MARGARET FULLER.
There was little in the life of the people of New England in the early part of the present century upon which to feed the imagination of a precocious and romantic child like Margaret Fuller; and her childhood, though outwardly fortunate and well placed, was one of labor and repression, and far from happy, if we may judge by her own account of it. The theology of the people was gloomy. They made everything connected with religion unlovely, and this austerity was particularly distasteful to one of Margaret's imaginative temperament and heroic disposition. Her ungratified imagination brought her early into conflict with the circumstances and surroundings of her life.
All the poetry of her nature cried out against the lives of toil and care by which she was surrounded,—lives at that time lighted up by little of art or literature or music, but held to a stern standard of duty and self-abnegation. Margaret's nature craved beauty and poetry and art and lavish affection, and it was nursed on a somewhat grim diet of hard work and little expressed affection, although her parents were both loving and intelligent. Her father himself educated her, being a Harvard graduate, and a lawyer and politician of that day. He taught her Latin at the age of six years; and she says that the lessons set for her were as many and various as the hours would allow, and on subjects far beyond her age. These lessons were recited to her father after office hours, which kept the poor tired child up till late in the evening, and as a result the youthful prodigy was terrified at night by dreams and illusions, and given to sleep-walking. The result of such over-tension of a childish mind was a morbid and unhealthy state of both body and mind; and though she loved study, these great demands made upon her powers almost overcame her with their weight. She had a natural passion for reading, and when a mere child singled out Shakespeare, Cervantes, and Molière, from all the books in the library, for her especial favorites.
She was but eight years old when she took a passionate interest in "Romeo and Juliet," and was disgraced in the family for perusing it on Sunday; and the imaginative child was always seeking for the heroic figures of her Shakespearian world in the every-day life about her, and was always disappointed. Altogether, we must call it an unhappy and unfortunate childhood, and cannot but think much finer intellectual as well as moral results would have followed a different treatment in her home.
In her early girlhood she mixed much in the college society at Cambridge, and would have been taken for a much older person than she really was. She was not handsome, but her animated countenance made its own impression, and awakened interest in almost all who saw her. She made some of her life-long friends at this time. Dr. Hedge, James Freeman Clarke, and William Henry Channing were among them. With Emerson she made acquaintance a little later, through Miss Martineau, then visiting in this country. She was not at this time an agreeable person. She was much derided for her self-esteem by people who knew her slightly, and was also accused of hauteur and arrogance. Even Lowell was thus impressed by her, and put her in the pillory in the "Fable for Critics." He proposes to establish new punishments for criminals, thus:—
"I propose to shut up every doer of wrong
With these desperate books, for such terms, short or long,
As by statute in such cases made and provided
Shall be by our wise legislators decided:
Thus:—Let murderers be shut, to grow wiser and cooler,
At hard labor for life on the works of Miss ——."
And again:—
"For a woman must surely see well, if she try,
The whole of whose being's a capital I."
And still further:—
"Phœbus! you know
That the infinite Soul has its infinite woe,
As I ought to know, having lived cheek by jowl,
Since the day I was born, with the Infinite Soul."
But people who knew her well soon lost this unfavorable impression, and she was almost idolized by her real friends. Mr. Emerson thus records his first impressions of her: "She had a face and frame that would indicate fulness and tenacity of life. . . . She was then, as always, carefully and becomingly dressed, and of lady-like self-possession. For the rest, her appearance had nothing pre-possessing. Her extreme plainness, a trick of incessantly opening and shutting her eyelids, the nasal tone of her voice,—all repelled; and I said to myself, 'We shall never get far.'" He adds: "I believe I fancied her too much interested in personal history; and her talk was a comedy in which dramatic justice was done to everybody's foibles. I remember she made me laugh more than I liked." But, "soon her wit had effaced the impression of her personal unattractiveness, and the eyes, which were so plain at first, swam with fun and drolleries and the very tides of joy and superabundant life," and he saw "that her satire was only the pastime and necessity of her talent;" and as he came to know her better, "her plane of character rose constantly in my estimation, disclosing many moods and powers in successive platforms or terraces, each above each." All superior women were drawn to her at once, and even those noted only for beauty or social talent vied in their devotion to her. A few years later, it was for this circle that her famous conversation classes were held in Boston; and so great was their popularity that she continued them for six years. These conversations were entirely unique in character, and attracted great attention in their day. The novelty of such a departure in the Boston of forty years ago may be imagined, and the criticism drawn upon a woman who should inaugurate such an innovation was in some cases very severe. In regard to these same conversations, as in other things, the impression she made was twofold. Mrs. Howe says: "Without the fold of her admirers stood carping, unkind critics; within were enthusiastic and grateful friends." But as to her great eloquence and ability, there was but one opinion. Even critics admitted that no woman had spoken like this before. And she addressed her fine audience of Boston's most cultivated women with entire ease and freedom, and gave many of them an impulse toward an intellectual career which nothing else at that time could have done.
Here was the real beginning of what may be called the woman question in this country. Before Margaret Fuller's day the agitation regarding woman's career and work in the world was practically unknown here; and all the ideas which have now become incorporated into the platform of the woman's party found in her their first and perhaps their best exponent. Very little that is new has since been urged upon this question. Her powerful mind seemed to have grasped the whole subject, and to have given it the best expression of which it was capable. She embodied her ideas after a time in her book, "Woman in the Nineteenth Century;" and although the literature of the subject is now voluminous, that book is still read and referred to.
Finding it necessary to support herself and to care for her mother and brothers after her father's death, she at first taught school, at one time in Mr. Alcott's famous school in Boston and afterwards in Providence, and then took a position upon the "New York Tribune," kindly offered her by Mr. Greeley. She supported her brothers in college, and aided her mother for some years, putting by her own ambitions with a cheerful outward appearance, though oftentimes with a heavy heart. She had many and very ambitious literary projects, few of which were ever destined to be carried out. For a woman who occupied so much the minds of the men of her day and of a succeeding generation, she really left little upon which to base their admiration. What she was, rather than what she did, seems to have made its impression upon her time. That her vocation was to speak rather than to write, there seems little doubt. She had the rare but much-prized gift of eloquence, and in these latter days would no doubt have made a very large success as a speaker. Some who listened to her think that she might have been the peer of Wendell Phillips in oratory, had she bent her powers entirely in that direction. As it is, her genius has become almost wholly a tradition. There are many to-day who cannot guess the secret of the continued interest the world feels in her. That secret lies largely in the impression she made upon many of the famous men of her time. They have transmitted her name to posterity along with their own. Horace Greeley at first determined not to like her personally, and avoided her even after she became a member of his family; but he ended by growing as enthusiastic over her as the rest. Even crabbed Carlyle, though much prejudiced against women of her sort, bore testimony to his liking for her. He writes to Emerson:—
"Margaret is an excellent soul; in real regard with both of us here. Since she went I have been reading some of her papers in a new book we have got; greatly superior to all I knew before,—in fact, undeniable utterances of a truly heroic mind, altogether unique, so far as I know, among the writing women of this generation; rare enough too, God knows, among the writing men. She is very narrow, but she is truly high. Honor to Margaret, and more and more good speed to her!"
It was not until 1846 that Margaret's long desire to visit Europe was gratified. It had been the dream of her life, and one cannot but be sad at thought of its tragic ending. She spent some time in London, seeing all the celebrities of the day there, and then crossed over to Paris. Like London, Paris had then some brilliant men and women, whose peers she has not seen since. Rachel was the queen of the tragic stage, George Sand queen of the literary domain. De Balzac, Eugene Sue, Dumas père, and Béranger were all alive, and the centre of the Parisian literary coterie. Liszt and Chopin held the musical world in the bondage of sweet sounds. Into this little inner circle Margaret entered, and did not fail to make her mark there. She was a second Madame de Staël in conversation, and in her little circle was recognized as such.
From Paris she went to Italy, where the real romance of her life was enacted and its tragic denouement prepared for. Italy had been her promised land from early youth. She had longed for its sunny clime, amid the storms and winds of bleak New England; for its historic associations, amid the poverty of a land without a past; for its architectural splendors, amid the bareness and baldness of the New World cities; for the grandeur of its ancient art, amid the poverty of the America of that day; for its impassioned music, in a land almost devoid of musical culture; and she had longed for the beautiful, sensuous, idle life of its people, through all the strain of a strenuous and overworked existence. Her vision had been fair, and at first she was much disappointed. In artistic or architectural magnificence St. Peter's and the Transfiguration could not disappoint a soul like Margaret's, but she was deeply disappointed in the life of the Italian people and in the general charm of the country.
She fell upon exciting times in Italy. There had grown up the fiercest hatred of the Austrian rule, which had recently been aggravated by foolish acts of repression and violence. The whole country was in a ferment. Mazzini, whom Margaret had met in London, was here awaiting his opportunity. Mrs. Howe says: "Up and down went the hopes and the hearts of the Liberal party. Hither and thither ran the tides of popular affection, suspicion, and resentment. The Pope was the idol of the moment. The Grand Duke of Tuscany yielded to pressure whenever it became severe. The minor princes, who had from their birth been incapable of an idea, tried as well as they could to put on some semblance of concession without really yielding anything." Margaret was soon in close relations with leading Liberals, and shared all their hopes and fears and some of their dangers.
At this time she first met the young Italian nobleman, Ossoli, who became her husband. She became separated from her party one day at some service at St. Peter's, and, wandering around trying to find them, became tired and somewhat agitated. A young man of gentlemanly address offered his services to her as guide; and after looking in vain for her friends, she was obliged to accept his escort home, night having come on and no carriages being in attendance. They became mutually attracted, and the acquaintance continued, with that disregard of conventionality for which American women are noted when abroad. Although much younger than Margaret, he seemed to be greatly interested in her; and although he had none of her intellectual tastes, she was equally interested in him.
A very romantic attachment sprang up between them, which ended after a few months in a secret marriage. Her reason for the secrecy lay in the troubled times, and the fear of Ossoli's being deprived of his paternal inheritance on account of marrying a Protestant. They had great hopes of the coming revolution, and trusted to a more liberal government to give him his rights despite the fact of his marrying outside the Church of Rome. He was as poor as Margaret herself; and this was another reason for living apart for a time. He was a captain in the Civic Guard, and at this time much occupied with military duties. It was at this time that the Roman Republic was proclaimed, with great pomp of rejoicing; and Margaret chronicles the opening of the Constitutional Assembly, with great display of processions and banners. In one procession walked a Napoleonic prince side by side with Garibaldi, both having been chosen as deputies. All this raised the hopes of the Liberals throughout Europe to the highest point, and Margaret was almost transported with happy excitement,—probably not understanding as well as the natives of Italy how ill prepared that country was for liberty, and how soon the despotic power would again close around the people. In point of fact, the Republic lasted but a few days, and Margaret's brief time for rejoicing was over, and her own personal troubles became very urgent and oppressive.
A son had been born to her some months before, and had of necessity been left in the hands of a nurse in the country, as the marriage had not yet been made known. During all the pomp of processions and the ringing of bells and firing of cannon, she had heard the voice of her infant crying at Rieti. She had not seen him for three months, on account of the troublous times. She lay awake whole nights contriving how she might end the separation which seemed killing her; but circumstances were too strong for her, and the object so dear to her heart could not be compassed. The French were already in Italy. The siege of Rome soon ended in the downfall of the Republic, and the government was placed in the hands of a triumvirate. The city once invested, military hospitals became a necessity. Margaret was named superintendent of the hospital of the Fate Bene Fratelli. "Night and day," writes Mrs. Story, "Margaret was occupied, and with the Princess Belgiojoso so ordered and disposed the hospitals that their conduct was admirable. Of money they had very little, and they were obliged to give their time and thoughts in its place. I have walked through the wards with Margaret, and have seen how comforting was her presence to the poor suffering men. For each one's peculiar taste she had a care. To one she carried books; to another she told the news of the day; and listened to another's oft-repeated tale of wrongs, as the best sympathy she could give. They raised themselves on their elbows to get a last glimpse of her as she went away." Ossoli was stationed with his command on the walls of the Vatican, and in great danger. He refused to leave his post even for food and rest. The provisions which Margaret sent him he shared with his comrades. Sometimes she could visit him at his post and talk about the little Angelo, now always in her thoughts. As the wounded men were brought into the hospital she was always expecting to see her husband; and as the nurse had threatened to abandon the babe, and it was utterly impossible for Margaret to get outside the lines now investing the city, the two horrors were almost more than she could bear. It was only in trying to help the helpless that she found any consolation in this dreadful time. The night of the 20th of June, the French effected an entrance into the city; and although the defence was gallantly continued until the 30th, there was really no hope for the patriots.
At that time Garibaldi informed the Assembly that further resistance would be useless. The French occupation then began, and the end of all liberties. The gates once open, Margaret, with all her sorrow for Rome, was happy in the thought of reaching her child. She did reach him just in time to save his life. He had been forsaken by his nurse, and his mother found him "worn to a skeleton, too weak to smile or lift his wasted little hand." All that Margaret had endured seemed slight compared to this. She could but compare the women of the Papal States to wolves. The child, however, recovered with good nursing, and the family, now united, enjoyed a little season of repose and happiness. The marriage was announced, and Margaret's many friends in Rome extended their help and sympathy. Life in Italy had now become so painful to them that she resolved to return to the New World. Her husband was willing to accompany her. They accordingly engaged passage upon a merchant-vessel from Leghorn, the same vessel being engaged to bring over the heavy marble of Powers's "Greek Slave." She seemed to have great forebodings about this voyage, and was almost induced to give up their passage on the vessel at the last moment; but she overcame her fears, and they embarked. After a few days the captain died of small-pox. The disease spread; and Margaret, as courageously as ever, went about the ship nursing the sick. Soon the little Angelo was taken with the dread disease; they nursed him safely through it, however, and after many dangers and trials the vessel arrived off the Jersey coast in thick weather. At night, the mate promised them a landing in New York in the morning; but the vessel ran upon the sand-bars near Long Island, and on Fire Island beach she struck at four o'clock on the morning of July 19. Margaret, with husband and child, was lost, after refusing to be separated in the efforts at rescue. They went down together, and the career of a great and noble woman ended thus tragically on that desolate coast.
