While there are abundant indications of literary culture visible, there is little to denote the abode of one of the most famous authors of the age. Still, by one and another token, an observant stranger would soon discover whose house he was in, and be reminded of the world-wide distinction her genius won, and of that great service of humanity with which her name is forever identified. He would, for instance, remark on its pedestal in the bow-window, a beautiful bronze statuette, by Cumberworth, called “The African Woman of the Fountain”; and on an easel in the back parlor a lovely engraving of the late Duchess of Sutherland and her daughter—a gift from her son, the present Duke of that name—subscribed: “Mrs. Stowe, with the Duke of Sutherland’s kind regards, 1869.” Should he look into a low oaken case standing in the hall, he would find there the twenty-six folio volumes of the “Affectionate and Christian Address of Many Thousands of Women in Great Britain and Ireland to their Sisters of the United States of America,” pleading the cause of the slave, and signed with over half a million names, which was delivered to Mrs. Stowe in person, at a notable gathering at Stafford House, in England, in 1853; and with it similar addresses from the citizens of Leeds, Glasgow and Edinburgh, presented at about the same time. The house, indeed, is a treasury of such relics, testimonials of reverence and gratitude, trophies of renown from many lands—enough to furnish a museum—all of the highest historic interest and value; but for the most part they are out of sight. Hid away in closets and seldom-opened book-cases is a priceless library of “Uncle Tom” literature, including copies of most of its thirty-seven translations. Somewhere is Mrs. Stowe’s copy of the first American edition, with the first sheet of the original manuscript (which, however, was not written first) pasted on the fly-leaf, showing that three several beginnings were made before the setting of the introductory scene was fixed upon.
There are relics, also, of a more private sort. For example, a smooth stone of two or three pounds weight, and a sketch or study on it by Ruskin, made at a hotel on Lake Neufchâtel, where he and Mrs. Stowe chanced to meet; he having fetched it in from the lake-shore one evening and painted it in her presence to illustrate his meaning in something he had said. One of her most prized possessions was a golden chain of ten links, which, on occasion of the gathering at Stafford House that has been referred to, the Duchess of Sutherland took from her own arm and clasped upon Mrs. Stowe’s, saying: “This is the memorial of a chain which we trust will soon be broken.” On several of the ten links were engraved the great dates in the annals of emancipation in England; and the hope was expressed that she would live to add to them other dates of like import in the progress of liberty this side the Atlantic. That was in 1853. Twelve years later every link had its inscription, and the record was complete.
It was difficult to realize, as one was shown memorials of this kind, that the fragile, gentle-voiced little lady, who stood by explaining them, was herself the heroine in chief of the sublime conflict they recall. For a more unpretending person every way than she was, or one seeming to be more unconscious of gifts and works of genius, or of a great part acted in life, it is not possible to imagine. In her quiet home, attended by her daughters, surrounded by respect and affection, filled with the divine calm of the Christian faith, in perfect charity with all mankind, the most celebrated of American women passed the tranquil evening of her days. She would often be found seated at the piano, her hand straying over its keys—that hand that was clothed with such mighty power,—singing softly to herself those hymns of Gospel hope which were dear to her heart through all her earthly pilgrimage, alike in cloud and in sunshine. During her last years she almost wholly laid her pen aside, her last work having been the preparation, with her son’s assistance, of a brief memoir of her honored husband, who passed away in 1886.
There continued to come to her in retirement, often from distant and exalted sources, messages of honor and remembrance, which she welcomed with equal pleasure and humility. Among them was a letter from Mr. Gladstone, inspired by his reading “The Minister’s Wooing” for the first time, and written in the midst of his public cares. What satisfaction it gave her may be judged by an extract from it. After telling her that, though he had long meant to read the book, he had not found an opportunity to do so till a month or two before, he says: “It was only then that I acquired a personal acquaintance with the beautiful and noble picture of Puritan life which in that work you have exhibited, upon a pattern felicitous beyond example, so far as my knowledge goes. I really know not among four or five of the characters (though I suppose Mary ought to be preferred as nearest to the image of our Saviour), to which to give the crown. But under all circumstances and apart from the greatest claims, I must reserve a little corner of admiration for Cerinthy Ann.”
Joseph H. Twichell.
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER
IN HARTFORD
Three-quarters of a mile west of the railway station, in an angle which Farmington Avenue makes with Forest Street, and where the town looks out into the country, lived Mr. Warner, with Harriet Beecher Stowe and Mark Twain for his near neighbors. The houses where they once lived are but a stone’s throw apart. No stones were thrown between them, however, the three authors having been not on stone-throwing terms, but very far otherwise. Mr. Warner’s house is a spacious, attractive dwelling, of the colonial style. It stands, unenclosed, several rods back from the street, in a grove of noble chestnuts, having no other grounds nor needing any other. Close behind it, at the foot of a steep, bushy bank, sweeps the bend of a considerable stream.
The Garden, which Mr. Warner has made so famous, will be looked for in vain on the premises. Indoors, indeed, the sage “Calvin” is found enjoying, on a mantel, such immortality as a bronze bust can confer; but nowhere the Garden. It pertained to another house, where Mr. Warner lived when “My Summer in a Garden” was written; the fireside of which, also, is celebrated in his “Back-log Studies,” to not a few of his readers the most delightful of his books,—a house dear to the recollection of many a friend and guest. While it is true that Mr. Warner’s experiment of horticulture was, in the time of it, something of a reality, its main success, it may be owned without disparagement, was literary; and with the ripening of its literary product, the impulse to it expired.
As one would anticipate, the interior of Mr. Warner’s house is genial and homelike. A cheerful drawing-room opens into a wide, bright music-room, making, with it, one shapely apartment of generous, hospitable proportions. The furnishing is simple, but in every item pleasing. The hand of modern decorative art is there, though under rational restraint. A chimney-piece of Oriental design rises above the fireplace of the music-room set with antique tiles brought by Mr. Warner from Damascus. Other spoils of travel are displayed here and there, with pictures and engravings of the best. In the nook of a bow-window is a lovely cast of the Venus of Milo, which, when it was made a birthday present in the family, was inscribed “The Venus of my-h’eye.” The house is full of books. Every part of it is more or less of a library. Laden shelves flank the landings of the broad stairway, and so on all the way up to the work-room in the third story, where the statuette of Thackeray on our author’s table seems to survey with amusement the accumulated miscellaneous mass of literature stacked and piled around. Upon any volume of this collection Mr. Warner could lay his hand in an instant—when he found where it was. This opulence of books was partly due to the fact that Mr. Warner was a newspaper editor, and in that capacity had the general issue of the press precipitated upon him. Not that he kept it all. The theological works and Biblical commentaries mostly went to the minister. And there are a score of children about, whose juvenile libraries are largely made up of contributions from “Uncle Charley.” His home was a thoroughly charming one in every way, and whoever may have had the pleasure of an evening there must have come away wishing that he might write an article on the mistress of that house.