Part 7

Dearest, I have hung up the pictures--the Isola over the mantel-piece, and the Menaggio on the opposite wall. This arrangement pleased me better, on the whole, than the other which we contemplated; and I cannot perceive but that the light is equally favorable for them both. You cannot imagine how they glorify our parlor--and what a solace they are to its widowed inhabitant. I sit before them with something of the quiet and repose which your own beloved presence is wont to impart to me. I gaze at them by all sorts of light--daylight, twilight, and candle-light; and when the lamps are extinguished, and before getting into bed, I sit looking at these pictures, by the flickering fire-light. They are truly an infinite enjoyment. I take great care of them, and have hitherto hung the curtains before them every morning; and they remain covered till after I have kindled my fire in the afternoon. But I suppose this precaution need not be taken much longer. I think that this slight veil produces a not unpleasing effect, especially upon the Isola--a gentle and tender gloom, like the first approaches of twilight. Nevertheless, whenever I remove the curtains I am always struck with new surprise at the beauty which then gleams forth. Mine ownest, you are a wonderful little Dove.

What beautiful weather this is--beautiful, at least, so far as sun, sky, and atmosphere are concerned; though a poor wingless biped, like my Dove's husband, is sometimes constrained to wish that he could raise himself a little above the earth. How much mud and mire, how many pools of unclean water, how many slippery footsteps and perchance heavy tumbles, might be avoided, if we could but tread six inches above the crust of this world. Physically, we cannot do this; our bodies cannot; but it seems to me that our hearts and minds may keep themselves above moral mud-puddles, and other discomforts of the soul's path-way, and so enjoy the sunshine.

I have added Coleridge's Poems, a very good edition in three volumes, to our library. Dearest, dearest, what a joy it is to think of you, whenever I buy a book--to think that we shall read them aloud to one another, and that they are to be our mutual and familiar friends for life. I intended to have asked you again for that list which you shewed me; but it will do the next time I come. I mean to go to a book-auction this evening. When our book-case is filled, my bibliomania will probably cease; for its shelves, I think, would hold about all the books that I should care to read--all, at least, that I should wish to possess as household friends.

What a reprehensible husband am I, not to have inquired, in the very first sentence of my letter, whether my belovedest has quite recovered from the varioloid! But, in truth, it seemed so long since we parted, that none but chronic diseases can have subsisted from that time to this. I make no doubt, therefore, but that the afflicted arm is entirely recovered, and that only a slight scar remains--which shall be kissed, some time or other. And how are your eyes, my blessedest? Do not torture them by attempting to write, before they are quite well. If you inflict pain on them for such a purpose, your husband's eyes will be sensible of it, when he shall read your letters. Remember that we have now a common property in each other's eyes.

Dearest, I have not seen Colonel Hall since my return hither--he being gone to Maine. When he comes back, or shortly thereafter, I will try to prevail on your neglectful spouse to pay you a short visit. Methinks he is a very cold and loveless sort of person. I have been pestering him, ever since I began this letter, to send you some word of affectionate remembrance; but he utterly refuses to send anything, save a kiss apiece to the Dove's eyes and mouth, and to Sophie Hawthorne's nose and foot. Will you have the kindness to see that these valuable consignments arrive at their destination? Dearest wife, the letter-writer belies your ownest husband. He thinks of you, and yearns for you all day long.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY

_Boston_, Feby. 11th, 1840--7 P.M.

_Belovedest_,

Your letter, with its assurance of your present convalescence, and its promise (to which I shall hold you fast) that you will never be sick any more, caused me much joy.... Dearest, George Hillard came in just as I had written the first sentence; so we will begin on a new score.

Your husband has been measuring coal all day, aboard of a black little British schooner, in a dismal dock at the north end of the city. Most of the time, he paced the deck to keep himself warm; for the wind (north-east, I believe it was) blew up through the dock, as if it had been the pipe of a pair of bellows. The vessel lying deep between two wharves, there was no more delightful prospect, on the right hand and on the left, than the posts and timbers, half immersed in the water, and covered with ice, which the rising and falling of successive tides had left upon them; so that they looked like immense icicles. Across the water, however, not more than half a mile off, appeared the Bunker Hill monument; and what interested me considerably more, a church-steeple, with the dial of a clock upon it, whereby I was enabled to measure the march of the weary hours. Sometimes your husband descended into the dirty little cabin of the schooner, and warmed himself by a red-hot stove, among biscuit-barrels, pots and kettles, sea-chests, and innumerable lumber of all sorts--his olfactories, meanwhile, being greatly refreshed by the odour of a pipe, which the captain or some of his crew were smoking. But at last came the sunset, with delicate clouds, and a purple light upon the islands; and your husband blessed it, because it was the signal of his release; and so he came home to talk with his dearest wife. And now he bids her farewell, because he is tired and sleepy. God bless you, belovedest. Dream happy dreams of me tonight.

February 12th--Evening.--All day long again, best wife, has your poor husband been engaged in a very black business--as black as a coal; and though his face and hands have undergone a thorough purification, he feels as if he were not altogether fit to hold communion with his white Dove. Methinks my profession is somewhat akin to that of a chimney-sweeper; but the latter has the advantage over me, because, after climbing up through the darksome flue of the chimney, he emerges into the midst of the golden air, and sings out his melodies far over the heads of the whole tribe of weary earth-plodders. My dearest, my toil today has been cold and dull enough; nevertheless your husband was neither cold nor dull; for he kept his heart warm and his spirit bright with thoughts of his belovedest wife. I had strong and happy yearnings for you to-day, ownest Dove--happy, even though it was such an eager longing, which I knew could not then be fulfilled, to clasp you to my bosom. And now here I am in our parlour, aweary--too tired, almost, to write.

Well, dearest, my labors are over for the present. I cannot, however, come home just at present, three of the Measurers being now absent; but you shall see me very soon. Naughtiest, why do you say that you have scarcely seen your husband, this winter? Have there not, to say nothing of shorter visits, been two eternities of more than a week each, which were full of blessings for us? My Dove has quite forgotten these. Oh, well! If visits of a week long be not worth remembering, I shall alter my purpose of coming to Salem for another like space;--otherwise I might possibly have been there, by Saturday night, at furthest. Dear me, how sleepy I am! I can hardly write, as you will discover by the blottings and scratchings. So good-bye now, darlingest;--and I will finish in the freshness of the morning.

February 13th--Past 8 A.M. Belovedest, how very soon this letter will be in your hands. It brings us much closer together, when the written words of one of us can come to the heart of the other, in the very same day that they flowed from the heart of the writer. I mean to come home to our parlour early to-day; so, when you receive this letter, you can imagine me there, sitting in front of the Isola. I have this moment interrupted myself to go and look at that precious production. How I wish that naughty Sophie Hawthorne could be induced to turn her face towards me! Nevertheless, the figure is her veritable self, and so would the face be, only that she deems it too beauteous to be thrown away on her husband's gaze. I have not dared to kiss her yet. Will she abide it?

My dearest, do not expect me very fervently till I come. I am glad you were so careful of your inestimable eyes as not to write to me yesterday. Mrs. Hillard says that Elizabeth made her a call. Good-bye. I am very well to day, and unspeakably happy in the thought that I have a dearest little wife, who loves me pretty well. God bless her.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY

_Boston_, March 11th, 1840--2 P.M.

_Blessedest_,

It seems as if I were looking back to a former state of existence, when I think of the precious hours which we have lived together. And now we are in two different worlds--widowed, both of us--both of us deceased, and each lamenting ...

(Portion of letter missing)

Belovedest, almost my first glance, on entering our parlor after my return hither, was at the pictures--my very first glance, indeed, as soon as I had lighted the lamps. They have certainly grown more beautiful during my absence, and are still becoming more perfect, and perfecter, and perfectest. I fancied that Sophie Hawthorne, as she stands on the bridge, had slightly turned her head, so as to reveal somewhat more of her face; but if so, she has since turned it back again. I was much struck with the Menaggio this morning;--while I was gazing at it, the sunshine and the shade grew positively real, and I agreed with you, for the time, in thinking this a more superlative picture than the other. But when I came home about an hour ago, I bestowed my chiefest attention upon the Isola; and now I believe it has the first place in my affections, though without prejudice to a very fervent love for the other.

... Dove, there is little prospect for me, indeed; but forgive me for telling you so, dearest--no prospect of my returning so soon as next Monday; but I have good hope to be again at liberty by the close of the week. Do be very good, my Dove--be as good as your nature will permit, naughty Sophie Hawthorne. As to myself, I shall take the liberty to torment myself as much as I please.

My dearest, I am very well, but exceedingly stupid and heavy; so the remainder of this letter shall be postponed until tomorrow. Has my Dove flown abroad, this cold, bright day? Would that the wind would snatch her up, and waft her to her husband.

How was it, dearest? And how do you do this morning? Is the wind east? The sun shone on the chimney-tops round about here, a few minutes ago; and I hoped that there would be a pleasant day for my Dove to take wing, and for Sophie Hawthorne to ride on horseback; but the sky seems to be growing sullen now. Do you wish to know how your husband will spend the day? First of the first--but there rings the bell for eight o'clock; and I must go down to breakfast.

After breakfast;--First of the first, your husband will go to the Post-Office, like a dutiful husband as he is, to put in this letter for his belovedest wife. Thence he will proceed to the Custom House, and finding that there is no call for him on the wharves, he will sit down by the Measurers' fire, and read the Morning Post. Next, at about half past nine o'clock, he will go to the Athenaeum, and turn over the Magazines and Reviews till eleven or twelve, when it will be time to return to the Custom-House to see whether there be a letter from Dove Hawthorne--and also (though this is of far less importance) to see whether there be any demand for his services as Measurer. At one o'clock, or thereabouts, he will go to dinner--but first, perhaps, he will promenade the whole length of Washington street, to get himself an appetite. After dinner, he will take one more peep at the Custom-House, and it being by this time about two o'clock, and no prospect of business to-day, he will feel at liberty to come home to our own parlor, there to remain till supper-time. At six o'clock he will sally forth again, to get some oysters and read the evening papers, and returning between seven and eight, he will read and re-read his belovedest's letter--then take up a book--and go to bed at ten, with a blessing on his lips for the Dove and Sophie Hawthorne.

THINE OWNEST.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY

_Boston_, March 15th, 1840--Forenoon.

_Best-belovedest_,

Thy letter by Elizabeth came, I believe, on Thursday, and the two which thou didst entrust to the post reached me not till yesterday--whereby I enjoyed a double blessing in recompense of the previous delay. Nevertheless, it were desirable that the new Salem postmaster be forthwith ejected, for taking upon himself to withhold the outpourings of thy heart, at their due season. As for letters of business, which involve merely the gain or loss of a few thousand dollars, let him be as careless as he pleases; but when thou wouldst utter thyself to thy husband, dearest wife, there is doubtless a peculiar fitness of thy communications to that point and phase of our existence, at which they ought to be received. However, come when they will, they are sure to make sweetest music with my heart-strings.

Blessedest, what an ugly day is this!--and there thou sittest as heavy as thy husband's heart. And is his heart indeed heavy? Why no--it is not heaviness--not the heaviness, like a great lump of ice, which I used to feel when I was alone in the world--but--but--in short, dearest, where thou art not, there it is a sort of death. A death, however, in which there is still hope and assurance of a joyful life to come. Methinks, if my spirit were not conscious of thy spirit, this dreary snow-storm would chill me to torpor;--the warmth of my fireside would be quite powerless to counteract it. Most absolute little wife, didst thou expressly command me to go to Father Taylor's church this very Sabbath?--(Dinner, or luncheon rather, has intervened since the last sentence)--Now, belovedest, it would not be an auspicious day for me to hear the aforesaid Son of Thunder. Thou knowest not how difficult is thy husband to be touched or moved, unless time, and circumstances, and his own inward state, be in a "concatenation accordingly." A dreadful thing would it be, were Father Taylor to fail in awakening a sympathy from my spirit to thine. Darlingest, pray let me stay at home this afternoon. Some sunshiny Sunday, when I am wide awake, and warm, and genial, I will go and throw myself open to his blessed influences; but now, there is but one thing (thou being absent) which I feel anywise inclined to do--and that is, to go to sleep. May I go to sleep, belovedest? Think what sweet dreams of thee may visit me--think how I shall escape this snow-storm--think how my heavy mood will change, as the mood of mind almost always does, during the interval that withdraws me from the external world. Yes; thou bidst me sleep. Sleep thou too, my beloved--let us pass at one and the same moment into that misty region, and embrace each other there.

Well, dearest, I have slept; but Sophie Hawthorne has been naughty--she would not be dreamed about. And now that I am awake again, here are the same snow-flakes in the air, that were descending when I went to sleep. Would that there were an art of making sunshine! Knowest thou any such art? Truly thou dost, my blessedest, and hast often thrown a heavenly sunshine around thy husband's spirit, when all things else were full of gloom. What a woe--what a cloud it is, to be away from thee! How would my Dove like to have her husband continually with her, twelve or fourteen months out of the next twenty? Would not that be real happiness?--in such long communion, should we not feel as if separation were a dream, something that never had been a reality, nor ever could be? Yes; but--for in all earthly happiness there is a but--but, during those twenty months, there would be two intervals of three months each, when thy husband would be five hundred miles away--as far away as Washington. That would be terrible. Would not Sophie Hawthorne fight against it?--would not the Dove fold her wings, not in the quietude of bliss, but of despair? Do not be frightened, dearest--nor rejoiced either--for the thing will not be. It might be, if I chose; but on multitudinous accounts, my present situation seems preferable; and I do pray, that, in one year more, I may find some way of escaping from this unblest Custom-House; for it is a very grievous thraldom. I do detest all offices--all, at least, that are held on a political tenure. And I want nothing to do with politicians--they are not men; they cease to be men, in becoming politicians. Their hearts wither away, and die out of their bodies. Their consciences are turned to India-rubber--or to some substance as black as that, and which will stretch as much. One thing, if no more, I have gained by my Custom-House experience--to know a politician. It is a knowledge which no previous thought, or power of sympathy, could have taught me, because the animal, or the machine rather, is not in nature.

Oh my darlingest wife, thy husband's soul yearns to embrace thee! Thou art his hope--his joy--he desires nothing but to be with thee, and to toil for thee, and to make thee a happy wife, wherein would consist his own heavenliest happiness. Dost thou love him? Yes; he knoweth it. God bless thee, most beloved.

THINE OWNEST HUSBAND.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY

(Fragment only)

And now good night, best, beautifullest, belovedest, blessingest of wives. Notwithstanding what I have said of the fleeting and unsatisfying bliss of dreams, still, if thy husband's prayers and wishes can bring thee, or even a shadow of thee, into his sleep, thou or thy image will assuredly be there. Good night, ownest. I bid thee good night, although it is still early in the evening; because I must reserve the rest of the page to greet thee upon in the morning.

TO MISS PEABODY

_Boston_, March 26th, 1840--Afternoon.

_Thou dearest wife_,

Here is thy husband, yearning for thee with his whole heart--thou, meanwhile, being fast asleep, and perhaps hovering around him in thy dreams. Very dreary are the first few centuries which elapse after our separations, and before it is time to look forward hopefully to another meeting--these are the "dark ages." And hast thou been very good, my beloved? Dost thou dwell in the past and in the future, so that the gloomy present is quite swallowed up in sunshine? Do so, mine ownest, for the sake of thy husband, whose desire it is to make thy whole life as sunny as the scene beyond those high, dark rocks of the Menaggio.

Dearest, my thoughts will not flow at all--they are as sluggish as a stream of half-cold lava. Methinks I could sleep an hour or two--perhaps thou art calling to me, out of the midst of thy dream, to come and join thee there. I will take a book, and lie down awhile, and perhaps resume my pen in the evening. I will not say good bye; for I am coming to thee now.

March 27th,--Before breakfast.--Good morning, most belovedest. I felt so infinitely stupid, after my afternoon's nap, that I could not possibly write another word; and it has required a whole night's sleep to restore me the moderate share of intellect and vivacity that naturally belongs to me. Dearest, thou didst not come into my dreams, last night; but, on the contrary, I was engaged in assisting the escape of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette from Paris, during the French revolution. And sometimes, by an unaccountable metamorphosis, it seemed as if my mother and sister were in the place of the King and Queen. I think that fairies rule over our dreams--beings who have no true reason or true feeling, but mere fantasies instead of those endowments.

Afternoon.--Blessedest, I do think that it is the doom laid upon me, of murdering so many of the brightest hours of the day at that unblest Custom-House, that makes such havoc with my wits; for here I am again, trying to write worthily to my etherealest, and intellectualest, and feelingest, and imaginativest wife, yet with a sense as if all the noblest part of man had been left out of my composition--or had decayed out of it, since my nature was given to my own keeping. Sweetest Dove, shouldst thou once venture within those precincts, the atmosphere would immediately be fatal to thee--thy wings would cease to flutter in a moment--scarcely wouldst thou have time to nestle into thy husband's bosom, ere thy pure spirit would leave what is mortal of thee there, and flit away to Heaven. Never comes any bird of Paradise into that dismal region. A salt, or even a coal-ship is ten million times preferable; for there the sky is above me, and the fresh breeze around me, and my thoughts, having hardly anything to do with my occupation, are as free as air.

Nevertheless, belovedest, thou art not to fancy that the above paragraph gives thee a correct idea of thy husband's mental and spiritual state; for he is sometimes prone to the sin of exaggeration. It is only once in a while that the image and desire of a better and happier life makes him feel the iron of his chain; for after all, a human spirit may find no insufficiency of food fit for it, even in the Custom-House. And with such materials as these, I do think, and feel, and learn things that are worth knowing, and which I should not know unless I had learned them there; so that the present portion of my life shall not be quite left out of the sum of my real existence. Moreover, I live through my Dove's heart--I live an intellectual life in Sophie Hawthorne. Therefore ought those two in one to keep themselves happy and healthy in mind and feelings, inasmuch as they enjoy more blessed influences than their husband, and likewise have to provide happiness and moral health for him.

Very dearest, I feel a great deal better now--nay, nothing whatever is the matter. What a foolish husband hast thou, misfortunate little Dove, that he will grieve thee with such a long Jeremiad, and after all find out that there is not the slightest cause for lamentation. But so it must often be, dearest--this trouble hast thou entailed upon thyself, by yielding to become my wife. Every cloud that broods beneath my sky, or that I even fancy is brooding there, must dim thy sunshine too. But here is no real cloud. It is good for me, on many accounts, that my life has had this passage in it. Thou canst not think how much more I know than I did a year ago--what a stronger sense I have of power to act as a man among men--what worldly wisdom I have gained, and wisdom also that is not altogether of this world. And when I quit this earthy cavern, where I am now buried, nothing will cling to me that ought to be left behind. Men will not perceive, I trust, by my look, or the tenor of my thoughts and feelings, that I have been a Custom-House officer.

Belovedest!--what an awful concussion was that of our two heads. It was as if two worlds had rushed together--as if the Moon (thou art my Moon, gentlest wife) had met in fierce encounter with the rude, rock-promontoried Earth. Dearest, art thou sure that thy delicatest brain has suffered no material harm? A maiden's heart, they say, is often bruised and broken by her lover's cruelty; it was reserved for naughtiest me to inflict those injuries upon my mistress's head....

(Portion of letter missing)