Or, if to touch such chord be thine,
Restore the ancient tragic line,
And emulate the notes that rung
From the wild harp that silent hung
By silver Avon's holy shore
Till twice an hundred years rolled o'er;
When she, the bold enchantress, came
With fearless hand and heart in flame,
From the pale willow snatched the treasure,
And swept it with a kindred measure,
Till Avon's swans, while rung the grove
With Monfort's hate and Basil's love,
Awakening at the inspired strain,
Deemed their own Shakespeare lived again!
Joanna, though taken by surprise, read on in a firm voice, till she observed the uncontrollable emotion of a friend by her side. Then she too gave way. It is delightful to partake by sympathy in so generous a gift of joy. What a pity it is that such a loving magnanimity as that of glorious Sir Walter is not more frequent among authors! The chief advantage of Fox over Pitt consisted in the fascinating demonstrativeness of his heart and manners. This won him hosts of idolizing friends, foremost among whom were many of the choicest ladies of the kingdom.
Pre-eminent among these were the two dazzlingly lovely women, ardent friends of each other too, Mrs. Catherine Crewe and Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire. They were indefatigable in canvassing for him. On one occasion, when the conflict for votes was intense, a butcher offered to vote for Fox on condition that the Duchess of Devonshire would allow him a kiss. The enthusiastic canvasser, perhaps the most beautiful woman then living, granted it amid deafening cheers. Nor was Mrs. Crewe less efficient. At a private banquet in honor of Fox's triumph, the Prince of Wales gave as a toast, "True Blue, and Mrs. Crewe." She gave in return, "True Blue, and all of you." The Duchess of Devonshire exerted all her powers, though in vain, to reconcile Burke with Fox, after their quarrel. On the death of Fox, she wrote a poetic tribute to his memory. Dr. Beattie, author of "The Minstrel," so many of whose touching lines have rung through souls of sensibility and are familiar to all lovers of poetry—such, for example, as,
Ah, who can tell how hard it is to climb
The steep where Fame's proud temple shines afar:
Ah, who can tell how many a soul sublime
Has felt the influence of malignant star,
And with inglorious fortune waged eternal war!
enjoyed a delightful friendship with the Duchess of Gordon. He spent the happiest hours of his saddened life at her castle, in the enjoyment of her unvarying kindness. He sent her books; they exchanged letters; and in all the brilliant whirl of her life as a reigning beauty, an ardent politician, and a leader of fashion, she fully appreciated his worth, and reciprocated his attentions and esteem until his death.
A friendship of an uncommon character, containing the elements of a romance, has left a monument of itself in two volumes, called "Letters of William Von Humboldt to a Female Friend." Humboldt, then an undergraduate at Göttingen, during one of his vacations spent three days at Pyrmont. Much of this time he passed in the society of a lovely and very superior young lady who was staying there with her father. Each was deeply interested in the other, without suspecting that the feeling was mutual. On parting, Humboldt gave his fair friend an album-leaf as a memento. The image of the fascinating student was indelibly impressed on her imagination, a centre of ideal activity and accumulation. So, it afterwards seemed, was her image left in his imagination. Twenty-six years passed in absence and silence. Humboldt had become famous and prominent, and was blessed with a happy family. Charlotte had been married, and was now a childless widow. Deprived of her parents, her husband, her property, she was overwhelmed with misfortunes. Her large property having been devoted to the State, it occurred to her that her old friend, of the three youthful days at Pyrmont, now a minister of the king, might assist her to recover, at least a portion of it, or at all events give her valuable advice as to what to do. She gathered courage to write him a letter, enclosing his old album-leaf, recalling their early meeting, telling how sacredly the memory of him had been enshrined in her soul, and begging him to counsel and console her in her great distress. The character of the letter was such, revealing a spirit so rich, high, and pure, that the generous nature of Humboldt was much moved. He at once replied with great kindness and wisdom, and with oars of practical aid. Thus began a correspondence which lasted until his death, twenty years later, during the whole of which period they only met twice for a brief time. Charlotte's portion of the correspondence, which is clot published—so affectionately reverential, so transparently sincere and trustful, evidently gave the great scholar and statesman extreme pleasure, a most varied stimulus. His letters reveal the fragrant warmth of his heart, the rare virtues and treasures of his soul, his saintly wisdom, in a most attractive manner. They were prized by Charlotte as the religion and sanctuary of her existence, and left to be given to the world as a holy bequest after her death. An interesting fact in the character of Charlotte, often noticed in these letters, and full of fruits in her life, is that she always had an intense desire to have a friend in the fullest sense of the word—a desire which was early heightened by the repeated enthusiastic perusal of Richardson's "Clarissa Harlowe." This dream had many partial realizations—the most complete and lasting in Humboldt. Rarely has any relation of individuals been so original, and awakened so much interest, as that between Goethe and his child-friend Bettine. In publishing their correspondence, many years after its close, Bettine prefaces it with the remark: "This book is for the good, and not for the bad." She foresaw how the bad would misinterpret it, yet felt that she could afford to defy their incompetent construal. She loved Goethe to idolatry—her whole soul vibrating beneath the power of the possession; but the ideality of the passion, in her naïve and spontaneous nature, was a perfect safeguard from evil. Under this spell, all her rich, unquestioning ardors of reverence and fondness were as sacredly guided as the movements of Mignon, dancing blindfold amidst the eggs, with never a false step. Goethe's conduct towards the trustful and impassioned girl was exceedingly discreet, in its mingled kindness and wisdom. He felt the sweetness of her worship; he guarded her, as a father would, from its dangers. But, above all, he was profoundly interested in the spectacle of her young, original, unveiled soul. The electric soil of her brain teemed with a miraculous efflorescence, on which he never tired of gazing. It was to him like sitting apart in some still place, and watching the secret forces and workings of nature, reflected in a small mirror. Thus Bettine writes from the strange fullness of her mind, in mystic language, to Goethe's mother: "Would that I sat, a beggar-child, before his door, and took a piece of bread from his hand, and that he knew, by my glance, of what spirit I am the child. Then would he draw me nigh to him, and cover me with his cloak, that I might be warm. I know he would never bid me go again. I should wander in the house, and no one would know who I was nor whence I came; and years would pass, and life would pass, and in his features the whole world would be reflected to me, and I should not need to learn any thing more." And Goethe replies, "Your dear letters bestow on me so much that is delightful, that they may justly precede all else: they give me a succession of holidays, whose return always blesses me anew. Write to me all that passes in your mind. Farewell. Be ever near me, and continue to refresh me." Mont Blanc stoops, with all his snows, to kiss the rosy vale nestling at his feet. Goethe, in the course of his life, stood in the most intimate relations with a large number of the rarest women. Few men have ever appreciated female character so well. No one has exhibited their virtues, and pleaded their cause with a more impressive combination of insight, sympathy, and veneration.
His many sins towards women deserve severe condemnation and rebuke; but it is an outrageous wrong towards his noble genius to limit attention, as so many critics do, to that aspect of the case. The wondering love and study which Frederike, Lili, and others drew from him; the religious admiration and awed curiosity evoked in him by the spiritual Fraulein von Klettenburg, "over whom," as he said, "in her invalid loneliness, the Holy Ghost brooded like a dove;" the respectful affection, gratitude, and homage commanded by the extraordinary merits of his lofty and endeared friends, the Duchess Amelia, and the Grand Duchess Louise—all bore fruits in his experience and his works. The revelations they made, the examples they set, the lessons they taught, the noble suggestions they kindled, re-appear in the series of enchanting, glorious, adorable women—Gretchen, Natalia, Ottilia, Iphigenia, Makaria, and the rest— who, with their artless affection, their self-renouncement, their wisdom, their dignity, their holiness, their sufferings, appear in his master-works, breathing presentments of life, for the edification and delight of generations of readers. He has recognized, more profoundly than any other author, the essentially feminine form of that divine principle of disinterested love, that impulse of pure self-abnegation, in which resides the redemptive power of humanity; and has set it forth with incomparable clearness and constancy. At the close of Faust, he has given it statement in a form which associates his genius with that of Dante, and in a kindred height. It is the womanly element, he would say, worshipful and self-denying love, that draws us ever forward, redeeming and uplifting our grosser souls:—
Das ewig weibliche
Zieht uns hinan.
Wieland and Sophia de la Roche were profoundly attached to each other during the greater part of their lives. He and his beloved wife were buried beside her; and a tasteful monument erected over them, according to his orders. It bears the inscription, in German, composed by himself:—
Love and Friendship joined these kindred souls in life,
And their mortal part is covered by this common stone.