The autumn found them again in England, this time to learn the delights of country visiting. Their first visit was to Atherstone, the seat of Charles Nolte Bracebridge, a descendant of Lady G.o.diva, a most cultivated and delightful man. He and his charming wife made the party welcome, and showed them everything of interest except the family ghost, which remained invisible.
Another interesting visit was to the Nightingales of Embley. Florence Nightingale was at this time a young woman of twenty-four. A warm friendship sprang up between her and our parents, and she felt moved to consult the Doctor on the matter which then chiefly occupied her thoughts. Would it, she asked, be unsuitable or unbecoming for a young Englishwoman to devote herself to works of charity, in hospitals and elsewhere, as the Catholic Sisters did?
The Doctor replied: "My dear Miss Florence, it would be unusual, and in England whatever is unusual is apt to be thought unsuitable; but I say to you, go forward, if you have a vocation for that way of life; act up to your inspiration, and you will find that there is never anything unbecoming or unladylike in doing your duty for the good of others.
Choose your path, go on with it, wherever it may lead you, and G.o.d be with you!"
Among the people they met in the autumn of 1844 was Professor Fowler, the phrenologist. This gentleman examined Julia"s head, and made the following p.r.o.nunciamento:--
"You"re a deep one! it takes a Yankee to find you out. The intellectual temperament predominates in your character. You will be a central character like Henry Clay and Silas Wright, and people will group themselves around you."
Now Julia could not abide Professor Fowler.
"Oh, yes!" she snapped out angrily. "They"ve always been my models!"
"The best things you do," he went on, "will be done on the spur of the moment. You have enough love of order to enjoy it, but you will not take the trouble to produce it. You have more religion than morality. You have genius, but no music in you by nature."
Fifty years later these words were fresh in her memory.
"I disliked Mr. Fowler extremely," she said, "and believed nothing of what he said; nevertheless, most of his predictions were verified. I had at the time no leading in any of the directions he indicated. I had been much shut up in personal and family life; was a person rather of antipathies than sympathies. His remarks made _no impression_. Yet," she added, "I always had a sense of _relation to the public_, but thought the connection would come through writing."
Apropos of Mr. Fowler"s "more religion than morality," she said: "Morality is a thing of the will; we may think differently of such matters at different times. What he said may have been true."
Then the twinkle came into her eyes: "When Mr. William Astor heard of my engagement, he said, "Why, Miss Julia, I am surprised! I thought you were too intellectual to marry!""
Another acquaintance of this autumn was the late Arthur Mills, who was through life one of our parents" most valued friends. He came to America with them; in his honor, during the voyage, Julia composed "The Milsiad," scribbling the lines day by day in a little note-book, still carefully preserved in the Mills family.
The first and last stanzas give an idea of this poem, which, though never printed, was always a favorite with its author.
My heart fills With the bare thought of the ill.u.s.trious Mills: That man of eyes and nose, Of legs and arms, of fingers and of toes.
To lands devoid of tax Goeth he not, armed with axe?
Trees shall he cut down, And forests ever?
Tame cataracts with a frown?
Grin all the fish from Mississippi River?
(My style is grandiose, Quite in the tone of Mills"s nose.)
Harp of the West, through wind and foggy weather We"ve sung our pa.s.sage to our native land, Now I have reached the terminus of tether, And I must lay thee trembling from my hand.
That hand must ply the ignominious needle, This mind brood o"er the salutary dish, I must grow sober as a parish beadle, And having fish to fry, must fry my fish.
Some happier muse than mine shall wake thy spell, Harp of the West, oh Gemini! farewell!
CHAPTER VI
SOUTH BOSTON
1844-1851; _aet._ 25-32
THE ROUGH SKETCH
A great grieved heart, an iron will, As fearless blood as ever ran; A form elate with nervous strength And fibrous vigor,--all a man.
A gallant rein, a restless spur, The hand to wield a biting scourge; Small patience for the tasks of Time, Unmeasured power to speed and urge.
He rides the errands of the hour, But sends no herald on his ways; The world would thank the service done, He cannot stay for gold or praise.
Not lavishly he casts abroad The glances of an eye intense, And did he smile but once a year, It were a Christmas recompense.
I thank a poet for his name, The "Down of Darkness," this should be; A child, who knows no risk it runs, Might stroke its roughness harmlessly.
One helpful gift the G.o.ds forgot, Due to the man of lion-mood; A Woman"s soul, to match with his In high resolve and hardihood.
J. W. H.
The name of Laura Bridgman will long continue to suggest to the hearer one of the most brilliant exploits of philanthropy, modern or ancient. Much of the good that good men do soon pa.s.ses out of the remembrance of busy generations, each succeeding to each, with its own special inheritance of labor and interest. But it will be long before the world shall forget the courage and patience of the man who, in the very bloom of his manhood, sat down to besiege this almost impenetrable fortress of darkness and isolation, and, after months of labor, carried within its walls the divine conquest of life and of thought.
J. W. H., _Memoir of Dr. Samuel G. Howe_.
In September, 1844, the travellers returned to America and took up their residence at the Perkins Inst.i.tution, in South Boston, in the apartment known as the "Doctor"s Wing."
At first, Laura Bridgman made one of the family, the Doctor considering her almost as an adopted child. His marriage had been something of a shock to her.
"Does Doctor love me like Julia?" she asked her teacher anxiously.
"No!"
"Does he love G.o.d like Julia?"
"Yes!"
A pause: then--"G.o.d was kind to give him his wife!"
She and Julia became much attached to each other, and were friends through life.
Julia was now to realize fully the great change that had come in her life. She had been the acknowledged queen of her home and circle in New York. Up to this time, she had known Boston as a gay visitor knows it.
She came now as the wife of a man who had neither leisure nor inclination for "_Society_"; a man of tenderest heart, but of dominant personality, accustomed to rule, and devoted to causes of which she knew only by hearsay; moreover, so absorbed in work for these causes, that he could only enjoy his home by s.n.a.t.c.hes.
She herself says: "The romance of charity easily interests the public.
Its laborious details and duties repel and weary the many, and find fitting ministers only in a few spirits of rare and untiring benevolence. Dr. Howe, after all the laurels and roses of victory, had to deal with the th.o.r.n.y ways of a profession tedious, difficult, and exceptional. He was obliged to create his own working machinery, to drill and instruct his corps of teachers, himself first learning the secrets of the desired instruction. He was also obliged to keep the infant Inst.i.tution fresh in the interest and goodwill of the public, and to give it a place among the recognized benefactions of the Commonwealth."
From the bright little world of old New York, from relatives and friends, music and laughter, fun and frolic, she came to live in an Inst.i.tution, a bleak, lofty house set on a hill, four-square to all the winds that blew; with high-studded rooms, cold halls paved with white and gray marble, echoing galleries; where three fourths of the inmates were blind, and the remaining fourth were devoting their time and energies to the blind. The Inst.i.tution was two miles from Boston, where the friends of her girlhood lived: an unattractive district stretched between, traversed once in two hours by omnibuses, the only means of transport.