they? I walk silent through my old haunts in that country; sunk
usually in inexpressible reflections, in an immeasurable chaos of
musings and mopings that cannot be reflected or articulated. The
only work I had on hand was one that would not prosper with me:
an Article for the _Quarterly Review_ on the state of the Working
Classes here. The thoughts were familiar to me, old, many years
old; but the utterance of them, in what spoken dialect to utter
them! The _Quarterly Review_ was not an eligible vehicle, and
yet the eligiblest; of Whigs, abandoned to Dilettantism and
withered sceptical conventionality, there was no hope at all;
the _London-and-Westminster_ Radicals, wedded to their Benthamee
Formulas, and tremulous at their own shadows, expressly rejected
my proposal many months ago: Tories alone remained; Tories I
often think have more stuff in them, in spite of their blindness,
than any other class we have;--Walter Scott's _sympathy_ with his
fellow creatures, what is it compared with Sydney Smith's, with a
Poor Law Commissioner's! Well: this thing would not prosper
with me in Scotland at all; nor here at all, where nevertheless
I had to persist writing; writing and burning, and cursing my
destiny, and then again writing. Finally the thing came out, as
an Essay on _Chartism;_ was shown to Lockhart, according to
agreement; was praised by him, but was also found unsuitable by
him; suitable to _explode_ a whole fleet of Quarterlies into
sky-rockets in these times! And now Fraser publishes it himself,
with some additions, as a little Volume; and it will go forth in
a week or two on its own footing; and England will see what she
has to say to it, whether something or nothing; and one man, as
usual, is right glad that he has nothing more to do with it.
This is the reason why I could not write. I mean to send you the
Proof-sheets of this thing, to do with as you see cause; there
will be but some five or six, I think. It is probable my New
England brothers may approve some portions of it; may be curious
to see it reprinted; you ought to say Yes or No in regard to
that. I think I will send all the sheets together; or at
farthest, at two times.
Fraser, when we returned hither, had already received his
_Miscellanies;_ had about despatched his five hundred _French
Revolutions,_ insured and so, forth, consigned, I suppose, to
your protection and the proper booksellers; probably they have
got over from New York into your neighborhood before now. Much
good may they do you! The _Miscellanies,_ with their variegated
binding, proved to be in perfect order; and are now all sold;
with much regret from poor James that we had not a thousand more
of them! This thousand he now sets about providing by his own
industry, poor man; I am revising the American copy in these
days; the printer is to proceed forthwith. I admire the good
Stearns Wheeler as I proceed; I write to him my thanks by this
post, and send him by Kennet a copy of Goethe's _Meister,_ for
symbol of acknowledgment. Another copy goes off for you, to the
care of Little and Company. Fraser has got it out two weeks ago;
a respectable enough book, now that the version is corrected
somewhat. Tell me whether you dislike it less; what you do
think of it? By the by, have you not learned to read German now?
I rather think you have. It is three months spent well, if ever
months were, for a thinking Englishman of this age.--I hope
Kennet will use more despatch than he sometimes does. Thank
Heaven for these Boston Steamers they project! May the Nereids
and Poseidon favor them! They will bring us a thousand miles
nearer, at one step; by and by we shall be of one parish
after all.
During Autumn I speculated often about a Hegira into New England
this very year: but alas! my horror of _Lecturing_ continues
great; and what else is there for me to do there? These several
years I have had no wish so pressing as to hold my peace. I
begin again to feel some use in articulate speech; perhaps I
shall one day have something that I want to utter even in your
side of the water. We shall see. Patience, and shuffle the
cards.--I saw no more of Webster; did not even learn well where
he was, till lately I noticed in the Newspapers that he had gone
home again. A certain Mr. Brown (I think) brought me a letter
from you, not long since; I forwarded him to Cambridge and
Scotland: a modest inoffensive man. He said he had never
personally met with Emerson. My Wife recalled to him the story
of the Scotch Traveler on the top of Vesuvius: "Never saw so
beautiful a scene in the world!"--"Nor I," replied a stranger
standing there, "except once; on the top of Dunmiot, in the
Ochil Hills in Scotland."--"Good Heavens! That is a part of my
Estate, and I was never there! I will go thither." Yes, do!--We
have seen no other Transoceanic that I remember. We expect your
_Book_ soon! We know the subject of your Winter Lectures too;
at least Miss Martineau thinks she does, and makes us think so.
Heaven speed the work! Heaven send my good Emerson a clear
utterance, in all right ways, of the nobleness that dwells in
him! He knows what silence means; let him know speech also, in
its season the two are like canvas and pigment, like darkness and
light-image painted thereon; the one is essential to the other,
not possible without the other.
Poor Miss Martineau is in Newcastle-on-Tyne this winter; sick,
painfully not dangerously; with a surgical brother-in-law. Her
meagre didacticalities afflict me no more; but also her blithe
friendly presence cheers me no more. We wish she were back.
This silence, I calculate, forced silence, will do her much good.
If I were a Legislator, I would order every man, once a week or
so, to lock his lips together, and utter no vocable at all
for four-and-twenty hours: it would do him an immense benefit,
poor fellow. Such racket, and cackle of mere hearsay and
sincere-cant, grows at last entirely deafening, enough to drive
one mad, --like the voice of mere infinite rookeries answering
your voice! Silence, silence! Sterling sent you a Letter from
Clifton, which I set under way here, having added the address.
He is not well again, the good Sterling; talks of Madeira this
season again: but I hope otherwise. You of course read his
sublime "article"? I tell him it was--a thing untellable!
Mr. Southey has fallen, it seems, into a mournful condition:
oblivion, mute hebetation, loss of all faculty. He suffered
greatly, nursing his former wife in her insanity, for years till
her relief by death; suffered, worked, and made no moan; the
brunt of the task over, he sank into collapse in the hands of a
new wife he had just wedded. What a lot for him; for her
especially! The most excitable but most methodic man I have ever
seen. [Greek] that is a word that awaits us all.--I have my
brother here at present; though talking of Lisbon with his
Buccleuchs. My Wife seems better than of late winters. I
actually had a Horse, nay actually have it, though it has gone to
the country till the mud abate again! It did me perceptible
good; I mean to try it farther. I am no longer so desperately
poor as I have been for twelve years back; sentence of
starvation or beggary seems revoked at last, a blessedness
really very considerable. Thanks, thanks! We send a thousand
regards to the two little ones, to the two mothers. _Valete
nostrum memores._
--T. Carlyle
XLVIII. Emerson to Carlyle
Concord, 12 December, 1839
My Dear Friend,--Not until the 29th of November did the five
hundred copies of the _French Revolution_ arrive in Boston.
Fraser unhappily sent them to New York, whence they came not
without long delays. They came in perfectly good order, not in
the pretty red you told us of, but in a sober green;--not so
handsome and salable a back, our booksellers said, as their own;
but in every other respect a good book. The duties at the New
York Custom House on these and a quantity of other books sent by
Fraser amounted to $400.36, whereof, I understand, the _French
Revolution_ pays for its share $243. No bill has been brought us
for freight, so we conclude that you have paid it. I confided
the book very much to the conscience and discretion of Little and
Brown, and after some ciphering they settle to sell it at $3.75
per copy, wherefrom you are to get the cost of the book, and
(say) $1.10 per copy profit, and no more. The booksellers
eat the rest. The book is rather too dear for our market of
cheap manufactures, and therefore we are obliged to give the
booksellers a good percentage to get it off at all: for we stand
in daily danger of a cheap edition from some rival neighbor. I
hope to give you good news of its sale soon, although I have been
assured today that no book sells, the times are so bad. Brown
had disposed of fifty or sixty copies to the trade, and twelve at
retail. He doubted not to sell them all in six months....
Several persons have asked me to get some copies of the _German
Romance_ sent over here for sale. Last week a gentleman desired me
to say he wanted four copies, and today I have been charged to
procure another. I think, if you will send me by Little and Brown,
through Longman, six copies, we can find an immediate market.
It gives me great joy to write to my friend once more, slow as
you may think me to use the privilege. For a good while I dared
believe you were coming hither, and why should I write?--and now
for weeks I have been absorbed in my foolish lectures, of which
only two are yet delivered and ended. There should be eight
more; subject, "The Present Age." Out of these follies I
remember you with glad heart. Lately I had Sterling's letter,
which, since I have read his article on you, I am determined to
answer speedily. I delighted in the spirit of that paper, loving
you so well and accusing you so conscientiously. What does he at
Clifton? If you communicate with him, tell him I thank him for
his letter, and hold him dear. I am very happy lately in adding
one or two new friends to my little circle, and you may be sure
every friend of mine is a friend of yours. So when you come here
you shall not be lonely. A new person is always to me a great
event, and will not let me sleep.--I believe I was not wise to
volunteer myself to this fever fit of lecturing again. I ought
to have written instead in silence and serenity. Yet I work
better under this base necessity, and then I have a certain
delight (base also?) in speaking to a multitude. But my joy in
friends, those sacred people, is my consolation for the mishaps
of the adventure, and they for the most part come to me from this
_publication_ of myself.--After ten or twelve weeks I think I
shall address myself earnestly to writing, and give some form to
my formless scripture.
I beg you will write to me and tell me what you do, and give me
good news of your wife and your brother. Can they not see the
necessity of your coming to look after your American interests?
My wife and mother love both you and them. A young man of New
York told me the other day he was about getting you an invitation
from an Association in that city to give them a course of
lectures on such terms as would at least make you whole in the
expenses of coming thither. We could easily do that in Boston.
--R.W. Emerson
What manner of person is Heraud? Do you read Landor, or know
him, O seeing man? Farewell!
XLIX. Carlyle to Emerson
Chelsea, London, 6 January, 1840
My Dear Emerson,--It is you, I surely think, that are in my debt
now;* nevertheless I must fling you another word: may it
cross one from you coming hither--as near the _Lizard Point_ as
it likes!
---------
* The preceding letter had not yet arrived.
---------
Some four sheets making a Pamphlet called _Chartism_ addressed to
you at Concord are, I suppose, snorting along through the waters
this morning, part of the Cargo of the "British Queen." At least
I gave them to Mr. Brown (your unseen friend) about ten days ago,
who promised to dispose of them; the "British Queen," he said,
was the earliest chance. The Pamphlet itself (or rather booklet,
for Fraser has gilt it, &c., and asks five shillings for it as a
Book) is out since then; radicals and others yelping
considerably in a discordant manner about it; I have nothing
other to say to _you_ about it than what I said last time, that
the sheets were _yours_ to do with as you saw good,--to burn if
you reckoned that fittest. It is not entirely a Political
Pamphlet; nay, there are one or two things in it which my
American Friends specially may like: but the interests discussed
are altogether English, and cannot be considered as likely to
concern New-Englishmen very much. However, it will probably be
itself in your hand before this sheet, and you will have
determined what is fit.
A copy of _Wilhelm Meister,_ two copies, one for Stearns Wheeler,
are probably in some of the "Line Ships" at this time too: good
voyage to them! The _French Revolutions_ were all shipped,
invoiced, &c.; they have, I will suppose, arrived safe, as we
shall hear by and by. What freightages, landings, and
embarkments! For only two days ago I sent you off, through
Kennet, another Book: John Sterling's _Poems,_ which he has
collected into a volume. Poor John has overworked himself again,
or the climate without fault on his side has proved too hard for
him: he sails for Madeira again next week! His Doctors tell me
there is no intrinsic danger; but they judge the measure safe as
one of precaution. It is very mortifying he had nestled himself
down at Clifton, thinking he might now hope to continue there;
and lo! he has to fly again.--Did you get his letter? The
address to him now will be, for three months to come, "_Edward_
Sterling, Esq., South Place, Knightsbridge, London," his
Father's designation.
Farther I must not omit to say that Richard Monckton Milnes
purposes, through the strength of Heaven, to _review_ you! In
the next Number of the _London and Westminster,_ the courageous
youth will do this feat, if they let him. Nay, he has already
done it, the Paper being actually written he employed me last
week in negotiating with the Editors about it; and their answer
was, "Send us the Paper, it promises very well." We shall see
whether it comes out or not; keeping silence till then. Milnes
is a _Tory_ Member of Parliament; think of that! For the rest,
he describes his religion in these terms: "I profess to be a
Crypto-Catholic." Conceive the man! A most bland-smiling, semi-
quizzical, affectionate, high-bred, Italianized little man, who
has long olive-blond hair, a dimple, next to no chin, and flings
his arm round your neck when he addresses you in public society!
Let us hear now what he will say, of the American _Vates._*
---------
* The end of this letter has been cut off.
---------
L. Carlyle to Emerson
Chelsea, London, 17 January, 1840
Dear Emerson,--Your Letter of the 12th of December, greatly, to
my satisfaction, has arrived; the struggling Steamship, in spite
of all hurricanes, has brought it safe across the waters to me.
I find it good to write you a word in return straightway; though
I think there are already two, or perhaps even three, messages of
mine to you flying about unacknowledged somewhere under the moon;
nay, the last of them perhaps may go by the same packet as this,
--having been forwarded, as this will be, to _Liverpool,_ after
the "British Queen" sailed from London.
Your account of the _French Revolution_ packages, and prognosis
of what Little and Brown will do with them, is altogether as it
should be. I apprised Fraser instantly of his invoiceless Books,
&c.; he answers, that order has been taken in that long since,
"instructions" sent, and, I conclude, arrangements for _bills_
least of all forgotten. I mentioned what share of the duty was
his; and that your men meant to draw on him for it. That is all
right. As to the _French Revolution,_ I agree with your
Booksellers altogether about it; the American Edition actually
pleases myself better for looking at; nor do I know that
this new English one has much superiority for use: it is
despicably printed, I fear, so far as false spellings and other
slovenlinesses can go. Fraser "finds the people like it";
_credat Judaeus;_--as for me, I have told him I will _not print
any more_ with that man, but with some other man. Curious
enough, the price Little and Brown have fixed upon was the price
I remember guessing at beforehand, and the result they propose to
realize for me corresponds closely with my prophecy too. Thanks,
a thousand thanks, for all the trouble you never grudge to take.
We shall get ourselves handsomely out of this export and import
speculation; and know, taught at a rather _cheap_ rate, not to
embark in the like again.
There went off a _Wilhelm Meister_ for you, and a letter to
announce it, several weeks ago; that was message first. Your
traveling neighbor, Brown, took charge of a Pamphlet named
_Chartism,_ to be put into the "British Queen's" Letter-bag
(where I hope, and doubt not, he did put it, though I have seen
nothing of him since); that and a letter in reference to it was
message second. Thirdly, I sent off a volume of _Poems_ by
Sterling, likewise announced in that letter. And now this that I
actually write is the fourth (it turns out to be) and last of all
the messages. Let us take Arithmetic along with us in all
things.--Of _Chartism_ I have nothing farther to say, except that
Fraser is striking off another One Thousand copies to be called
Second Edition; and that the people accuse me, not of being
an incendiary and speculative Sansculotte threatening to
become practical, but of being a Tory,--thank Heaven. The
_Miscellanies_ are at press; at _two_ presses; to be out, as
Hope asseverates, in March: five volumes, without _Chartism;_
with Hoffmann and Tieck from German Romance, stuck in somewhere
as Appendix; with some other trifles stuck in elsewhere, chiefly
as Appendix; and no essential change from the Boston Edition.
Fraser, "overwhelmed with business," does not yet send me his net
result of those Two Hundred and Fifty Copies sold off some
time ago; so soon as he does, you shall hear of it for your
satisfaction.--As to _German Romance,_ tell my friends that it
has been out of print these ten years; procurable, of late not
without difficulty, only in the Old-Bookshops. The comfort is
that the best part of it stands in the new _Wilhelm Meister:_
Fraser and I had some thought of adding Tieck's and Richter's
parts, had they suited for a volume; the rest may without
detriment to anybody perish.
Such press-correctings and arrangings waste my time here, not in
the agreeablest way. I begin, though in as sulky a state of
health as ever, to look again towards some new kind of work. I
have often thought of Cromwell and Puritans; but do not see how
the subject can be presented still alive. A subject dead is not
worth presenting. Meanwhile I read rubbish of Books; Eichhorn,
Grimm, &c.; very considerable rubbish; one grain in the cart
load worth pocketing. It is pity I have no appetite for
lecturing! Many applications have been made to me here;--none
more touching to me than one, the day before yesterday, by a
fine, innocent-looking Scotch lad, in the name of himself and
certain other Booksellers' shopmen eastward in the City! I
cannot get them out of my head. Poor fellows! they have nobody
to say an honest word to them, in this articulate-speaking world,
and they apply to _me._--For you, good friend, I account you
luckier; I do verily: lecture there what innumerable things you
have got to say on "The Present Age";--yet withal do not forget
to _write_ either, for that is the lasting plan after all. I
have a curious Note, sent me for inspection the other day; it is
addressed to a Scotch Mr. Erskine (famed among the saints here)
by a Madame Necker, Madame de Stael's kinswoman, to whom he, the
said Mr. Erskine, had lent your first Pamphlet at Geneva. She
regards you with a certain love, yet a _shuddering_ love. She
says, "Cela sent l'Americain qui apres avoir abattu les forets a
coup de hache, croit qu'on doit de meme conquerir le monde
intellectuel"! What R.M. Milnes will say of you we hope also to
see.--I know both Heraud and Landor; but alas, what room is
here! Another sheet with less of "Arithmetic" in it will soon be
allowed me. Adieu, dear friend.
Yours, ever and ever,
T. Carlyle
LI. Emerson to Carlyle*
New York, 18 March, 1840
My Dear Friend,--I have just seen the steamer "British Queen"
enter the harbor from sea, and here lies the "Great Western," to
sail tomorrow. I will not resist hints so broad upon my long
procrastinations. You shall have at least a tardy acknowledgment
that I received in January your letter of December, which I
should have answered at once had it not found me absorbed in
writing foolish lectures which were then in high tide. I had
written you, a little earlier, tidings of the receipt of your
_French Revolution._ Your letter was very welcome, as all
your letters are. I have since seen tidings of the _Essay on
Chartism_ in an English periodical, but have not yet got my
