I remember that while reading it I thought it a
welcome proof, and still more a prediction, of American culture. I
need not trouble you with any cavils I made on the manuscript I read,
as ---- assures me that he has lately revised and improved the
original draft. I hope you will like the poem as heartily as I did."
I find a record of one very warm day in Boston in July when, in spite
of the heat, Mr. Emerson came to dine with us:--
"He talked much of Forceythe Willson, whose genius he thought akin to
Dante's, and says E---- H---- agrees with him in this, or possibly
suggested it, she having been one of the best readers and lovers of
Dante outside the reputed scholars. 'But he is not fertile. A man at
his time should be doing new things.' 'Yes,' said ----, 'I fear he
never will do much more.' 'Why, how old is he?' asked Emerson; and
hearing he was about thirty-five, he replied, with a smile, 'There is
hope till forty-five.' He spoke also of Tennyson and Carlyle as the
two men connected with literature in England who were most
satisfactory to meet, and better than their books. His respect for
literature in these degenerate days is absolute. It is religion and
life, and he reiterates this in every possible form. Speaking of Jones
Very, he said he seemed to have no right to his rhymes; they did not
sing to him, but he was divinely led to them, and they always
surprised you."
We were much pleased and amused at his quaint expressions of
admiration for a mutual friend in New York at whose hospitable house
we had all received cordial entertainment.
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