Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" Part 18

I recall with especial joy the long walks we used to take together.

After a day of wearisome work, it was one of her great delights to leave the piled-up desk and find herself in the street, her arm linked in mine. At such times much of her talk was ravis.h.i.+ng speculation upon things seen and unseen. It was as if, released for the moment from the pressure of work, her mind sprang into a world removed from the practical and immediate, to revel in contemplation of the divine. Yet she was no visionary, and the world of sight held her cheerful allegiance. Hers was never "the dyer's hand subdued to what it works in," and this is the more remarkable since she never relinquished work, even for our beloved walks, without a mild protest at laying aside her pen. One afternoon I called, intending to take her out for one of our "play-hours," but I failed to find her in her apartment.

Next morning the post brought me this note:

"MY DEAR FRIEND:

"I was so glad to get your card, and so sorry to miss you.

It was just that hour out-of-doors with you that I was longing for. I have been so long away, and since my return have been so busy with much detail of correspondence that in quant.i.ty is always more or less depressing, that I needed a sight of you to tone me up and restore my standard. I have also taken advantage of enforced quiet to brace up for an heroic two weeks of dentistry, and have therefore been in absolute retirement and upon baby diet of the most innocuous description...

"I am afraid this recapitulation will take away all desire to repeat your effort in my direction. But I trust that this may find you in a missionary humor, and that you will see that I need 'looking after'--a far stronger motive with most women than friends.h.i.+p, isn't it? Anyway, come again soon, won't you? Afternoon is our gadding time, you know.

"Really and lovingly your friend.

"P.S.--This note will show that I truly have not command of all my faculties and need a human tonic."

All out-of-doors was dear to her. Trees were to her as men--rooted, and she often naively talked to them as if to friends while we strolled in the twilight. Her love of nature even seemed to affect her choice of diet, for she preferred simply prepared dishes and the natural foods. This was doubtless due in part to her unmixed Old World nationality and to her early surroundings in rural England: as she was in girlhood, so, in spite of the complex life of this distracting New World, she remained to the last.

My friend dwelt lovingly upon anniversaries; the true spirit of Christmas entered her heart at every Yuletide season, and her gifts showed generous care in selection and in the dainty wrappings in which they were sent to us. She delighted in the Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners, but St. Valentine's was the dearest, as it was the anniversary of her marriage. This the Woman's Press Club of New York has always observed as the date of its annual dinner.

She had a keen sense of humor, yet never did she forget herself either in posing or pranks, for hers was the unerring sense of the fitness of things. An instance of her ready wit comes to me: Soon after her return from her last visit to England she came to us to stay for a few days. It was in September, three months before her death. On Sunday evening several friends dropped in, and from general conversation we drifted into singing some of the old songs. Now and then she would add her own low tones to our untrained vocalizing, crooning or cantillating the tune as if she were musing aloud. We had been singing for a full hour, she, with crutch near at hand, sitting apart from us at the open window. We had just sung one of her favorites, the old ballad "Far Away," and were beginning another with all the energy of amateurs when it occurred to me that Mrs. Croly might be tired and ready to go to her room for the night. Bending over I whispered, "Come, dear, you must be weary of all this." She turned slowly in her chair, and looking up into my face, smiling whimsically, said: "Oh, no, not yet! I am enjoying the music just as if it were good!"

I have already intimated that the home life of the family was happy.

There existed between husband and wife a genuine congeniality in tastes and pursuits; yet between any two minds when both are strong and original there will generally be a divergence; and it has always seemed to me that the origin of Sorosis might be traced by the psychological a.n.a.lyst to some such divergence between Mrs. Croly's lines of intellectual development and those of her equally gifted husband, David G. Croly. The power of initiative was strong in each of these two, and in each it produced excellent though differing results.

It is cause for regret that Mrs. Croly did not write more in her latter years, when her native wisdom had ripened in the soil of a rich experience.

Her philosophy was the fruit of a rightly-lived, useful life, and even after the distressing accident which lamed her, her enthusiasm never waned, but rather seemed intensified and glorified. Seldom do the heart and brain work together as did hers. She will ever stand to those who knew her as a fine specimen of a rare type. She had convictions, and she had the courage to uphold them. She hated shams and hypocrisy with the vigor of Carlyle. The bravery of her public life was matched by the beauty of her private life. Good and Truth were her watchwords. "Good has faculty," says Swedenborg, "but not determinate except by truth. Determinate faculty is actual power." In the dear friend whom we here commemorate, faculty was determinate.

Brave and honest pleader for woman; true, tender, sincere friend, you fought the good fight well; the world is better for your work, and among your saddest survivors are those whom you smote with a deserved pen-stroke, or with spoken words, who have long since given you grateful thanks.

C.M.M.

L'Envoi

She cut a path through tangled underwood Of old traditions out to broader ways.

She lived to hear her work called brave and good, But oh! the thorns, before the crown of bays.

The world gives lashes to its pioneers Until the goal is reached--then deafening cheers.

ELLA WHEELER WILc.o.x.