The Letters of Anne Gilchrist and Walt Whitman Part 14

Please give my love to Mrs. Whitman & remember me to Colonel Whitman. This afternoon, when driving with Mr. Marvin, I thought of the pleasant drives I have had with Colonel Whitman.

Yours affectionately, BEATRICE C. GILCHRIST.

If it were not for records acc.u.mulating mountain high I should have time to write to my friends.

LETTER XL

ANNE GILCHRIST TO WALT WHITMAN

_Sept. 3, '78.

Chesterfield, Ma.s.s._

I am half afraid Herby has got a malarious place by his description.

MY DEAREST FRIEND:

I had a lingering hope--till Herby went south again--that I should have a letter from you, in answer to mine, saying you were coming up to see us here. In truth, it was a great disappointment to me, his going back to Philadelphia instead of your joining us, or him, either here or somewhere near to New York. I wonder where that North Amboyna is that you once mentioned to me--and what kind of a place it is. I have had a long, quiet time here, and have enjoyed it very much--never did I breathe such sweet, light, pure air as is always blowing freely over these rocky hills. Rocky as they are--and their sides & ravines are strewn with huge boulders of every conceivable size & shape--they nourish an abundant growth of woods, and I fancy the farmers here do a great deal better with their winter crops of lumber and bark and maple sugar than with their summer one of grain & corn. I expect Herby has described our neighbours to you--specially Levi Bryant, the father of my hostess--a farmer who lives just opposite and has put such heart & soul and muscle & sinew into his farming that he has continued to win quite a handsome competence from this barren soil (it isn't muscle & industry only that are wanted here--but pluck and endurance) hauling his timber up & down over the snow & through the drifts, along roads that are pretty nearly vertical. I am never tired of hearing his stories (nor he of telling them) of hairbreadth escapes for him & his cattle--when the harness or the shafts have broken under the tremendous strain--& nothing but coolness & daring have got him or them out of it alive. Generally, as he sits talking, his little boy of eleven who bids fair to be like him and can now manage a team or a yoke of oxen as well as any man in the parish--and work almost as hard--sits close by him leaning his head on his father's shoulder or breast--for the rugged old fellow has a vein of great gentleness and affectionateness in him & I notice the child nestles up to him always rather than to the mother--who is all the same a very kind, amiable, good mother. Then there are neighbours of another sort up at the "Centre"--Mr. Chadwick, &c., from New York, with whom I have pleasant chats daily when I trudge up to fetch my letters--now & then I get a delightful drive or go on a blackberrying party with the folks round--I expect Giddy over to-day & we shall remain here together for about a fortnight--then back to Round Hill--where I am to meet the Miss Chase whom you may remember taking tea with & liking--then on to Boston to see dear Bee--& then to New York, where we shall meet again at last, I hope ere long. Love to Mr. & Mrs. Whitman--I enjoy her letters. Also to Hattie & Jessie--who will hear from me by & bye. With love to you, dear Friend.

Good-bye.

A. GILCHRIST.

LETTER XLI

ANNE GILCHRIST TO WALT WHITMAN

_Concord, Ma.s.s.

Oct. 25th._

MY DEAREST FRIEND:

The days are slipping away so pleasantly here that weeks are gone before I know it. The Concord folk are as friendly as they are intellectual, and there is really no end to the kindness received. We are rowed on the beautiful river every day that it is warm enough--a very winding river not much broader than your favourite creek--flowing sometimes through level meadows, sometimes round rocky promontories & steep wooded hills which, with their wonderful autumn tints, are like a gay flower border mirrored in the water. Never in my life have I enjoyed outdoor pleasures more--I hardly think, so much--enhanced as they are by the companions.h.i.+p of very lovable men and women. They lead an easy-going life here--seem to spend half their time floating about on the river--or meeting in the evening to talk & read aloud. Judge h.o.a.r says it is a good place to live and die in, but a very bad place to make a living in. Beatrice spent one Sunday with us here. We walked to Hawthorne's old house in the morning, & in the afternoon to the "Old Manse" and to Sleepy Hollow, most beautiful of last resting places. Tuesday we go on to Boston for a week very loth to leave Concord--at least, I am!--but Giddy begins to long for city life again.

And then to New York about the 5th Nov. Herby told you, no doubt, that I spent an hour or two with Emerson--and that he looked very beautiful--and talked in a friendly, pleasant manner. A long letter from my sister in England tells me Per. looks well and happy & is so proud of his little boy--and that Norah is really a perfect wife to him--affectionate, devoted, and the best of housewives. How glad I am Herby is painting you.

I wonder if you like the landscape he is working on as well as you did "Timber Creek." Miss Hillard has undertaken the charge of a young lady's education, and is very much pleased with her task. She is in a delightful family who make her quite one with them--live in the best part of New York, and pay her a handsome salary. She has the afternoons and Sat.u.r.day & Sunday to herself.--Concord boasts of having been first to recognize your genius. Mr. Alcott & Mr. Sanborn say so. Good-bye, dear Friend.

A. G.

LETTER XLII

ANNE GILCHRIST TO WALT WHITMAN

_39 Somerset St.

Boston Nov. 13, '78._

MY DEAREST FRIEND:

I feel as if I didn't a bit deserve the glorious budget you sent me yesterday, for I have been a laggard, dull correspondent of late, because, leading such an unsettled kind of life, I don't seem to have got well hold of myself. Beautiful is the t.i.tle prose poem--the glimpse of the autumn cornfield: one smells the sweet fragrance, basks in the suns.h.i.+ne with you--tastes all the varied, subtle outdoor pleasures, just as you want us to. A lady who has just been calling on me--Miss Hillard--no relation of the odious Dr. H.--said, "Have you seen a lovely little bit about a cornfield by Walt Whitman in a New York paper?" She did not know your poems, but was so taken with this. By the bye, I am not quite American enough yet to enjoy the sound of the locusts & big gra.s.shoppers--ours are modest little things that only make a gentle sort of whirr--not that loud bra.s.sy sound--couldn't help wis.h.i.+ng for more birds & less insects when I was at Chesterfield--but I like our English name "ladybird" better than "ladybug". Do your children always say when they see one, as ours do, "Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home: your house is on fire, your children are flown"? But for the rest--I believe I am growing a very good American; indeed, certain am I there is no more lovable people to live amongst anywhere in the world--and in this respect it has been good to give up having a home of my own here for awhile--for I have been thrown amongst many more intimately than I could have been otherwise. What you say of Herby's picture delights me, dear Friend. I have been grieving he was not with us, sharing the pleasant times we have had and enlarging his circle of friends--but after all he could not have been doing better--he must come on here by & bye. I wonder if you are as satisfied with his portrait of you as with the landscape. I suppose he is gone on to New York to-day.

I have sighed for dear little Concord many times since I came away--beautiful city as Boston is & many the interesting & kindly people I am seeing here: but the outdoor life & the entirely simple, unpretending, cordial, friendly ways of Concord & its inhabitants won my heart altogether--one of them came to see me to-day & to ask us to go and spend a couple of days with them there again before we leave & I could not say nay, though our time is short. There are some portraits in the Art Museum here, which interested me a good deal--of Adams, Hanc.o.c.k, Quincy, &c.,--& of some of the women of that time--they would form an excellent nucleus of a national portrait gallery, which (together with good biographies while yet materials & recollections are fresh & abundant) would be a very interesting & important contribution to the world's history.--Tennyson's letter is a pleasure to me to see--considering his age & the imperfection of his sight through life, matters are better rather than worse with him than one could have expected. Since that was written a friend (Walter White) tells me they--the Tennysons--have taken a house in Eaton Sq., London, for the winter. And last, not least, thanks for Mr. Burroughs's beautiful letter--that young man is indeed, as he says, like a bit out of your poems.

There are two or three fine young men boarding here, & Giddy & I enjoy their society not a little. Love to your Brothers & Sister. I shall write soon as I am settled down in New York to her or Hattie. Love to Mrs.

Stafford. And most of all to you.

Good-bye, dear friend.

A. GILCHRIST.

I will send T's letter in a day or two.

LETTER XLIII

ANNE GILCHRIST TO WALT WHITMAN

_112 Madison Ave.

New York Jan. 5, '79._

MY DEAREST FRIEND:

Herby has told you of our difficulties in getting comfortable quarters here--and also that we seem now to have succeeded--not indeed in the way I most wished & hoped we had--in 19th St., taking rooms & boarding ourselves--so that we could have a friend with us when & as we pleased. It seems as if that were not practicable unless we were to furnish for ourselves. Certainly our experiences there of using another's kitchen were discouraging--it was so dirty and uncomfortable that we were glad to take refuge in a regular boarding house again before one week was out. It seems to me more difficult to get anything of a medium kind in New York than elsewhere I have been--if it isn't the best, it is very uninviting indeed.

Herby is enjoying his work and companions.h.i.+p at the League very much. We stand the cold well--how does it suit you? Is your arm free from rheumatic pains? When you come to Mr. J. H. Johnstons, which will be very soon I hope, we shall be quite handy, and have a pretty, sunny room--a sitting room by day!--with a handsome piece of furniture which is metamorphosed into a bed at night--and a large dressing closet with hot & cold water adjoining--all very comfortable. O how wistfully do I think of one evening in Philadelphia, last winter. I shan't begin really to like New York till you come and we have had some chats together. I have news from England which makes me rather anxious. The Blaenavon Co., to which Per. is chemist, has gone into liquidation--& I don't know whether it will continue to exist--or how soon in these dull times he may find a good opening elsewhere. Should things go badly for him, either Giddy and I will return to England to share [our] home with him there, or else I want him to take into serious consideration coming out here, instead of our going back. Of course it would be a risky thing for him to do with wife & child, in these times, unless some definite opening presented itself, but I cannot help thinking that, being an expert in his profession, with first rate training & experience, and iron work & metallurgy promising here to have such enormous developments, he would be sure to do well in the end; and meanwhile we could rub on together somehow. However, we shall see. I have laid the matter before him, he & his dear little wife wrote me a very brave, cheery letter when they told me the bad news--& I shall have an answer to mine, I suppose, by the end of the month. Kate Hillard read an amusing paper on Swinburne at a meeting of the Woman's Club in Brooklyn--& we had some fine music too. For the rest, I have not yet presented any introductions here.

Have had some beautiful glimpses of the North & East River effects of the s.h.i.+pping at sunset, &c.--Have subscribed to the Mercantile library,--& are beginning to feel at home. Herby & Giddy had been to hear Mr. Frothingham this morning, & were much interested. Bee missed us sorely at first--but writes--when she does write, which is but seldom--pretty cheerily.

Friendly remembrance to your brother & sister. I wonder where Hattie & Jessie are spending their holidays. Love from us all. Good-bye, dear friend.

A. GILCHRIST.

Had a letter from Mr. Marvin--all well--he is doing the Was.h.i.+ngton letter of a N. Eng. paper. Hopes & trusts you are really going to Was.h.i.+ngton.

LETTER XLIV