XXIV
THE DAWNING OF LITERARY LIFE
“January 28th, 1854.
“My very dear Friend,—I wish you were here this morning! I long to talk with you. There are many things I cannot commit to paper, or of which I might be ashamed as soon as they were written. There are no short-hand and long-tongued reporters at our face-to-face confabulations.
“Of one thing I will give you a hint: Have you any recollection of a certain MS., portions of which were read in your hearing last spring? I should not be surprised if you were to hear something of it before long. Keep your eyes upon the papers for a few weeks, and if you see nothing that looks like a harbinger of the advent, just conclude that I have changed my mind at the last gasp and recalled it. For it has gone out of my hands! After the appearance of anything that looks that way, I unseal your mouth.
“Seriously, I have much pending upon this venture. The success of the book may be the opening of the path I cannot but feel that Providence has marked out for me.
“As it is a Virginia story, Southerners should buy it, if it has no other merit. My misgivings are grave and many; but my advisers urge me on, and notices of fugitive articles that have appeared in Northern and Southern papers have inoculated me with a little confidence in the wisdom of their counsel.
“I had not meant to say this, or, indeed, to mention the matter at all, but as the day of publication draws near, I am, to use an expressive Yankeeism—‘fidgety.’
“If anything I have said savors of undue solicitude for the bantling’s welfare, recollect that I am the mother. One thing more: I shall have nothing to do with advertisements. If they laud the work too highly, bear in mind that it is ‘all in the way of trade,’ and that booksellers will have their way.
“Our ‘Musical Molasses Stew’ came off last night. We had a grand ‘time!’ Violin, flute, guitar, piano—all played by masculine amateurs, and a chorus of men’s voices. It was ‘nae sae bad,’ as the Scotch critic said of Mrs. Siddons’s acting. The same might be said of the real frolic of pulling the treacle. My partner was a young Nova Scotian—‘Blackader’ by name—an intelligent, agreeable, and versatile youth who entered gloriously into the spirit of the occasion. He played upon the piano, sang treble, tenor, and bass by turns, and pulled and laughed with me until he had no strength left.”
I was but feebly convalescent from a brief illness when, chancing to pick up the latest number of Godey’s Magazine, and fluttering the leaves aimlessly, my eyes rested upon a paragraph in the “Editor’s Table.”