File:Frances (Appleton) Longfellow to Emmeline (Austin) Wadsworth, 25 June 1839 (26d94f77-5c19-41ab-88a4-7f778a83d786).jpg

Manuscript letter

Archives Number: 1011/002.001-009#011

Yale Manor – Sunday – 1839.
9 o’clock A.M.
Me voila, dearest, sitting in our snug salon enjoying all the delicious repose of a country Sunday – the perfumes of the rival bushes of Seringa & Roses that bloom either side of our door-step – breathing in the open window - & all manner of natural sounds enlivening the sunny air – the distant baaing of some poor lambkin, - the consequential crow of Sultan-Cocks, - the old-mannish laughter of a trio of turkies – flirting their fans, the matronly, gossiping cluck of strutting hens – teaching avoidance of younger brothers & love without corn -, the chirping of some squat eggy-looking brood – already catching their mother’s knowing cock of the eye & sharpness of bill, - the malicious buzz of flies & mosquitoes, & by way of bass – solemn croakings from a monkish brotherhood of bull-frogs, evidently moralizing on the folly of the rest – there’s an overture for you more various than Rossinis! And each one of these sounds answers in my ear to some ‘genre’ of humanity – from the morbid, melancholy sheep – to the prosaic bull-frog – so you see how vain it is to escape the “vassalage that binds us to the Earth” - & men. I can hardly believe it is a week since I wrote you – the days slip away so rapidly – in our ‘dolce far mente.’ I am thankful your Father “feels the breeze of Nature stirring in his soul” - & wont pin you to hot bricks & graveled walks all summer – but I trust also that your boarding scheme wont interfere with your promised jaunt hitherward. 2. P.M. Thus far got I when Mary lured me forth to exercise our devotions in the woods & for 2 or 3 [p. 2] goodly hours sat we down near our darling brook – whose lowly murmur seemed half complaining for these Puritains a actually d-m their own souls by partially damming – (on Sunday. this innocent brook, one of God’s voices. That is a fact – sadly true. Well there we sat – reading the Bible & Dr Channing’s “Self Culture, worthy – to be read in the same breath – pitying more in sorrow than in anger the deluded worshippers who were listening to human thoughts in the red church (we never patronize) with such a “fare most Catholic & solemn” all around. Thus pass our Sunday mornings - & then at ½ past 4. we descend to the village – to hear Mr Parker preach – a Sophomorical, well-intentioned sermon – to the élite (that is Unitarians.) of this neighborhood. This reminds me of a warm discussion I had yesterday with Mackintosh – who being a Scotch Presbyterian of course holds in ‘holy horror’ such dissenters. & as civilly as his conscience would admit – echoed crazy Sue’s faith that – “Unitarianism is only a genteel way of blaspheming”! I at last brought in Phrenology to explain that one kind of faith would not do for all species of brains – if not hearts - & that a Procusstes tied in religion was as intolerable as in any thing else & so we battled beautifully for an hour. He pretended to be amazed that I had not a “Unitarian bible”! & would not believe in our ignorance of such a thing. I think it is rather amusing (living as we do – among our own sect so much) to hear now & then what notions really intelligent people (not these phrenzied [sic] Calvinists alone) have of our faith. He said he doubted if his sister would receive Miss Sedgwick under her roof if she knew she was a Unitarian! This worthy gentleman, about whom you seem to be so anxious, takes himself off tomorrow I believe to few people’s regret I fancy. I believe he is a good enough creature ‘au fond’ – but such a combination of gaucherie, coolness & lazy [p. 3] ness I never encountered. He has such a horror of long words blue conversations – or any-thing that shall betray his ever having been an author – that he is not far from discoursing like the “Artful Dodger” - & says Alice in Bulwer or Margaret in Faust is his beau ideal heroine. Tomorrow we pass the day at Pittsfield to see our worthy relations. Jewett has promised to drop us a call & I hope will not be too intellectual for warm weather. He is in N. York trying to get up a Periodical & will take us ‘en route’ to Burlington – where he goes to select his burial-spot & renew his childish associations. Nearly every evening some of our kind village friends drop in with a bouquet of flowers – or a bowl of strawberries on which for a week (that is wild ones) we have been feasting. Mrs Jane Sedgwick is my daily growing admiration – with her fine, Cornelia face & true, noble character. Then this Mrs Davidson is a winning person with her thrice superannuated husband – yoked to her like a skeleton O’Sullivan gave us all the particulars of her story the other day which are very touching. At 16 he being her guardian & 60 & her lover said to be dead he fancied she ought not to live with him – without stronger connection & besought her to marry him. She was in desperation – caring little whether dead or alive - & she felt some compunction at deserting the old man who had been so kind to her & needed a faithful nurse much. So at last she consented – chiefly for that capacity & partly unwilling to cause him such misery as her refusal seemed to. Then imagine – what he must have felt when after this sacrifice her lover returned & died broken-hearted – If he had any heart I think he could not have resisted shooting himself. And so she has lived on with such memories & such realities dragging at her soul – a consoling example of what [p. 4 bottom] a woman can live through. Tom seems to have his hands full with N. York widows - & maidens – so I suppose fights ennui – profitably. Mary Channing – (a droll child staying at Mrs Charles S’s assured me gravely the other day that it was confidently reported in Boston that M. D’Hauteville had married again! There is a nice bit of gossip for you. I have got thro’ Deerbrook - & think it considerably interesting. The monotony of situation & detail is tiresome enough but the characters of the sisters & Hope are well developed & good. Have you come across Milnes poems? I [p. 4 top] am dying to get them Jewett raves so extravagantly about their perfections. Miss Sedgwick’s last little book is a nice legacy to her friends – so full of her true, healthy – philanthropic spirit – I am going to endeavor to sketch part of the magnificent panorama from my chamber-window – but bird’s eye views are generally failures. Tis a sin for me to prose on to you in this way but what on Earth can I write about but “the rose is red, the violet’s blue, the pink is pretty & so are you!” You see I [p. 1 cross] am waxing child-like if not childish as the Professor says. By the way Mrs. A writes us he was very wrathy – about the interesting gossip his good nurse had been circulating so briskly & confessed the asparagus was forced upon him. If Sally N. edifies you with any thing more of the same sort as good pray dont begrudge me a laugh uncharitable tho’ it be. Dont yawn yourself into a lock-jaw over this vacant epistle but return good for evil. Remember me to Sally – the Dexters – Mrs Ticknor &c & love ever, sweetest
thy true friend.
[p. 4 cross] Dear Em. May I ask the favor of you to go to M Knott & ask him to make me a pair of blk boots of the same size & thickness of the blk velvet he made me to button over, but with lasting tops instead of velvet. To be made as soon as possible & sent to our house. They will send them up, this wil much oblige y raff Marie.
Addressed: Miss Austin. / Care of Saml Austin Esq. / Boston. Mass.
Postmark: STOCKBRIDGE / JUN 25 / MS

• Keywords: frances elizabeth (appleton) longfellow; correspondence; emmeline (austin) wadsworth; Correspondence (1011/002); (LONG-SeriesName); Letters from Frances Longfellow (1011/002.001); (LONG-SubseriesName); 1839 (1011/002.001-009); (LONG-FileUnitName)