File:Frances (Appleton) Longfellow to Thomas Gold Appleton, 18 April 1857 (791c869d-9db1-466c-bbd3-965a799be604).jpg

Manuscript letter

Archives Number: 1011/002.001-027#009

Cambridge April 18th 1857
Dear Tom,
We were rejoiced to hear such good accounts of Sumner from you, and we really feel more sanguine about his recovery than we have done. How he must have enjoyed all you showed him. [crossed out: His daily] Henry envies him. The buoyant influence of fresh & pleasant sights & the perfect rest from care will medicine him better than any physician. If he is strong enough for a walk thro’ Swissland it would brace him admirably no doubt. How provokingly Mackintosh just missed him at Cowes! The Chinese trouble seems happily ended by the Emperor himself, & we shall now be able to drink our tea in peace without fear of being poisoned. [p. 2] You saw, perhaps, that Uncle William, Mr Hooper & others interested in this beverage went on to Washington to remonstrate. Wm B. Reed (Harriot’s friend) had been appointed Commissioner to China the fruit of his tardy democracy, but I should think he would care little to go & leave his young family. We hoped to get rid of Cushing by sending him there, but a bad penny always stays by one.
Hume’s triumph in Paris is amazing as he really seems an anant humbug. He was detected here & in Florence. We have had quite a commotion here from the sending away of one of the Divinity students for pretended medium power. Some of the Faculty were at a séance, & Eustis suspecting he passed a bell round, under the table, on his foot, placed it so it must fall if so supported, & then caught hold of the [p. 3] foot without a boot upon it. Some people in Boston insist he is innocent, & a much abused youth, but the Colelge discovered his character had not been spotless, & that he did this thing for money – so I suppose they are right. But as the newspapers will have their say, Felton is studying this new science for a counter blast, - &, hopeless skeptic as he is, has invaded the ghostly bookstore & armed himself with the best authorities!
The Divinity School or rather the senior class consisting of four, invited Theodore Parker to give their annual Sermon, or address & that the Faculty, of course, prohibit, so they refuse to have any. It was a foolish attempt on their part, knowing it could not succeed. Julia Howe’s play has been abused by all the papers here & in N. York except in one or two cases, but she is serenely indifferent & thinks it was a success. The sudden virtue of the Herald about it is amusing, but it is strange so clever a woman should have chosen so hacknied a story, and so [p. 4] wretched a heroine, & should not see there is tragedy enough in life to inspire a drama without descending to vice. It is cleverly written, & the close has a good deal of vigor, but it should never have been published. The poor Dr must feel it painfully as a thing he cannot give his daughters to read. One hoped better from an American woman of genius, & I trust she will do something better that this may be forgotten.
Fanny Kemble has been reading here this week tho’ she has a bad cold. She is still looking out for a houses but can find nothing spacious & elegant enough. Miss Davie was here, yesterday, full of Lent preaching & Mr Heiney the Calvinistic preacher you must remember. He is crowding Park St at present. I told you, I think, of Fred Sears’ engagement to Miss Shelton. The box of wine &c is at the Custom House.
Our grass is beautifully green but was this morning veiled in snow – pearls & emeralds. The children have a tent under the pines & are ‘playing Indian’ with all the poetry of their age. Alice looks it well, but Edie seems a stolen Saxon. Annie Allegra is the merriest of babies & is getting very wise & cunning. We have the carriage mended, but have not yet sent for the horses. The publisher has sent us, framed, a lithograph of Minnehaha with a dumpy Hiawatha. And the wild April days will soon be followed [p. 1 cross] by the dreary east wind. Motley is in his house down a little pinched court on the common, opposite the old grave yard & sighs for you. I urged him to write but he pretends you owe him a letter. I hope my last commissions wont trouble you too much. I met Emerson in a bookstore on Saturday & he asked me what book I was after. I said “The best – “ for my children He was utterly puzzled & could not guess. I fear he reads little, for all his love of oriental poetry, - the noblest relic. Have you read Kindley’s “Two years Age”? We not yet. Gurowski has written a book on America, not gossipy but all generalizations à la Tocqueville, profound & shrewd no doubt. Henry has a present of an oil portrait of his admirer the Emperor of Brazil from a Yankee clergyman who brought a kind message from him. It is just like our Edmund!

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