The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss

by George Lewis Prentiss

I charm thy life, from the weapons of strife,
From stone and from wood, from fire and from flood,
From the serpent's tooth, and the beasts of blood,
From sickness I charm thee, and time shall not harm thee, etc., etc.

I listened, intent, fascinated, forgot to ask why he was there instead of in his bed, forgot that it was midnight instead of mid-day. It was not till on bidding me good night he added, "I hope you will have a better night than I shall," that it occurred to me that he must be suffering. The next day I learned from his wife that when unable to sleep on account of his racking cough, he often left his bed at night, the cough being more endurable when in a sitting posture. I never saw Dr. Payson after that visit, nor for several years any of the family, except Louisa, who spent a year with us while attending school in Boston to fit herself as a teacher to aid in the support of her younger brothers and sister. When I was next with them, Louisa was already at the head of a school in which her young sister was the brightest pupil, and to the profits of which she laid no personal claim, all going untouched into the family purse. Several young girls, Louisa's pupils, had been received as boarders in the family, and occasionally a clergyman was added to the number. It was during this visit that I first learned to appreciate Mrs. Payson. Now that she stood alone at the head of the household, either her fine qualities were in bolder relief, or I being older, was better able to estimate them. The singular vivacity of her intellect made her a delightful companion. Then her youth had been passed in the literary circles of New Haven and Andover, and she had much to tell of distinguished people known to me only by reputation. I admired her firm yet gentle rule, so skilfully adapted to the varying natures under her charge; her conscientious study of that homely virtue economy, so distasteful to one of her naturally lavish temper, always ready to give to those in need to an extent which called forth constant remonstrances from more prudent friends; her alacrity also in all household labors, which the more excited my wonder, knowing the little opportunity she could have had to practise them amid the wealth of her father's house before the Embargo, which later wrecked his fortune with those of so many other New England merchants. She was, indeed, of a most noble nature, hating all meanness and injustice, and full of helpful kindness and sympathy. No woman ever had warmer or more devoted friends.

Both at this time and in subsequent visits, as she advanced from childhood to girlhood, I remember Lizzy well; although my attention was chiefly absorbed by the elder sister of my own age, my principal companion when present, and correspondent when absent. The two sisters were strongly contrasted. Louisa, as a child, was afflicted with a sensitive, almost morbid shyness and reserve, and an incapacity for enjoying the society of other children whose tastes were uncongenial with her own. The shyness passed with her childhood, but the sensitiveness and exclusiveness never quite left her. Her love of books was a passion, and she would resent an unfair criticism of a favorite author as warmly as if it were an attack on a personal friend. To Lizzy, on the contrary, a friend was a book which she loved to read. Human nature was her favorite study. There seemed to be no one in whom she could not find something to interest her, none with whom there was not some point of sympathy. Combined with this wide and genial sympathy was another quality which helped to endear her to her companions, viz., an entire absence of all attempt to show her best side, or put the best face on anything that concerned her. An ingenuous frankness about herself and her affairs—even about her little weaknesses—was one of her most striking traits. No one, indeed, could know her without learning to love her dearly. Yet if I should say that in my visits to Portland, Lizzy always appeared to me pre-eminently the life and charm of the household, it would not be exactly true, though she would have been so of almost any other household. The Payson family was a delightful one to visit, all were so bright, and in the contest of wits that took place often between Lizzy and her merry brothers, it was sometimes hard to tell which bore off the palm.

I do not know that I ever thought of her at that time as an author. If anybody had predicted to me that one of that group would be the writer of books, which would not only have a wide circulation at home, but be translated into foreign languages, I should certainly have selected Louisa, and I think most persons who knew them would have done the same. The elder sister's passion for books, her great powers of acquisition, the range of her attainments—embracing not only modern languages and their literature, but Latin, Greek and Hebrew—her ability to maintain discussions on German metaphysics and theology with learned Professors, all seemed to point her out as the one likely to achieve distinction in the literary world.

I do not remember whether it was Lizzy's early contributions to "The Youth's Companion," showing already the germ of the creative power in her, or her letters to her sister, which first suggested to me that the pleasure her friends found in her conversation might yet be enjoyed by those who would never see her. Louisa had given up her school for the more congenial employment of contributing to magazines and reviews and of writing children's books. And as the greater literary resources of Boston drew her thither, she was often for months a welcome guest at our house, where she first met Professor Hopkins of Williamstown, and whom she afterward married. The letters which Lizzy wrote to her at those times were never allowed to be the monopoly of one person; we all claimed a right to read them. The ease with which in these she seemed to talk with her pen, the mingled pathos and humor with which she would relate all the little joys and sorrows of daily life, leaving her readers between a smile and a tear, showed the same characteristics which afterward made her published writings so much more generally attractive than the graver ones of her elder sister. But Louisa's failing health soon after her marriage, and the long years of suffering which followed, prevented her ever doing justice to the expectations her friends had formed for her.

The occasion of my next visit to Portland was a letter from Mrs. Payson to my mother, who was her constant correspondent, in which she spoke sadly of an indisposition she feared was the precursor of serious illness, but which chiefly troubled her on account of Lizzy's distress that her school prevented her being constantly with her mother. An offer on my part to come and take her place, in her hours of necessary absence, was at once accepted. Mrs. Payson's illness proved less serious than had been feared, and once more I passed several pleasant weeks in that house; but the pleasantest hours of the day were those in which Lizzy, returning from school, sat down at her mother's bedside and amused her with her talk about her pupils, their various characters and the progress they had made in their studies, or related little incidents of the school-room—with her usual frankness not omitting those which revealed some fault, or what she considered such, on her part, especially her impulsiveness that led her often to say things she afterward regretted. As an example, one of her pupils was reading French to her and coming to the expression Mon Dieu! so common in French narratives, had pronounced it so badly that Lizzy exclaimed, "Mon Doo? He would not know himself what you meant!" The laugh which it was impossible to repress, did not diminish her compunction at what she feared her pupils would regard as irreverence on her part. I believe I always cherished sufficient affection for my teachers, and yet I was not a little astonished on accompanying Lizzy to school one day, to see as we turned the corner of a street a rush of girls with unbonneted heads, to greet their young teacher for whom they had been watching, and escort her to her throne in the school-room, and evidently in their hearts. For a year or two after this visit I have no recollection of her, or indeed of any of the Payson family. Death, meanwhile, had been busy in my own home, and my memory is a blank for anything beyond that sad circle.

Since that date you have known her better than I. I wish that these recollections of a time when I knew her better than you, were not so meagre. If we were not thousands of miles apart, and I could talk with you, instead of writing to you, perhaps they would not appear quite so unsatisfying. Yet, trivial as they are, I send them, in the persuasion that any trifle that concerned her or hers is of interest to you.

GENEVA, Switzerland, Feb. 1, 1879.

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III.