I record here the complete story of her introduction to Liszt. One moonlight night in the spring of either 1868 or 1869, Mrs. Clerke and her daughters rambling about Rome were fascinated by such piano-playing as they had never before heard, and they stopped outside the open window of the villa and listened spellbound until the unknown Maestro had finished and came to the window to look out upon the night. Then the enthusiasm of the hearers overcame conventionality, and they gave free expression to their admiration; and the fifth act of the little drama was that Liszt invited his listeners to enter, promising to play again on condition that Agnes first played for him, which I believe she did.
Remarkable as were the intellectual powers of Agnes Clerke, her moral endowments were equally so. It was a question we frequently debated—the influence of character on work; and as I write the memory of certain talks is hauntingly present. As is the heart, is the work. The best work is and must be associated with lofty character. It was so with Agnes Clerke. No purer, loftier, and yet sweetly unselfish and human soul has lived. She was so incapable of meanness that she even incurred danger as a historian in crediting too readily all workers with her own high ideals.
As a friend and companion she was faithful and true, and full of charm; and without her the world to those who had her friendship seems darkened and empty.
But her mission, I must believe, was accomplished. For twenty years she had been to modern Astronomy an admirable historian, and had kept before working astronomers clear charts, so to speak, of what was being done, and of what should and might be done. In so doing she rendered splendid service, and inaugurated a kind of work which must be more and more needed—a kind of work which not only advances Astronomy, but promotes a universal brotherhood and co-operation, golden indeed.
Agnes Clerke’s death comes as a shock to many. A cold—I fear not sufficiently nursed at first—led to pneumonia and complications, and in spite of all that devoted love and skill could do, she passed gently to the next life, peaceful and fully conscious almost to the last, on the morning of January 20, 1907.
Note.—The portrait is from a photograph taken by Mendelssohn in 1895.
“EDINBURGH” ARTICLES
List of Papers contributed to Edinburgh Review
by Agnes Mary Clerke