Practical, too; for each manuscript bears my name and address; you can appreciate the importance of that. One, which I had left by mistake in a strange pulpit, I had returned to me the other day by mail. Sincerely yours.
A. D. Swively.
***
In the September number of the Atlantic, Mr. Newton, discussing his delightful Old Lady, London, made something of a whipping-post of old Thomas Carlyle. The editor, who has loved the cantankerousness of Teufelsdröch for forty years, gladly prints this letter from an indignant disciple.
Dear Atlantic,—
In the September Atlantic the author of the Amenities of Book-Collecting slipped from amenities in interrupting his tale of love for 'My Old Lady, London' to express some misinformation about Carlyle.
Our amenitor was treading in Carlyle's foot- steps in searching out the Gough Square house: and if he proceeds, he may find other points of agreement. His specific charge is this: 'Carlyle! who never had a good or kindly word to say of any man or thing.' Carlyle has lain in his grave for forty years. When Johnson had lain in his grave for forty-seven years, Carlyle wrote of him: 'Johnson does not whine over his existence, but manfully makes the most and best of it. … He is animated by the spirit of the true workman, resolute to do his work well; and he does his work well; all his work, that of writing, that of living. … Loving friends are there! Listeners, even Answerers: the fruit of his long labors lies round him in fair legible writings, of Philosophy, Eloquence, Morality, Philology: some excellent, all worthy and genuine Works: for which too, a deep, earnest murmur of thanks reaches him from all ends of his Fatherland. Nay, there are works of Goodness, of undying Mercy, which even he has possessed the power to do: "What I gave I have; what I spent I had!" … How to hold firm to the last the fragments of old Belief, and with earnest eye still discern some glimpses of a true path, and go forward thereon, "in a world where there is much to be done and little to be known"! This is what Samuel Johnson, by act and word, taught his Nation; what his Nation received and learned of him, more than of any other. … If England has escaped the blood-bath of a French Revolution, and may yet, in virtue of this delay and of the experience it has given, work out her deliverance calmly into a new Era, let Samuel Johnson, beyond all contemporary or succeeding men, have the praise of it. … Since the time of John Milton, no braver heart had beat in any English bosom than Samuel Johnson now bore.'
Better or kindlier words concerning Sam Johnson it will tax the Amenities of Book-Collecting to discover.
But enough. Good and kindly words; great affectionate thoughts Carlyle had for Scott, for Sterling, for Irving, for Elliott, the Corn-Law Rhymer, for Allan Cunningham, for Dickens, for Tennyson, for Emerson, and had their sincere and lasting love contemporaries all; and the list might be extended indefinitely.
Merritt Starr.
***
Into each life some rain must fall. The poems penned in wet weather have not infrequently a certain melancholy appeal.
Dear Atlantic,—
I submit herewith an 'Il Penseroso' for that 'L'Allegro' entitled 'Joy' in the October number of your revered publication. Shall we call it
SADNESS
When I am sad
There seems to be
A big Dreadnaught
Inside of me.
It sags, and drags
Down to my feet;
And yet I lose
No chance to eat.
From my sub-con-
Scious mind doth come
(Down in my ep-
I-gas-tri-um)
A 'What care I,
Though there should be
A fleet of woe
Inside of me?
For may I not
Of such a toy
At once disarm,
And so find joy?
Very truly yours,
Kate E. Parker.
***
We always did like a pessimist. He has a way of looking the world right in the eye. But the editor's family is too considerable to admit of his accepting the following proposal.
Dear Atlantic,—
Am wondering whether you will be interested in a 3000-word article on 'Must Human Propagation Continue?' In a thorough discussion of the subject I suggest the thought that the numerous troubles in the world will cease, and its great problems be solved, only by a cessation of multiplication, sorrow and death be at an end, and the earth itself be better off without human beings. Very truly yours, ——— ———.
The same mail brings us a contribution entitled 'The Horrors of Matrimony'; but that—as we might have guessed, even if the note-paper had not told us so—is by a member of the League for the Preservation of Wild Life.
