[51] After three weeks spent with Mr. Norton and his family at their hotel in Paris, Mr. and Mrs. Lowell moved across the river, upon the departure of their friends to London. As will be seen later, this little hotel became their familiar home whenever they were in Paris. They endeared themselves to their host and hostess, and long after there hung, perhaps still hangs, in the office, a large photograph of Lowell.
[52] A well known second-hand bookseller in Boston.
[53] Mrs. Burnett’s first child had lately been born.
[54] Letters, ii. 125.
[55] See Letters, ii. 115.
[56] “While the wise nose’s firm-built aquiline.”
[57] One clause of his will reads: “I give to the corporation of Harvard College, the Library thereof, my copy of Webster on Witchcraft, formerly belonging to Increase Mather, President of the College; and also any books from my library of which the College Library does not already possess copies, or of which the copies or editions in my library are for any reason whatever preferable to those possessed by the College Library.” He had at the time of his death about seven thousand books in his library.
[58] He was wont to assemble on the fly-leaf of a volume notable words that had struck him when reading the text, and it is worth noting that the careful index to the Riverside edition of Lowell’s writings contains under the heading “Words and Phrases” some seven score examples.
[59] The verse in “Agassiz” which cut deepest was that containing the lines
“And all the unwholesomeness
The Land of Broken Promise serves of late
To teach the Old World how to wait.”