed the unsought gift of life. He told me once how this conviction first came to him. It was a touching anecdote of his childhood when his mother's tenderness to the erring aroused in him the perception of the goodness of God. Whittier was a singularly modest man; if one praised his work he would say, 'Yes, but there should be a perfection of form, and what I do is full of faults.' Once, at an evening party, he was vainly entreated to recite one of his poems. 'No,' he said, 'but I wish she would,' pointing to me. I then read 'The Swan Song of Parson Avery,' and when I had finished he came across the room and said, 'Why, thee has reallymade me think I've written a beautiful poem.'
"No words could overpraise the sweet graciousness of Longfellow and Dr. Holmes to me, a new-comer into their world. I knew Ralph Waldo Emerson, also. The very last time I saw him he had just returned from California, and he crossed the Athenæum Library, where we chanced to be, to ask me if I had ever been there myself and had seen the big trees. 'Why,' he said, 'it took thirteen horses to go round one tree, the head of one touching the tail of another—what do you think of that?'
"I remember once, when I was a guest in his house in Concord, his telling me that he had long wanted to make an anthology of the one-poem men. And he went on to speak of the poets who were remembered by only one poem. He never carried out his idea, but I wish some one else might."
It was a rich and stimulating atmosphere into which Mrs. Moulton entered in Boston. The first winter after her marriage Thackeray visited this country and gave in Boston, in January of that year (1856), his lectures on "The Four Georges." In recalling these, Mrs. Moulton afterward said:
"I sat close to the platform, thoroughly entranced, and longing to speak to him—this great man! longing with all a romantic schoolgirl's ardor and capacity for hero-worship. I never missed a lecture. The last day and the last lecture came, and as Mr. Thackeray came from the platform he bent toward me and said: 'I shall miss the kind, encouraging face that has sat beneath me for so many hours'; and I was too surprised to be able to answer him a word. But it is a memory that has never left me."
"I sat close to the platform, thoroughly entranced, and longing to speak to him—this great man! longing with all a romantic schoolgirl's ardor and capacity for hero-worship. I never missed a lecture. The last day and the last lecture came, and as Mr. Thackeray came from the platform he bent toward me and said: 'I shall miss the kind, encouraging face that has sat beneath me for so many hours'; and I was too surprised to be able to answer him a word. But it is a memory that has never left me."
Boston in the fifties had little to boast of in the artistic line. Henry James, writing of Hawthorne's time, noted with amusement the devotion to the "attenuated outlines" of Flaxman's drawings. The classic old Athenæum contained practically all that the city could offer in the way of art. Here were some casts from antique marbles, specimens of the work of Greenough and Thorwaldsen, a certain number of dull busts of interesting men, a supply of engravings, and a small collection of paintings. The paintings were largely copies, but included originals by Allston, Copley, and a few others.
In music the taste was pure, if the opportunities were but provincial. Grisi and Marioin brief visits delighted the town in opera; the Handel and Haydn Society provided oratorio; the Harvard Orchestra gave instrumental concerts. In the spring of 1856 was held a Beethoven Festival, and the bronze statue, so long familiar in the old Boston Music Hall, was inaugurated with a poem by the sculptor, William Wetmore Story.
In intellectual life Boston had long been distinguished among American cities. In these early years of Mrs. Moulton's life here Lowell gave his course of lectures on "Poetry" before the Lowell Institute, and Curtis his course on "Bulwer and Disraeli." Longfellow at this time was writing "Hiawatha"; Richard Grant White was often coming over from New York to confer with the Cambridge group on nice points in his edition of Shakespeare. The interest in literature is illustrated by the fact that when "Maud" appeared in the summer of 1855 Longfellow and George William Curtis made a pilgrimage to Newport to read and discuss it with Mrs. Julia Ward Howe. The aristocratic ideal in the world into which Mrs. Moulton had come was distinctly intellectual rather than plutocratic.
The year of her marriage was also the year of the publication of her second book, a novel entitled "Juno Clifford," which wasbrought out anonymously by the Appletons. Again the praise of the reviewers was practically unanimous. A Boston critic wrote: "The authorship is a mystery which perhaps time will unravel, for rumor is ascribing it to lofty names in the world of literature"; and George D. Prentice, in theLouisville Journal, in less journalistic phrase, characterized the story as having "numerous points of strange beauty and a strange pathos."
Among the sympathetic friends who at this time enriched Mrs. Moulton's life none was of personality more striking than Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman, whose connection with Poe was at once so touching and so tragic. "No person ever made on me so purely spiritual an impression," wrote Mrs. Moulton inThe Athenæumin after years, "as did Mrs. Whitman. One of her friends said of her: 'She is nothing but a soul with a sweet voice.'" Some of the poems signed "Ellen Louise" had attracted the attention of Mrs. Whitman, and a correspondence followed. In a postscript to the first letter written to Mrs. Moulton after her marriage, Mrs. Whitman says:
"You ask my plans. I have none nor ever had. All my life I have been one of those who walk by faith and not by sight. I nevercan plan ahead. The first words I ever learned to speak were caught from hearing the watchman call out in the middle of the night, 'All's well.' This has always been my great article of faith. An angel seems ever to turn for me at the right time the mystic pages of the book of life, while I stand wondering and waiting,—that is all."
"You ask my plans. I have none nor ever had. All my life I have been one of those who walk by faith and not by sight. I nevercan plan ahead. The first words I ever learned to speak were caught from hearing the watchman call out in the middle of the night, 'All's well.' This has always been my great article of faith. An angel seems ever to turn for me at the right time the mystic pages of the book of life, while I stand wondering and waiting,—that is all."
On the appearance of "Juno Clifford," Mrs. Whitman wrote:
Mrs. Whitman to Mrs. MoultonNovember15 [1855].My Dear Louise: I have read "Juno Clifford," and my "honest opinion" is that it is a very fascinating story, eloquently related. I was surprised at its finished excellence; yet I expected much from you.I have written a notice for theJournalwhich will appear in a few days. I will send you a copy of the paper. I wish I had leisure to tell you all I think of the book. You have all the qualities requisite for a successful novelist, and some very rare ones, as I think. The grief of the poor Irish girl brought tears to my eyes,—eyes long accustomed to look serenely on human sorrows. The characterof Juno is admirably portrayed and you have managed the "heavy tragedy" with admirable skill. I do not, however, like to have Juno tear out her beautiful hair by "handfuls," and I think there is a lavish expenditure of love scenes in the latter part of the book; but all young lovers will freely pardon you for this last offence, and I am not disposed to be hypercritical about the hair.I can find nothing else to condemn, though I would fain show myself an impartial judge. I wish "Juno" all success, and am ever, with sincere regard,Your friend,S. Helen Whitman.P.S.—I saw the death of Miss Locke inThe Times! could it have been our Miss Locke? Do you know? I am very busy just now. I have no good pen, and my pencil turns round and round like an inspired Dervish, but utters no sound; so look on my chirography with Christian charity, and love me, nevertheless.S.H.W.
Mrs. Whitman to Mrs. Moulton
November15 [1855].
My Dear Louise: I have read "Juno Clifford," and my "honest opinion" is that it is a very fascinating story, eloquently related. I was surprised at its finished excellence; yet I expected much from you.
I have written a notice for theJournalwhich will appear in a few days. I will send you a copy of the paper. I wish I had leisure to tell you all I think of the book. You have all the qualities requisite for a successful novelist, and some very rare ones, as I think. The grief of the poor Irish girl brought tears to my eyes,—eyes long accustomed to look serenely on human sorrows. The characterof Juno is admirably portrayed and you have managed the "heavy tragedy" with admirable skill. I do not, however, like to have Juno tear out her beautiful hair by "handfuls," and I think there is a lavish expenditure of love scenes in the latter part of the book; but all young lovers will freely pardon you for this last offence, and I am not disposed to be hypercritical about the hair.
I can find nothing else to condemn, though I would fain show myself an impartial judge. I wish "Juno" all success, and am ever, with sincere regard,
Your friend,
S. Helen Whitman.
P.S.—I saw the death of Miss Locke inThe Times! could it have been our Miss Locke? Do you know? I am very busy just now. I have no good pen, and my pencil turns round and round like an inspired Dervish, but utters no sound; so look on my chirography with Christian charity, and love me, nevertheless.
S.H.W.
In other letters from Mrs. Whitman, undated, but evidently written about this time, are these passages:
"I have to-day found time to thank you for your letter and beautiful poem. It is very fine, picturesque, and dramatic. These are, I think, your strong points, but you have touches of pathos.... You must not leave off writing stories, nor do I see any necessity of making any selection between the muse of poetry and the muse of romance. I should say, give attendance to both, as the inspiration comes.... Dr. Holmes, whom I met at the lectures of Lola Montez, is charmed by her....""Mrs. Davis read me Mrs. [R.H.] Stoddard's book ['Two Men'], because you spoke of it so highly. It has, indeed, a strange power,—not one that fascinates me, but which impresses me profoundly and piques my curiosity to know more of the author. I marked some paragraphs which indicated a half-conscious power of imaginative description, which I wish she would exercise more freely. Tell me about her in her personal traits of character.... I hope you will not impugn my taste, dear Louise, when I tell you I like your 'two men' better than Mrs. Stoddard's. 'Margaret Holt' is a charming story. Why is it that Mrs. Stoddard so entirely ignores all sweet and noble emotions?"
"I have to-day found time to thank you for your letter and beautiful poem. It is very fine, picturesque, and dramatic. These are, I think, your strong points, but you have touches of pathos.... You must not leave off writing stories, nor do I see any necessity of making any selection between the muse of poetry and the muse of romance. I should say, give attendance to both, as the inspiration comes.... Dr. Holmes, whom I met at the lectures of Lola Montez, is charmed by her...."
"Mrs. Davis read me Mrs. [R.H.] Stoddard's book ['Two Men'], because you spoke of it so highly. It has, indeed, a strange power,—not one that fascinates me, but which impresses me profoundly and piques my curiosity to know more of the author. I marked some paragraphs which indicated a half-conscious power of imaginative description, which I wish she would exercise more freely. Tell me about her in her personal traits of character.... I hope you will not impugn my taste, dear Louise, when I tell you I like your 'two men' better than Mrs. Stoddard's. 'Margaret Holt' is a charming story. Why is it that Mrs. Stoddard so entirely ignores all sweet and noble emotions?"
Mrs. Moulton's next volume was a collection of the stories which she had contributed to various magazines. It was entitled "My Third Book," and was brought out by the Harpers in 1859. It was greeted as a work which "bears the seal of feminine grace," and which "reveals the beauty of Mrs. Moulton's genius." Of two of the tales a reviewer said, in terms which give with amusing fidelity the tone of the favorable book-notice of the mid-century:
"'No. 101' reminds us of some wondrous statue, her pen has so sculptured the whole story. 'Four Letters from Helen Hamilton' are enough to stir all hearts with their [sic] high purpose and the beautiful ideal of womanhood which consecrate [sic] them."
"'No. 101' reminds us of some wondrous statue, her pen has so sculptured the whole story. 'Four Letters from Helen Hamilton' are enough to stir all hearts with their [sic] high purpose and the beautiful ideal of womanhood which consecrate [sic] them."
Continuing her old habit at school, Mrs. Moulton for many years kept notes of her abundant reading, and the comments and extracts set down in her exquisite handwriting throw a most interesting light on the growth of her thought. She mentions Miss Austen's "Sense and Sensibility" as "interesting, but deficient in earnestness." "Guy Livingston," that old-fashioned apotheosis of brute force, she, like most of the novel-readers of the time, found "fascinating." "The ScarletLetter" impresses her profoundly, and she copies many passages; the first volume of "Modern Painters" she reads with the most serious earnestness, and comments at length upon Ruskin's view that public opinion has no claim to be taken as a standard in the judgment of works of art. Although the bride of a few months, and not yet twenty-one, she enters with the enthusiasm of a schoolgirl into the larger opportunities of life opened to her by her marriage. To English literature she gives herself in serious study. She writes copious analyses of the history of different periods, and critical studies of various writers. It was perhaps at this period that she began to respond to the work of the Elizabethan lyricists with a sympathy which marked the kinship which English critics found so evident in her poetic maturity.
The list of books noted in these records during the next ten years is large and varied. Mrs. Gaskell, Bishop Butler, Dr. Martineau, Miss Mulock (Mrs. Craik), Anthony Trollope, and later George Eliot and George Meredith, are among the writers whom she mentions; and from the "Self-Help" of Samuel Smiles in 1860 she makes copious extracts. Her taste was catholic, and her attitude toward literature always one of genuine seriousness.
Mrs. Moulton's memoranda for her own stories are both interesting and suggestive. To see as it were the mind of the creative writer at work is always fascinating, and here, as in the "American Notebooks" of Hawthorne, the reader seems to be assisting in the very laboratory of the imagination. Some of these notes are as follows:
"Have the story written by a man. Have him go all his life worshipping one woman, even from boyhood. He wins her,—she is cold but he is satisfied and believes she will grow to love him. After three years she leaves him. He gives his life to seeking her. At last finds her just as she is attempting to drown herself, and takes her home."
"Have the story written by a man. Have him go all his life worshipping one woman, even from boyhood. He wins her,—she is cold but he is satisfied and believes she will grow to love him. After three years she leaves him. He gives his life to seeking her. At last finds her just as she is attempting to drown herself, and takes her home."
And again:
"Have a wealthy family travelling in Egypt, and a child born to them there who shall bear the name of the country. This child, Egypt Sunderland, seems to be strangely influenced by her name, and develops all the peculiar characteristics of the Egyptian women."
"Have a wealthy family travelling in Egypt, and a child born to them there who shall bear the name of the country. This child, Egypt Sunderland, seems to be strangely influenced by her name, and develops all the peculiar characteristics of the Egyptian women."
She conceives the outline plots for numerous stories,—among the titles for which are "The Sculptor's Model," "The Unforgiven Sin," "The River Running Fast," "TheEmbroidered Handkerchief," "A Wife's Confession," "The Widow's Candle and How It Went Out." For one projected story her outline runs:
"Show that there is punishment for our sins lying in the consequence of them, which no repentance can avert, or forgiveness condone,—which must be suffered to the uttermost. Make it clear that passive goodness is not enough. We must do something for humanity. That a man who has no moral fibre or practical wisdom has a claim on us for help. For energy and good judgment are as much a gift as are eyes to see and ears to hear. The very lack of practical wisdom gives the one so lacking a special claim on our sympathies."
"Show that there is punishment for our sins lying in the consequence of them, which no repentance can avert, or forgiveness condone,—which must be suffered to the uttermost. Make it clear that passive goodness is not enough. We must do something for humanity. That a man who has no moral fibre or practical wisdom has a claim on us for help. For energy and good judgment are as much a gift as are eyes to see and ears to hear. The very lack of practical wisdom gives the one so lacking a special claim on our sympathies."
Perhaps no one ever lived more in accord with this little gospel of human duty than did Mrs. Moulton, and this fact invests the note with a peculiar interest.
The fiction of the day was little concerned with character-drawing or mental analysis, but was largely occupied with a certain didactic embodiment of ideals of conduct. In such fiction a writer of Mrs. Moulton's genuine sincerity of temperament could not but show clearly her true attitude towardthe deeper problems of life. The opening of one of her stories, "Margaret Grant," will illustrate this fact.
"The love of life, the love of children, the love of kin—these constrain all of us; but it was another kind of love that constrained Margaret Grant. Curiously enough the first awakening came to her soul from a book written by an unbeliever, a book meant to bring Christianity to the final test of final obedience, and to prove its absurdity, thereby prove that to be a Christian as Christ taught, would overthrow the uses of the world, and uproot the whole system of things. 'Let the uses of the world go, and the system of things take care of itself,' Margaret Grant said when she laid the book down. 'This same religion of Christ is the best thing I know, and I will go where it leads me.' And then she waited for the true Guide, that Holy Spirit which shall be given to every honest soul that seeks—waited for her special work, but not idly, since every day and all the days were the little offices of love that make life sweeter for whatever fellow-pilgrim comes in our way."Margaret read to her half-blind grandmother—taught the small boy that ran thefamily errands to read—helped her mother with the housekeeping, all on the lines of 'godly George Herbert,' who wrote:Who sweeps a room as for God's laws,Makes that and the action fine.But all the time she felt that these were not the real work of her life, that work which was on its way."
"The love of life, the love of children, the love of kin—these constrain all of us; but it was another kind of love that constrained Margaret Grant. Curiously enough the first awakening came to her soul from a book written by an unbeliever, a book meant to bring Christianity to the final test of final obedience, and to prove its absurdity, thereby prove that to be a Christian as Christ taught, would overthrow the uses of the world, and uproot the whole system of things. 'Let the uses of the world go, and the system of things take care of itself,' Margaret Grant said when she laid the book down. 'This same religion of Christ is the best thing I know, and I will go where it leads me.' And then she waited for the true Guide, that Holy Spirit which shall be given to every honest soul that seeks—waited for her special work, but not idly, since every day and all the days were the little offices of love that make life sweeter for whatever fellow-pilgrim comes in our way.
"Margaret read to her half-blind grandmother—taught the small boy that ran thefamily errands to read—helped her mother with the housekeeping, all on the lines of 'godly George Herbert,' who wrote:
But all the time she felt that these were not the real work of her life, that work which was on its way."
With the earnestness of spirit which is shown in this and which so continually sounded in her poems, Mrs. Moulton lived her rich life in the congenial atmosphere which surrounded her. Mrs. Spofford, writing of Mrs. Moulton from personal memory, says of her in 1860:
"She was now in her twenty-fifth year, fully launched upon the literary high-seas, contributing toHarper's, theGalaxy, andScribner'sas they came into existence, and to theYoung Folks, theYouth's Companion, and other periodicals for children. Her life seemed a fortunate one. She had a charming home in Boston where she met and entertained the most pleasant people; her housekeeping duties were fulfilled to a nicety, and no domestic detail neglected for all her industrious literary undertakings. A daughter had beenborn to her, Florence, to whom 'Bed-time Stories' were dedicated in some most tender and touching verses, and, somewhat later, a son whose little life was only numbered by days."
"She was now in her twenty-fifth year, fully launched upon the literary high-seas, contributing toHarper's, theGalaxy, andScribner'sas they came into existence, and to theYoung Folks, theYouth's Companion, and other periodicals for children. Her life seemed a fortunate one. She had a charming home in Boston where she met and entertained the most pleasant people; her housekeeping duties were fulfilled to a nicety, and no domestic detail neglected for all her industrious literary undertakings. A daughter had beenborn to her, Florence, to whom 'Bed-time Stories' were dedicated in some most tender and touching verses, and, somewhat later, a son whose little life was only numbered by days."
Life was deepening and offering ever wider horizons. With Emily Dickinson she might have said of the complex interweaving of event, influence, and inspiration:
The morning skies were all aflame.—L.C.M.
POETRY with Mrs. Moulton was a serious art and an object of earnest pursuit. It was not for mere pastime that she had steeped herself, so to speak, in
for in her poetic work she recorded her deepest convictions and her most intimate perceptions of the facts of life. To her life was love;its essence was made up of the charm of noble and sincere friendships, of happy social intercourse, of sympathetic devotion. To this joy of love and friendship, there was in her mind opposed one sorrow—death, and not all the assurances of faith or philosophy could eliminate this dread, this all-pervading fear, that haunted her thoughts. In some way the sadness of death, as a parting, had been stamped on her impressionable nature, and it inevitably colored her outlook and made itself a controlling factor in her character. It took the form, however, of deepening her tenderness for every human relation and widening her charity for all human imperfection. The vision of
Cold hands folded over a still heart,
touched her as it did Whittier, with the pity of humanity's common sorrow, and with him she could have said that such vision
Swept all my pride away, and trembling I forgave.
Writing in later years of Stephen Phillips she said:
"Is it not, after all, the comprehension of love that above all else makes a poet immortal? Who thinks of Petrarch without remembering Laura, of Dante without the vision of Beatrice?""I have said that Phillips is the poet of love and of pity. Many poets have uttered the passionate cries of love; but few, indeed, are those who have seen and expressed the piteous tragedy of life as he has done. He says in 'Marpessa,'"The half of music, I have heard men say,Is to have grieved.And not only has Phillips grieved, but he has felt the grief of other men—listened to the wild, far wail which, one sometimes feels, must turn the very joy of heaven to sorrow."
"Is it not, after all, the comprehension of love that above all else makes a poet immortal? Who thinks of Petrarch without remembering Laura, of Dante without the vision of Beatrice?"
"I have said that Phillips is the poet of love and of pity. Many poets have uttered the passionate cries of love; but few, indeed, are those who have seen and expressed the piteous tragedy of life as he has done. He says in 'Marpessa,'
And not only has Phillips grieved, but he has felt the grief of other men—listened to the wild, far wail which, one sometimes feels, must turn the very joy of heaven to sorrow."
These words reveal much of her own nature. One critic said aptly:
"She is penetrated with that terrible consciousness of the futility of the life which ends in the grave—that consciousness of personal transitoriness which has haunted and oppressed so many passionate and despairing hearts. She knows that 'there is no name, with whatever emphasis of passionate love repeated, of which the echo is not faint at last.' And against this inevitable doom of humanity she rebels with all the energy of her nature."
"She is penetrated with that terrible consciousness of the futility of the life which ends in the grave—that consciousness of personal transitoriness which has haunted and oppressed so many passionate and despairing hearts. She knows that 'there is no name, with whatever emphasis of passionate love repeated, of which the echo is not faint at last.' And against this inevitable doom of humanity she rebels with all the energy of her nature."
In her verse-loving girlhood she had delighted in the facile music and the obvious sentiment of Owen Meredith; his "AuxItaliens," "Madame la Marquise," and "Astarte" had delighted her fancy. As she developed, Browning's "Men and Women" held her captive; and she responded with eagerness to the new melodies of Swinburne. She was indeed wonderfully sensitive to the charm of any master who might arise; yet her own work seemed little influenced by others. She remained always strikingly individual.
In the decades between 1860 and 1880 Boston was singularly rich in rare individualities, and among them Mrs. Moulton easily and naturally made her own place. She found the city not so greatly altered from the Boston of the forties of which Dr. Hale remarked that "the town was so small that practically everybody knew everybody. Lowell could discuss with a partner in a dance the significance of the Fifth Symphony of Beethoven in comparison with the lessons of the Second or the Seventh, and another partner in the next quadrille would reconcile for him the conflict of freewill and foreknowledge." At this period James Freeman Clarke had founded his Church of the Disciples, of which he remained pastor until 1888; and in 1869 Phillips Brooks became rector of Trinity. Lowell, in these years, was living at Elmwood, and it was in 1869 that he recited atHarvard Commencement his great Commemoration Ode. The prayer on that occasion was made by Mr. Brooks, and of it President Eliot said that "the spontaneous and intimate expression of Brooks' noble spirit convinced all Harvard men that a young prophet had risen up in Israel."
Lydia Maria Child, the intimate friend of Whittier, Sumner, Theodore Parker, and Governor Andrew, was then living, and in her book, "Looking Toward Sunset," quoting a poem of Mrs. Moulton's from some newspaper copy which had omitted the name of the author, Mrs. Child had altered one line better to suit her own cheerful fancy. On Mrs. Moulton's remonstrance Mrs. Child wrote her a characteristically lovely note, but ended by saying: "I hope you will let me keep the sunshine in it; the plates are now stereotyped, and an alteration would be very expensive." Mrs. Moulton cordially assented to the added "sunshine," and an affectionate intercourse continued between them until Mrs. Child's death in 1880.
These years of the third quarter of the Nineteenth Century were the great period of Webster, Choate, Everett, Channing, Sumner, and Winthrop. With the close of the Civil War national issues shaped themselves anew.It was a period of wonderful literary activity. Thomas Starr King, who came to Boston in 1845, was a lecturer as well as a preacher of power and genius. Henry James, the elder, was publishing from time to time his philosophic essays, and to Mrs. Moulton, who was much attracted by his gentle leadings, he gave in generous measure his interest and encouragement. TheAtlantic Monthlywas founded in 1857 by Phillips and Sampson, the enterprising young publishers who, according to Dr. Hale, inaugurated the publishing business in Boston, and who were the publishers of Mrs. Moulton's first book. With Lowell, the first editor of theAtlantic, Mrs. Moulton came in contact in the easy intimacy of the literary atmosphere. She heard with eager attention the well known lecture of George William Curtis on "Modern Infidelity" in 1860; and in the same year read with enthusiastic appreciation Hawthorne's "Marble Faun," from which she made copious extracts in her note-books with sympathetic comments. The artistic and intellectual life of Boston in those days held much to call out her keenest interest. Mrs. Kemble gave her brilliant Shakespearian readings; Patti, a youthful prima donna, delighted lovers of opera; Charles Eliot Norton invited friendsto see his new art treasure, a picture by Rossetti; Agassiz was marking an epoch in scientific progress by his lectures. Interested by Professor Agassiz's efforts to found a museum, Mrs. Moulton wrote for theNew York Tribunea special article on the subject; and this was acknowledged by Mrs. Agassiz.
Mrs. Agassiz to Mrs. MoultonThanks for the pleasant and appreciative article about the Agassiz Museum in theTribune. It is a good word spoken in season. It is very charming, and so valuable just now, when the institution is in peril of its life. No doubt it will be of real service in our present difficulties by awakening sympathy and affection in many people. Mr. Agassiz desires his best regards to you.Yours sincerely,Elizabeth Carey Agassiz.
Mrs. Agassiz to Mrs. Moulton
Thanks for the pleasant and appreciative article about the Agassiz Museum in theTribune. It is a good word spoken in season. It is very charming, and so valuable just now, when the institution is in peril of its life. No doubt it will be of real service in our present difficulties by awakening sympathy and affection in many people. Mr. Agassiz desires his best regards to you.
Yours sincerely,
Elizabeth Carey Agassiz.
The intellectual and the social were closely blended in the Boston of the sixties and the seventies, and Mrs. Moulton was in the very midst of the most characteristically Bostonian circles. Her journals record how she went to a "great party" given by Mrs. William Claflin, whose husband was afterward governor; to Cambridge to a function given by theAgassizs; to a reception at Dr. Alger's "to meet Rose Terry," later known as Rose Terry Cooke; to a dinner given in honor of Miss Emily Faithful; to one intellectual gayety after another. She was one of the attractive figures at the delightful Sunday evening reunions given by Mr. and Mrs. Edwin P. Whipple. She notes in the journal that at a brilliant reception given by Mrs. John T. Sargent, so well known as the hostess of the famous Chestnut Street Radical Club, she had "a few golden moments" with Emerson, and a talk with the elder Henry James, with whom she was a favorite.
In 1870 Mrs. Moulton became the Boston literary correspondent of theNew York Tribune. This work developed under her care into one of much importance. Boston publishers sent to her all books of especial interest, and her comments upon them were of solid value. She recorded the brilliant meetings of the Chestnut Street Radical Club, and the intellectual news in general. These letters made a distinct success. Extracts from them were copied all over the United States, and they came to be looked upon as a sort of authorized report of what was doing in the intellectual capital of the country. They were given up only when the desire for foreign travel drew Mrs. Moulton so much abroad that she could no longer keep as closely in touch with current events as is necessary for a press correspondent.
The Radical Club at that time was famed throughout the entire country, and it was regarded as the very inner temple wherein the gods forged their thunderbolts. Only those who bore the sacramental sign were supposed to pass its portals. Mrs. Moulton's accounts of these meetings were vivid and significant. As, for instance, the following:
"The brightest sun of the season shone, and the balmiest airs prevailed, on the 21st of December, in honor of the meeting of the Radical Club under the hospitable roof of Mr. and Mrs. John T. Sargent in Chestnut street. Mrs. Howe was the essayist, and there was a brilliant gathering to hear her. David Wasson was there, and John Weiss, and Colonel Higginson, and Alcott, hoary embodiment of cool, clear thought. Mr. Linton, the celebrated engraver, John Dwight of theMusical Journal, Mrs. Severance, the beloved president of the New England Woman's Club, bonny Kate Field of the honest eyes and the piquant pen, Mrs. Cheney, Miss Peabody, and many others, distinguished in letters or art."To this goodly company Mrs. Howe read a brilliant essay on the subject of Polarity. She commenced by speaking of polarity as applied to matter, in a manner not too abstruse for thesavantswho surrounded her, though it was too philosophical and scholarly to receive the injustice of being reported. The progress of polarity she found to give us the division of sex; and Sex was the subject on which she intended to write when she commenced the essay; but she found it, like all fundamental facts in nature, to be an idea with a history. In the pursuit of this history she encountered the master agency of Polarity, and found herself obliged to make that the primary idea, and consider sex as derived from it."
"The brightest sun of the season shone, and the balmiest airs prevailed, on the 21st of December, in honor of the meeting of the Radical Club under the hospitable roof of Mr. and Mrs. John T. Sargent in Chestnut street. Mrs. Howe was the essayist, and there was a brilliant gathering to hear her. David Wasson was there, and John Weiss, and Colonel Higginson, and Alcott, hoary embodiment of cool, clear thought. Mr. Linton, the celebrated engraver, John Dwight of theMusical Journal, Mrs. Severance, the beloved president of the New England Woman's Club, bonny Kate Field of the honest eyes and the piquant pen, Mrs. Cheney, Miss Peabody, and many others, distinguished in letters or art.
"To this goodly company Mrs. Howe read a brilliant essay on the subject of Polarity. She commenced by speaking of polarity as applied to matter, in a manner not too abstruse for thesavantswho surrounded her, though it was too philosophical and scholarly to receive the injustice of being reported. The progress of polarity she found to give us the division of sex; and Sex was the subject on which she intended to write when she commenced the essay; but she found it, like all fundamental facts in nature, to be an idea with a history. In the pursuit of this history she encountered the master agency of Polarity, and found herself obliged to make that the primary idea, and consider sex as derived from it."
Another letter, describing a meeting a few weeks later, gives a glimpse at some of the women who frequented the club:
"There was Mrs. Severance, reminding one so much of an Indian summer day, so calm and peaceful is the sweet face that looks out at you from its framing of fair waving hair. Not far away was Julia Ward Howe, who some way or other makes you think of the old fairy story of the girl who never opened her mouth but there fell down before her pearls and diamonds. That story isn't a fairy story, nota bit of it. It is real, genuine truth, and Mrs. Howe is the girl grown up, and pearls of poetic fancy and diamonds of sparkling wit are the precious stones which fall from her lips. Lucy Stone was there, an attentive listener, looking the very picture of retiring womanliness in her Quaker-like simplicity of dress, and her pleasant face lighted with interest and animation. Sitting by a table, busy with note-book and pencil, was Miss Peabody, the Secretary of the Club. She has a sparkling, animated face, brimming over with kindness and good-will; she wins one strangely—you can't help being drawn to her. There's a world of fun in the black eyes, and you feel sure she would appreciate the ridiculous sides of living as keenly as any one ever could."
"There was Mrs. Severance, reminding one so much of an Indian summer day, so calm and peaceful is the sweet face that looks out at you from its framing of fair waving hair. Not far away was Julia Ward Howe, who some way or other makes you think of the old fairy story of the girl who never opened her mouth but there fell down before her pearls and diamonds. That story isn't a fairy story, nota bit of it. It is real, genuine truth, and Mrs. Howe is the girl grown up, and pearls of poetic fancy and diamonds of sparkling wit are the precious stones which fall from her lips. Lucy Stone was there, an attentive listener, looking the very picture of retiring womanliness in her Quaker-like simplicity of dress, and her pleasant face lighted with interest and animation. Sitting by a table, busy with note-book and pencil, was Miss Peabody, the Secretary of the Club. She has a sparkling, animated face, brimming over with kindness and good-will; she wins one strangely—you can't help being drawn to her. There's a world of fun in the black eyes, and you feel sure she would appreciate the ridiculous sides of living as keenly as any one ever could."
In still another letter are these thumb-nail sketches of persons well-known:
"As we drew near Chestnut street we saw a goodly number of pilgrims.... Nora Perry, with the golden hair, had journeyed up from Providence with a gull's feather in her hat and a glint of mischief in her glance; Celia Thaxter, whom the Atlantic naturally delights to honor, since from Atlantic surges she caught the rhythm of her life, sat intent; Mr. Alcott beamed approval; Professor Goodwinhad come from Harvard; David A. Wasson had left his bonded ware-house a prey to smugglers; Rev. Dr. Bartol, who seems always to dwell on the Mount of Vision; and Mr. Sanborn, who had sheathed his glittering lance, sat near; Mrs. Howe, taking a little vacation from her labors for women, listened serenely; Miss Peabody had a good word to say for Aspasia; and Mrs. Cheney quoted Walter Savage Landor's opinion of her."
"As we drew near Chestnut street we saw a goodly number of pilgrims.... Nora Perry, with the golden hair, had journeyed up from Providence with a gull's feather in her hat and a glint of mischief in her glance; Celia Thaxter, whom the Atlantic naturally delights to honor, since from Atlantic surges she caught the rhythm of her life, sat intent; Mr. Alcott beamed approval; Professor Goodwinhad come from Harvard; David A. Wasson had left his bonded ware-house a prey to smugglers; Rev. Dr. Bartol, who seems always to dwell on the Mount of Vision; and Mr. Sanborn, who had sheathed his glittering lance, sat near; Mrs. Howe, taking a little vacation from her labors for women, listened serenely; Miss Peabody had a good word to say for Aspasia; and Mrs. Cheney quoted Walter Savage Landor's opinion of her."
A racy letter tells of the meeting when the Club discovered Darwin; another deals with the day when Mrs. Howe discoursed of "Moral Trigonometry"; and yet another of an occasion when the Rev. Samuel Longfellow was essayist, and all the pretty women had new bonnets. This allusion reminds one of a bit of witty verse when "Sherwood Bonner" (Mrs. McDowell) served up the Radical Club in a parody of Poe's "Raven," and described Mrs. Moulton as,
"A matron made for kisses, in the loveliest of dresses."
The "Twelve Apostles of Heresy," as the transcendental thinkers were irreverently termed by the wits of the press, were about this time contributing to the enlightenment of the public by a series of Sunday afternoonlectures. These lectures were held to represent the most advanced thought of the day, and were delivered by such speakers as the Rev. O.B. Frothingham, Mary Grew (Whittier's friend and a woman of equally cultivated mind and lovely character), the Rev. John Weiss, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, T.W. Higginson, and Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney. In one letter Mrs. Moulton writes thus:
"As the coffin of Mahomet was suspended between heaven and earth, so is Mr. Wasson, who spoke last Sunday at Horticultural Hall, popularly supposed to be suspended between the heaven of Mr. Channing's serene faith and the depths of Mr. Abbot's audacious heresy. But if any one should infer from this statement that Mr. Wasson is a gentle medium, a man without boldness of speculation, or originality of thought, he would find he had never in his life made so signal a mistake. Few men in America think so deeply as David A. Wasson, and fewer still have so many of the materials for thought at their command. He has a presence of power, and is a handsome man, though prematurely gray, with an expansive forehead, where strong thoughts and calm judgment sit enthroned, and with eyes beneath it which see very far indeed. His features are clearly cut, and he looks as if he felt, and felt passionately, every word he utters, as he stands before an audience, his subject well in hand, and with always twice as much to say as his hour will give space for, forced, therefore, against his will, to choose and condense from his thronging thoughts. He spoke, in the Sunday afternoon course, on 'Jesus, Christianity, and Modern Radicalism.'"
"As the coffin of Mahomet was suspended between heaven and earth, so is Mr. Wasson, who spoke last Sunday at Horticultural Hall, popularly supposed to be suspended between the heaven of Mr. Channing's serene faith and the depths of Mr. Abbot's audacious heresy. But if any one should infer from this statement that Mr. Wasson is a gentle medium, a man without boldness of speculation, or originality of thought, he would find he had never in his life made so signal a mistake. Few men in America think so deeply as David A. Wasson, and fewer still have so many of the materials for thought at their command. He has a presence of power, and is a handsome man, though prematurely gray, with an expansive forehead, where strong thoughts and calm judgment sit enthroned, and with eyes beneath it which see very far indeed. His features are clearly cut, and he looks as if he felt, and felt passionately, every word he utters, as he stands before an audience, his subject well in hand, and with always twice as much to say as his hour will give space for, forced, therefore, against his will, to choose and condense from his thronging thoughts. He spoke, in the Sunday afternoon course, on 'Jesus, Christianity, and Modern Radicalism.'"
John Weiss, the biographer of Theodore Parker, discoursed on one occasion on "The Heaven of Homer," and Mrs. Moulton commented: